Anti-Sport Sentiments in Literature

The most well known negative critiques of modern sport are found in academic works within the social sciences. This book seeks to take a critical view of sport from the perspective of the humanities, drawing on literature, specifically on the writings of selected novelists and poets. The principle aim is to widen an existing anti-sport discourse to include hitherto excluded voices from the world of literature. The book commences with a review of existing pro- and anti-sport discourses and then proceeds to examine, in turn, the written works of six eminent authors, excavating from their writings their anti-sport rhetorics. These writers are Lewis Carroll (Charles Dodgson), Charles Hamilton Sorley, Jerome K. Jerome, John Betjeman, Alan Sillitoe and Philip Roth. In its conclusion, the book draws together the broad themes discussed in the preceding chapters. This is an innovative approach to sport and literature, remarkable for it not having been previously explored in any depth, and will be of interest to readers from both social sciences and humanities backgrounds. John Bale is Professor Emeritus of Sports Studies at Keele University, UK, and an honorary professor at Queensland University, Australia, and De Montfort University, UK.Bale, John is the author of 'Anti-Sport Sentiments in Literature', published 2007 under ISBN 9780415422659 and ISBN 0415422655.