The blog post that changed the world
Just finished reading The Match: The Day the Game of Golf Changed Forever. It recounts an 18-hole match between young amateurs Ken Venturi and Harvie Ward and legends Byron Nelson and Ben Hogan (shown here) -- played at the suggestion of two millionaires who were betting on the outcome. Author Mark Frost nicely entwined the match with profiles of the golfers and the history of the sport.
But I bristle at books that purport to be about "THE DAY/WEEK/MONTH THAT (insert weighty topic here) CHANGED FOREVER." It's usually just so much hype. Maybe authors need to do that sort of thing in pitching an idea to editors, or maybe it's a sign of a marketing department run amok. Whatever, it usually amounts to false advertising, and with The Match, a strong argument can be made that nothing changed on that day -- except some money changed hands. The hype sapped some enjoyment from an interesting book.
I'll be writing about this in my Sunday column in The Sun, so let me know if you have other examples.
Comments
This comment, filed on the afternoon of June 23, 2009, changed everything forever. Before this comment, written by me, Patrick K. Lackey, everything was different than it is now. People, animals, plants and things have grown older than they were. The stock market is down.
Posted by: patrick lackey | June 23, 2009 4:26 PM
The hype in relation to books started a long time ago. I'm Catholic and love the Bible, but is it "The Greatest Story Ever Told"? No way! Hey, in my book, it can't compete with "Gone with the Wind."
Posted by: Gail Farrelly | June 23, 2009 6:47 PM
Everything changes every day. Therefore, the title basically means, "The Match: Another Day of Golf," as far as I'm concerned.
Posted by: Irieisa | June 24, 2009 8:41 AM
On a whim, I did a Google search for "books changed the world." The list of hits might fill a newspaper. Some of the book titles were:
Books That Changed the World.
On the Origin of Species: the Book that Changed the World
12 Books That Changed the World
The Fish That Changed the World
The Book List That Changed the World
1001 Inventions That Changed the World
Rome 1960: The Olympics That Changed the World
Banana: the Fate of the Fruit that Changed the World
Today's Post mentions in a correction a book whose long title includes the line "the Speech that Should Have Changed the Country." Now that's reaching.
Posted by: patrick lackey | June 24, 2009 10:40 AM
The description of that book reminded me of one I came across while researching* Japanese literature. The Master of Go by Nobel winner Yasunari Kawabata, which was the author's favorite, though not one of the books he won the Nobel for. It is a novelization of the account of a single game which, while it didn't change Go forever, is taken as an allegory of Japan's defeat in World War II. A lot of the text is made up of reworked articles Kawabata wrote about the game as it happened. Sounds a little more interesting to me, but then I've never understood the appeal of golf.
* well, "researching." Looking up important names on wikipedia, really. Still, not a bad way to get a feel for the landscape.
Posted by: sollocks | June 24, 2009 12:06 PM
Uh.....Change is forever because static is dead.
Posted by: LizzieD | June 24, 2009 12:08 PM
Excellent story! By the end of the book you will feel as if you know each golfer personally. If you are a golfer, this one is a keeper. It was like reading several biographies rolled into one book with a golf game at the centerpiece. Really enjoyed it!
Posted by: huile de foie de mor | December 12, 2009 6:12 AM