Open main menu

Changes

no edit summary
[[Category:Biography|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|Biography]]__NOTOC__<!-- Remove -->
{{newreview
|title=The Boys In The Boat: An Epic Journey to the Heart of Hitler's Berlin
|author=Daniel James Brown
|rating=4.5
|genre=Biography
|summary=You see, Jesse Owens had it easy – all he had to do was run fast. Alright, he did have to face unknown hardship, heinous prejudice at home and abroad, and make sure he was fast enough to outdo the rest of his compatriots then the world's best to win gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics, but others who wished to do the same had to do more. People such as those rowers in the coxed eights squad – people such as young Joe Rantz. He certainly had to face hardship, the prejudice borne by those in the moneyed east coast yacht clubs against an upstart from the NW USA, and when he got to compete he had to use so many more muscles, and operate at varying tempi, with the temperament of the weather and water against him, all in perfect synchronicity with seven other beefcakes. Despite rowing being the second greatest ticket at those Games, Joe's story is a lot less well known, and probably a lot more entertaining.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1447210980</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|summary=Biographies old and new of Queen Victoria, her husband and her children are plentiful enough. The vast majority of them are based to some extent on the diaries, memoirs and biographies of some of the most important figures who served her, and Kate Hubbard has put these as well as supplementary archive papers to good use in presenting a thoroughly engrossing account of the royal household throughout the Queen’s lengthy reign. I might almost say ‘lively’, though that could be an exaggeration. The court of Victoria may have been homely after a fashion, but for the most part it was hardly lively.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099532239</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Robert Sellers
|title=What Fresh Lunacy is This?: The Authorised Biography of Oliver Reed
|rating=5
|genre=Biography
|summary=For rather more of his career than he, his family and closest friends might have liked, the name Oliver Reed was a byword for booze, brawls and all types of laddish behaviour. As Sellers’ very full and remarkably objective biography reveals, it was a funny yet sad life all at once. For although he repeatedly played up to the image of the lovable rogue which he had created, underneath the bad boy of popular legend he was at heart a professional actor who could always deliver a first-rate performance on the film set when required.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>147210112X</amazonuk>
}}