Cricket’s natural escapist appeal often keeps its literature firmly within the boundary ropes but even more than Ross – and writing on the cusp of the postcolonial moment – James is exhilaratingly different.Ĭricket’s philosopher-king – and arguably England’s most successful captain – explains all … In the process, his lucid treatise not only guides the reader through the many tricks, traps and pitfalls of being a captain, but reveals just how complex, psychologically as much as tactically, the game is. Regularly placed at or near the top of lists of “best cricket books ever”, this is a compelling mixture of memoir, history, polemic and technical analysis, all knitted together with a sense of deep personal engagement. ”What do they know of cricket who only cricket know?” famously asks the West Indian writer and political activist. In his day job a renowned literary editor and accomplished poet, Ross here provides a seductive double narrative: the cricketing dramas and heroics, yes, but also a shrewd, lyrical snapshot of a country still finding its modern identity. Cardus’s reputation has waned in recent years (too many factual inaccuracies, note the pedants), but he remains the foundation stone.Ĭricket tours in the old days were leisurely affairs, starting with the long voyage out, and this account of the epic Ashes-winning tour under the determined if sometimes overly pessimistic captaincy of Len Hutton stands as a classic of the tour-book genre. He also appreciated how the rhythm and feel of a day’s play depends as much on the interaction between players and crowd as it does on the events in the middle. It was he, more than anyone before or, arguably, since, who exploited the possibilities of imaginatively turning the leading cricketers of the day into three-dimensional, almost novelistic characters. Modern cricket writing begins with Cardus, the working-class Mancunian autodidact who in the 1920s found fame reporting cricket matches for the Manchester Guardian. What unites the writers here is that, deep down, they all know the two essential things: that cricket really matters and that cricket really doesn’t matter at all.
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