Floodlights and Touchlines

a History of Spectator Sport

Edición de la obra Floodlights and Touchlines

"Focusing on spectator sports and their accompanying issues, tracing their origins, evolution and impact, inside the lines and beyond the boundary, this book offers a thematic history of professional sport and the ingredients that magnetize the world. It tells the stories that matter: from the gladiators of Rome to the runners of Rift Valley via the innovator-missionaries of Rugby School ; from multifaceted British exports to the Americanisation of professionalism and the Indianisation of cricket. Rob Steen traces the development of the sports that capitvate the turnstile millions and the mouse-clicking masses, addressing their key themes and commonalities, from creation myths to match-fixing via race, politics, sexuality and internationalism. Insightful and revelatory, this is an entertaining exploration of spectator sports' intrinsic place in culture and how sport imitates life - and life imitates sport"--Book jacket.