Something in the Air: American Passion and Defiance in the 1968 ... Cover Art

Something in the Air: American Passion and Defiance in the 1968 Mexico City Olympics (Paperback)

By: Richard Hoffer (Author)


Availability: This item has not yet been released.
google_checkout
Share This:
Add To KaboodleAdd To Kaboodle  Submit To Digg!Submit To Digg!  Share On FacebookShare On Facebook  Add to FavoritesAdd to Favorites  TwitterTwitter 

Product Description



Run a Quick Search on "Something in the Air: American Passion and Defiance in the 1968 Mexico City Olympics" by Richard Hoffer to Browse Related Products:

Browse more products related to "Something in the Air: American Passion and Defiance in the 1968 Mexico City Olympics"

Browse more products related to "Richard Hoffer"


Review

"There were many...dramas played out in Mexico City...and Hoffer gracefully brings them all into the same arena. More important, his jaunty but disciplined prose puts the wind at the reader's back and shows us how the leaps, lifts and dashes of 1968 made a significant impact on the civil rights movement and raised the political consciousness of athletes."

"[A]t the core of this book is how [Tommie] Smith and [John] Carlos reached their moment of immortality....This is a well-told tale..."

"[T]he lasting image of the Games remains Smith and Carlos, and the most important achievement of this reconsideration of Mexico '68 is to remind readers that they did not act in a vacuum or without cause....[But o]ne of the important achievements of SOMETHING IN THE AIR is Hoffer's recounting of the other rebellious - albeit sometimes quietly rebellious - acts that characterized the '68 Games and began to change the way at least some of the athletes thought about themselves and the authority figures to whom they felt allegiance."

Annotation

One image stands out in our collective memory of the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City--African-American track stars Tommie Smith and John Carlos with their fists in the air atop the pedestal, after taking gold and bronze, respectively, in the 200-meter dash. But as Richard Hoffer reveals, Smith and Carlos's salute to black power was only one of the extraordinary stories of that year's games; from the setting itself, which was the highest ever in terms of altitude and one of the lowest ever in terms of national prosperity; to the controversial Olympics committee chairman Avery Brundage, whose support of apartheid-era South Africa led to a boycott by many African-American athletes (including Lew Alcindor, soon to be known as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar); to the spectacular performances by an eclectic group of athletes, including George Foreman, Dick Fosbury, and Bob Beamon.

"Sports Illustrated" senior writer Richard Hoffer records the unforgettable athletic achievements of the 1968 U.S. Olympic team in Mexico City.



Customer Reviews for "Something in the Air: American Passion and Defiance in the 1968 Mexico City Olympics (Paperback)" by Richard Hoffer (Author)

There are no customer reviews yet. Be the first to write a review!

Submit your Review




Explore More Great Tower Sales & Specials



Tower.com BOOK Sales, Promotions & Special Features

Tower.com Popular Book Wiki Articles

  • The Paperback
    Learn more information on the paperback format before choosing which type of book to purchase.
  • The E-Book
    What exactly is an "electronic book?" Learn before you buy with Tower Wiki!
  • The Audio Book
    Do you prefer to read or be read to? Learn more about this increasingly popular book format.

Interact with Tower.com