Celebrating Canadian athletes and sporting history. The cultural impact of sport on a nation is not slight. Famous for a Time explores a number of important, if not well remembered, Canadian athletes and the sports they played to help explain the nation’s complicated history, sporting and otherwise. It is an exploration that reveals the socio-cultural trends that have shaped Canada since Confederation. Through the prism of some exceptional athletes, the prevailing attitudes of many Canadians about class, race, masculinity, femininity, and national identity are laid bare. Here, from the sidelines, we learn how these attitudes have changed — or not, as the case may be — over time. From team sports such as lacrosse, baseball, and cricket to Canada’s cycling craze, track and field, and boxing, each chapter offers insight into an important aspect of the nation’s narrative. The winners and losers of Canada’s games simply mirror the larger questions that have faced Canadian society across three centuries.

This book provides an interpretation of sport in contemporary South Africa through an historical account of the evolution and social ramifications of sport in the twentieth century. It comprises chapters which trace the growth of sports such as football, cricket, surfing, boxing and rugby, and considers their relationship to aspects of racial identity, masculinity, femininity, political and social development in the country. The book also draws out the wider geo-political significance of South African sport, placing it in the context of the development of sport both elsewhere on the African continent and internationally. The history of sport has seen significant international growth over the past few decades. For the most part, however, the history of sport in Africa has remained largely untraced. By detailing the way in which sport’s development in South Africa overlapped with major socio-political processes on the wider African continent, this volume seeks to narrow the gap. This book was previously published as a special issue of the International Journal of the History of Sport.

Charles Burgess Fry, known as C. B. Fry was an English polymath; an outstanding sportsman, politician, diplomat, academic, teacher, writer, editor and publisher, who is best remembered for his career as a cricketer. Fry's achievements on the sporting field included representing England at both cricket and football, an F.A. Cup Final appearance for Southampton F.C. and equalling the then world record for the long jump. But he was much more than a sportsman. He won a major scholarship to Oxford, where his friends numbered Max Beerbohm, Hilaire Belloc, and F.E. Smith. He wrote several books, including an autobiography and a novel, and he was one of the most successful journalists of his day. He was a friend of many prominent Labour and Liberal politicians, but flirted with Fascism, meeting Hitler in 1934. He tried out for Hollywood, represented India at the League of Nations, and stood for Parliament three times. 'A most incredible man . . . the most variously gifted Englishman of any age . . . the pre-eminent all-rounder, not merely of his own age but, so far as is measurable, of all English history.' John Arlott; 'This is a well-researched, well-rounded picture of one of England's great sporting heroes.' - Jeremy Paxman, Mail on Sunday; 'He has written what should come to be regarded as one of the very best sporting biographies. I could not put it down.' - Michael Kennedy, Sunday Telegraph; 'This is a book that rises to its subject's level in fascination, entertainment and brilliance.' - Tim Rice, Literary Review

This book explores how cricket in South Africa was shaped by society and society by cricket. It demonstrates the centrality of cricket in the evolving relationship between culture, sport and politics starting with South Africa as the beating heart of the imperial project and ending with the country as an international pariah. The contributors explore the tensions between fragmentation and unity, on and off the pitch, in the context of the racist ideology of empire, its ‘arrested development’ and the reliance of South Africa on a racially based exploitative labour system. This edited collection uncovers the hidden history of cricket, society, and empire in defining a multiplicity of South African identities, and recognises the achievements of forgotten players and their impact.