History is too often written not only by, but about, the winners. Marginalised groups – poor, female, the wrong colour – are silenced, the indifference or worse of gatekeepers meaning that their stories and exploits go unrecorded, making retrieval essential to balance historical accounts.
This vital recovery process is exemplified by Jenny Landreth’s Swell (Bloomsbury), which made the William Hill sports book of the year shortlist and would have been a more than worthy winner. An intriguing hybrid, it links Landreth’s swimming memories – coining “waterbiography” merits a prize in itself – to the history of female swimmers as participants and competitors. Giving fresh life to remarkable achievers such as Agnes Beckwith and Mercedes Gleitze, it mixes warmth with anger and compels and engages at the same time.
If history needs its chroniclers, so too does modern achievement. Sarah Juggins and Richard Stainthorpe’s The History Makers (Pitch) did justice to perhaps the most uplifting British success at the 2016 Olympics, the women’s hockey gold.
Women’s football may feature heavily in next year’s publishing schedules, following events on and off the field in 2017 that made the front and back pages. This year, it generated a terrific collection of stories of the adventures undertaken and the struggles faced by players around the world, Gwendolyn Oxenham’s Under the Lights and in the Dark (Icon). A happier rite of passage is the publication of Chris Slegg and Tom Garry’s The First Ever Women’s Football Yearbook (Wordzworth), which makes a welcome step towards giving the women’s game the reference library that the men’s version takes for granted.
But even men’s football has unbeaten tracks. Breaking Ground (Axis Projects), edited by Neville Gabie, Alan Ward and Jason Wood, is a crowdfunded multimedia examination of the art, archaeology and mythology of Bradford Park Avenue’s long-abandoned former stadium that was also on the William Hill shortlist, while Michael Walker’s Green Shoots (De Coubertin) gives an even-handed, affectionately perceptive view of Irish football on both sides of the border, its emotional core a moving evocation of Walker’s ill‑fated great uncle, Johnny Brown, a star of the middle of the last century.
Pitch has made a speciality of encouraging unfashionable but publishable projects, its output typified by Robbie Dunne’s Working-Class Heroes. Dunne captures the singularity of the determinedly local, blue-collar, radical Madrid club Rayo Vallecano, providing a view of Spanish football beyond the slavish preoccupation of most media with Real Madrid and Barcelona.
Michael Calvin’s No Hunger in Paradise
(Century) completed his formidable trilogy on the game with a blistering indictment of how it treats its youngest players. Calvin finds and celebrates decent, committed individuals and clubs, but they are a minority in “an industry which commodifies childhood without deigning to acknowledge the cost” and in which “fun is too often regarded as a four-letter word”, its inherent problems exacerbated by a shameless, blackmailing power grab by Premier League clubs at the expense of the rest.
Those needing an antidote can turn to Judy Murray’s memoir, Knowing the Score (Chatto and Windus), which shows that she raised two world No 1 tennis players as the opposite of a “tiger mum”, expounding a sane, humane coaching philosophy in which her children’s welfare and enjoyment of their sport were paramount.
Some sports might welcome more attention. Rugby league is a William Hill blind spot and this year’s omission was Tony Hannan’s Underdogs (Bantam), recounting a year with Batley. Hannan’s aim was to evoke a venerable, small-scale sporting institution in relation to the town around it, but, as well as marshalling a cast that seemed to run into the hundreds, he found himself reckoning with the coming out of team captain Keegan Hirst and the murder of the local MP, Jo Cox. Its appeal should extend well beyond league fans, who should also enjoy James Oddy’s True Professional (Pitch), an overdue biography of Clive Sullivan, the first black captain of a Great Britain national team and an idol for both sides in Hull.
Similarly long-awaited was Chris Thomas’s biography of his father, Clem (Iponymous), which outlines a rumbustious, never-dull life in which Wales and Lions rugby union star and Observer writer were only the most public of numerous roles, all played to their limit.
Cricket fans will cherish Duncan Hamilton’s The Kings of Summer (Safe Haven) – a gem that celebrates the remarkable climax of the 2016 County Championship while fearing for the long game’s future – and Harry Pearson’s admirable Learie Constantine biography Connie (Little, Brown).
If the William Hill award is our barometer, this was a year for biographies. Andy McGrath’s life of cyclist Tom Simpson, Bird on a Wire (Rapha), won over the judges with the elegance of its presentation, particularly some fine period photography. At the same time, Jonathan Eig’s Ali: A Life (Simon & Schuster) achieved the minor miracle of refreshing ground already trodden by writers of the quality of Thomas Hauser, Mike Marqusee and David Remnick, relating groundbreaking analysis of the punches taken by Muhammad Ali, particularly in his later fights, to his subsequent ill health. David Bolchover’s The Greatest Comeback (Biteback) located Bela Guttman, arguably football’s first celebrity coach, amid the cultural and sporting traditions of central European Jews and unravelled the mystery of how he survived the Holocaust.
But we end 2017 in need of cheering up. Guardian cartoonist David Squires has the answer, with his Illustrated History of Football Hall of Fame (Century). Like all good humorists, Squires has an edge. His takedowns of John Terry, José Mourinho and football’s long-term attitude to women show how picture strips can be worth thousands of words. A portrayal of how different Dutch masters might have painted Johan Cruyff is downright joyous. He always informs, but still leaves us feeling better – and that is never a bad thing.
•What have you enjoyed reading in 2017? Send your choices in 150 words or fewer to readers.books@theguardian.com or Readers’ Books of the Year, Review, The Guardian, Kings Place, 90 York Way, London N1 9GU (including address and phone number), to arrive no later than Monday 11 December. Or comment below. We will publish a selection in the paper and online on 30 December.
