Ping-Pong Diplomacy: Ivor Montagu and the Astonishing Story Behind the Game That Changed the World - Brossura

Griffin, Nicholas

Brossura

ISBN 10: 0857207369 ISBN 13: 9780857207364

Casa editrice: Simon & Schuster Ltd, 2015

Riassunto

It was one of the most significant developments of the post-war era: China finally abandoning its close relationship with the Soviet Union to begin detente with the USA. Astonishingly, the man who helped make it happen was a British aristocrat, Ivor Montagu, a Soviet spy who knew Stalin and dined with Trotsky. Even more remarkably, the means to this rapprochement was table tennis, a sport loved by both Chairman Mao and Montagu. For years, Montagu had lived a dual life, working to spread communism and also table tennis around the world. Surprisingly, the two strands of his career would come together in an event of global significance. Nicholas Griffin weaves a compelling story to reveal the background to the famous occasion in 1971, when the USA's Glenn Cowan, a 19-year-old hippie, befriended China's world champion Zhuang Zedong, who was imprisoned during the Cultural Revolution. Within days, the Americans would be playing the Chinese in front of 18,000 fans in Beijing, with the whole world watching. It was the beginning of a thaw in Sino-US relations that forced the Soviets into a crippling arms race that acted as a catalyst to pressuring them into errors that would draw the Cold War to an end. Sometimes sport truly can have the biggest consequences.

Su questo libro

Recensione

'Meticulously researched and ambitiously conceived...it is an early contender for sports book of the year,' Matthew Syed, The Times
'A stranger-than-fiction tale...the result is an impressive and intricately-woven overview of the characters and events that led to a seismic shift in the dynamics between two of the world's greatest superpowers,' Charlotte Philby, Independent
'A curious, compelling story: one that reminds us sharply of the close embrace of politics and sport,' Julia Lovell, Sunday Telegraph
'Griffin tells human stories as deftly as he describes the machinations of international communism...a fitting treatment of the entire overlooked episode,' Nicholas Mancusi, Boston Globe
'Alfred Hitchcock would grab this book for a spy thriller,' Sir Harold Evans
'The amazing drama of how ping-pong changed the world,' Walter Isaacson

L'autore

Born in London and educated at Eton, where his father's best friend was Ivor Montagu's nephew, Nicholas Griffin is the author of four novels and one non-fiction book, as well as having written for various newspapers including The Times and the Financial Times. He now lives in Miami with his family and was a Term Member on the Council on Foreign Relations.

Su questa edizione

• Editore: Simon & Schuster Ltd
• Data di pubblicazione: 2015
• ISBN 10: 0857207369
• ISBN 13: 9780857207364
• Rilegatura: Copertina flessibile
• Numero di pagine: 352