| Barney Polan's Game: A Novel of the 1951 College Basketball Scandals Contributor(s): Rosen, Charley (Author) |
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ISBN: 1888363568 ISBN-13: 9781888363562 Publisher: Seven Stories Press OUR PRICE: $21.56 Product Type: Hardcover - Other Formats Published: December 1997 Annotation: Rosen's new book, Barney Polan's Game, is a fictional account of the college basketball scandals of 1950-51, when players, coaches, bookies, and gangsters conspired to fix the outcomes of games. Their exposure affected the basketball world the same way the 1919 Black Sox scandal affected baseball. For all sports fans, the game was irrevocably corrupted by power and big money. Each principal character in Barney Polan's Game speaks directly to the reader, giving his or her perspective as events unfold. The most prominent voice is that of Barney Polan himself - the veteran sportswriter. Dubbed the "verse of the peepul" by a colleague, he borrows from Shakespeare and Brooklynese for his columns in The Brooklyn Sentinel. Each of the characters - coaches, bookies, players, family members - desperately tries to control the uncertain events around them in whatever way he or she can. Unsettling aspects of postwar America loom in the background: racism, class injustice, fears of nuclear annihilation, and the McCarthy hearings. |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - Fiction | Sports - Sports & Recreation | Basketball - Fiction | Literary |
| Dewey: FIC |
| LCCN: 97024273 |
| Physical Information: 1.2" H x 5.87" W x 8.55" (1.12 lbs) 336 pages |
| Themes: - Chronological Period - 1950's |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: A New York Times Notable Book In Barney Polan's Game, Charley Rosen takes on the legendary point-shaving scandals of 1950 and '51, when the best of the college basketball players took money from gamblers in return for affecting the outcomes of games, never knowing that in the process they were trading in their innocence and love of the game-until they were caught, and the scandal moved them from the sports pages to the news pages across the nation. No one will walk away from the scandals unscathed; many of the guilty will have their lives and careers ruined, others among the guilty will end up in the Basketball Hall of Fame. |