Project and content management for Contemporary Authors volumes
WORK TITLE: The shared origins of football, rugby, and soccer
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE: 1948
WEBSITE: http://www.christopherrowley.net/
CITY: Hudson Valley
STATE: NY
COUNTRY:
NATIONALITY: American
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Rowley * http://us.macmillan.com/author/christopherrowley/ * https://ussporthistory.com/2016/10/02/review-of-the-shared-origins-of-football-rugby-and-soccer/
RESEARCHER NOTES:
LC control no.:
n 93094304
LCCN Permalink:
https://lccn.loc.gov/n93094304
HEADING:
Rowley, Christopher, 1948-
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PERSONAL
Born 1948, in Lynn, Massachusetts.
EDUCATION:Brentwood School, Essex, England.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Science-fiction and fantasy novelist. London-based journalist in the 1970s.
WRITINGS
SIDELIGHTS
Christopher Rowley has written many science fiction and fantasy books and is the author of the “Book of Arna” series and the “Netherworld” trilogy. His books Bazil Broketail and Starhammer were literary influences in the creation of the Halo game by Bungie Studios. Born in 1948 in Lynn, Massachusetts, to an American mother and English father, Rowley was educated in England and was a London-based journalist in the 1970s. He now lives in New York’s Hudson Valley.
Rowley’s “Netherworld” series, with illustrations by Justin Norman, has been inspired by the graphic style and stories of Heavy Metal magazine. In Pleasure Model, Detective Rook Venner is investigating a bizarre murder. His only witness is Plesur, a pleasure model, i.e., an illegal gene-grown sex android with limited intelligence whose purpose is to pleasure men. Nonetheless, Plesur carries high-level U.S. government secrets implanted in her brain. When she is targeted by assassins because of the critical information she carries, Venner places her in hiding for her protection. Soon, he learns about the dark underworld of pleasure models and their buyers. A reviewer for Publishers Weekly was disappointed by the narrative’s “hackneyed dialogue, overt misogyny and predictable violence.” The same reviewer advised that “there’s little to like in the ugly and cliché-driven world” of the book.
In 2010, Rowley published the second Netherworld book, The Bloodstained Man. Venner is still on the run with Plesur, who has since become an intelligent fighting machine. Venner and Plesur dodge mercenaries, car crashes, and pyrotechnics, and participate in gladiatorial games. A writer in Publishers Weekly noted that the second book “barely advances the plot” of the first book, and the various chases and fights that litter the story line “only point up the story’s thin substance.”
Deviating from fantasy, Rowley published The Shared Origins of Football, Rugby, and Soccer in 2015. The book is an ambitious chronicle of the evolution of these games. Rowley looks back to early football- and soccer-like games in ancient China, Greece, Rome, and Mesoamerica and forward to the 2022 FIFA World Cup scheduled to take place in Qatar. He traces various historical paths between the ancient games and the development of the seven modern football, rugby, and soccer codes. Rowley’s discussion puts the evolution of these related sports in historical context, against the backdrop of war and political conflict, national consolidation, and imperialism, He even explores how the football itself, which began as an inflated animal bladder, has evolved into a sports icon. In addition, Rowley comments on how professionalism and the media have become part of these sports.
Journal of Sports History contributor Brian M. Ingrassia found The Shared Origins of Football, Rugby, and Soccer to be somewhat limited by Rowley’s “ventures into the realm of conjecture and counterfactual speculation.” Still, Ingrassia thought that the book “shows general readers that the various games called ‘football’ do have a fascinating, intertwined history.” In a review at the Sport in American History group blog, Zachary R. Bigalke commented: “While there is nothing revolutionary within the story beyond the interweaving of conjectural recreations with diligent research, [Rowley] has produced a compelling overview of the shared history of the various games known as football.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Publishers Weekly, December 7, 2009, review of Pleasure Mode, p. 39.
Publishers Weekly, May 10, 2010, review of The Bloodstained Man, p. 32.
ONLINE
Christopher Rowley Home Page, http://www.christopherrowley.net (June 1, 2017).
Journal of Sport History, https://muse.jhu.edu/ (summer, 2016), review of The Shared Origins of Football, Rugby, and Soccer.
Sport in American History, https://ussporthistory.com/ (October 2, 2016), Zachary R. Bigalke, review of The Shared Origins of Football, Rugby, and Soccer.
Christopher Rowley (born 1948) is an American writer of both science fiction and fantasy.
Rowley was born in 1948 in Lynn, Massachusetts to an American mother and an English father. Educated for the most part at Brentwood School, Essex, England, he became a London-based journalist in the 1970s. In 1977 he moved to New York City, and he currently lives in upstate New York's Hudson Valley.
Rowley's first science fiction novel was The War for Eternity. It was published in 1983 and won the Compton Crook Award for best first novel.[1] The War for Eternity led to three further novels set in the same future: The Black Ship, The Founder and To a Highland Nation. His novel Starhammer has been cited by computer programmer Jason Jones as an important literary influence in the creation of the Halo video game by Bungie Studios. Starhammer was followed by The Vang: The Military Form and The Vang: The Battlemaster to form a loosely connected trilogy (all published by Ballantine Books) spanning several thousand years and involving different sets of characters in each book.
In the 1990s, Rowley switched to the fantasy genre with the success of his first novel for Roc Books, Bazil Broketail. This novel was set on the imaginary world Ryetelth and involved the adventures of battledragons and the boys that care for them in the service of the Legions of the nine cities of the Argonath. Bazil Broketail's adventures continued with Sword for a Dragon, Dragons of War, Battledragon, A Dragon at World's End, Dragons of Argonath and Dragon Ultimate. The Ryetelth novels also include a tangential story, told in The Wizard and the Floating City that interrupted the sequence of Bazil Broketail novels and introduced new characters and a broadening of the conceptual framework of the entire series. In the 1980s and 1990s he also co-wrote two television animated series by Robert Mandell, The Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers and Princess Gwenevere and the Jewel Riders.
After the conclusion of the Bazil Broketail series, he produced the Books of Arna, a trilogy set on Arna, a world colonized by humans in the far future. This series began with The Ancient Enemy, continued with The Shasht War, and concluded with Doom's Break. In February 2009, Rowley's first illustrated novel, titled Arkham Woods, a supernatural tale of horror inspired by the Cthulhu Mythos of H.P. Lovecraft and published by Seven Seas.
APRIL 04, 2017
Rowley, Christopher
Tagged: Author
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(1948- ) US author whose career began with efficiently written Military SF novels, beginning with the War for Eternity/Fenrille sequence – The War for Eternity (1983), The Black Ship (1985), The Founder (1989) and To a Highland Nation (1993) – which concentrates on warfare within our solar system, though the inhabitants of at least one outlying Space Habitat are involved in interstellar exploration. The Vang sequence – Starhammer (1986), The Vang: The Military Form (1988) and The Vang: The Battlemaster (1990) – moves into interstellar space and features a deadly Alien lifeform. With George Snow (anon) he wrote the Star Wars text Return of the Jedi (1983 chap), one of his few individual titles; in Golden Sunlands (1987) the humans on a colony planet are kidnapped to serve as cannon fodder in a complex war within a vast Dyson Sphere, but soon show their spunk. After the Bazil Broketail sequence of fantasies beginning with Bazil Broketail (1992) and ending with Dragon Ultimate (1997), and the Arna sequence, beginning with The Ancient Enemy: The First Book of Arna (2000) and ending with Doom's Break: The Third Book of Arna (2002), he returned to sf with the ongoing Heavy Metal Pulp sequence, beginning with Heavy Metal Pulp: Pleasure Model (2010), heavily illustrated Near Future noir thrillers set in a decadent New York, much of the action revolving around an Android sex worker who seems to be the repository of dread secrets. [JC]
Christopher B Rowley
born Lynn, Massachusetts: 1948
died
works
series
War for Eternity/Fenrille
The War for Eternity (New York: Ballantine Books/Del Rey, 1983) [War for Eternity/Fenrille: pb/Ralph McQuarrie]
The Black Ship (New York: Ballantine Books/Del Rey, 1985) [War for Eternity/Fenrille: pb/Ralph McQuarrie]
The Founder (New York: Ballantine Books/Del Rey, 1989) [War for Eternity/Fenrille: pb/Stephen Hickman]
To a Highland Nation (New York: Ballantine Books/Del Rey, 1993) [War for Eternity/Fenrille: pb/Bob Eggleton]
Vang
Starhammer (New York: Ballantine Books/Del Rey, 1986) [Vang: pb/David Schleinkofer]
The Vang: The Military Form (New York: Ballantine Books/Del Rey, 1988) [Vang: pb/Stephen Hickman]
The Vang: The Battlemaster (New York: Ballantine Books/Del Rey, 1990) [Vang: pb/Stephen Hickman]
Bazil Broketail
Bazil Broketail (New York: Penguin/Roc, 1992) [Bazil Broketail: pb/Daniel Horne]
A Sword for a Dragon (New York: Penguin/Roc, 1993) [Bazil Broketail: pb/Daniel Horne]
Dragons of War (New York: Penguin/Roc, 1994) [Bazil Broketail: pb/Daniel Horne]
Battledragon (New York: Penguin/Roc, 1995) [Bazil Broketail: pb/Daniel Horne]
The Wizard and the Floating City (New York: Penguin/Roc, 1996) [Bazil Broketail: pb/Daniel Horne]
A Dragon at World's End (New York: Penguin/Roc, 1997) [Bazil Broketail: pb/Daniel Horne]
Dragons of Argonath (New York: Penguin/Roc, 1998) [Bazil Broketail: pb/Daniel Horne]
Dragon Ultimate (New York: Penguin/Roc, 1999) [Bazil Broketail: pb/Daniel Horne]
Arna
The Ancient Enemy: The First Book of Arna (New York: Penguin/Roc, 2000) [Arna: pb/Duane Myers]
The Shasht War: The Second Book of Arna (New York: Penguin/Roc, 2001) [Arna: pb/Duane Myers]
Doom's Break: The Third Book of Arna The Second Book of Arna (New York: Penguin/Roc, 2002) [Arna: pb/Duane Myers]
Heavy Metal Pulp
Heavy Metal Pulp: Pleasure Model: Netherworld Book One (New York: Tor, 2010) [tie to Heavy Metal Magazine: Heavy Metal Pulp: pb/Gregory Manchess]
Heavy Metal Pulp: The Bloodstained Man: Netherworld Book Two (New York: Tor, 2010) [tie to Heavy Metal Magazine: Heavy Metal Pulp: illus/Justin Norman: pb/Gregory Manchess]
Heavy Metal Pulp: Money Shot: Netherworld Book Three (New York: Tor, 2010) [tie to Heavy Metal Magazine: Heavy Metal Pulp: pb/Gregory Manchess]
individual titles
Golden Sunlands (New York: Ballantine Books/Del Rey, 1987) [pb/Ralph McQuarrie]
Arkham Woods (Los Angeles, California: Seven Seas, 2009) [graph: illus/pb/Jhomar Soriano]
links
Internet Speculative Fiction Database external link
Picture Gallery external link
Christopher Rowley is a prolific science fiction and fantasy writer, author of Bazil Broketail and Starhammer, which has been cited as an important literary influence in the creation of Halo by Bungie Studios. Rowley wrote Arkham Woods for Seven Seas and the Netherworld trilogy for Tor Books. Rowley lives in Hudson Valley, New York.
Christopher Rowley
USA flag (1948 - )
Christopher is a prolific writer of both science fiction and fantasy novels. He was born in 1948 in Lynn, Massachusetts to an American mother and an English father. Educated for the most part at Brentwood School, Essex, England, he became a London-based journalist in the 1970s. In 1977 he moved to New York City and began work on The War For Eternity, his first science fiction novel. He currently lives in upstate New York.
New Books
March 2017
(kindle)
Demon Blood
(Battle Dragons, book 4)
Series
Fenrille
1. The Founder (1989)
2. The War for Eternity (1983)
3. The Black Ship (1985)
4. To a Highland Nation (1993)
thumbthumbthumbthumb
Vang
1. Starhammer (1986)
2. The Military Form (1988)
3. The Battlemaster (1990)
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Bazil Broketail
1. Bazil Broketail (1992)
2. A Sword for a Dragon (1993)
3. Dragons of War (1994)
4. Battledragon (1995)
5. A Dragon at Worlds' End (1997)
6. The Dragons of Argonath (1998)
7. Dragon Ultimate (1999)
thumbthumbthumbthumb
thumbthumbthumb
Arna
1. The Ancient Enemy (2000)
2. The Shast War (2001)
3. Doom's Break (2002)
thumbthumbthumb
Netherworld
1. Pleasure Model (2010)
2. The Bloodstained Man (2010)
3. Money Shot (2010)
thumbthumbthumb
Battle Dragons
1. The Broketail (2016)
2. The Doom (2016)
3. Witch Sword (2016)
4. Demon Blood (2017)
thumbthumbthumbthumb
Novels
Golden Sunlands (1987)
The Wizard and the Floating City (1996)
Arkham Woods (2009)
thumbthumbthumb
Listen to the latest episode of World Soccer Talk Radio featuring an interview with author Christopher Rowley.
During the interview, Christopher Rowley talks about his new book, 'The Shared Origins of Football, Rugby and Soccer,' where he examines how all three sports got their roots from the one same sport, as well as how the different sports formulated through the years. The author also talks about how American football got its name, as well as dispelling some common misconceptions about the word 'soccer.'
rugbyfootballnflaussierules
5/5/17, 3(53 PM
Print Marked Items
The Bloodstained Man
Publishers Weekly.
257.19 (May 10, 2010): p32. From Book Review Index Plus. COPYRIGHT 2010 PWxyz, LLC http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
The Bloodstained Man
Christopher Rowley. Tot/Heavy Metal Pulp, $14.99 paper (256p) ISBN 978-0-7653- 2389-7
This slight second novel in Rowley's pulp-heir Netherworld series barely advances the plot jump-started in 2009's Pleasure Model. Ex-homicide detective Rook Venner is still on the run with Plesur, a sex android who carries top- secret data that has made her the quarry of the government, the military, and possibly a shadowy private agency. A rendezvous with a vice-presidential aspirant whose name has been programmed into Plesur promises to clear up some of the mystery of why she is being pursued, but it's interrupted by a band of marauding mercenaries who kidnap the refugees and force Rook to fight a series of gratuitously brutal gladiatorial matches that take up much of the novel's first half. Abundant car chases, pyrotechnic gunfights, and sexual interludes only point up the story's thin substance, and sketchy illustrations by artist Justin Norman distract more than they enhance. (July)
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"The Bloodstained Man." Publishers Weekly, 10 May 2010, p. 32. PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA226474866&it=r&asid=07f7b4d7260a5a60f640364b39e9501f. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A226474866
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Pleasure Model: Netherworld, Book 1
Publishers Weekly.
256.49 (Dec. 7, 2009): p39. From Book Review Index Plus. COPYRIGHT 2009 PWxyz, LLC http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
Pleasure Model: Netherworld,
Book 1
Christopher Rowley. Tor/Heavy Metal Pulp, $14.99 paper (320p) ISBN 978-0-7653-2388-0
There's little to like in the ugly and cliche-driven world Rowley (Arkham Woods) creates to launch Tor's Heavy Metal Pulp line. In a future New York of implanted personalities and heavy weaponry, net. Rook Venner, the archetypal good cop in a corrupt department, investigates a murder and finds the titular Plesur, a vat-grown, mentally impaired woman designed to be a sex toy, who apparently possesses important evidence. Only Rook can resist Plesur's engineered hotness, so he brings her home to protect her. Helped by a series of women who die to advance the plot, Rook and Plesur are soon dodging assassins and a vast government conspiracy. Even readers who can tolerate the hackneyed dialogue, overt misogyny, and predictable violence will be annoyed by the utterly unresolved ending. B&w illustrations by Justin Norman mostly serve to pad the story and emphasize its cartoonish nature. (Feb.)
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Pleasure Model: Netherworld, Book 1." Publishers Weekly, 7 Dec. 2009, p. 39. PowerSearch,
go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do? p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA217239297&it=r&asid=50b150e9eb82e3f80491f9e8c3199a89. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A217239297
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Dragon Ultimate
Kliatt.
33 (May 1999): p28. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Dragon Ultimate." Kliatt, May 1999, p. 28. PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA34862931&it=r&asid=13651d98f6146f8b00e934a068eab2a3. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A34862931
about:blank Page 3 of 24
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The Dragons of Argonath
Kliatt.
32 (May 1998): p24. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"The Dragons of Argonath." Kliatt, May 1998, p. 24. PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA34724550&it=r&asid=5ba5461e30370f3242393938ceff3dbb. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A34724550
about:blank Page 4 of 24
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A Dragon at World's End
Kliatt.
31 (May 1997): p15. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"A Dragon at World's End." Kliatt, May 1997, p. 15. PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA34301859&it=r&asid=1e939c439b47fb44558a26d5a2f67662. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A34301859
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The Wizard and the Floating City
Kliatt.
30 (Sept. 1996): p20. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"The Wizard and the Floating City." Kliatt, Sept. 1996, p. 20. PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA34228477&it=r&asid=8bc25c9e8ae460efd44353e8cd244d04. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A34228477
about:blank Page 6 of 24
5/5/17, 3(53 PM
Dragons of War
Locus.
33 (Dec. 1994): p60. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Dragons of War." Locus, Dec. 1994, p. 60. PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA34365553&it=r&asid=5fb6a4094572793bb05090352804b7c6. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A34365553
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To a Highland Nation
Kliatt.
27 (Sept. 1993): p22. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"To a Highland Nation." Kliatt, Sept. 1993, p. 22. PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA34050160&it=r&asid=fedc787b6d390a372a8c369296730fe5. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A34050160
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Bazil Broketail
Locus.
29 (Sept. 1992): p62. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Bazil Broketail." Locus, Sept. 1992, p. 62. PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA33922887&it=r&asid=03a834dff49a7d3be4c6af751245fda3. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A33922887
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Bazil Broketail
Kliatt.
26 (Nov. 1992): p18. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Bazil Broketail." Kliatt, Nov. 1992, p. 18. PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA33910438&it=r&asid=89f888aca0f634373da75794fb487fdc. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A33910438
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A Sword for a Dragon
Locus.
30 (May 1993): p52. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"A Sword for a Dragon." Locus, May 1993, p. 52. PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA34006443&it=r&asid=e06ee0bb45ffa705372fbc347ddb7544. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A34006443
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The Military Form
Locus.
25 (Dec. 1990): p55. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"The Military Form." Locus, Dec. 1990, p. 55. PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA33680764&it=r&asid=1a9cf5a8fd3d2352ca71480a0275ba0c. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A33680764
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Starhammer
Locus.
25 (Dec. 1990): p55. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Starhammer." Locus, Dec. 1990, p. 55. PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA33680765&it=r&asid=1533d0046fc2eebd7b7283ab582b7034 Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A33680765
.
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The Founder
Analog Science Fiction & Fact.
110 (Aug. 1990): p143. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"The Founder." Analog Science Fiction & Fact, Aug. 1990, p. 143. PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA33611922&it=r&asid=1bc722ce364c4103210302f1d34a5202. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A33611922
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The Founder
Chronicle.
11 (Feb. 1990): p35. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"The Founder." Chronicle, Feb. 1990, p. 35. PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA33611924&it=r&asid=feb6ae6400eb183c818ee96ebc4a8e50. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A33611924
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The Founder
Penny Kaganoff
Publishers Weekly.
236.20 (Nov. 17, 1989): p48. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Kaganoff, Penny. "The Founder." Publishers Weekly, 17 Nov. 1989, p. 48. PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA8182921&it=r&asid=6c37c2819ba1d74438f0ed4a03b49b4b. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A8182921
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The Vang: The Military Form
Analog Science Fiction & Fact.
108 (Nov. 1988): p133. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"The Vang: The Military Form." Analog Science Fiction & Fact, Nov. 1988, p. 133. PowerSearch,
go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do? p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA33346385&it=r&asid=eb61bbc04fcc0b80f147891fd66651e3. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A33346385
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The Vang: The Military Form
Chronicle.
9 (Apr. 1988): p50. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"The Vang: The Military Form." Chronicle, Apr. 1988, p. 50. PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA33346387&it=r&asid=554eab18dcaee09490fa0abdf68a6f28. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A33346387
about:blank Page 18 of 24
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The Vang: The Military Form
Penny Kaganoff
Publishers Weekly.
233.6 (Feb. 12, 1988): p79. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Kaganoff, Penny. "The Vang: The Military Form." Publishers Weekly, 12 Feb. 1988, p. 79. PowerSearch,
go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do? p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA6338933&it=r&asid=db816923db55bd8d06691761e5647510. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A6338933
about:blank Page 19 of 24
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Starhammer
Analog Science Fiction & Fact.
106 (Sept. 1986): p180. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Starhammer." Analog Science Fiction & Fact, Sept. 1986, p. 180. PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA33094951&it=r&asid=2a7c4c352c1ccd43e74dc5959ba7911c. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A33094951
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The Black Ship
Analog Science Fiction & Fact.
106 (Feb. 1986): p177. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"The Black Ship." Analog Science Fiction & Fact, Feb. 1986, p. 177. PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA33094950&it=r&asid=00b57825ede32b84674f3c280985aac5. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A33094950
about:blank Page 21 of 24
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The War For Eternity
Analog Science Fiction & Fact.
(July 1984): p165. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"The War For Eternity." Analog Science Fiction & Fact, July 1984, p. 165. PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA32535793&it=r&asid=b5449ead9c8d2929c4e60f22cc687a8c. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A32535793
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The war against eternity
Algis Budrys
The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. 66 (Apr. 1984): p24. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Budrys, Algis. "The war against eternity." The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, Apr. 1984, p. 24.
PowerSearch, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do? p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA3200267&it=r&asid=de66120e92e2cc884148523f305a8fed. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A3200267
about:blank Page 23 of 24
5/5/17, 3(53 PM
The War For Eternity
The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. 66 (Apr. 1984): p24. From Book Review Index Plus.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"The War For Eternity." The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, Apr. 1984, p. 24. PowerSearch,
go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do? p=GPS&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA32535795&it=r&asid=86ad0c1f6cae35720af749dc3fb17ab4. Accessed 5 May 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A32535795
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Review of The Shared Origins of Football, Rugby, and Soccer
lindsaypieper / 02 October 2016
Rowley, Christopher. The Shared Origins of Football, Rugby, and Soccer. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield, 2015. Pp. xi+248. Bibliography and index. $36.00 hardback, $35.99 electronic book.
Reviewed by Zachary R. Bigalke
My graduate advisor originally hails from Peru, and he is fond of telling a story from his earliest days as a graduate student in the United States. During his first year in the country in the early 1990s, he entered a free grocery-store contest and ended up winning two tickets to attend the Super Bowl. For a man from South America, whose passion about fútbol and its intricacies is unbounded, the gridiron was an absolute mystery at that point. He had a concrete vision of football, and the American version did not fit that understanding.
Colleagues and friends congratulated him on his good fortune, yet my advisor had little desire to sit in a stadium to watch a game that made no sense. So, passing up the opportunity to attend an event that millions of Americans dream of witnessing live, he sold the two tickets and turned his prize into something even more valuable to a graduate student – grocery money. The following season my advisor sat down with a friend who explained the game to him, and he came to understand and enjoy the American version of the sport. Yet to this day football first and foremost means the kicking game in his vernacular.
shared-origins
Rowman & Littlefield, 2015
How did the word “football” come to mean so many things to so many different people around the globe? In his book The Shared Origins of Football, Rugby, and Soccer, Christopher Rowley attempts to trace a linear path from the earliest team ball sports to the seven main football codes that are played around the world today. At many points the fragmentary nature of the resources leads Rowley to draw upon his skills as a novelist and journalist, and the result is a book that relies in many places on creative historical reconstructions designed to place the reader at the scene at various points of evolution.
The author takes a mostly chronological approach to the subject, beginning with a look at ancient ball games in Mesoamerica, China, and Celtic England. In many ways this is the only substantive treatment that Mesoamerica and China receive in the book, and clear connections are never made between these sports and regions and how they fit into the broader narrative that Rowley is trying to tell. This chapter feels as though the American and Asian examples were added merely to satisfy the need to acknowledge their existence and to set up the Celtic storyline that continues onward, as Rowley covers two centuries of developments outside of Europe in the initial chapter and then moves on to the story he actually wants to tell.
Greek ball games such as pheninda (a game resembling handball with elements of rugby) and episkyros (a kicking and throwing game played with a leather-encased bladder redolent of early modern footballs) serve as the real launch point of Rowley’s origin story. Unlike the prestige-laden athletic and combat competitions of the Panhellenic games, Rowley notes that these ball sports were more common pastimes played on a spontaneous and recreational basis. Tracing the lineage between these Greek games, especially pheninda and its Roman forbear harpastum, the author sets up his audience for a clash of cultures. The Roman campaigns in Britain provide a plausible means of explaining how Greco-Roman ball construction might have disseminated to England. Castoff equipment, Rowley opines, might have made its way down to local Celtic population who used the balls to play games that meshed indigenous and Roman forms of play.
At this point Rowley shifts his attention squarely on the British Isles as the epicenter of the sport’s evolution. Whether due to a limited corpus of source materials, or the language barriers that often arise when conducting transnational studies of any type, allusions to Chinese or Mesoamerican influences become increasingly scarce deeper into the book. While there are some anecdotes from these regions as well as mainland Europe spliced through the narrative, the history of ball games in these other regions is largely subsumed in a storyline that firmly anchors England as the spiritual home of football.
Rowley admits up front in his introduction that he is not a trained historian and that he is not necessarily producing a purely academic monograph. He is obviously a skilled storyteller, and much of the substantive details about football and its ancestor sports are easily verifiable through the bibliography of sources. While there is nothing revolutionary within the story beyond the interweaving of conjectural recreations with diligent research, he has produced a compelling overview of the shared history of the various games known as football. While Rowley refrains from footnoting his references throughout the book, the work draws upon a wide variety of secondary research that is clearly documented in a bibliography at the end of the work.
Where the book ultimately fails as a useful resource is more an indictment of the editorial and publishing process than of research or writing on the part of the author. The index at the back of the book is effectively irrelevant, as none of the page numbers correspond to any of the stated terms of interest. After scanning through two dozen different words from various sections of the index, one wonders whether the index corresponds to an earlier draft copy and was never adjusted in final proof.
Ultimately The Shared Origins of Football, Rugby, and Soccer is written for popular audiences that are unlikely to concern themselves with the index or worry about references. The author appears to have done his due diligence in terms of the research, but the structural issues regarding the index would need to be rectified before it can be considered of much value from an academic standpoint. For football (or rugby or soccer) fans who unfamiliar with the history of their favorite sports prior to the mid-19th century, the book is a quick and engaging read that offers a broad-strokes look at the history that led to the variety of modern football codes.
Zachary R. Bigalke is a graduate student in the Department of History at the University of Oregon focusing on the impact of immigration and industrialization on the early development of various forms of football in the Americas. He is a regular contributor to the college football website Saturday Blitz, and can be reached at bigalkez@gmail.com and followed on Twitter at @zbigalke.
he Shared Origins of Football, Rugby, and Soccer by Christopher Rowley (review)
Brian M. Ingrassia
From: Journal of Sport History
Volume 43, Number 2, Summer 2016
pp. 245-246
In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:
Reviewed by
Brian M. Ingrassia
Rowley, Christopher. The Shared Origins of Football, Rugby, and Soccer. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2015. Pp. 248. $36.00 hb; $35.99 ebook.
In The Shared Origins of Football, Rugby, and Soccer, Christopher Rowley gives readers a whirlwind tour of the deep historical origins of “football.” The scope is dizzying: Rowley [End Page 245] ranges from ancient China and Mesoamerica to the 2022 FIFA World Cup scheduled for Qatar. The book shows how games such as episkyros in ancient Greece and harpastum in the Roman Empire were eventually transformed into something called “footeballe” by the 1400s (83).
Rowley is “best known as a science fiction and fantasy” writer (247). He warns that his book is “not an academic work” yet maintains that his “speculations and conclusions” give readers a greater “understanding of where his or her favorite . . . codes of football came from” (x–xi). It is hard to argue with this assessment. Rowley shows how seven football codes (American, Australian, Canadian, Gaelic, rugby league, rugby union, and association) developed. He includes rules for various precursor games in lists that may have served readers better in an appendix. The author includes valuable historical context, although in places the volume reads like a breezy Western civilization textbook. At other times, he ventures into the realm of conjecture and counterfactual speculation.
An interesting takeaway from this book is the parallel history of various football codes. Most were codified between the 1850s and 1880s, and some gained global popularity in the three decades stretching from the 1880s to the outbreak of World War I. In other words, at a time of national consolidation (1850s–70s) and imperialism (1880s–1910s), something similar happened to kicking and running games.
Among the most enjoyable aspects of this book are passages wherein the author discusses atavistic “fossil games.” For instance, Rowley entertainingly recounts his encounter with the Ashbourne Game, a rough-and-tumble Derbyshire contest in which players struggle to move a ball to one of two old mill sites on a distant brook. Rowley also weaves into his narrative late-1800s’ debates over professionalism, as well as the centuries-long evolution of the ball itself—from carefully heated and shaped animal bladder to mass-produced, leather-encased rubber.
The most frustrating aspects of this volume are the index and bibliography. The index is useless. Page numbers appear to have been derived from a manuscript with different pagination. By the later chapters, page numbers in the index are off by fifteen pages. Some important names appearing in the text—including Walter Camp (195–198, 205)—do not have entries. (Knute Rockne, whose name is misspelled in the chapter on American football, is also not included in the index.) The bibliography includes many books on the history of the British Isles and English sports. Yet many authoritative historians of soccer or American football—including David Goldblatt, Barbara J. Keys, Ronald A. Smith, and David Wangerin—are absent.
This book, written in an accessible style, will be welcomed on the shelves of public and school libraries. It shows general readers that the various games called “football” do have a fascinating, intertwined history. Its scholarly shortcomings, though, limit its utility. [End Page 246]