Volume 48, Number 14 · September 20, 2001
Death of a Champion
By Charles Sprawson
The Crossing: The Glorious Tragedy of the First Man to Swim the English Channel
by Kathy Watson
Tarcher/Putnam, 242 pp., $22.95
Throughout the nineteenth century the English were generally considered the best swimmers in the world. Ever since Waterloo was supposedly won on the playing fields of Eton, their enthusiasm for sport and games became almost their distinguishing feature, a source of fascination to the rest of Europe. 'They even taught us Swiss to climb our own mountains,' commented Jung, 'and make a sport out of it.''
Review, 2644 words
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