The Sweet Science

A. J. Liebling's classic New Yorker pieces on the "sweet science of bruising" bring vividly to life the boxing world as it once was. The Sweet Science depicts the great events of boxing's American heyday: Sugar Ray Robinson's dramatic comeback, Rocky Marciano's rise to prominence, Joe Louis's tragic decline. Liebling never fails to find the human story behind the fight, and he always evokes the atmosphere in the arena as distinctly as he does the goings-on in the ring—a combination that prompted Sports Illustrated to name The Sweet Science the best American sports book of all time.

As the noted boxing writer Robert Anasi remarks in his foreword to this book, "Liebling doesn't make the ring over into the setting for a morality play or an alternate site for Armageddon. His own boxing experience allowed him to represent the sport as sport, and to see boxing the way the pros do: as a job, more difficult than most, but also more rewarding."