His Ownself: A Semi-Memoir Author: Dan Jenkins | Language: English | ISBN:
B00F1W0DYA | Format: PDF
His Ownself: A Semi-Memoir Description
From Dan Jenkins—one of America’s most respected and acclaimed sportswriters and author of the bestselling novels Semi-Tough and Dead Solid Perfect—comes a colorful, sentimental, hilarious, and cantankerous memoir about his lifelong journey through the world of sports. “Sometimes, I envy my own childhood,” says Dan Jenkins. Many can say that about Dan’s whole life. In
His Ownself, we follow him from his youth in Texas, where being a sports fan meant understanding a lot about religion, heroes, and drinking; to his first job at the
Fort Worth Press working alongside all-time journalistic greats like Blackie Sherrod and Bud Shrake; to the glory days of
Sports Illustrated. One of a handful of writers to establish
SI as the most important sports magazine ever, Dan refocused the magazine’s college football coverage and covered the game’s greatest players and coaches. Beyond football, Dan is in the conversation about the best golf writers of all time. Having covered every Masters, U.S. Open, PGA, and British Open for the past fifty years, he takes us behind the scenes to capture the drama—as well as the humor—of these tournaments as he brings us up close and personal with the likes of Ben Hogan, Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, and Tiger Woods.
From his friendship and the rounds played with Ben Hogan, to the stories swapped with New York’s elite, to the corporate expense accounts abused, Dan lets loose on his experiences in journalism, sports, and showbiz. An honest, one-of-a-kind look at politics, hypocrites, political correctness, the past, the present, Hollywood, money, and athletes, this is a sports fan’s dream book. It’s a touching, laugh-out-loud tribute to the romanticism of sportswriting and the glory days of sports, told straight from the mouth of the man who saw it all his ownself.
From the Hardcover edition.- File Size: 2702 KB
- Print Length: 288 pages
- Publisher: Doubleday (March 4, 2014)
- Sold by: Random House LLC
- Language: English
- ASIN: B00F1W0DYA
- Text-to-Speech: Enabled
X-Ray:
- Lending: Not Enabled
- Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,094 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
- #1
in Books > Sports & Outdoors > Miscellaneous > Journalism - #2
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Sports > Golf - #2
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Sports > Biographies
- #1
in Books > Sports & Outdoors > Miscellaneous > Journalism - #2
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Sports > Golf - #2
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Sports > Biographies
The closing lines of Dan Jenkins’ memoir say it all: “True friends are a priceless commodity in this world, and I’ve been blessed with many. And there are other things intended: a vitality of existence, a hopeful view of life, and a tender attitude about love. After all, Billy Clyde won the game and got the girl—and so did I.”
This conclusion summarizes the gist of His Ownself. DJ’s memoir is a story of friends, of family life, of journalism, novelistic fiction and romance, but principally it is a story about the vitality of existence. It is a story about Paschal High School in Fort Worth and TCU, a story about golf and football and those who write about it for a living. Dan Jenkins has written about all of that, both as a journalist and novelist (and now as a memoirist) and readers of his novelistic writing will already know how his personal background and journalistic career intersect and intertwine with his fiction.
There is such a thing as a ‘Dan Jenkins book’ and whether it be fiction or non-fiction, it is always delightful. Add His Ownself to the list. It is, indeed, a memoir rather than an autobiography, but it triumphs as a memoir because DJ knows/knew such interesting people, had such interesting experiences and writes about both in such an engaging way. You will not turn to this book expecting a step by step, monthly account of his life. The overall outlines are clear, but much of the material is conceived thematically and expressed anecdotally. This works because the anecdotes are so interesting and expressed in the pure Jenkins voice.
DJ is incapable of being dull, but the stories he tells are enlivened further when they concern such individuals as Ben Hogan, David Merrick, Henry Luce and Agatha Christie.
HIS OWNSELF: A SEMI-MEMOIR owes its title to Dan Jenkins’ most well known character, Billy Clyde Puckett, former stud-horse running back featured in SEMI-TOUGH and LIFE ITS OWNSELF.
Jenkins is a treasure, the last of his generation of sportswriters. Sportswriters whose prose sang, who didn’t take themselves or the games and contests they covered too serious, who were part of sports milieu devoid of corporations. Jenkins unique spot in this pantheon is that he is funny. Laugh out loud funny. Three buddies of mine and I nearly died while driving up Highway 395 listening to YOU GOTTA PLAY HURT…we were laughing so hard we almost drove the car off the road.
A SEMI-MEMOIR is also funny. If you are looking for a traditional autobiography you can stop here. It ain’t. It is more of a rambling overview.
Jenkins wrote for a couple of Texas newspapers before being recruited to Sports Illustrated to cover the college football scene. He eventually got the back page. (His protagonist in YOU GOTTA PLAY HURT writes the back page for a thinly disguised SI.) In covering the great sporting events Jenkins, ever irrepressible, makes no bones about his true loves: college football, especially Texas Christian University, and golf.
Jenkins’ golf hero is Ben Hogan, another Texas boy. For Jenkins the Golden Age of golf was as the mantle was passed from Hogan to Arnold Palmer to Jack Nicklaus. He does not hide his disdain for one Tiger Woods, going as far as to reproduce his Golf Digest column “Nice (Not) Knowing You” in its entirety. “…spoiled, pampered, hidden, guarded, orchestrated, and entitled.” And that’s the nice stuff!
One my favorite anecdotes in the book features Pearl, a waitress in a Texas diner.
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