NEW DELHI: Eminent sports journalist Pradeep Magazine has published a memoir Not Just Cricket: A Reporter's Journey through Modern India, to be distributed by HarperCollins.
Magazine's memoir is a story of lived, real experiences, of joy, sorrow, fear, loss and hope, and about how an uprooted identity shapes one’s attitude towards society and the nation. From the Kashmir of the 1950s to terror-stricken Punjab, from the Mandir–Masjid divide and the impact of Mandal politics to the tragic consequences of the Kashmir situation — Magazine paints a fascinating portrait of modern India.
At the core of the book are accounts of some of the most epochal events in India’s cricketing history, woven around personal encounters with several well-known cricketers. The author lays bare the vicious machinations that are a staple diet of sports governance and reveals hitherto unknown facts about the frictions and ego clashes that are inevitable in a game that dominates India’s sporting discourse.
Whether it is cricket that you’re keen on, or India’s troubled history, Not Just Cricket is a must-read.
Praise for the book
‘Pradeep Magazine combines a deep knowledge of cricket with a sturdy independence of mind, and his wonderful memoir is richly insightful both about the game he loves—and sometimes despairs of—and the strife-torn states of India in which he has himself lived and worked. Lovers of sport and students of contemporary history will warm equally to this fine and often deeply moving book.’
– Ramachandra Guha
‘Not Just Cricket is a ride through the ups and downs of Indian cricket, seen from the eyes of one of India’s finest sports journalists. Pradeep Magazine has the experience, wisdom and self-awareness to tell a story that is as honest as it is thoughtful. While cricket is very much at the heart of the book, the author’s own story and that of his political beliefs threads the narrative to create a fuller and altogether more vivid picture of the times that it documents. The author’s humanity and straightforwardness shines through in every word that he has written.’
– Santosh Desai
‘Insightful, expansive, warm and truthful—a rare kind of book about India and cricket.’
– Sharda Ugra
On his forthcoming publication, Magazine says: ‘This work is a culmination of lifetime experiences—social, political, cricketing—that I have lived through while reporting on Indian cricket worldwide. It is as much a personal journey as it is about the world of cricket stars, fans, ordinary people intermingling to create the mosaic that is India. I am hopeful that the effort and care I put into writing this book will find resonance among the lovers of cricket as well as those who care about people and their aspirations in a society that is living in challenging times.’
Udayan Mitra, executive publisher, HarperCollins India, says: ‘Pradeep Magazine is a highly respected journalist and writer, and his journey through modern India, as he has seen it evolve, makes for fascinating reading. As the title indicates, this is not a book just about cricket—though there are some truly memorable cricketing encounters and anecdotes that make up an important part of the narrative. The keen insights into India's troubled history that the book offers are extremely valuable. Not Just Cricket is an absolute pleasure to read; we at HarperCollins are delighted to be publishing it, and I hope it will prove engrossing to many a reader.’
Pradeep Magazine is a cricket writer, columnist and former sports editor of The Pioneer, the India Today e-paper and Hindustan Times. He began his journalistic career in 1979 with the Chandigarh edition of The Indian Express and was its cricket editor in 1999–2000. Widely travelled, Magazine has covered international cricket in every Test-playing nation; he is the author of the book Not Quite Cricket that exposed the match-fixing scandal much before it surfaced in 2000.
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