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"For Anthony Ervin, the stretch between his two greatest athletic achievements — two Olympic gold medals — included a suicide attempt, a period of homelessness and a stint in a rock band. Jobs found, then lost. Too much drinking, too many drugs. Depression. Confusion. And then, a kind of rebirth." — USA Today "An inspiring, humorous and often profound biography." —People Magazine "Anthony Ervin is a lot of things. He is an open book and a closed circuit, a body fueled by a brain, an old man with a young soul. He is the American Dream. He is, once again, improbably, an Olympic champion." —Yahoo "Anthony Ervin is not only the most beautiful swimmer in the water I have ever seen, he is also one of the great stories of triumph and perseverance in the midst of tremendous adversity. I am so proud to call him my friend and I know his life's challenges will inspire generations to come." —Rowdy Gaines, swimmer, three-time Olympic gold medalist "Just a glance at the cover of the swimmer's recently published memoir Chasing Water: Elegy of an Olympian, reveals the intensity of Ervin's career to date. He's seen looking straight at the reader while in the full lotus pose underwater in a pool. Other swimmers are racing behind him, but Ervin doesn't see them. The message the reader receives is clear: Anthony Ervin is focused on more than the competition." — Tricycle Magazine "You won't find many athletes like Ervin, nor will you find many sports autobiographies like his recently published Chasing Water: Elegy of an Olympian. . . . It's fascinating." —Charlotte Observer "Ervin, a former world record-holder, won gold in Rio in the 4x100m free and 50m free races. He's also overcome incredible odds, surviving depression, homelessness, and addiction in the years between his record-breaking 2000 Olympic performance and his comeback in 2012. His book, Chasing Water, tells the story of those times." — Miami New Times Every four years in the Olympic cycle the surge of national interest in swimming grows, and with it a desire to be captivated by its stars. This book tells the dramatic, surprising, and sometimes provocative path that Anthony Ervin has taken to become one of those captivating Olympic heroes. Not your typical sports memoir, Chasing Water also contains arresting black-and-white drawings and a graphic story extra, as well as an inventive and mercurial narrative style that morphs chapter by chapter to reflect Ervin's restless, multifaceted life. Ervin won a gold medal at the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games at the age of nineteen. He is an athlete branded with a slew of titles including being the first US Olympic swimmer of African American descent, along with Jewish heritage, who also grew up with Tourette's syndrome. He shocked the sporting world by retiring soon after claiming two world titles following the 2000 Olympics. Auctioning off his gold medal for charity, he set off on a part spiritual quest, part self-destructive bender that involved Zen temples, fast motorcycles, tattoo parlors, and rock 'n' roll bands. Then Ervin resurfaced in 2012 to not only make the US Olympic team twelve years after his first appearance, but to continue his career by swimming faster than ever before. At the Rio Olympics in August 2016, Ervin "wrote" the most fitting afterword to his astonishing story, winning two gold medals, becoming the oldest swimmer (from any nation) to win a gold medal in an individual race, and—in finishing first in the 50-meter freestyle—once again earning...
This is a good warm-up to the Olympics. I loved the behind-the-scenes look at Anthony Ervin's life and how he was able to overcome his own demons to get back in the pool. Constantine Markides is an excellent writer ... he carried the book from start to finish and threw in analogies that I never would have thought of. Odysseus? Yes! ( )
I think I appreciated this memoir of US Olympic swimmer Anthony Ervin because I am a former competitive swimmer and understand the swimming lingo and the dedication it takes to excel in this sport, but non-swimmers will also be informed and amused by Ervin's tales.
Ervin talks about what a hooligan he was growing up and how swimming kept him out of more trouble he could have been into. His love/hate relationship with the sport resonates with me, as I'm sure it would with other athletes who had to train hours upon hours a day to try to get ahead in a sport you once loved but come to resent at times.
When an opportunity presented itself to Ervin for a free ride to college if only he would continue swimming competitively, he took it with the intent to continue swimming for one year, then move on with his life. That one year led to an Olympic gold medal and some hard partying.
While Ervin didn't finish college in the traditional means, he did eventually realize what college and swimming meant to him and made his way back to them both after many years of partying, drugs, and transient living.
Ervin and his co-writer are both interesting writers with a sense of humor and this book makes for a quick read in which I found myself rooting for Ervin and his don't-call-it-a-comeback, looking forward to more success for this truly interesting human being. I was happy to have won a copy of this book from LibraryThing. ( )
It’s partly my own fault, I know. I expected a biography/autobiography of an Olympic gold-medal-winning swimmer to be, well, about swimming. Instead, what I read was mostly about that swimmer’s reckless lifestyle. The excessive drinking, the recreational drugs, the casual sex, and the high-speed motorcycle riding (he reportedly got his bike up to 170 mph). His depression. His wandering from couch to couch. At that point, I was sorely disappointed. I wanted to read this book for the swimming, not to learn what it’s like to wake up in a jail’s drunk tank.
In the end, though, it picked up. He tried to make a swimming comeback and the last 40 or 50 pages were the best part of the book, detailing his efforts to get back into competitive swimming in 2011-12 and perhaps make the 2012 London Olympic team. As he said, the pool was a prison for him when he was a youth but it later turned into a sanctuary. He's now 33 and trying again next month, for Rio. After his "tortured" life, I'll be curious to see how this latest chapter turns out.
In the end, I’d say I liked this book but didn’t love it. ( )
Co-written by Anthony Ervin, an Olympian, and Constantine Markides, a journalist with a swimming background, Chasing Water is about what you'd expect from a sports memoir: a remarkable talent is discovered in childhood, the individual is thrust into greatness before he is really ready, falls off the wagon for a while, and later rediscovers a love for what defined him when he was younger. Weaving between Ervin's own thoughts and Markides' outside—yet still personal—perspective, this book gives readers unique insights into Tourette's Syndrome, the day-to-day experiences and expectations of a high-level athlete, plus some forays into drug abuse and depression and anxiety. It's the story of what makes a man, and the army of people who contribute to the making.
Seeing as this is a memoir about an Olympian, I would have liked more time on the sports side of things and less on Ervin's "rebel" period, but all in all, it's an enjoyable book. And who doesn't love a good Olympics story? ( )
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But Hermes did not find great-hearted Odysseus indoors, but he was sitting out on the beach, crying, as before now he had done, breaking his heart in tears, lamentation, and sorrow, as weeping tears he looked out over the barren waters. - Homer, The Odyssey
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Informatie afkomstig uit de Engelse Algemene Kennis.Bewerk om naar jouw taal over te brengen.
"For Anthony Ervin, the stretch between his two greatest athletic achievements — two Olympic gold medals — included a suicide attempt, a period of homelessness and a stint in a rock band. Jobs found, then lost. Too much drinking, too many drugs. Depression. Confusion. And then, a kind of rebirth." — USA Today "An inspiring, humorous and often profound biography." —People Magazine "Anthony Ervin is a lot of things. He is an open book and a closed circuit, a body fueled by a brain, an old man with a young soul. He is the American Dream. He is, once again, improbably, an Olympic champion." —Yahoo "Anthony Ervin is not only the most beautiful swimmer in the water I have ever seen, he is also one of the great stories of triumph and perseverance in the midst of tremendous adversity. I am so proud to call him my friend and I know his life's challenges will inspire generations to come." —Rowdy Gaines, swimmer, three-time Olympic gold medalist "Just a glance at the cover of the swimmer's recently published memoir Chasing Water: Elegy of an Olympian, reveals the intensity of Ervin's career to date. He's seen looking straight at the reader while in the full lotus pose underwater in a pool. Other swimmers are racing behind him, but Ervin doesn't see them. The message the reader receives is clear: Anthony Ervin is focused on more than the competition." — Tricycle Magazine "You won't find many athletes like Ervin, nor will you find many sports autobiographies like his recently published Chasing Water: Elegy of an Olympian. . . . It's fascinating." —Charlotte Observer "Ervin, a former world record-holder, won gold in Rio in the 4x100m free and 50m free races. He's also overcome incredible odds, surviving depression, homelessness, and addiction in the years between his record-breaking 2000 Olympic performance and his comeback in 2012. His book, Chasing Water, tells the story of those times." — Miami New Times Every four years in the Olympic cycle the surge of national interest in swimming grows, and with it a desire to be captivated by its stars. This book tells the dramatic, surprising, and sometimes provocative path that Anthony Ervin has taken to become one of those captivating Olympic heroes. Not your typical sports memoir, Chasing Water also contains arresting black-and-white drawings and a graphic story extra, as well as an inventive and mercurial narrative style that morphs chapter by chapter to reflect Ervin's restless, multifaceted life. Ervin won a gold medal at the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games at the age of nineteen. He is an athlete branded with a slew of titles including being the first US Olympic swimmer of African American descent, along with Jewish heritage, who also grew up with Tourette's syndrome. He shocked the sporting world by retiring soon after claiming two world titles following the 2000 Olympics. Auctioning off his gold medal for charity, he set off on a part spiritual quest, part self-destructive bender that involved Zen temples, fast motorcycles, tattoo parlors, and rock 'n' roll bands. Then Ervin resurfaced in 2012 to not only make the US Olympic team twelve years after his first appearance, but to continue his career by swimming faster than ever before. At the Rio Olympics in August 2016, Ervin "wrote" the most fitting afterword to his astonishing story, winning two gold medals, becoming the oldest swimmer (from any nation) to win a gold medal in an individual race, and—in finishing first in the 50-meter freestyle—once again earning...
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