When Pride Still Mattered - by David Maraniss (Paperback)

About the Book

Using the same meticulous reporting and sweeping narrative style employed in "First in His Class", his classic biography of Bill Clinton, Maraniss separates myth from reality and wondrously recaptures Vince Lombardi's life and times. "When Pride Still Mattered" is the quintessential story of the American family: how Vince Lombardi, the son of an immigrant Italian butcher, rose to the top and came to inspire the entire country. of photos.

Book Synopsis

In this groundbreaking biography, David Maraniss captures all of football great Vince Lombardi: the myth, the man, his game, and his God.

More than any other sports figure, Vince Lombardi transformed football into a metaphor of the American experience. The son of an Italian immigrant butcher, Lombardi toiled for twenty frustrating years as a high school coach and then as an assistant at Fordham, West Point, and the New York Giants before his big break came at age forty-six with the chance to coach a struggling team in snowbound Wisconsin. His leadership of the Green Bay Packers to five world championships in nine seasons is the most storied period in NFL history. Lombardi became a living legend, a symbol to many of leadership, discipline, perseverance, and teamwork, and to others of an obsession with winning.

Review Quotes

"A masterly biography. . . . A finely crafted, multifaceted portrait of a life driven by obsession."--Tim Long "The Miami Herald"

"A monumental biography."--Michael Bauman "Milwaukee Journal Sentinel"

"A superb book, one of the best on football that we have."--Michael Oriard "The Philadelphia Inquirer"

"An astonishingly good book. . . . A triumph, a classic American biography."--Robert W. Creamer "The Washington Post Book World"

"Both the reach of the research and the grasp of Lombardi's character are impressive. It is a wonderful work."--Lester Munson "Chicago Tribune"

"Forges a near-perfect synthesis of fine writing and fascinating material. May be the best sports biography ever published."--Ron Fimrite "Sports Illustrated"

"It is simply a superb biography."--Bill Brashler "Chicago Sun-Times"

About the Author

David Maraniss is an associate editor at The Washington Post and a distinguished visiting professor at Vanderbilt University. He has won two Pulitzer Prizes for journalism and was a finalist three other times. Among his bestselling books are biographies of Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, Roberto Clemente, and Vince Lombardi, and a trilogy about the 1960s--Rome 1960; Once in a Great City (winner of the RFK Book Prize); and They Marched into Sunlight (winner of the J. Anthony Lukas Prize and Pulitzer Finalist in History).