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Published: 16th April 2012

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Munich 1972 tells the compelling story of the most controversial of all modern Olympiads within the turbulent context of simmering global tensions: the ongoing Cold War, political posturing between the two Germanys, seemingly endless warfare in Indochina, lingering recriminations surrounding decolonization in Africa, and, of course, the cauldron of religious and ethnic hatred known euphemistically as the "Middle East Conflict." It was, of course, this last conflict that spilled over so tragically into the Munich festival, which will forever be remembered for the murder of eleven Israeli Olympians by Palestinian terrorists: a grisly episode that ruined a much-anticipated coming-out party for newly democratic West Germany and for "new Munich" itself, the erstwhile "capital" of Hitler's Nazi movement. What began as a putatively "merry" celebration of peaceful play and beery bonhomie turned into a tragic milestone in the signature horror of our times: political and religious terror. Crucial as the "Munich Massacre" is to the story of the '72 Games, however, it is by no means the only story. There was plenty of high drama in the athletic competitions as well, which were themselves hardly free of unsportsmanlike acrimony. Controversies over biased judging, commercialization, political posturing, and (above all) doping helped to make this Olympic festival very much a mirror of its contentious times. Drawing on a wealth of contemporaneous sources, including recently opened files in the German and Olympic archives, eminent historian David Clay Large offers a comprehensive exploration of the 1972 festival. He interweaves the political drama surrounding the Games with the athletic spectacle in the arena of play, itself hardly free of political controversy. Writing with flair and an eye for telling detail, Large brings to life the stories of the indelible characters who epitomized the Games, ranging from the city itself to the visionaries who brought the Games to Munich against all odds to the athletes, obscure and famous alike. With the Olympic movement in constant danger of terrorist disruption, and with the fortieth anniversary of the 1972 tragedy upon us in 2012, the Munich story is more timely than ever.

This fluent, measured, and thorough book is a worthy successor to David Large's fine earlier study of the Nazi Games in Berlin. Once more, Large uncovers surprising twists in an ultimately tragic story and adeptly skewers the pretensions and hypocrisies of the modern Olympic movement. -- Hayes, Peter In 1972, Munich was the site of the Olympics, thirty-six years after Adolph Hitler's Nazi regime hosted the games in Berlin. Now the Federal Republic had the chance to show off a new German face--amid Cold War tensions with the Communist German Democratic Republic--and a very different Munich, in some ways the cradle of the Nazis and Hitler's favorite city. But that is not what is remembered. Well into the games, amid woeful security centered on chain-linked fences, terrorists seized and then after a standoff killed Israeli athletes. David Clay Large follows his fine study of Hitler's Olympics with a gripping account of the 'Olympics of Terror,' when the games went on, despite the tragedy that arguably signaled the new challenges and dangers of our world. Well-researched and crafted, Munich 1972 is an excellent, haunting book, one that matters even more now. -- John Merriman

ISBN: 9780742567399
ISBN-10: 0742567397
Audience: General
Format: Hardcover
Language: English
Number Of Pages: 384
Published: 16th April 2012
Dimensions (cm): 23.6 x 16.2  x 3.2
Weight (kg): 0.663