Patrick Scrivenor
Turf Wars
Mr Darley’s Arabian: High Life, Low Life, Sporting Life – A History of Racing in Twenty-Five Horses
By Christopher McGrath
John Murray 426pp £25
There are few sights uglier than the finish of a horse race. Atop each elegant, patient beast, straining to do its best and bearing 85 per cent of the risk, perches a diminutive specimen of the hairless ape, crouched in a foetal posture, flailing away with a whip and, if successful, yelling in triumph at a victory that he is only partly entitled to claim.
The jockey may be the salt of the earth; the horse might be an intractable brute that kicks the stable boys and bites its trainer; the use of the whip is – supposedly – regulated. Nevertheless, this stereotypical image is disquieting. It is the misfortune of the horse that it can run fast – something that excites mankind’s basest passions. Christopher McGrath’s book amply testifies to the fact that the history of horse racing is one of fraud, villainy and considerable cruelty. Because horses are beautiful and because their speed is sensational, they shed glamour over the human shenanigans clustered round the business of racing. There is nothing ‘glamorous’ about ‘the turf’. From the dodges of trainers and owners down to the financial dealings of the betting industry, horse racing is remorselessly seedy.
The unlikely outcome of it all is something close to perfection: the thoroughbred horse. McGrath starts his history with an Arabian stallion imported by Thomas Darley in 1704. Tracing the line through a further twenty-five stallions, he reaches Frankel in the 21st century, perhaps the finest racehorse ever to have
Sign Up to our newsletter
Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.@Lit_Review
Follow Literary Review on Twitter
Twitter Feed
London's East End was long synonymous with poverty and sweatshops, while its West End was associated with glamour and high society. But when it came to the fashion industry, were the differences really so profound?
Sharman Kadish - Winkle-pickers & Bum Freezers
Sharman Kadish: Winkle-pickers & Bum Freezers - Fashion City: How Jewish Londoners Shaped Global Style; Fashion City: ...
literaryreview.co.uk
In 1982, Donald Rumsfeld presented Saddam Hussein with a pair of golden spurs. Two decades later he was dropping bunker-busting bombs on his palaces.
Where did the US-Iraqi relationship go wrong?
Rory Mccarthy - The Case of the Vanishing Missiles
Rory Mccarthy: The Case of the Vanishing Missiles - The Achilles Trap: Saddam Hussein, the United States and the ...
literaryreview.co.uk
Barbara Comyns was a dog breeder, a house painter, a piano restorer, a landlady... And a novelist.
@nclarke14 on the lengths 20th-century women writers had to go to make ends meet:
Norma Clarke - Her Family & Other Animals
Norma Clarke: Her Family & Other Animals - Barbara Comyns: A Savage Innocence by Avril Horner
literaryreview.co.uk