|
|
 |
The Escape Artist, Matt Seaton (2002)
Forth Estate 1 84115 103 3 £14.99 186pp
Autobiography on two wheels including genuine tragedy and beautifully
observed reporting

|
Matt Seaton is possibly the most talented writer chronically cycling
today. Widely known for being The Guardian (and Fleet Street's) first
cycling columnist, he has a long track record as an intelligent interpreter
of modern sporting culture. Indeed, he first came to public notice when
he won an essay competition in the late 1980s run by the magazine Marxism
Today. In that, he dissected the relationship between gym use and the
prevailing Thatcherite spirit.
Detractors might dismiss Escape Artist for being Nick Hornby on two
wheels. And, it is true that the male-self-discovery-through-obsessive-activity
story has been applied to pretty much every imaginable leisure pursuit.
But, it is a format that Seaton takes to a new level. This is part because
of his talent and intelligence, part because the period of his life that
he chronicles contains a narrative that is truly heart wrenching. By the
end of the book, Seaton's 33 year old wife, the mother of his 18 month-old
IVF-conceived twins, has died from breast cancer.
Even without that, his lyrical description of his transition from boyhood
with his second-hand Raleigh Jubilee, to being a creditable amateur racer,
and then finding that he had to devote more time to his family, makes
this book an enduring pleasure. His observations are illuminating on dozens
of tiny matters of cycling interest: the tactile qualities of tubular
tyres; the social dynamics of the club run and; cycle apparel before and
after Lycra.
Here he is on a question that has tested all of us who have ever put
razor to leg: "For cyclists, the real question of shaving, the one
which no one dares to ask, is where to stop. In changing rooms at race
controls you would see all sorts of ad hoc solutions to this conundrum.
Some would shave to just above the point which their lycra shorts would
reach. This was fine as far as it went, but in the changing rooms it looked
ridiculous because it created the distinct visual impression that they
were wearing a pair of hair shorts. On a particularly hirsute cyclist
if could look like a pair of opaque tights cut off above the knee.".
Perhaps most important of all, however, Seaton unpicks the way that,
for him at least, his bicycle was so much more than a means of physically
travelling from A to B. His two wheeled odyssey is as much about his human
growth as his muscular development and for that reason is essential reading
for all who seek to explore their own transports of delight.
PS July 2008
|
Bookmark this on Delicious
Follow the site!
Join our list we will let you known when new reviews
are added to the site. We will never share your email address with
third parties.
tim@timdawsn.demon.co.uk
You can also follow us on Facebook
|
Visit our sister site
for dispassionate, expert advice on general cycling
issues
|
How this site is organised
As reviews are added, they are featured on the
front page. All titles are listed in the master index and cross-referenced
in the other indicies.
The subject line contains the title, author and
date of each book's publication. As a general rule, we list the
date of the actual edition that we read, unless there is an obvious
reason to use the original date (say where we read a reprint).
The first line of the main text contains the name
of the publisher, the ISBN
number, where it exists, an indication of the book's
size and the number of printed pages that it contains. Finally,
where it is clear, I list the published price of the work in the
currency that is most prominently displayed.
We summarise the book in a single sentence or two
in the next line. The rest of the review is then intended as a self-contained
piece.
|
|