Bench Press [Paperback]

Sven Lindqvist (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 1, 2003

In Bench Press, Sven Lindqvist intersperses the story of his own toils in the gym with the history of bodybuilding. Quoting from Arnold Schwarzenegger and Japanese writer Yukio Mishima, Lindqvist muses on what bodybuilding's increasing popularity says about contemporary society. Bench Press is an intoxicating blend of philosophical and political insight, emotional candor, and forgotten annals of the history of exertion.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Sven Lindqvist is one of the most original and imaginative authors working today."

About the Author

Sven Lindqvist was born in Stockholm in 1932 where he still lives, and has travelled extensively through Asia, Africa and Latin America. He is the author of A History of Bombing, 'Exterminate All The Brutes' and Desert Divers, shortlisted for the Thomas Cook Travel Award.

Product Details

• Paperback: 122 pages
• Publisher: Granta UK; Revised edition (August 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1862075727
• ISBN-13: 978-1862075726
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 6.4 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,077,090 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

30 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Body, Mind and Spirit, December 19, 2005

By 

Steven R. McEvoy "MCWPP" (Canada) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Bench Press (Paperback)

What do an aging 50-year-old writer and a skinhead body builder have in common? This is an intriguing little book, written part as memoir and part as history of working out, weights and bodybuilding, and little bit of dreams. Sven, who is our 50- year-old writer, meets the skinhead in the sauna; they end up talking, as people will at the gym, and a man who only swam laps started working out. Yet in the process of working out, he experiences an almost religious epiphany.
A man, who was happy as a writer traveling the world, and was content with middle age, slowly reawakens dreams from his youth. As he workouts, Sven remembers childhood dreams, like a desire to visit the Sahara desert.
This book begins with a quote from Marcus Aurelius; "Does transformation frighten you? Yet what can happen without transformation? Can you yourself take a hot bath without the wood being transformed, can you nourish yourself without the food being transformed? Do you not then see that your own transformation is equally necessary?", and this book will change you. As I read it, my own childhood dreams and aspirations, long put away, were awakened. This book is broken up into 85 penses or thoughts. Some are the personal reflections of the author, some of history, and tidbits of information fun and bizarre, and a few are visions that Sven has along his journey.
This book is the first in a trilogy. The last chapters of the first two are the first chapter of the next. They are Desert Divers , a journey into the desert to see childhood dreams, and Exterminate All the Brutes, a history of genocides in Africa committed by Europeans and leading up to the great genocide of the Nazi reign. Sven, in the preface to Bench Press, states: "As a boy, I read about fire-eaters and well-divers, sandstorms and desert lakes. I dreamed of going to the Sahara. Bench Press is the story of how I found my dream again.......these books grew out of one another and form a single unit, taking the reader from the self-obsessed physical culture of the early 1980's to a new awareness of the crimes of the past and the threats lying ahead in the future."
Lindqvist books in English are not easy to find, but are well worth the effort. Back to the writer and the skinhead, what they have in common is self-image and self- doubt that can be overcome, and dreams that are assisted by building the body. Or as Montaigne stated a long time ago: "To Strengthen the mind you must harden the muscles." Use this book for the mind and maybe it will challenge you to do some work on tuning up the body as well.

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Bench Press for the brain, August 27, 2003

By 

Stephen Chapman (victoria Australia) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Bench Press (Paperback)

Sven Lindqvist's book is definitely not for the bench press fanatic of the macho fraternity. A book of ethereal snippets, dreams, observations and interesting historical facts with an underlying theme of weight training & physical culture.
Written by a middle class Scandinavian intellectual, the title could be very deceiving for someone looking for a training book.
Its a pretty slim volume but I found it a worthwhile addition to my iron game library. Its easy to read so I suppose that means the translation from the original Swedish is good!