Fairways and Greens [Paperback]

Dan Jenkins (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1, 1995

"Tell me about plumbing, fine. Tell me about  carpentry, terrace gardening, the timer on VCRs. Go  ahead and explain cellophane. Tell me about all of  these things, but don't try to tell me about golf,  okay? Golf I know."--Dan  Jenkins

After four decades of covering golf-not to  mention "playing scratch from the blues and  gambling for my own money when I didn't have  any", Dan Jenkins most definitely knows golf. He may,  in fact, know the game better than anyone on the  planet. Now, his latest and long awaited  collection brings together his best writing on the game,  from serious pieces on timeless classics like the  1954 Masters and the 1960 Open to humorous takes on  everything from the best things in golf-the best  bar is Club XIX in the Pebble Beach Lodge-to his  unrequited love of golf carts. With a cast that  includes everyone from Hogan, Palmer, and Nicklaus to  all of the lurkers and spoilers on the PGA Tour,  the book is a timeless addition to great golf  literature.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

The fun in reading Dan Jenkins's golf writing is that no matter how askew his slant or how teed off he may be about something, he can never hide his passion for the game and the respect he has for the players who've nearly mastered it. This collection of nearly three dozen selections from his work at Sports Illustrated and Golf Digest is alternately irreverent and revering, continually insightful, and often hilarious.

Both his writing and his thinking are as bold as a six-foot putt uphill: his deep respect for the Ben Hogans, Tommy Bolts, and Byron Nelsons is as palpable as his disgust with the game's corporatization and the self-important foolishness of swing theorists and TV announcers. A fine golfer himself, Jenkins isn't content to just sit on the sidelines opining; "Golf with the Boss" is a luscious romp around the links with President Bush, and "You'll Not Do That Here, Laddie," has him touring, and suffering on, the courses of the game's birthplace in Scotland.

Years after the fact, his reportage continues to resonate and spin like a crisp drive on a chilly morning. "It was, I still believe, the most remarkable day in golf since Mary Queen of Scots found herself three down to an unbathed bagpiper and invented the back nine... What happened?" he asks in "Whoo-Ha, Arnie!," his dramatic account of the 1960 U.S. Open. "Oh, not much. Just a routine collision of three decades at one historical intersection. On that afternoon, in the span of just 18 holes, we witnessed the arrival of Nicklaus, the coronation of Palmer, and the end of Hogan." To be sure, it was one for the ages, and Jenkins's prose etches it in stone with dead-solid perfection. --Jeff Silverman

From Publishers Weekly

Jenkins ( Semi-Tough ) has been a golf writer for four decades, and his addiction to the sport is palpable in this collection of articles from Golf Digest and Sports Illustrated , with a few additions. His mania is best expressed in his final piece, about playing all the major courses in Scotland, including Old St. Andrews, which Jenkins writes about reverently. Other selections are in a lighter vein, about being a pariah during a tournament at the host club where he is a member, about spoiled players who make too much money and golf hustlers and semicompetent cable TV reporters and about the impossible job of the golf pro. Jenkins has a list of bests and warm comments about the greats he has known. His occasional attacks of whimsy and fantasy work less well. But Jenkins is always knowledgeable and entertaining.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: Anchor (May 1, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0385474261
• ISBN-13: 978-0385474269
• Product Dimensions: 5 x 0.7 x 7.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,099,312 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The best of one of golf's best writers, January 23, 2001

By 

rodboomboom (Dearborn, Michigan United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Fairways and Greens (Paperback)

Funny stories from this talented writer and lover of the game. Having followed golf from such a priviledged and close position, what makes Jenkins writing so enjoyable to me is his historical perspective. This guy can really put the contemporary players into historical perspective for us.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A Conversation with Dan Jenkins, April 1, 2007

By 

Big D (Auburn, AL. USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Fairways and Greens (Paperback)

It is important to remember what this book is...it is not a history of golf, though it does have some historical aspects about it. It is a collection of the best writing of one of golf's all-time best writers.
It's funny, humorous and, at times, touching...it is not designed to be golf history...

The book is best read and enjoyed when read as if one is sitting around a table with Dan and his friends, having a beer(s) and swapping stories. That's what it is really---ole Dan Jenkins, the best writer of his day,telling stories about how it once was, what made golf special then and lends to the specialness of golf today.

Take it for what it is, enjoy and remember how it was before metal woods, hot balls and the corporate takeover of golf. This is a book for old guys, those of us who remember and appreciate Hogan, Nelson, Palmer, Nicklaus, the old crowd.

Young fans of golf today, say 50 and younger, need to come to an appreciation of those men as icons of golf, then read this book to see and understand them as flesh and blood people, something more full and colorful than simple iconic figures.

This book has a place in golf history. It is about a time that has passed, a very human and humorous look at golf as it once was, a time that was pretty good to those of us who lived through it and appreciated it then---and now.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars "Laugh-out-loud" funny!, August 25, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Fairways and Greens (Paperback)

Fairways and Greens provides a "laugh-out-loud funny", account of Jenkins experiences in the golf world over the past fifty some-odd years. An irreverent but often factually accurate account of the game of golf in general and many of the PGA's all-time heros, in particular.