Customer Reviews

St Andrews Links: Six Centuries of Golf

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

When I heard about ST. ANDREWS: SIX CENTURIES OF GOLF I couldn't move fast enough to obtain a personal copy. As the title seemed to imply, I looked forward to reading about golf as it had been played since before Christopher Columbus at the Home of Golf. What would the book include? Perhaps a detailed account of golf history as it unfolded in St. Andrews? A detailed history of how the land was first discovered as an ideal venue for the evolving game? A look at how the equipment of the game, balls and clubs, evolved at St. Andrews? Maybe detailed accounts of early tournaments and golf events on the Old Course and their participants and winners? I hoped that this would be a volume that would answer these and many other questions about the Royal and Ancient game of golf.

Instead, what unfolds here is a dreary dialog involving such weird and boring things as the politics of St. Andrews. Yes, the politics did impact golf, but why not keep politics in the background and bring forward a rich history of a game, its notable players and a preeminent place? Rather, the author also goes to great lengths to describe such riveting things as how facilities for changing clothes were provided, how driving ranges were added and how sprinkler systems were added. What total nonsense! How do such mundane things play at all into a book title that seems to promise so much.

Add a preface by Jack Nicklaus. After finishing the book, I went back and read the Nicklaus's preface again. After a second careful review of the Golden Bear's assessment of the book, I had to conclude that Nicklaus probably wrote his comments either before reading the book or after a cursory review of a few of the pages therein. I just cannot bring myself to believe that Nicklaus would have written his glowing preface after a careful reading of this volume.

The only redeeming pages of ST. ANDREWS: SIX CENTURIESW OF GOLF are those that deal with some of the "The People Who Brought the Links to Life", "St. Andrews and the Open Championship" and "Winners of the Open at St. Andrews." These pages account for the very weak two stars that I give this monumentally disappointing book.

THE (GOLFING) HORSEMAN

This the updated version of St. Andrews Golf Links - The First 600 Years, with a forward by Tom Watson. "Both versions" were released in 1995, but this version was updated with newer photos and information on the new Castle Course.

I recommend that you skip the other book and pick this one up...

It's very interesting....