Rugby saturation point reached with Kidney biography
IF THE consumption of books is steady, as numbers suggest, within total book sales lie little sub-categories of larger sections. These rise and fall, quite naturally, as human interests change. In sport this is quite easy to see; as a game gains popularity, publications follow, and three or four books turns into a full shelf pretty quickly.
It is certainly noticeable how many books on Mixed Martial Arts are now squeezed into the Book Centre’s shelves, as opposed to five years ago. Rugby, not exactly coming from nowhere like MMA, has also seen a massive increase in interest level and therefore the books have followed.
But there is a saturation point. A time when the interesting ideas run dry, the big names have already put pen to paper, and someone decides to go in another direction. That point could have been reached with the release of ‘Declan Kidney - The Master’.
There are two ways to approach a biography. You could go out and do new work, interview key people in the career of your subject, delve into the finer details of what made the man tick. A thorough look at the achievements of the coach a few years on.
Or, you could do what Liam Hayes does in this publication. That is, find quotes that are already in the public sphere and mash them together to form a book of just over 250 pages that spans a professional coaching career of more than 15 years.
The first option can be successful with the recycled quotes thrown in but, as a reader, there’s always something more authentic about a publication that needed that extra work to tease out the little idiosyncrasies.
The cynic might suggest that if you throw this together, place a big name and face on the cover, it’s all about the bottom line more than the end result. Yet, despite his success, is Kidney a big enough draw to sell huge numbers in that way?
In this instance it feels like that’s the angle of the publishing company and that maybe Hayes wanted to chronicle a high-achiever that isn’t the most likely candidate to put pen to paper himself.
Maybe you can get away with that in this country and people will still buy the book. The thing is, put it next to any half-decent European or American sports biography and there really is no comparison.
Whatever the reason for the book, it could have been better. Apart from the content, there are too many typos dotted throughout the publication. The two sections are a little peculiar - ‘The Man’, the first 20 pages, touches on Kidney the person but it’s hollow.
Part two is ‘The Master’, unravelling his professional coaching career. For someone who doesn’t know a lot about the coaching of Declan Kidney, it will certainly give you an idea of what made him tick, through his own sound bites and those of others.
The book moves along with the undercurrent of Kidney’s relationship with Ronan O’Gara through the years and the quotes deal with that situation reasonably well. Another plus is that the language is fairly simple, making it accessible to a younger audience.
From a Wexford point of view there are a few mentions of Gordon D’Arcy but they are fleeting and his relationship with the former Ireland boss is not focused on the same way as other relationships.
Who will buy this? Honestly, maybe only Munster fans with a long-held appreciation for Kidney. There’s nothing new or massively eye-opening about ‘The Master’ and there are far better books to spent a hard-earned 20 quid on.
DEAN GOODISON
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