James Klagge's Reviews > Zatopek the Marathon Victor

Written in 1954 after the high point of Zatopek's career, but by no means the end of his career. It is written by a reporter who apparently had considerable access doing numerous interviews--so that it is full of detailed accounts of races and experiences that could only be gained in this way. To that extent it is a valuable and interesting book. On the other hand it is written by one who is committed to, or forced by the censors to write in the style of, "socialist realism." Zatopek encounters obstacles, but always over comes them for the sake of his country and fellow workers. The chapter about his never-to-be-equalled accomplishment at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics (winning the 5K, 10K and marathon) concludes as follows (p. 183): "As an athlete he had reached hitherto unattained summits, as a man he had won the hearts of all peace-loving men who appreciate hard work and good sportsmanship. In his home country, not only the sportsmen, but also the workers, followed his example and set a higher pace for their work, in order to hasten the building of socialism in their country. Thus Emil's success bore rich fruits in this sphere as well." So each chapter seems to veer off into a sappy moral of some kind. There was very little overt politics. Many mentions of how athletes are all peace-loving, and there were no negative comments about Western runners. In fact Zatopek was very catholic in his friendships. Zatopek did start running during the years before WWII, when Czechoslovakia was a free country--but there was a brief reference to the greedy factory owner who made Zatopek work in unhealthy conditions. And after the war there was no mention of the problematic transition to communism. There is no, and there will probably never be a, good biography that honestly covers how Zatopek handled living under communism. We know that in 1968 he spoke out against the communist regime, and was then internally exiled for the next 20 years. But I have just heard of a novel that does cover that issue: "Running: A Novel," by Jean Echenoz, so I will try to get ahold of that.
I'm happy to confess that I did not buy this book (I have only occasionally seen it available on amazon, and then for $500+). I got it through interlibrary loan! The book has loads of good photos, but they are not at all aligned with the chronology of events as they unfold.