Stroke of Genius: Victor Trumper and the Shot that Changed Cricket, Penguin Random House, Sydney, 2016
If Trumper is a legend, George Beldam’s ‘Jumping Out’ has become an icon. But that image has almost paradoxically obscured the story of its subject. Man and photograph have entranced Gideon Haigh since childhood, and inStroke of Genius he explores both the real Victor Trumper and the process of his iconography. Together they inspired a profound moral and aesthetic revaluation of the game, and changed the way we think about cricket, art and Australia. In this inventive, fresh and compelling work of history, Haigh reveals how Trumper, and Beldam’s incarnation of his brilliance, are at the intersection of sport and art, history and timelessness, reality and myth. (blurb)
The book is reviewed by Derek Abbott for Honest History. Haigh writes about the book for espncricinfo. He also gave a lecture on Trumper. There’s an extract from the book in The Saturday Paper (if you can avoid its paywall). A review by Russell Jackson in Guardian Australia. Years ago, Haigh wrote a piece on Trumper’s batting partner, Reggie Duff.
There is a Victor Trumper Society. Gideon Haigh once had a cat called Trumper. Gideon Haigh is one of Honest History’s distinguished supporters. Gideon Haigh’s book Certain Admissions won the Ned Kelly Award for true crime and was reviewed by David Stephens for Honest History.
