This book surveys the practice of horse racing from antiquity to the modern period, and in this way offers a selective global history. Unlike previous histories of horse racing, which generally make claims about the exclusiveness of modern sport and therefore diminish the importance of premodern physical contests, the contributors to this book approach racing as a deep history of diachronically comparable practices, discourses, and perceptions centered around the competitive staging of equine speed. In order to compare horse racing cultures from completely different epochs and regions, the authors respond to a series of core issues which serve as structural comparative parameters. These key issues include the spatial and architectural framework of races; their organization; victory prizes; symbolic representations of victories and victors; and the social range and identities of the participants. The evidence of these competitions is interpreted in its distinct historical contexts and with regard to specific cultural conditions that shaped the respective relationship between owners, riders, and horses on the global racetracks of pre-modernity and modernity. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of The International Journal of the History of Sport.

Magic messed up everything. It always chose the worst time to screw everything up. Billy was fine. He kept his magical life away from his normal life and he was happy. Then, everything happened at once. Billy's passion was football. It was simple. It was enjoyable. It was pure. There was only one way to play and the thought that magic couldn't corrupt it. Then someone cheated and his world fell apart. The most amazing player in decades turned out to be cheating magically. There was nothing Billy could do about it. The NFL was a fantasy place. It was on TV and it was real, but it was so far away. Yes, Billy could use magic, he had magical friends, but he was just a fast food closing manager. He couldn't do anything about anything. Then, everyone in the world suddenly spontaneously transforms into centaurs. They don't transform into the traditional equine lower body with a human upper torso, they become centaurs with the lower bodies of a variety of animals. The world is decimated overnight. People find themselves too small or too big for their vehicles. Cars and planes careen out of control and there is massive loss of life. Everything is affected from food production to transportation to football players. The whole world is in chaos. Finding out that one of his magical friends was inadvertently associated with the transformation, Billy learns that a magical event was going to take place in the near future. It's called Brianna's Call and it is the return of magic to the Earth. The only way that the world can transform back into their human bodies is for them to intercept Brianna's Call. In order to do that, Billy must join his favorite NFL team and take them to the championship game. Brianna's Call is going to touch down on Super Bowl Sunday at the Super Bowl. Along the way, Billy must confront the cheating NFL player, battle powerful wizards intent on collecting Brianna's Call for themselves, and deal with a jealous girlfriend.

WINNER OF THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD AND THE PRIX DU MEILLEUR LIVRE ÉTRANGER The Centaur is a modern retelling of the legend of Chiron, the noblest and wisest of the centaurs, who, painfully wounded yet unable to die, gave up his immortality on behalf of Prometheus. In the retelling, Olympus becomes small-town Olinger High School; Chiron is George Caldwell, a science teacher there; and Prometheus is Caldwell’s fifteen-year-old son, Peter. Brilliantly conflating the author’s remembered past with tales from Greek mythology, John Updike translates Chiron’s agonized search for relief into the incidents and accidents of three winter days spent in rural Pennsylvania in 1947. The result, said the judges of the National Book Award, is “a courageous and brilliant account of a conflict in gifts between an inarticulate American father and his highly articulate son.”

**WINNER OF THE GENERAL OUTSTANDING SPORTS BOOK OF THE YEAR AWARD** **SHORTLISTED FOR THE WILLIAM HILL SPORTS BOOK OF THE YEAR 2017** Coping with your own death, when you are not yet dead, is a strange thing... A natural on a horse since he was able to walk, and imbued with a pure love of riding, Declan Murphy became one of the most brilliant jockeys of his generation before his world came crashing down at the final hurdle of a race at Haydock Park. His skull shattered in twelve places, he was believed to be dead, the last rites were read and the Racing Post prepared his obituary. Miraculously, and the word is not used lightly, he survived and defied medical thinking in recovering to the extent that eighteen months after his fall, he was able to saddle up for one more race. As usual, he won. For 23 years, Declan has been unable to tell his story, to bring to words existence on the frontier between life and death, to describe the incredible bond between man and horse. But now, in an extraordinary collaboration with Ami Rao, she has helped him find those words, a way to piece together what happened before, during and after, what it all meant and what it means to us all. It is a story of triumph, fear, love and loss, by turns primal, heartbreaking and inspirational, and ultimately, it is the story of hope, and of life.

Stella left one life behind for another. Finding happiness in a new world, Stella never thought anything could destroy her new life. Until a package arrived containing a severed head. The threat was clear and the stakes were high. Leaving her new life behind, Stella hoped her choice would protect her loved ones. Now twelve years later, someone had discovered Stella’s identity. People she loves are starting to die at the hands of a very cold and calculated killer. Forced out of hiding, Stella moves fast to protect her family. Can the Centaur Agency discover the identity of the killer in time? Or will Stella lose everyone she has ever loved?

The Centaur is a story of a man who is uncomfortable in the modern world and seeks to find the relief from this feeling. He takes vacation to get back in touch with Nature, and heads for Caucasus, the land, which he believes is not yet polluted with the imprint of progress. On his way, he encounters several individuals who argue both for and against the reality of his discomfort and the meaning behind it. Thus, the whole story turns into an opposition and, at the same time, friendship between two sorts of man: the skeptic and the dreamer. The conflict reaches its climax as climax as the travellers see a herd of the mythical creatures, centaurs. This encounter arouses the feeling of supernatural horror. The characters feel the outside force dominating them. Yet, each handles this situation differently. Some get obsessed, while others come away with a feeling of discovered truth. A deeply philosophical novel about our inner drive to discover the mysteries of the world, that remains topical for all times.

Supplemented by seventy-five photographs, Centaur will engross specialists and general readers interested in biography, cultural history, art, architecture, politics, and Russian/Soviet studies."--BOOK JACKET.

In this spiritual memoir, Joshua Rice explores his Pentecostal history in search of a tangible theology to fall in love with. From the revivalist urges of the Deep South to mainline Protestant halls of learning, this quest for God leads to and through personal stories of encounter, of dissonance, of doubt, and of faith. Since the Azusa Street Revival launched the global Pentecostal movement a century ago, the chase has been on to figure out what God is up to. The Jewish Centaur follows the trail, seeking to discover.

A Study Guide for May Swenson's "The Centaur," excerpted from Gale's acclaimed Poetry for Students. This concise study guide includes plot summary; character analysis; author biography; study questions; historical context; suggestions for further reading; and much more. For any literature project, trust Poetry for Students for all of your research needs.