Sunil Gavaskar: An illustrated biography

by Dom Moraes

196 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 1987

About the author

Dominic Francis Moraes (19 July 1938 – 2 June 2004) was an Indian writer and poet who published nearly 30 books in English. He is widely seen as a foundational figure in Indian English literature. His poems are a meaningful and substantial contribution to Indian and World literature.

Reviews

[Prabhat sharma · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sunil Gavaskar : An illustrated Biography: Dom Moraes- is an interesting Book from the point of view of research on cricket played round the world, charming photographs and interviews with people who have seen Gavaskar play and life of his contemporaries. This is one book which has analysed Gavaskar as a batsman, captain, fielder of merit and the effect on viewers at the he comes to take stance and start facing the attack as an opening batsman. Another quality of Gavaskar that he is helpful to all juniors who play with him - he takes initiative to talk to them, ask their problems and provide solutions. During foreign tour, he keeps juniors with him during dinner and during outings, parties. Inputs on cricket life of Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi, M L Jaisimha, G R Vishwanth, Ajit Wadekar, Milind Rege, Ramesh Nagdev, Ashok Mankad, Sudhir Naik, Anshuman Gaekwad, Hemant Waingankar, Dilip Vengsarkar, Ravi Shastri, Kapil Dev, Mahendra Amarnath, Salim Durrani and others. The author, Dom Moraes is a well traveled person and has friends amongst cricketers and other fields round the world whom he keeps meeting during his journalistic travels. His research has written well about cricket in England, Ceylon, West Indies, Pakistan, New Zealand. Interviews of his parents, wife, teammates reveal his growth as a cricketer. In the Book, A Maidan View- The Magic of Indian Cricket- Mihir Bose who is his senior at St Xaviers School has written that Jesuit priests who managed the school, encouraged students to play all games and especially cricket. This fact has been confirmed in this book. Budding cricketers were employed by Nirlon, ACC and other Indian companies, thus they especially Gavaskar had some financial security in life to commit themselves to the game. In Bombay, club cricket is played almost round the year including rainy season for some days, thus as Gavaskar has been shcool, college, university, Ranji Trophy, etc from Bombay he is close of Bombay players. One incident- Australia tour- when Gavaskar was declared LBW on a bowl by Lillee and on the follow through the bowler came to Gavaskar and showed that the ball had hit is pad. Gavaskar in anger asked the other batsman Chetan Chauhan to leave the field. While going back, the Manager, Wing Commander Shahid Durrani saw the situation and asked Dilip Vengsarkar to enter the field and also asked Chetan Chauhan to return back and start playing. Because of the research and photographs, the book is worth being stored for posterity.

[Salil Lavgankar · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are 2 ways to look at any events or person- either having a contemporary perspective or look later via hindsight, both with its own benefit and cons. For this particular book about a legendary person such as SMG, it offers an opportunity to look at the contemporary thinking that existed at the time about the man and the times.

However the book by Dom Moraes unfortunately doesn’t reach the expected heights and is a curious mix of interactions with Gavaskar and his family, friends, rivals and some objective analysis of his career. The book’s start itself is not something that will captivate you with the 1st Chapter- UnSunny Prelude seems to be more about the struggle of the author to get access to SMG within his busy schedule, and doesn’t throw any light on the personality of the subject which I assume was the objective.

The early chapters about Sunny’s childhood, and his rise to cricketing debut do offer some insights into his mindset and development of technique to some extent due to the position of the available cricketing space within their housing society and narrow lanes overall. Also the book seems to unnecessarily focus on his temper which is referred to in later stages as well with people either refuting or confirming.

For the rest, the book follows a linear path primarily through the career and given that it is written when Gavaskar was still playing in 1986, it had a lot of opportunities to focus on the cricketing environment, the players around SMG and so on but it just briefly touches on some aspects without giving a satisfactory feel to it. Also I could spot atleast one gross inaccuracy or laziness by the author- it mentions India playing under lights, in coloured clothing and a white ball in 1985 in Champions of Champions tournament for the 1st time which of course is untrue as India played atleast a few matches in 1981 in Australia and under the leadership of SMG himself.

The 3 star ratings for the book are primarily for the outstanding photographs of SMG with his family, on and off the field which probably won’t be easily available for a biography written years later, and hence makes it a collector’s item.

I would definitely suggest SMG by Devendra Prabhudesai as a highly comprehensive biography of SMG or any of Sunny’s own books. Probably the best way to look at this book is to view it as a visual journey of SMG’s career rather than any in-depth analysis or insights. That is the best way to avoid disappointment while reading the book, but still enjoying SMG’s journey

[Samikshan Sengupta · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well, from a writer of the calibre of Dom Moraes, I expected better.

The book consists of how many runs Sunil Gavaskar scored in which match, well known stories like how Dilip Sardesai predicted his double century in the West Indies series, the renowned myth of Sunil's rage (the man had guts, cricket or no cricket, standing up to Bal Thackeray requires much more than a solid front foot defense), etc, etc...

It provides little insight of HOW exactly Mr. Gavaskar was in person (apart from the rage, the appetite for runs & all that).

Brief glimpses of him playing with his mother in a narrow alley (hell yeah, I did so ! Infact, 80% of Indian kids probably did that) raise hopes, but only to be drowned by a fullisade of statistics.

Mr. Moraes, we know the stats, we can look it up in the internet. But in a biography, we wanted to hear stories of his life, see the pictures (figuratively, I mean. The photos are marvelous)

Any ways, the book sort of disappointed me. Sunil Gavaskar's autobiography was far better..