Willy Meisl was a trailblazing Austrian-Jewish sports journalist who revolutionised the field during the Weimar Republic.
A product of Vienna’s vibrant coffeehouse culture, he brought intellectual depth to sports writing, exploring professionalism, tactics, and sporting history with the flair of a cultural critic.
Known as the "King of the Sports Journalists," Meisl’s influence was unmatched. But with the rise of the Nazis, his focus shifted. Forced into exile, he turned his sharp pen to the roots of Nazism, its reign of terror, and the myths of racial ideology that upended his life.
Meisl also became a leading sports journalist in Britain after the war and a critic of English football, which he considered to be far behind Central Europe. To be a leading journalist in one country and then a highly influential journalist in a foreign language after fleeing for his life speaks to his remarkable adaptability and intellect.
This volume gathers his most powerful writings on these themes, presented in their original German with English introductions. A forgotten pioneer of interwar journalism, Meisl’s work remains as urgent and insightful today as it was in his time.
Authors Darren O’ Bryne and Christopher Young will be in conversation with David Bolchover, author, commentator and business writer. His latest book is “The Greatest Comeback: From Genocide to Football Glory”, a biography of the football coach Béla Guttmann. The book was shortlisted for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year. David is currently writing a book on great Jewish footballers throughout Europe who were murdered in the Holocaust.
