Pre-Owned Wrestling Observer's Tributes: Remembering Some of the World's Greatest Wrestlers (Hardcover) 1553660854 9781553660859

The Official record of professional wrestling is written on gossamer - easily forgotten by greedy promoters, performers addicted to the life and fans bloodthirsty for more story lines. The fantasy world that is professional wrestling is less enticing if it bears any firm connection to reality and, most of the time, we like it that way. But the spectacle has amassed a body count in recent years that boggles the imagination and calls the business out. Ten bell salutes, the traditional paying of respect for fallen performers, and memorial graphics streaming across television screens, have taken on the likeness of national anthems at baseball games: their meaning steeped in sadness, but now lost to the average fan. Tributes: Remembering Some of the World's Greatest Wrestlers is a detailed chronicle of the lives, times and passings of the biggest names the sport has produced in the modern era. It is an authoritative record of legends like Andre the Giant, Owen Hart, Kerry and Fritz Von Erich, Rick Rude, Bruiser Brody, and a dozen more who couldn't walk away from the fame and the treadmill that came with it, even when their bodies quit and their families begged them to stop. It is an homage to their athletic ability, their charisma and drive, a celebration of the characters they brought us, and a warning to those who figure to follow in their footsteps. Book jacket.