Our Price: € 13.50

Publisher: Kingpin Publishers, 2007
Edition: Paperback medium
ISBN: 978-095555120-8
Pages: 194
Language: English

Born in London of poor Irish parents, hardened on the streets by the age of seven, out of school at fourteen, John Healy casts himself neither as hero nor victim as he recalls the downward spiral of his teenage years, overwhelmed by alcoholism, isolated on the edge of society.

Pressed into the army, bruised by military prison and the boxing ring, dependent on booze, he ends up in the grass arena - the terrifying world ruled by psychopaths and peopled by beggars, con-men, thieves, prostitutes and killers, where the law is enforced with the broken bottle, the boot and the knife.

A sordid early death seems inevitable until, in prison, he learns to play chess. His single-minded devotion to the game combines with a remarkable natural ability: he becomes a tournament champion, he plays grandmasters; his games are reported in the national press. One addiction is abandoned for another and his life is transformed. Peace of mind, however, remains elusive - and the quest continues.

John Healy has written an astonishing autobiography. By turns lyrical and brutal, The Grass Arena scalds the reader with the harsh intensity of its vision.

Guardian:
"Brilliant...universally acclaimed."

Irish Post:
"An autobiographical classic."

Literary Review:
"Sober and precise, grotesque, violent, sad, charming and hilarious all at once."

The Sunday Times:
"Compellingly readable."

Anne Holohan, The Irish in Britain:
"Eloquent and brutal."

Colin McCabe:
"The only book which even begins to evoke a real comparison in English is William Burroughs' 'Junkie'."

Iain Sinclair, London Review of Books:
"The Grass Arena is a devastating account, told directly and without subterfuge. These painfully retrieved highlights stun the reader like blows from an invisible assailant, leaving him dizzy, and slightly high, trembling in an amphetamine stutter."