Book excerpt: "This book illustrates the complete story of boxing, from the professionally trained pugilists of the classical amphitheatres, who fought to the death with vicious studs strapped to their hands, through the thick-set bare-fist sluggers who met in the hundred-round contests of the nineteenth century, to today's heroes, mainly from impoverished backgrounds, for whom boxing is the only route up from crime and destitution to TV stardom, uncountable riches and world fame."--Book flap.