The bouts between Louis and Schmel­ing were invest­ed with great pas­sion and dra­ma. Joe Louis, unde­feat­ed and regard­ed as like­ly to become only the sec­ond black world’s heavy­weight cham­pi­on, was knocked out in the 1936 fight in a shock­ing upset. Max Schmel­ing, embraced by Hitler and the Third Reich, was then vicious­ly dis­man­tled in a first round knock­out in the 1938 rematch. Louis’ revenge for his ear­li­er defeat was per­son­al, but giv­en the his­tor­i­cal con­text, his vic­to­ry also rep­re­sent­ed a nation­al tri­umph. As a result, Louis assumed hero­ic stature as America’s rep­re­sen­ta­tive glad­i­a­tor, and the cheer­ing was under­stand­ably most ardent among blacks and Jews. 

As Margolick’s title sug­gests, mere ath­let­ic glo­ry is too con­fin­ing for these pro­tag­o­nists. Their lib­er­at­ing effect enabled them to tran­scend racial and polit­i­cal bar­ri­ers as the world edged toward war. This is an engross­ing book for even the casu­al sports fan.