[Book Review] Once Upon a Time in Naples

In the minds of the English public, Diego Armando Maradona is simply a cheat. The Hand of God image is the one that stuck in the nation’s collective memory putting all the rest of his achievements in a shadow.

Whish is unfortunate because Maradona is very much the kind of hero that the English love. He was the key player as Napoli – hailing from Italy’s poor South – won the only two titles of their history emerging from a history of consistent failure to beat their richer and more powerful neighbours.

In between, he scored some magnificent goals and regularly put on show his fantastic skills, all the time juggling football with a more shadowy private life full of excesses. In other words, his story is one worth telling.

John Ludden agrees, which is why he’s written Once Upon A Time in Naples, a book that focuses on Maradona’s time in the Southern Italian city. And he does a good job starting from an analysis of the reasons that led Barcelona to sell such a talent and going into his increasingly troubled stay with the occasional glance at his Argentina career.

He has also gone into a lot of detail, relaying innumerable games where Maradona starred. On the whole, perhaps there is too much detail as most games don’t really matter in the bigger picture.

Yet you can hardly blame Ludden for doing his research, something that he has done very well. There is nothing truly revealing here as everything is public knowledge in Italy – and in this sense the book would have achieved greater insight had he actually spoken to some of those who surrounded Maradona - but for the British audience most of what is written here will come as news.

The problem with Once Upon A Time In Naples is that Ludden likes to use big words. A lot. A typical excerpt is “high above in the Presidential box, Silvio Berlusconi, dressed divinely by Italy’s finest tailors, took the acclaim of the adoring crowd” . Once in a while wouldn’t be a problem but he seems to write this way constantly and continuously.

If this sort of writing style doesn’t bother you then you’ll probably love this book. Otherwise, however, I’d steer well clear.

This article was published on squarefootball.net on the 13th October 2005.