Lions in Africa - A new Book about an old rivalry
Lions in Africa - Talking to author David McLennan
On today’s podcast I’m joined by our resident Rugby Union writer Daniel Cullinane to talk with one of the two authors of a new book, Lions in Africa, a history of the British & Irish Lions and their tours to South Africa.
Daniel and I have a long-distance chat with South African rare book dealer and author, David McLennan, co-author of ‘Lions in Africa’. His fellow author Chris Schoeman did join us, but thanks to the vagaries of modern technology, we couldn’t hear him so he had to leave the zoom room.
On today’s podcast we talk to David about;
How he navigated writing the first 6 chapters of the book, dealing with Lions tours from the 19th Century and the early 20th century
The conditions the players would have been faced with on their journey to South Africa
The places they may have stayed and travelled to on their journies to all parts of South Africa
The make-up of those South African sides, and the demographic that they would have belonged to
The case of Rugby forging friendships despite deep political divides and even war
How the tours have changed over the years, and how they started compared to the giant commercial operation it is today.
How covid has affected tour preparations so far and what the Lions can expect from a country badly affected by Covid-19
The book was a real pleasure to read and meticulously researched. It will be available in August and you can find out a bit more about it here. https://www.amberley-books.com/lions-in-africa.html
Check out the podcast below, and wherever you get your podcasts from.
