One of South Africa’s finest batsmen in the first half of the twentieth century, Eric Rowan (1909-1993) will always be remembered for his cocky and fiercely combative approach to every match in which he played. A highly courageous player, he was prepared to take on Lindwall and Miller at their fastest without the benefit of either gloves or box. To him the very thought of a helmet and other modern protective gear would have been anathema. No stranger to controversy, he sat down on the pitch when a Lancashire crowd barracked him for slow scoring, was controversially omitted from South Africa’s 1947 tour of England and had his Test career ended by the South African Cricket Association for reasons other than cricket. Using a variety of sources and photographs from the Brian Bassano collection, Rick Smith describes the career of this South African whose approach to cricket would have been very much at home in the modern era. In his Test career lasting from 1935 to 1951 Eric Rowan scored 1,965 runs at an average of 43.66. In 1951, aged 42, he made 236 against England at Leeds which was then South Africa’s highest individual score in a Test match. He is still the oldest cricketer to score a Test match double century. Durable to the end, Eric’s career ended in the 1953/1954 season when he was not far short of his 45th birthday.

Funny, thought-provoking, and incredibly disturbing, Slow Death by Rubber Duck reveals that just the living of daily life creates a chemical soup inside each of us. Pollution is no longer just about belching smokestacks and ugly sewer pipes - now, it's personal. The most dangerous pollution has always come from commonplace items in our homes and workplaces. Smith and Lourie ingested and inhaled a host of things that surround all of us all the time. This book exposes the extent to which we are poisoned every day of our lives. For this book, over the period of a week - the kind of week that would be familiar to most people - the authors use their own bodies as the reference point and tell the story of pollution in our modern world, the miscreant corporate giants who manufacture the toxins, the weak-kneed government officials who let it happen, and the effects on people and families across the globe. Parents and concerned citizens will have to read this book. Key concerns raised in Slow Death by Rubber Duck: • Flame-retardant chemicals from electronics and household dust polluting our blood. • Toxins in our urine caused by leaching from plastics and run-of-the-mill shampoos, toothpastes and deodorant. • Mercury in our blood from eating tuna. • The chemicals that build up in our body when carpets and upholstery off-gas. Ultimately hopeful, the book empowers readers with some simple ideas for protecting themselves and their families, and changing things for the better.

Cricket matches didn't always top out at five days, regardless of a result or not – they used to be 'timeless', with play continuing until one team won, no matter how many days that took. The last of these – which took place in Durban in 1939, in a series pitched against the backdrop of impending war – is now universally acknowledged as 'the timeless Test'. Weighing in at a prodigious ten days – the match stretched from 3–14 March 1939, and allowed for two rest days, while one day's play (the eighth) was lost entirely to rain – it is quite simply the longest Test ever played. A litany of records also perished in its wake and 'whole pages of Wisden were ruthlessly made obsolete'. If that was not enough, one player, the fastidious South African batsman Ken Viljoen, felt the need to have his hair cut twice during the game. Only the matches between Australia and England at Melbourne in 1929, which lasted eight playing days, and West Indies and England at Sabina Park, Jamaica, a year later (seven days), come remotely close in terms of their duration. In Edging Towards Darkness, John Lazenby tells the story of that Test for the first time. Set firmly in its historical and social setting, the story balances this game against the threat of encroaching world war in Europe – unfolding at terrifying speed – before bringing these two disparate strands together in an evocative and vibrant denouement.

'Caught Behind' chronicles the events and political intrigue that led to South Africa's cricket isolation in the apartheid era and its eventual readmission and throws new light on the role of black cricket and black cricketers in South Africa, who until recently were omitted from the country's sporting history.

This book traces British and South African relations from the Boer War to the present.

Starting with the period from 1889, this title profiles all the cricket captains to the present, bringing the story up to date with chapters on Hansie Cronje and Shaun Pollock.

From the authors of the bestselling Slow Death by Rubber Duck comes Toxin Toxout: Getting Harmful Chemicals Out of Our Bodies and Our World. Yes, the Rubber Duck boys are back and, after showing us all the ways that toxins get in our bodies, now they give us a guide for scrubbing those toxins out.Following the runaway success of their first book, two of the world's leading environmental activists give practical and often surprising advice for removing toxic chemicals from our bodies and homes. There are over 80,000 synthetic chemicals in commerce today, including hormone-disrupting phthalates and parabens, cancer-causing pesticides, heavy metals and air pollutants. Rick Smith and Bruce Lourie use their outrageous experiments (on themselves and their brave volunteers) to prove how easily our bodies absorb these chemicals from the foods we eat, the air we breathe, and the products we smear on our skin &– day after day. Then they give us the good news about what is in our control and the steps we can take for reducing our toxic burden. They investigate the truth behind organic foods, which detox methods actually work, if indoor air quality is improving, and how we dispose of waste (where do those chemicals go?). The result is nothing short of a must-read prescription for a healthier life.