Mayo man produces top-class new boxing book

NOW that Christmas is upon us and sports books are high on the wish-list of many we take a look at a wonderful production from Mayo man Kevin Martin which is sure to be under many Christmas trees on December 25.

In 1903, the National Police Gazette wrote that Irish boxers were greeted by audiences with "a hearty cheer and earnest backing." For a time in the United States, the Irishman became the idealised boxer—the apotheosis of masculinity. The “Emperors of Masculinity,” as author Randy Roberts described the leading heavyweight boxers of the era, had become Emerald Emperors. This book is the first in-depth study of the role played by the Irish and Irish Americans in US boxing. It examines the lives of many men who contributed to the sport’s development and looks at social, cultural, and historical facets of their lives and careers. It is a story of assimilation, achievement, and heartbreak in the most brutal sport of all.

Martin, a native of Crossmolina and current Castlebar resident is a retired lecturer in Irish social and cultural history and has worked tirelessly to produce this top-class publication. There are boxing books that tally wins and losses like accountants at their desk, and then there are books that understand boxing as a human drama played out under hot lights and heavy ghosts. Emperors of the Ring belongs firmly in the second camp. Kevin Martin doesn’t just chronicle champions; he studies power — who holds it, who loses it, and who pays the price when fists become currency.

This is a book about dominance, yes, but also about fragility. Martin writes with a historian’s discipline and a storyteller’s instinct. He knows that every emperor, whether crowned by belts or myth, is only ever one bad night away from exile. From the golden age to the modern circus, he tracks how fighters rise, how they are sold to the public, and how the machine that builds them eventually turns and eats its own.

What stands out most is Martin’s refusal to romanticise boxing while still respecting the courage required to step between the ropes. He never sneers at the fighters, but he is ruthless on the systems around them — promoters, broadcasters, sanctioning bodies — the shadowy courtiers whispering behind the throne. The ring, in his telling, is both battlefield and stage, and the emperors are as much performers as warriors.

There’s an Irish journalist’s eye here: sharp, sceptical, allergic to hype. Martin cuts through boxing’s self-mythologising with clean prose and a moral compass that never wobbles. He understands that boxing’s greatness lies not in perfection but in contradiction — beauty and brutality sharing the same breath. You feel the sweat, the fear, the loneliness of the walk back to the dressing room when the crowd has already moved on.

For readers who love sport — really love it, warts and all — Emperors of the Ring lands with particular force. It asks the same questions Gaelic football asks in its quieter moments: what do we demand of our heroes, and what do we owe them when the cheering stops? Success is fleeting. Glory fades. Memory is the only belt that truly lasts.

This is not a book for casual fans chasing highlights. It’s for those who understand that sport is a mirror, and sometimes we don’t like what looks back. Clear-eyed, compassionate, and unflinching, Emperors of the Ring earns its place on the shelf — not as nostalgia, but as truth told straight.

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