BOOK REVIEW
Tea With Mr Newton
Rob Hadgraft
Desert Island Books

TEA with Mr Newton was considered an essential component of any serious runner’s development and Rob Hadgraft’s easy to read biography of the life of Arthur Newton will have similar appeal to a wide spectrum of South Africans.

Newton was a vicar’s son who ­emigrated from England to the “Last outpost of the British Empire” in South Africa towards the end of the Boer Wars. Having tried his hand both as a teacher and in the commercial world, Newton took up farming on the south coast of Natal. As a result of land claim disputes with the Pretoria ­government, he decided to run the 1922 Comrades Marathon as a means of gaining publicity for his plight.

It is a mistake to try to classify this well­researched book, as it will satisfy different needs for different readers.

Hadgraft’s portrayal of Newton’s life reads like a novel, while providing historic insight into Natal and South Africa in the mid- twenties. His battle with the government eventually converted him from prosperous farmer to all-but-penniless tramp, and prompted his 1 300-kilometre walk to a new life in the then Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and eventually to the land of his birth where he ­became one of the world’s most ­renowned coaches.

During his 13 competitive years Newton covered over 160 000 kilometres of running and walking in what author Rob Hadgraft calls “the longest protest march in history”, but the athletics world recognises him as one of the greatest thinkers and ­masters of distance running. For this reason, ­runners and aspirant Comrade Marathoners will find this a useful coaching manual.

Newton went on to break records at distances from 50 to 240 kilometres, and run on four continents, including a race across the width of the United States. His experience, lessons and advice form the basis for Newton’s Laws of Running — Professor Tim Noakes identifies them in his definitive work The Lore of Running — which are in the final chapter.

This is Hadgraft’s fourth ­detailed biography of athletics’s greats, and it’s one that should find its place on the bookshelf of anyone with the ­remotest interest in running, the Comrades Marathon or life in colonial South ­Africa.

Norrie Williamson