The Iceman writeth

WRITER'S BLOCK

What is a recently retired cricketer doing in a column mean to showcase authors, you ask?

Well, if you know about Steve Waugh's proclivity for maintaining detailed tour diaries and journals (some of which have become bestsellers), you have a part-answer to that question. But if you read his superb new autobiography, you wouldn't need to ask the question at all.

In the last few years of a career that saw him become one of the sport's most inspirational players, Waugh developed an obsession for recording things: the minutiae of matches he played in and watched, little details about the countries he toured in.

However, as we learn in Out of My Comfort Zone: An Autobiography, it wasn't always this way. The title of this book is more meaningful than it first appears to be. On one level, it indicates the attitudinal development, the building up of mental strength, that saw Waugh progress from a bits-and-pieces player in a faltering Australian team in the mid-1980s to a great Test batsmen and one of the most successful captains ever.

But at another level it is also a pointer to the strides he took as a person: how a callow, insular-minded, somewhat shy, Australian boy growing up in a Sydney suburb went on to become a man of the world "" developing into cricket's most respected global ambassador, a man with empathy and respect for other cultures.

Without being too explicit about it, Waugh repeatedly suggests what a struggle it was (and also how important it was) for him to step out into the world.

This is nicely brought out in a passage where he describes his efforts to get out and see the "real India" on his first tour of the country "" despite having been overwhelmed and disturbed by the place on many levels (including the gastronomic one):

"My one significant achievement was that "" for the first time, really"" I had been able to put myself a little outside my comfort zone...I had a desire to experience the places I was playing in, warts and all...Taking a taxi by myself, or maybe with one or two others, was my way of seeing what life was really like for the majority, not the minority."

None of this is to suggest that the cricketing bits in this much-awaited autobiography are anything less than thrilling.

Dressing-room anecdotes involving stark naked cricketers singing patriotic songs, or prawn-heads strategically placed in a player's shoes, or an impromptu drinking session the night before an ODI that saw Waugh win his first Man of the Match award...you'll find them all here, along with one of the best collection of photographs in any cricketing memoir I've seen.

Out of My Comfort Zone is a vibrant firsthand history of the game in the last 20 years, written by someone who has experienced every trough and crest a professional cricketer could expect to encounter. But more than anything else it's the story of a remarkable evolution.

Cricket is too often compartmentalised as a team sport; cliches abound on how the game is bigger than any individual. But this sometimes gives short shrift to the men who have had a powerful and long-lasting impact on the sport. Few have had a greater impact than Steve Waugh and this is his story, no punches pulled, and without the assistance of a ghostwriter.

Other books:

Never Say Die
Steve Waugh's Diary 2001
Steve Waugh's Diary 2002
Steve Waugh's World Cup Diary
Images of Waugh