Review of Austin's Book

[Guest ligerbomb03]

TSN.ca Staff

http://www.tsn.ca/wrestling

11/15/2003

 

Fans of WWE are well versed in the legend of Stone Cold Steve Austin. He’s the entire reason the WWF Attitude Era took off. He was the lynchpin of the entire promotion for nearly 5 years. He sold more pay-per-view’s, more merchandise, and lead the WWE to it’s greatest financial period in the illustrious history of the company.

 

However, for all we know of Stone Cold the legend, you could have written a book about what we didn’t know about Steve Austin the man.

 

He was born Steve Williams, his name was changed to Steve Austin by “Dirty” Dutch Mantel. He has been married three times, has two daughters, who are the loves of his life. He still wears the gold chain that his late partner Brian Pillman gave him as part of their Hollywood Blondes gimmick. He has been battling a career ending injury since that fateful day on August 3rd 1997, when the late Owen Hart dropped him on his head in a failed piledriver attempt.

 

Most shockingly, he seems convinced that his match with Rock at WrestleMania 19 last year was the last time we will see Steve Austin in the ring as an active performer.

 

Now that the book has actually been written and released, we all know “The Stone Cold Truth”, Steve Austin’s autobiography, co-written by Jim “J.R.” Ross, and Dennis Brent.

 

The book goes through Austin’s childhood, a happy, hell raising time in small town Edna Texas, where he and brothers Kevin, Scott, and Jeff caused all sorts of mischief, each story ends with his long suffering mother Beverly, and his step-dad Ken Williams (who adopted Steve and brother Kevin at an early age) teaching the boys the error of their ways. His respect for his parents, and his fondness of his brothers and little sister Jenny is readily apparent, this isn’t a guy who had a hard childhood full of grief, and run-ins with the law, he had a happy, well grounded education, and he learned a ton about respect, and never giving up during his formative years.

 

Those lessons would serve him well as he travelled the roads on his way to becoming a wrestling superstar. He talks about the days of living on a ten pound bag of potatoes, and a few cans of tuna for weeks on end, and he tells us of driving up and down the roads between independent shows, learning from the likes of “Dirty” Dutch Mantel, Tom Pritchard, Danny Davis, and Percy “Paul Bearer” Pringle.

 

The book helps us see many wrestlers in a new light. Kevin Nash is one of Austin’s better friends, and in WCW they were both part of a group of friends who took turns making each other laugh which included Brian Pillman, Raven, Cactus Jack, Tex Slazinger (Mideon), Shanghai Pierce (Henry Godwinn), and Dan Spivey.

 

Austin’s time in ECW is where he learned the art of a promo, and began using the tools which would serve him during his WWE run.

 

The book flips through his Ringmaster days, and slows down long enough for Austin to talk about some of his favourite performers to work with. His fondness of The Rock’s work is obvious, as is his appreciation of Bret Hart and Kurt Angle, the latter of whom Austin pegs as having the potential to be one of the all time greats in the business. It’s also interesting when he devotes an entire chapter to Chris Benoit, saying that his favourite match of all time was with the Canadian Crippler, and that Benoit is an eight cylinder engine running on seven cylinders. The missing cylinder is his personae. If he can get that eighth cylinder firing, Austin says Benoit can make himself a true superstar in the business.

 

Of course Austin talks about walking out of the business, and attributes it to frustration from his personal life (he and Debra were fighting a lot, his ex-wife had moved back to England, taking his daughters with her), unhappiness with creative, the fact that his body was breaking down, and just over all exhaustion. He also talks about a scare he had with his health before WrestleMania 19, which may or may not have been a caffine and ephedra induced heart attack.

 

Austin’s observations at the end of the book on the way the business is going, and the way that he thinks it should go are fascinating. What he says makes perfect sense, and it’s stuff that has been said by the likes of Mick Foley and Jerry “The King” Lawler, in their books. Wrestling is not like movies and TV, it shouldn’t be written, it should be outlined, a long term plan should be drawn out, and the performers should be given the ability and tools to react organically to the crowd’s needs and desires. Austin likens wrestling to stand-up comedy, and that is probably the most appropriate comparison, a comic has to react to his audience, and be prepared to go off to other material if what he’s working with doesn’t work, likewise, he has to stretch out what he’s doing if they are rolling in the aisles.

 

The book is a fascinating look into the man behind the myth, and is an incredibly light, yet fun read. There were a lot of things I wished he would have gone into more depth on, stuff like his time in WCW, and all of the twists and turns of that promotion, I would have liked to have read more on his relationship (or lack thereof) with Hulk Hogan, his feelings towards Jeff Jarrett, who was allegedly kept down by Austin, and I would have loved to have read more than just a few passing comments on the new crop of talent that is coming up.

 

Overall though, the Stone Cold Truth is a good read, up there with the Jerry Lawler and Mick Foley books in terms of quality. It's a really interesting look at the man who turned the business of wrestling on it’s ear, and gave us the ultimate anti-hero, at just the exact moment in time when an anti-hero is what we were looking for.

 

 

 

For TSN.ca/Wrestling, I'm Brian Garside.

[TheOriginalOrangeGoblin 0]

Despite how much he sucks in the ring I've heard from DDP, Austin, Foley and Raven how Nash is one of the funniest guys ever outside the ring.