Posnanski paterno biography

Joe Posnanski lived in State College, Pennsylvania, through the turbulent final months of Paterno's life and was with him and his family as the scandal that.
Paterno is a 2012 biography of the Penn State football coach Joe Paterno book by sportswriter Joe Posnanski.
Joe Posnanski's biography of the late Penn State football coach Joe Paterno follows in the tradition of works by Richard Ben Cramer on Joe DiMaggio and.

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Joe Posnanski’s controversial biography, ‘Paterno’

Hour 1

When acclaimed sportswriter JOE POSNANSKI set out, in early 2011, to write the definitive biography of Penn State football coaching legend Joe Paterno, he had no idea what he was in for. Months later, a grand jury would indict Paterno’s longtime defensive coordinator, Jerry Sandusky, for a slew of child sexual abuse charges, for which Sandusky was convicted this summer. When the scandal hit the news in November 2011 with the indictment of Sandusky and two top Penn State administrators, the furor dominated the national headlines and did what had been unthinkable in Happy Valley: the beloved “Joe Pa” was unceremoniously fired by Penn State’s Board of Trustees, along with President Graham Spanier. Posnanski’s unprecedented access to Paterno during the most tumultuous period of the famed coach’s life, including the last interview before Paterno died in January, yielded a book that’s among the most anticipated of the year. In “Paterno,” Posnanski tries to square what the Sandusky trial and Freeh Report ha

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I knew this was a powerful scene, one that would spark a lot of discussion and opinion. And I would not want to get in the middle of that. Joe Paterno was a well-educated man, and he was also a man from a different time. I know people will bring their own experiences and logic to this, they will choose what to make of those words, and I would want them to do that.

Another scene from the book that has lingered with me: Paterno at dinner with his family in a restaurant, and he throws a fit after one of his children takes a cucumber from another child’s all-you-can-eat salad plate. Paterno might be the only person in the world who would consider this theft, but he was so angry he stormed out of the restaurant. Years after, he would continue to insist he was right. In retrospect the portrait that emerges is one of a moral scold who holds people to a higher standard than he holds himself. Is that a fair assessment?

I think that’s your assessment as a critical reader, and I think it’s a perfectly viable reaction. I’m sure, however, that others would respond differently. As a writer,

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Paterno

From America’s premier sportswriter, the definitive, #1 New York Times bestselling biography of Joe Paterno.

Joe Posnanski’s biography of the late Penn State football coach Joe Paterno follows in the tradition of works by Richard Ben Cramer on Joe DiMaggio and David Maraniss on Vince Lombardi. Having gained unprecedented access to Paterno, as well as the coach’s personal notes and files, Posnanski spent the last two years of Paterno’s life covering the coach, on (and off) the field and through the scandal that ended Paterno’s legendary career.

Joe Posnanski, who in 2012 was named the Best Sportswriter in America by the National Sportswriters and Sportscasters Hall of Fame, was with Paterno and his family as a horrific national scandal unfolded and Paterno was fired. Within three months, Paterno died of lung cancer, a tragic end to a life that was epic, influential, and operatic.

Paterno is the fullest description we will ever have of the man’s character and career. In this honest and surprising portrait, Joe Posnanski brings new insight and understanding to one