SKU: 99278500438

Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life

Sale price$15.30 Regular price$17.00
Save 10%

Shipping Estimate
USA
  • USA
  • CAN

Ships within 48 hours · Estimated delivery Jul 11 - Jul 16

Promo Codes Available:

For Your Every Summer RSVP, with Code: SUMMER15

Description

Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life**Winner of the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Autobiography** "Reading this guy on the subject of waves and water is like reading Hemingway on bullfighting; William Burroughs on controlled substances; Updike on adultery. . . . a coming of age story, seen through the gloss resin coat of a surfboard." Sports Illustrated Included in President Obama's 2016 Summer Reading List Barbarian Days is William Finnegan's memoir of an obsession, a complex enchantment.

**Winner of the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Autobiography**

"Reading this guy on the subject of waves and water is like reading Hemingway on bullfighting; William Burroughs on controlled substances; Updike on adultery. . . . a coming-of-age story, seen through the gloss resin coat of a surfboard." --Sports Illustrated

Included in President Obama's 2016 Summer Reading List

Barbarian Days is William Finnegan's memoir of an obsession, a complex enchantment. Surfing only looks like a sport. To initiates, it is something else: a beautiful addiction, a demanding course of study, a morally dangerous pastime, a way of life.

Raised in California and Hawaii, Finnegan started surfing as a child. He has chased waves all over the world, wandering for years through the South Pacific, Australia, Asia, Africa. A bookish boy, and then an excessively adventurous young man, he went on to become a distinguished writer and war reporter. Barbarian Days takes us deep into unfamiliar worlds, some of them right under our noses--off the coasts of New York and San Francisco. It immerses the reader in the edgy camaraderie of close male friendships forged in challenging waves.

Finnegan shares stories of life in a whites-only gang in a tough school in Honolulu. He shows us a world turned upside down for kids and adults alike by the social upheavals of the 1960s. He details the intricacies of famous waves and his own apprenticeships to them. Youthful folly--he drops LSD while riding huge Honolua Bay, on Maui--is served up with rueful humor. As Finnegan's travels take him ever farther afield, he discovers the picturesque simplicity of a Samoan fishing village, dissects the sexual politics of Tongan interactions with Americans and Japanese, and navigates the Indonesian black market while nearly succumbing to malaria. Throughout, he surfs, carrying readers with him on rides of harrowing, unprecedented lucidity.

Barbarian Days is an old-school adventure story, an intellectual autobiography, a social history, a literary road movie, and an extraordinary exploration of the gradual mastering of an exacting, little-understood art.

Praise for Barbarian Days

"Without a doubt, the finest surf book I've ever read . . . But on a more fundamental level, Barbarian Days offers a clear-eyed vision of American boyhood. Like Jon Krakauer's Into the Wild, it is a sympathetic examination of what happens when literary ideas of freedom and purity take hold of a young mind and fling his body out into the far reaches of the world." --The New York Times Magazine

"Incandescent . . . I'd sooner press this book upon on a nonsurfer, in part because nothing I've read so accurately describes the feeling of being stoked or the despair of being held under. . . . But] it's also about a writer's life and, even more generally, a quester's life, more carefully observed and precisely rendered than any I've read in a long time." --Los Angeles Times


Binding Type: Paperback
Publisher: Penguin Group
Published: 04/26/2016
ISBN: 9780143109396
Pages: 464
Weight: 0.90lbs
Size: 8.50h x 5.45w x 1.00d
Shipping Notes
  • Free Standard Shipping on $100+ Orders to the USA.
  • Except Preorder products are shipped in 48 hours.
  • Delivery to the USA:
  1. Standard Shipping : 3-10 business days
  • If time is of the essence, please consider selecting expedited delivery for faster service.
Exchange/Return Notes
  • We offer a 30-day return/exchange service after receiving.
  • Final sale items are not eligible for returns or exchanges.
  • To process your return/exchange, please contact us at [email protected]
  • Please click here for more details>>> Return & Exchange Policy
SKU: 99278500438

Discover Niche Categories That Outsell

Top-Converting Item to Boost Your Average Order

4.1 ★★★★★
Based on 2374 reviews
Sort
Highest Rating
Newest First
Oldest First
Product Reviews
W
Verified Purchase
William Lovelace
Lowell, US
★★★★★ 5
Great dog toys
Color: S6-muti-color
These are long lasting, durable dog toys. My dogs love the squeak sound.
WAS THIS REVIEW HELPFUL?YesReportShare
Reviewed in the United States on May 23, 2026
K
Verified Purchase
Karen
Whiting, US
★★★★★ 5
Durable
Color: S6-muti-color
The balls are great for chewers. The squeaky didn’t last long but they are perfect for the ball launcher.
WAS THIS REVIEW HELPFUL?YesReportShare
Reviewed in the United States on May 18, 2026
C
Verified Purchase
Candice K
San Leandro, US
★★★★★ 4
The squeeker isn't durable, but the balls themselves are.
Color: S6-muti-color, Color: S6-muti-color
I have two 70+lb, ball obsessed dogs (a field bred Golden Retriever, and an Old Time Scotch Collie), and these balls are living up to the abuse they're receiving. In the fall we always lose a ball or two in the yard due to getting lost in leaves or longer grass, so I always try and buy a multi pack at the start of the season, so went with these this year. I'm glad I did. Great price for a 6 pack, they fit the medium Chuck-It launcher (a little loosely, but they throw just fine), have great bounce, they FLOAT (which means I didn't lose any at the beach), and they're super durable to the dreaded "mouth squish." The squeaker dies pretty quick, like, within a day, but it isn't the kind that can fall out or choke your dog, so no worries there. The boys are happy, I'm happy, my wallet is happy - I've already ordered another pack.
WAS THIS REVIEW HELPFUL?YesReportShare
Reviewed in the United States on November 2, 2024
S
Verified Purchase
S. Berg
Lexington, US
★★★★★ 5
Good balls
Color: S6-glow
My dog is a chewer, and these have held up for close to a year actually a pretty good product
WAS THIS REVIEW HELPFUL?YesReportShare
Reviewed in the United States on May 27, 2026
N
Verified Purchase
nanny america
Lowell, US
★★★★★ 3
Disappointed
Color: S6-muti-color
These were great for about 20 minutes then they stopped squeaking...we have 2 left that I have saved but the other 4 do not squeak anymore...disappointed as my dog loves to squeak things...would not buy these again...My dog is only an 8lb dog too...but he can still play with the balls without the squeak...
WAS THIS REVIEW HELPFUL?YesReportShare
Reviewed in the United States on April 26, 2026

recommand products