Why We Swim

Does anything beat jumping into the sea as the sun rises over Dublin Bay? I think not. From The Forty-foot to Seapoint, sea swimming has seen a real resurgence over the last while. but this is not a distinctly Irish thing - people swim all over the world and have done so for eons. From the freezing, icy Arctic waters to piranha-infested rivers in hotter climates, we swim. We swim for pleasure, for exercise, for healing - to feel alive. But unlike other animals that are drawn to water, we are not natural-born swimmers. We must be taught. Our ancestors learned to swim for survival; now, in the twenty-first century, swimming has grown to become one of the most popular activities in the world.

In this love letter to swimming, Tsui explores the unique skill of swimming from the five angles of survival, well-being, community, competition, and flow, through fascinating stories of Olympic champions, a Baghdad swim club that meets in Saddam Hussein’s palace pool, modern-day Japanese samurai swimmers, and even an Icelandic fisherman who improbably survives a wintry six-hour swim after a shipwreck.

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Who wrote it?
Bonnie Tsui

How does it come?
Paperback, 20 x 12 x 2cm, 224 pages