In view of Milano Cortina 2026, five books to read the Olympics as a story of power, identity and global imagination, beyond sport and medals
Every Olympics is a declaration of intent. Even before a sporting event, it is a story that a country chooses to tell about itself, its past and its idea of the future. With Milan Cortina 2026Italy returns to face this symbolic responsibility in a particularly delicate historical moment, marked by geopolitical transformations, a crisis of confidence in large global institutions and a profound redefinition of the very concept of competition, sustainability and entertainment.
The Olympic Games, during the twentieth century and the new millennium, have long since ceased to be just a sporting arena. They have become a space of political, economic and cultural representation, a laboratory in which urban models, media languages, diplomatic balances and new forms of soft power are experimented. Each edition has left behind not only medals and records, but iconic images, historical fractures, narrative turning points that have had an impact on the collective imagination for much longer than any ranking.
Milan Cortina inherits all of this: the weight of Olympic history, its contradictions, its successes and its shadows. And it does so in an unprecedented, widespread, polycentric form, which reflects a fragmented Italy but also capable of holding together metropolises, Alpine territories, tourism, cultural industry and international narrative. For this reason, approaching the Games also means questioning their profound meaning: what do the Olympics really say? Who do they talk to? And to whom?
Reading about the Olympics, even before watching them, is a useful exercise to escape the rhetoric of the event and recover complexity. The books that have analysed, told and questioned them help to understand why each edition has been the mirror of its time: Rome as a promise of modernity, Tokyo as a national rebirth, Munich as a global trauma, up to the contemporary Olympics, increasingly observed for what they represent outside the competition field.
In view of Milano Cortina 2026, these five books offer precious tools for reading the Games with greater depth, historical awareness and critical sense. Not to reduce its charm, but to truly understand its role in today’s world.
Olympia – Luciano Regolo
A journey to the deep roots of the Olympic idea, from the Greek origins to the modern reinvention of the Games. Regulus reconstructs the founding myth of the Olympics as a space of respite, competition and sacredness, showing how these elements have been reinterpreted over time. An essential book to understand why the Olympics continue to have universal appeal and why each edition, including Milan Cortina, inevitably deals with a thousand-year legacy.
The Olympics: A History of the Modern Games – Allen Guttmann
Considered one of the fundamental texts on modern sports, this essay traces the birth and evolution of the modern Olympics, from Pierre de Coubertin’s project to the most recent editions. Guttmann analyzes the Games as a cultural and political phenomenon, showing how the Olympic model has transformed together with global society. An essential read to understand what hosting an Olympics means today and why Milano Cortina 2026 is part of a tradition that is anything but neutral.
Munich 1972 – David Clay Large
The book that tells the end of Olympic innocence. The 1972 Munich attack changed the way we think about security, politics and sport forever. Clay Large reconstructs the facts with historical rigor, showing how that event marked a point of no return in the history of the Games. A tough but necessary read, which reminds us how the Olympics are inevitably exposed to the tensions of the real world.
The Games: A Global History of the Olympics – David Goldblatt
One of the most complete and up-to-date accounts of the Olympics as a global event. Goldblatt intertwines sport, geopolitics, economics and media, showing how the Games have become one of the most powerful tools for representing power in the contemporary world. It is the ideal book to read Milano Cortina 2026 not only as a sporting event, but as a cultural, diplomatic and industrial operation on an international scale.
Tokyo 1964 – Christian Tagsold
Tokyo 1964 as an act of rebirth and reinvention. This book tells how Japan used the Olympics to present itself to the world as a technological, peaceful and modern nation after the trauma of war. A powerful example of how the Games can become a declaration of intent on the future. An inevitable parallel with Milan Cortina, called to tell the story of 21st century Italy through sport, sustainability and innovation.
