Irvin Muchnick a widely published writer and nephew of the late, legendary St. Louis wrestling promoter Sam Muchnick has produced a book unlike any other on the astonishing growth of professional wrestling and its profound impact on mainstream sports and society. In Wrestling Babylon, he traces the demise of wrestlings old Mafia-like territories and the rise of a national marketing base thanks to cable television, deregulation and a culture-wide nervous breakdown. Naturally, the figure of WWEs Vince McMahon lurks throughout, but equally evident is the publics late-empire lust for bread, circuses, and blood. As this book demonstrates, the more cartoonishly unreal wrestling got, the more chillingly real it became. What truly distinguishes Wrestling Babylon, however, is Muchnicks ability to show how professional wrestling has become the ur-carnival for a culture that feeds on escapist displays of humiliation, revenge, fantasy characters, and sex. His People magazine article on Hulk Hogan blew the lid off the drug abuse of the sports signature superstar. His award-winning Penthouse profile of the ill-starred Von Erich clan was the first to connect the dots between wrestling, televangelism, and MTV-style production values.

His never-before-published investigation of the death of Jimmy Superfly Snukas girlfriend suggests the cover-up of a murder. The books appendix a comprehensive listing of the dozens of wrestlers who died prematurely over the last generation, with little or no attention is both a valuable resource for wrestling historians and a shocking document of the ruthless way sports entertainment eats its own.