I agree with the late author Kingsley Amis who said that there is no point in writing unless you’re going to upset someone.

So too, apparently, does James Dalton, the one-time enfant terrible of the Springboks. He has a book out and as you’d expect it is as raw and as rowdy as he was. Dalton doesn’t return to controversies so much as stir them up again and remind us why he was such a spiky character.

Given that he finished up with the Boks 17 years ago, he probably thought carefully about writing a book now. The only way it would sell was if he opened the door fully on his wild life.

To his credit, he’s done so, and, among many recollections, there are withering put-downs of coaches and players alike. Bullet by name and bullet by nature, he’s taken several shots, which add to the book’s dark appeal.

Once, he told me, “Van der Berg, sometimes you write a load of crap.”

“James,” I responded, “sometimes you play like a load of crap.”

While the local sports book market is generally moribund, suddenly there’s an array of rugby offerings.

Top KZN wordsmith Andy Capostagno collaborated with Beast Mtawarira whose book was released later than planned because some of the content rattled cages. It was quickly packed away so as not to distract from the World Cup.

If nothing else, the move only heightened interest in the great player’s story.

“Cappy” is trying to pin the prop down to add a vital World Cup chapter but Mtawarira is in such demand here and overseas, it will have to wait.

It’s only right that the Sharks legend has a book, although there’s a massive void when it comes to many of his rivals of recent years. Where is Schalk Burger’s book? Or Bryan Habana’s. What of James Small, whose story might be the most remarkable of them all?

Not to mention the many soccer players, cricketers and others who slipped through the cracks, their stories still untold.

An exception was Herschelle Gibbs, who had two biographies. Asked about his first book, Gibbs said he couldn’t comment: “Dunno . . . haven’t read it.”

It’s a blight on rugby fans that their appetite for the game doesn’t quite extend to book reading – in South Africa a dismal 5000 sales is considered good.

There are other festive rugby offerings. “Against all Odds” (by Jeremy Daniel) tells the tale of Siya Kolisi. Not having read it, I can’t vouch for its quality, but the timing was perfect.

Trouble was, Kolisi distanced himself from it. Daniel claims to have sought input but was rebuffed on account that the timing wasn’t right.

It’s upset some, but unauthorised biographies are a convention of publishing. Often, they are more honest appraisals and lift the lid on an individual far more effectively than an insipid biography, of which thousands litter book shelves.

The final addition to this winter’s offerings comes from prominent rugby correspondent Liam Del Carme. His book – “Winging It” – tells what it’s like as an insider on tour with the Springboks. Beat writers have an absurdly privileged insight into the teams they cover, so this is perhaps a natural product. The “what goes on tour stays on tour” decree is one followed by players as well as reporters, although the rise of social media and the softening of such traditions means that Del Carme was able to get his teeth into some of the more entertaining episodes that define the life of a reporter on the road. – © Sunday Tribune