Contributor(s): David Goldblatt | Seventeen days, 12,000 athletes, 29 sports, 302 gold medals: this event will be your personal trainer for the back stories and culture of the modern Olympics. David Goldblatt is a writer, broadcaster and teacher. He is author of The Ball is Round: a global history of football and, with Johnny Acton, How to Watch the Olympics. Simon Glendinning is a reader in European philosophy in the European Institute, LSE and director of the Forum for European Philosophy.