Home Run - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0156011549 ISBN 13: 9780156011549

Publisher: Mariner Books, 2001

Synopsis

The author of Paper Tiger presents a selection of outstanding essays and commentary on baseball's most exciting moments and includes contributions by John Updike, Roger Angell, Don DeLillo, Paul Gallico, Red Smith, Grantland Rice, and other notables on the events and athletes that have changed baseball history. Original. 35,000 first printing.

About this title

About the Authors

George Plimpton is the author of many books including Paper Lion. Founder and editor of the Paris Review, he is New York City's Honorary Commissioner of Fireworks.

George Plimpton is the author of many books including Paper Lion. Founder and editor of the Paris Review, he is New York City's Honorary Commissioner of Fireworks.

Reviews

From the late poet Gregory Corso's "Dream of a Baseball Star" to pitcher Sadaharu Oh's "A Zen Way of Baseball," New York's honorary commissioner of fireworks, George Plimpton (who has also written a score of books and cofounded the Paris Review), has assembled the full-swinging Home Run, with pieces devoted to that fence-transcending moment. Don DeLillo's fictionalized "Pafko at the Wall" watches Bobby Thomson's "Shot Heard `Round the World" sail over his head; Garrison Keillor takes "The Babe" to Lake Wobegon; and Roger Angell (A Pitcher's Story; Forecasts, Apr. 16) chimes in with "Homeric Tales" of the mythically showstopping impact of home runs: "Even when one goes out in mid-game, it stops the story. Nothing ensues." These 18 essays revel in such moments as Maris's 61st, McGwire's 69th and 70th and Hank Aaron's all-time record.Plimpton (who contributes two essays) presents all with signature panache in introductory notes.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

This anthology of some of the best writing on home runs and home run hitters covers all the bases. In this lineup are the biggest sluggers ever to sock one into the stands, e.g., Babe Ruth, Josh Gibson, Hank Aaron, Sadarharu Oh, Reggie Jackson, and Mark McGwire. They are described by a murderer's row of writers that includes Grantland Rice, Bernard Malamud, Red Smith, Roger Angell, and Rick Telander. Plimpton's selection of pieces is very astute. John Updike's familiar rendering of Ted Williams's final round-tripper is balanced with the equally fascinating contemporary commentary by Daniel Paisner on the journey followed by the ball McGwire hit for his 70th home run in 1998. This book takes us on a similar blast of a journey: from Malamud's mythological fiction, to Smith's newspaper account of the 1951 Bobby Thompson pennant winner with the unforgettable lead "The art of fiction is dead," to Don DeLillo's fictional retelling of that same reality. Highly recommended. John Maxymuk, Rutgers Univ. Lib., Camden, NJ
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Mariner Books
• Publication date: 2001
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0156011549
• ISBN 13: 9780156011549
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 278
• Editor: Plimpton George