The Summer Game, Roger Angell's first book on the sport, changed baseball writing forever. Thoughtful, funny, appreciative of the elegance of the game and the passions invested by players and fans, it goes beyond the usual sports reporter's beat to examine baseball's complex place in our American psyche.
Between the miseries of the 1962 expansion Mets and a classic 1971 World Series between the Pirates and the Orioles, Angell finds baseball in the 1960s as a game in transition--marked by league expansion, uprooted franchises, the growing hegemony of television, the dominance of pitchers, uneasy relations between players and owners, and mounting competition from other sports for the fans' dollars.
Willie Mays, Roberto Clemente, Brooks Robinson, Bob Gibson, Sandy Koufax, Carl Yastrzemski, Tom Seaver, Jim Palmer, and Casey Stengel are seen here with fresh clarity and pleasure. Here is California baseball in full flower, the once-mighty Yankees in collapse, baseball in French (in Montreal), indoor baseball (at the Astrodome), and sweet spring baseball (in Florida)--as Angell observes, "Always, it seems, there is something more to be discovered about this game."
Customer Reviews:
Avg. Customer Rating: 4.5 / 5.0
Not the best book I ever read:
Unlike everyone else in the world, I did not find this book to be all that great.A guy goes to baseball games or watches them on TV and gives you his side of things.Save yer money and come to my house I can do the same thing. Not much to hold my interest other than watching Tom Seaver play and a few trivial research interests.It is sad to think that this book may have been the book of it's time.
The Bard of Baseball:
Pure chance -- and luck -- brought me to Roger Angell's books. I was shopping for baseball titles as gifts, and clicked on Summer Game in the search results. First, I am a literature student, who loves good writing. Second, I am a huge baseball fan. Third, I'm a girl. On the basis of previous reviews, I purchased Summer Game and Five Seasons, for me AND for my step-father. From the very first page I was blown away. Angell's vocabulary is tremendous; his use of metaphor phenomenal. Baseball really is poetry.... more info
YES, HE IS THE POET LAUREATE OF BASEBALL:
There are some great baseball writers. Roger Kahn and Pat Jordan come to mind. Roger Angell is the very best of them all. This book is as much a part of my youth as family vacations. I have read this book numerous times, often just picking up random pages and reading for hours until sleep overtook me. There is something about New York City, the 1950s, and the Brooklyn Dodgers that contributed to the axiom that the best sportswriting is baseball writing. Angell is it, in its purest form. Jaques Barzun, a... more info
Now back in print:
Due to popular demand, this book is now back in print and available again. Enjoy.
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