If you don't have a copy of the book it should be available at your local bookstore, provided the shop is not run by godless communist terrorists who hate America and gleefully kick puppies with malice aforethought. If your book merchant is in fact unpatriotic (or simply sold out of copies due to the incredible demand) you'll just have to order it online and try to catch up.
That is all.
6 comments:
One could also hit their local library and keep signing it out until a copy arrives off Amazon. I bet you can get used copies off of there pretty darn cheap.
Somebody has to come up with a Ball Four Checklist of all the players mentioned in the book.
"Ball Four" is an educational book. I read it when my oldest daugheter was about 4 and learning her numbers. I used the large chapter numbers in the book instead of flash cards for her.
I must be absolutely nuts.
If you read only one baseball book, "Ball Four" is the one to read. The thing about it is that it can be read on many levels. Taken very lightly, it's an often funny and often insightful account of a baseball team and season. If you read between the lines, there is a lot of implied info about various people, but you really need to pay close attention to Bouton's word choice.
Beyond that, though, the book must be read with the realization that clubhouses were totally closed to the media back then. A player's off-field activities, whether known to the mmbers of the media or not, was totally off-limits for reporting in any fashion. All players were treated like idols who could do not wrong except on occasion on the field. Bouton's book was a complete shock to EVERYONE who read it at the time--and that can be lost on people today since we're so accustomed to tabloid coverage of athletes and other celebrities.
I read this book when I was a teenager. Wow, did I learn stuff.
I'm sure there's a lot of it I didn't understand at the time. I need to read it again.
"Somebody has to come up with a Ball Four Checklist of all the players mentioned in the book."
Funny you should say that...
I've read Ball Four so many times that the binding broke and the pages are coming out. One of my favirite passages is the one about Cleveland, and if your plane is going to crash on a Cleveland flight, it would be better if it was an inbound flight. Wise-ass.
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