In this comprehensive study of baseball in American literature,
Candelaria looks primarily at novels to explore how writers have
used this quintessential American symbol and to examine what the
metaphors and images of the fictional universe of baseball have to
tell us about ourselves. Her analysis includes both juvenile and
adult sports fiction and other types of literary works that draw
significantly on baseball imagery. Candelaria offers a probing
analysis of the progression from allegory and romanticism in the
earliest baseball fiction to the realism, irony, and solipsism of
contemporary narrative.
Candelaria examines the origins and folklore of baseball, the
development of its mythic status as the national game or pastime,
as well as early literary treatments. Baseball soon emerged as a
romantic and heroic metaphor in juvenile and pulp fiction and as a
vehicle for ironic comedy in the work of Ring Lardner and other
writers of the early decades of the twentieth century. Allusions to
baseball in works by such literary masters as Mark Twain, Sinclair
Lewis, and Ernest Hemingway emphasize the symbolic dimensions of
the game, and its mythic possibilities have been fully exploited by
more recent writers, notably Bernard Malamud in The Natural and
Philip Roth in The Great American Novel. Increasingly complex
levels of abstraction are characteristic of the baseball fiction of
Philip Roth, Mark Harris, Jay Neugeboren, John Graham Alexander,
and Robert Coover. Candelaria offers a probing analysis of the
progression from allegory and romanticism in the earliest baseball
fiction to the realism, irony, and solipsism of contemporary
narratives. A stimulating work of literary and cultural criticism,
this book will appeal to students and scholars of American
literature, popular culture, American studies, and physical
education, as well as to baseball enthusiasts.
General
Imprint: |
Praeger Publishers Inc
|
Country of origin: |
United States |
Release date: |
September 1989 |
First published: |
September 1989 |
Authors: |
Cordelia Chávez Candelaria
|
Dimensions: |
230mm (L) |
Format: |
Hardcover
|
Pages: |
175 |
ISBN-13: |
978-0-313-25465-9 |
Categories: |
Books
|
LSN: |
0-313-25465-6 |
Barcode: |
9780313254659 |
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