Hub Fans Bid Kid Adieu: John Updike On Ted Williams (2010) - Plot & Excerpts
Wonderful little essay about baseball legend Ted Williams' last game. John Updike was there and later wrote a wonderful piece for the New Yorker. It was republished in a commemorative version last year. I'm not a big sports fan, but this is so well told. When I finished, I was angry all over again about what has happened to sports (steroids, multi-million dollar contracts...) Every record Barry Bonds holds should be thrown out. Thanks dad! It's funny reading the reviews on the back cover, nearly all by sports writers, nearly all claiming Updike changed with this one essay the way sports writers write. Of course, this essay appeared in 1960, so if this is true I didn't get the 'before' picture. But looking at the sports columns that I regularly visit, both in the Star Tribune and on ESPN.com, there is evidence all over the place. The unfortunate thing, of course, is that this means lesser writers are trying almost all the time to write equally moving and poignant columns mostly about lesser achievements by lesser athletes. I have seen one or two really embarrassing examples of this in the last year or so...and now I know why. But it's good that they are trying!I really liked it, and Updike's obit of Ted Williams as well (though he could have left the fawning on Barry Bonds out of it). I only give it 4 stars instead of 5 because it's too short! Just like the best baseball games I've watched...and like life...it's too bad that it has to end. I could read writing like this on this topic for ever and ever.Makes me look even more forward to Mike Royko's articles on Chicago baseball which I'm sure I will encounter when I start his collections soon (sooner now!).
What do You think about Hub Fans Bid Kid Adieu: John Updike On Ted Williams (2010)?
A great essay by a wonderful novelist about the final game of Ted Williams' superlative career.
—jayy_johanna
A short book, but filled with great writing about a great ball player. Highly recommended.
—TX_Curbmonkey
Perhaps the most wonderful essay ever written - reread constantly.
—Simon4ik
