Book Review: The Art of Fielding

The Art of Fielding,
by Chad Harbach

The Art of Fielding, by Chad Harbach, caught my attention because it's been listed on many lists of the Best Novels of 2011, but also because it's about baseball.  Sort of.

The novel's plot revolves around a talented shortstop on a small college baseball team.  Like many baseball novels, though, The Art of Fielding is less about baseball than it is about the neuroses and hang-ups of the ballplayers.  To read the average baseball novel, you'd think all baseball players are mental cases.  As one ballplayer in the novel says, "Doubt has always existed. Even for athletes."

It's an enjoyable story, though, with enough actual baseball to please the fan in me.  Plus, there are a few good quotes about the game.

The title of the novel is taken from the title of Henry Skrimshander's favorite book, by his favorite ballplayer, the fictional Aparacio Rodriguez.  The ballplayer's book is full of tips on fielding, some very technical and practical, some very artsy, such as:

It always saddens me to leave the field.  Even fielding the final out to win the World Series, deep in the truest part of me, felt like death.

Many of the "deep thoughts" about the nature of the game come through the voice of Schwartz, the driven leader of the team:

Baseball was an art, but to excel at it you had to become a machine.  It didn't matter how beautifully you performed sometimes, what you did on your best day, how many spectacular plays you made.  You wren't a painter or a writer - you didn't work in private and discard your mistakes, and it wasn't just your masterpieces that counted.  What mattered, as for any machine, was repeatability.  Moments of inspiration were nothing compared to elimination of error. 

Baseball, in its quiet way, was an extravagantly harrowing game.  Football, basketball, hockey, lacrosse - these were melee sports.  You could make yourself useful by hustling and scrapping more than the other guy.  You could redeem yourself through sheer desire. 

But baseball was different.  Schwartz thought of it as Homeric - not a scrum but a series of isolated contests.  Batter versus pitcher, fielder versus ball.  You couldn't storm around, snorting and slapping people, the way Schwartz did when he played football.  You stood and waited and tried to still your mind.  When your moment came, you had to ready, because if you f***ed up, everyone would know whose fault it was.  What other sport not only kept a stat as cruel as the error but posted it on the scoreboard for everyone to see?