Score One For Our Great, Sad Game

0.cached.png

By Newsweek Editors

See more of our trusted coverage when you search.Prefer Newsweek on Googleto see more of our trusted coverage when you search.

Not long ago, any publisher who churned out 400,000 copies of a new five-pound coffee-table book would have been considered a little unbound. But that was before the tome that accompanied Ken Burns's Civil War series sold some 800,000 copies. So it's not surprising that his "Baseball: An Illustrated History" (486 pages. Knopf. $60), written with the historian Geoffrey C. Ward, is hitting the shelves harder than a Randy Johnson fastball. And why shouldn't it? Hoping to give us the definitive volume on the national pastime, the authors have managed to do what baseball's caretakers haven't: they've cashed in on the game -- in a big way -- while still preserving all the dignity and humility that made it great.

Featuring stark snapshots and skillfully compiled anecdotes, the book tears down some baseball myths even as it restores our faith in the game (among the more interesting revelations in this P.C. age: the Indians were actually named in honor of a Native American player). It also features nine mostly insightful commentaries from the likes of Daniel Okrent and Bill James and a moving introduction by Roger Angell. The dean of baseball writers points out that it is the game that masters the players and not the reverse; a nation of immigrants and workingmen, we chose a sport with far more losers than winners. For all its triumphs, there's something hauntingly sad about this book. Entranced by pictures of children on rustic playing fields and eager Philadelphians lining the rooftops outside old Shibe Park, it's hard not to feel like something's been stolen, not just from the game but from all of us -- something no salary cap can ever replace.

Read More on News