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The Art of Fielding

by Chad Harbach

4.05 · rating details · 7,638 ratings · 1,691 reviews

At Westish College, a small school on the shore of Lake Michigan, baseball star Henry Skrimshander seems destined for big league stardom. But when a routine throw goes disastrously off course, the fates of five people are upended.

Henry's fight against self-doubt threatens to ruin his future. College president Guert Affenlight, a longtime bachelor, has fallen unexpectedly a...more

Hardcover, 512 pages

Published September 7th 2011 by Little, Brown and Company

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Dec 21, 2011

Greg rated it

Shelves: fiction, baseball

Review 1.1 updated introduction.

I've finished the book. I was a little wrong about how the book would end, I think I liked the book more because of the way it wrapped up than I expected to. I gave it an extra star. It is a pretty good book, not a great book, there are problems with it, some of the characters could be developed a bit more in places and some of the middle part of the book could have probably been reworked a little bit to make it not feel like a slog for a little bit...more

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Dec 19, 2011

RandomAnthony rated it

Chad Harbach's The Art of Fielding is 2/3rds strong but maybe 100 pages too long. You know that weird paradox you feel when you like a book but kind of wish it was over? I felt that around, oh, page 350 of The Art of Fielding. So while I can recommend the novel, with reservations, I can't make the four star leap.

The storyline revolves around five characters and readers shouldn't be misled into thinking, as the inside cover description seems to imply, that Henry is the star and ...moreChad Harbach's The Art of Fielding is 2/3rds strong but maybe 100 pages too long. You know that weird paradox you feel when you like a book but kind of wish it was over? I felt that around, oh, page 350 of The Art of Fielding. So while I can recommend the novel, with reservations, I can't make the four star leap.

The storyline revolves around five characters and readers shouldn't be misled into thinking, as the inside cover description seems to imply, that Henry is the star and the four other characters lesser lights. The five meet, collaborate, have sex, become codependent (maybe...I'm not sure what “codependent” means) and evolve over the course of a couple years on the campus of a small northeastern Wisconsin college. Water (specifically Lake Michigan) and Moby Dick recur as themes that, I would bet, a grad student somewhere is analyzing in a paper right now. Harbach writes in a controlled, professional writer's workshop manner about 80% of the time. His writing is good, clean, and high-quality but, unfortunately, occasionally reads sterile. The "gay guys discovering each other" subplot was trite and predictable. Only in the last fifty pages does he passionately let loose. The novel's end is serene and satisfying. The first 460 pages are more like a clinic on how to write well. Nothing wrong with that. If you like austere, well-constructed novels, you'll like The Art of Fielding. Franzen gives a cover blurb, by the way. He's a good reference point for Harbach; “kind of like Franzen” would describe Harbach well.

The prominent positioning of baseball in the title and storyline might lead non-sports-oriented (is that a word?) readers to question if this novel is for them. That's a fair inquiry. I bet you expect me to say, “No, you'll like the book even if you don't know much about baseball.” But I won't. Baseball knowledge/appreciation will increase your interest and/or understanding of The Art of Fielding. Too many scenes involve the committed, meditative approach Mike and Henry employ while on the diamond. If you don't know where a shortstop stands in the infield, stay away from this book. You won't get it.

So I liked The Art of Fielding and expect the novel to garner many end of the year prizes and, possibly, a film deal leading to a serious, oscar-worthy movie. I just can't get passed the idea that, for a week or so before the final push toward the last page, I wasn't looking forward to reading this book much. Maybe the skyrocketing press and reviews raised my expectations too high. It's possible. Recommended with tempered enthusiasm.(less)

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Feb 01, 2012

Kemper rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: 2012, modern-lit, sports

This novel should win some kind of award for Best Character Names. Check some of these out: Henry Skrimshander. Guert Affenlight. Pella Affenlight. Rick Starblind.

No John Smiths or Jane Does allowed in this one.

Mike Schwartz is a hard working and ambitious student athlete at second rate Westish College in Wisconsin. At a summer league baseball game, Mike sees Henry Skrimshander play and instantly recognizes that he’s seeing the kind of fielding talent that can only...moreThis novel should win some kind of award for Best Character Names. Check some of these out: Henry Skrimshander. Guert Affenlight. Pella Affenlight. Rick Starblind.

No John Smiths or Jane Does allowed in this one.

Mike Schwartz is a hard working and ambitious student athlete at second rate Westish College in Wisconsin. At a summer league baseball game, Mike sees Henry Skrimshander play and instantly recognizes that he’s seeing the kind of fielding talent that can only be called genius. Skinny Henry has just finished high school and assumes his days in organized baseball are over because all the college scouts passed him over because of his lack of size and below average hitting ability. Where Henry excels is at playing shortstop where no ball gets past him and all of his throws are right on target.

Mike arranges for Henry to get a baseball scholarship to Westish, and begins putting him through a rigorous training regimen designed to turn him from a talented fielding shortstop into a complete baseball player. As eager Henry flourishes under Mike’s guidance, the Westish baseball team starts winning for the first time, and pro scouts have started talking big money just as Henry is on the verge of breaking the record of his idol for most consecutive games without an error.

Then one bad throw with disastrous consequences shatters Henry’s confidence and suddenly leaves him unable to complete the simplest toss during a game. As Henry struggles to get his mojo back, Mike is realizing that his own ambitions may be bigger than his actual talent. The school president Guert Affenlight, a Herman Melville fanatic, has fallen in love with Henry’s gay roommate Owen, and Guert’s daughter Pella has just come to the campus looking to jumpstart her life after a bad marriage.

You don’t have to be a baseball fan to enjoy this one. The author doesn’t engage in the practice of trying to sell the readers on the greatness of the game. Henry loves it because it’s what he was born to do just like a great painter was born to paint, but other characters complain that it’s boring. Even Owen, who is on the team, bitches about it and prefers to read in the dugout rather than watch the games.

For the first half of this book, I was completely sucked in by the characters. Any one of these could have made a great book by themselves: Pella’s backstory about leaving high school to marry an older man and coming to Westish to finally pick up where she left off. Guert’s falling for Owen after a lifetime of heterosexuality and fearing that he was making a fool of himself. Mike’s bitterness over thinking that he’d never be truly great at anything himself while completely dismissing his own talent for motivating and getting the most out of people. All of these were excellent and the writing makes you feel for all of them.

Where it really hits a next level is with Henry’s struggles. Harbach spends a lot of time in the early going telling us about Henry’s development into a top baseball prospect and his incredible grace on the field. And he’s also just a helluva nice guy, the kind of student who doesn’t like to talk in his English class because he’s worried that he’ll hurt his sensitive teacher’s feelings. He works his ass off not for fame and fortune but because he wants to be the best. Then he's helpless to keep it from falling apart just as he’s about to achieve his dream. It’s painful, particularly the way Harbach puts you into Henry’s head on the field where he’s over thinking every play to the point where I almost found myself yelling aloud, “Just throw the fucking ball to first, Henry!”

That’s why I almost consider this a horror story with it’s notion that no matter how much work has gone into something, talent is such a mental thing that it can be destroyed in moments if the wrong set of circumstances cause self doubt to creep in.

Unfortunately, things got a bit too drawn out in the second half of the book, and the various self-destructive cycles that some of the characters enter when things get rough almost turned them from sympathetic into tiresome whiners. Shaving about a hundred pages from this book and tightening it up would have made this a five star read. It’s still an excellent book with some great characters and very good writing. (less)

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Jan 06, 2012

Nya rated it

The more I read the less I liked it. On the plus side, I enjoy reading a book that has an actual story rather than just a series of mood peices, but on the downside over the long haul the writing calls too much attention to itself as nothing is ever said simply, the stilted and even sophomoric use of names to endow this with literary gravitas was not only transparent but annoying, and if one is going to use baseball in a novel the game descriptions need to ring absolutely true, and these, sadly...more

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Feb 07, 2012

Miriam rated it

People love to talk about the "great" books that aren't good reads. There's also the crap that people call "beach reads" but gobble up without taking seriously. But The Art of Fielding falls under a third category: A book I didn't like so much that I wanted to keep reading it.

I wanted to like it, I did. I like books that take place in college. I like baseball. I like baseball metaphors even more. but it felt like a book that took 10 years to write and not in a goo...more

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Oct 16, 2011

Stuart rated it

Shelves: more-stuff-like-this-please

I'm from Wisconsin. This book takes place in Wisconsin. I love baseball. This book is about a baseball team from a fictitious Wisconsin college, Westish, which seems like a mix of Ripon and Lawrence. I love that fictitious name by the way. I love that school's absurd tie to Herman Melville as well and its funny Melville-related sports handle, The Harpooners. In a lot of ways, this book is as tailor made for me as a sharp ground ball is to a shortstop eager to make a 6-4-3 double play. It'...moreI'm from Wisconsin. This book takes place in Wisconsin. I love baseball. This book is about a baseball team from a fictitious Wisconsin college, Westish, which seems like a mix of Ripon and Lawrence. I love that fictitious name by the way. I love that school's absurd tie to Herman Melville as well and its funny Melville-related sports handle, The Harpooners. In a lot of ways, this book is as tailor made for me as a sharp ground ball is to a shortstop eager to make a 6-4-3 double play. It's not surprising that I think that mostly this book is very good or as they say in Wisconsin, where modesty is king, pretty good. But there are flaws as one might expect with a first novel. There are also pet peeves that I have about coming of age, college-located novels that this book brings to the fore.

Here's the good news. In plain, precise prose, Chad Harbach tells a big-hearted story about five people - four young and one old - trying to find fulfillment and (sometimes) love in a tiny Midwestern college town. The story is well plotted and carefully thought out. Mr. Harbach clearly knows how to write. He's read Moby Dick many times no doubt (I've only read it twice), and essentially turns Melville's ship of men into a baseball team. If you like Moby Dick, you'll probably like this testosterone laden book. If you don't, you probably will hate it or maybe even more likely just be bored.

There are some slightly sour elements in this book related to my pet peeves. Like almost all college located novels, this one seems to assume that colleges are all about the humanities. That's simply not believable. Less than 10 percent of people major in the humanities at most schools, even liberal arts colleges in Wisconsin. The age of the prominent English professor ended about 30 years ago; he or she doesn't matter anymore. Also this book plays both light and earnest with a sexual relationship between a faculty member and a college student. I found that relationship to be creepy; there was nothing funny or uplifting about it, that's for certain.

Like many good first novels, this one starts with a bang. The two main characters and their bond are established within the first twenty pages. Also like many good first novels, the author doesn't quite know how to end his story and has use a "how convenient for the author" event to pull the plug. There are many times when characters are moved like marionettes for plot purposes and you can see the strings. But then there is the fun word play - especially with the names of characters and places - and the amusing antics of the characters that make up for the first novel clumsiness. The Art of Fielding is mostly a fun read, droll and often light hearted. The language is crisp. If I scored this novel as a baseball game, I'd say that it was mostly well played. It had a couple of bizarre errors, but the teams showed a lot of hustle, the pitchers were intelligent, there were a couple of home runs, and it was fun to watch. If you're a fan of good writing and baseball, you'll likely get your money's worth.

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Nov 26, 2011

Lola425 rated it

Everything they're saying about this book is true. I couldn't put it down. First, Harbach knows how to tell a story. I want to make a Franzen comparison, because this book gave me the same type of satisfying "ahhh" feeling I have when reading him, but he is not Franzen. Sometimes reading Franzen is like taking a vitamin. You know it's good for you, but sometimes it's a little bitter going down. Not so, with this book. His writing is lovely, without being highbrow. If you are a b...moreEverything they're saying about this book is true. I couldn't put it down. First, Harbach knows how to tell a story. I want to make a Franzen comparison, because this book gave me the same type of satisfying "ahhh" feeling I have when reading him, but he is not Franzen. Sometimes reading Franzen is like taking a vitamin. You know it's good for you, but sometimes it's a little bitter going down. Not so, with this book. His writing is lovely, without being highbrow. If you are a baseball fan, you will be mesmerized, because he writes about baseball with a poetic and philsophical tone, yet with an everyperson appeal to it. All of the characters felt fully realized. By twenty pages in, you cared about everyone you encountered. Henry and Schwartz's relationship was fascinating. You were rooting for them to work it out as much if not more than you would root for a romantic couple. At first look you might want to label their relationship a "bromance" in the pop culture parlance, but you'd be wrong. Their relationship seemed much more essential, was filled with much more gravitas than the word bromance would imply. I'd even say there isn't yet a word that adequately describes the kind of love and affection that Mike and Henry had for each other. Pella calls Schwartz out on it, in a half-joking-half-jealous-but-100% convinced-of-its-truth way. And it's not that you imagine that their realtionship has any kind of homo-erotic tension, because it doesn't. You need only to contrast the relationship between Owen and Affenlight and Henry and Schwartz to see that love between two people (I want to say to men but even writing that fells like I am giving the wrong impression of the book, which just goes to show, I guess, how hard it is to pin down and names complex, complicated emotions) can take any number of forms.

There were images that made me put the book down and think on them awhile, there were uncomfortable moments where my heart wanted to break for Henry, there were many, many moments, in fact. The sole main female character in the book was handled well and believeably. My one and only complaint was that perhaps all the characters were a bit idealized, no one had any egregious flaws. An entire baseball team didn't flinch in having an "out" gay man on their team, Mike's addiction to pain pills is glossed over, even the affair of a 60 year old man with a gay teenager feels "right". And speaking of Owen, good Lord, he was Oscar Wilde in a baseball cap. But I think it is simply that kind of book. Harbach created characters and a story that makes you believe. Definitely in my top five books this year.(less)

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Jan 14, 2012

Peter rated it

Man, I really didn't want to like this book. And here, quickly, are the reasons why:

Number 1) Pure jealousy. Harbach got paid like a bajillion dollars for his very first novel. I was paid slightly less than that. Okay, a lot less than that.

Number 2) I don't like n+1 magazine, of which he is the co-founder. I find it pretentious and boring. I would honestly rather read Cat Fancy.

Number 3) Harbach wrote an article about MFA vs. New York writers that was, in a ...moreMan, I really didn't want to like this book. And here, quickly, are the reasons why:

Number 1) Pure jealousy. Harbach got paid like a bajillion dollars for his very first novel. I was paid slightly less than that. Okay, a lot less than that.

Number 2) I don't like n+1 magazine, of which he is the co-founder. I find it pretentious and boring. I would honestly rather read Cat Fancy.

Number 3) Harbach wrote an article about MFA vs. New York writers that was, in a word, uber-douchy. And anyone who weighs in on that argument has already told you something about themselves that you'd be best off not knowing.

So, as you can see, I had all my petty reasons amassed into an army of pre-read hatred. I was ready to unleash the critical beast and be confirmed in my belief that all hyped literary things are, at heart, overrated, particularly new "it" books written by new "it" writers.

Then I read it.

And I'll be damned if it isn't a really good book. It's not earth-shattering. It's not even particularly person-shattering. But it's great storytelling, particularly when it comes to the friendship/rivalry of the two baseball players at its core.

Harbach writes sports with a strong balance of precision and emotional coloration. He literally had me on the edge of my seat during his masterfully-imagined game days. I felt like I could see the whole field expand in front of me, but, on top of the action, I had access to the internal state of the players. And when it came to the wondrous and beleaguered Henry Skrimshander (a note: the names in this book will either be the best or the worst names in literary history, depending on your personal taste), it was fascinating to get inside the mind of a natural who is beginning to deal with the unnatural. And it was just as compelling to see the game from the eyes of Mike Schwartz, the old soul team captain who pops "Vikes" like they're beer nuts.

Off the diamond, Harbach was a little less successful, but still batting at decent average (Ha! A baseball pun). While I had moments of disbelief with the gay affair that takes up a bit more page space than it likely should have, it was never completely bungled. And the lone female character, Pella, avoided token status with a compelling backstory and a believable case of indecision. Her life is pretty much defined by the men vying for her affections, but it helps (a tiny bit) that she admits this early on and tries to free herself of the affliction.

The prose is a seemingly-effortless mix of clarity with flourishes of the lyric, particularly in moments of high action. I also really liked all the poetic waxing about America's pastime and the art of being a shortstop.

On the whole, this was a solid meaty book about surprisingly interesting meat-heads. I cared. I invested. I wanted to be in the locker room of Westish College, post small-stakes win, all the while contemplating suffering, love, perfection, and the infinity pattern of a baseball's red stitching. But when I was done, I was happy to go back to being a barely-coordinated nerd. Less chance of a pulled groin.
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Dec 07, 2011

Yulia rated it

Certainly the best book to come from one of the founders of n+1, the others being Indecision by Benjamin Kunkel and All the Sad Young Literary Men by Keith Gessen. Harbach said this book, his first, took him nine years to write and his effort paid off. The main characters are all very sympathetic and engaging and there's a reality to their reactions to the situations they confront that I found very realistic.

A review I read compared Harbach's voice to Franzen but I don't think there...more

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Oct 24, 2011

Claire rated it

The buzz about this book had my hopes high and I did start out enjoying it. However, my enjoyment waned as the book went on. I appreciated Harbach's writing, his turn of phrase and his imagination. He starts out with an interesting set of characters. Unfortunately, I didn't find any of the characters to be very well developed. The characters are more like props for the author rather than realistic people. After 500 pages, I did not know Henry Skrimshander. He appears to be a person who plays bas...more

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Mar 01, 2012

Ellen rated it

Pretty much hyped as the latest Great American Novel (note the capitalisation), I had high hopes for this first novel. As a first novel, it is excellent. As a novel, it's a bit weaker. I'm surprised that, as a first novel, it wasn't edited a bit more tightly.

Here in Britain, reviewers wondered if the baseball narratives would be too much for British readers. They shouldn't be a problem, however as they're the best written part of the book. It's when Harbach leaves behind the baseball...more

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Dec 28, 2011

Michael Magras rated it

Don't let anyone tell you otherwise: You do have to like baseball to appreciate fully Chad Harbach's début novel. Yes, it's about other things, but the focus is on baseball and how one's talent for the game, or lack thereof, affects one's sense of self-worth. Non-baseball fans would probably relate to many of the themes, but I doubt they'd give the book its due if they had to force their way through long set pieces about missed cut-off men and errant throws and hitting to the opposite field. It ...more

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Aug 07, 2011

switterbug (Betsey) rated it

This tender campus novel about five individuals whose paths connect and cross--straight, not straight, diagonally, vertically, and sometimes horizontally, doesn't require you to like baseball, although you may be roused to watch a game when you close this lively book.

It opens in Peoria with a no-name tournament between small-time summer teams. Harbach sets the robust tone and pacing here, with a droll wit and a steady, fluid tempo. He coaxes us to treasure his characters as much as he ...moreThis tender campus novel about five individuals whose paths connect and cross--straight, not straight, diagonally, vertically, and sometimes horizontally, doesn't require you to like baseball, although you may be roused to watch a game when you close this lively book.

It opens in Peoria with a no-name tournament between small-time summer teams. Harbach sets the robust tone and pacing here, with a droll wit and a steady, fluid tempo. He coaxes us to treasure his characters as much as he clearly enjoyed writing them. Occasionally, it feels self-conscious, that he is maneuvering us to like them.

During the Peoria game, farmboy shortstop Henry Skrimshander impresses college sophomore and student coach Mike Schwartz, enough for Mike to recruit South Dakotan Henry to Westish College in Wisconsin. Mike takes Henry under his wing and they form an intense, interdependent bond. Henry is a runty guy lacking season but is a wonder boy with his glove named Zero. The more garrulous Mike is brawny, brash, and a superb team supporter, but no record-breaking player.

The title, The Art of Fielding, comes from the (fictional) and well-read baseball bible that is Henry's inspiration and encouragement, a kind of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance guide for baseball players. Athlete and philosopher-writer of the book, retired player Aparicio Rodriguez, holds a shortstop record for number of games with no errors. Henry aspires to meet him and match his record. Along the way, he must confront a crisis of confidence and a mound of angst and anxiety.

Henry's roommate, Owen, is scholarly, sartorial, and secure in his own skin. He's a brotherly friend to Henry, and the only player who gets away with reading books on the bench. He starts out dimensional, but unfortunately dwindles to not much more than a set piece later on, more of a vehicle for the story's progression.

College president Guert Affenlight is a hale, hearty, and handsome intellect with cultured charm, who looks younger than his sixty-ish years. He's been estranged from his only daughter, Pella, since she skipped out years ago and married an older architect.

Now the prodigal daughter returns, solo, and Guert and Pella make a go of repairing their fractured bond as well as establishing other new relationships. Guert's conduct in all affairs wasn't wholly convincing, and the author engineered a facile plot turn towards the climax, a tactic that a veteran author might have avoided.

As the story unfolds and the bases get loaded, the reader is taken on a journey of second chances and last chances, where a phoenix can rise out of the Astroturf, and a curve ball can cut loose and fly. It's a big-hearted, warm-hearted story of friendship, love, and loyalty. There's also a wink and a nod to a scene in John Irving's A Prayer for Owen Meany.

Debut author Harbach is an ace storyteller, terrifically engaging, who nevertheless went a half inning or so too long in the end, and presented a few implausible events along the way. The exuberance of his writing is his best defense against his overindulgence. (3.75)(less)

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Feb 11, 2012

Julie rated it

Shelves: contemporary-fiction, usa-contemporary, best-of-2012, read-2012

Baseball. Such magic and possibility, such aromas and images and sounds and yearnings this simple, two-syllable word conveys to those lucky or cursed to be caught in its spell. A sport chock full of rules only a pedant could love, heaps of statistics that confound mathematicians, games that last so long enjoyment gives way to endurance... Yet it is holds a singular place in our national lore, leaving us starry-eyed for summers and lovers, for youth and potential that we only imagine we once poss...moreBaseball. Such magic and possibility, such aromas and images and sounds and yearnings this simple, two-syllable word conveys to those lucky or cursed to be caught in its spell. A sport chock full of rules only a pedant could love, heaps of statistics that confound mathematicians, games that last so long enjoyment gives way to endurance... Yet it is holds a singular place in our national lore, leaving us starry-eyed for summers and lovers, for youth and potential that we only imagine we once possessed. Baseball is for dreamers. Baseball is for writers.

Baseball. Professional sports shenanigans have burst whatever bubbles of homespun mystique that the major leagues blew our way, so the fan looks with eager hope to the minor and collegiate levels. Chad Harbach nimbly drops us into the latter, playing an easy game of catch with our hearts. Before we know it night has fallen and we can hardly see the white sphere as it's lobbed at us from yards away. In the distance we can hear our mom calling us from the back porch to dinner on this warm, breezy summer's night.

Baseball. No, you don't need to care about the sport or know a shortstop from a pinch-hitter to enjoy this book. But if you do, you'll at least have an inkling of the angels and demons that nibble at these characters' brains. And knees. And lower backs. And shoulders. And hearts.

The Art of Fielding is a bit of precious fantasy. A fantasy of well-intentioned, smart, driven young men living pretty clean lives at a well-intentioned, smart, driven liberal arts college on the shores of Lake Michigan in wholesome, milk-fed Wisconsin. By holding the real world at bay, Harbach can indulge in a writer's fantasy world where co-eds spout Emerson and Whitman, where the college's star football/baseball player spends the wee hours before his next gut-spewing workout poring over his senior thesis on Aristophanes.

But Harbach tells a marvelous story with characters so fully realized that it seems any break with reality is the doing of characters' and the choices they make. They own this story. Harbach owns the team, but his characters are the ones out there swinging for the home run. It is a story, not just of baseball, but of the ivory towers of academe, about a father and a daughter, about coming of age and coming to terms with aging. It is a story of friendship, of true love and of love when it's convenient.

I have a feeling about this book. I feel Harbach was put into a zen zone of storytelling by writing about our national past-time -- that there's really no way to tell a GOOD story about baseball but that the author must slow down, give each play time to unfold, each team member his place on the field and be patient as the game takes shape.

Interestingly, this epic debut -- epic for its advance, epic for the attention it has received -- has been compared in substance and style to Jonathan Franzen and David Foster Wallace, authors I have not read nor have any interest in, to be frank. I thought instead of John Irving, Jhumpa Lahiri, Philip Roth, John Updike -- writers who have penned novels I have adored and novels I have loathed. But of their works I have loved, it's the richness of the story and fullness of the characters that enchanted me.

Somehow I find myself holding back that "It was amazing" fifth star. Maybe I give a higher nod to historical fiction where the author has to work harder to find the right tone, language and props for a setting and era beyond his or her experience.

Perhaps this is a case where rankings are essentially meaningless. I'll let thoughts settle a bit more, but in all fairness, this was a book I didn't want to put down. That's my highest recommendation.

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Jan 16, 2012

Ken rated it

In his debut novel, The Art of Fielding, Chad Harbach examines the lives of 5 people and the ways in which their paths intersect at the fictional Westish College in Wisconsin. Henry Skrimshander, the main character, is a socially awkward yet preternaturally good shortstop. Mike Schwartz in the dedicated catcher for the Westish Harpooners who discovers Henry during a summer league game and persuades him to attend Westish. Guert Affenlight is the president of the college, and Pella is his daughter...moreIn his debut novel, The Art of Fielding, Chad Harbach examines the lives of 5 people and the ways in which their paths intersect at the fictional Westish College in Wisconsin. Henry Skrimshander, the main character, is a socially awkward yet preternaturally good shortstop. Mike Schwartz in the dedicated catcher for the Westish Harpooners who discovers Henry during a summer league game and persuades him to attend Westish. Guert Affenlight is the president of the college, and Pella is his daughter, recently returned to Wisconsin (and her father) after having left her domineering husband in California. Lastly, there is Owen Dunne, Henry's room-and teammate.

The Art of Fielding is about baseball. The title of the novel refers to Henry's bible, a book of wisdom for infielders written by Henry's favorite player. One of the main story lines of the novel concerns the progress of the Harpooners through the season. In the 100 year history of the college, they have never won a conference championship, but they have never had a player as good as Henry, either.

The Art of Fielding is not really about baseball. The relationships between the 5 characters mentioned above (in addition to some well-rounded secondary characters) bind the various plotlines together, and these relationships--especially in the late chapters of the novel--form the center of Harbach's considerations of love, loyalty, and identity.

I enjoyed The Art of Fielding a great deal. It is, at just over 500 pages, a long novel, and some parts--in the middle third, say--drag a bit, but it is a quick read with short chapters. For the most part, Harbach keeps the action moving. Harbach's characterization is a strength of the book, as we always know the thoughts and motivations of the main characters. The most recent book I completed before this one was Jeffrey Eugenides The Marriage Plot, and I am tempted to say that Harbach draws his secondary characters more sharply that Eugenides does his main characters.

I read a lot, and I read--I think--a lot of good stuff. Still, it is not often the I pause during reading to admire how good the writing is. But I did for this book. After I finished chapter 73--a turning point, even climactic for one of the characters--I just shook my head, not believing (except I had just read it) how good, how lovely the chapter was.

My favorite quotation from the book: "You loved it because you considered it an art: an apparently pointless affair, undertaken by people with special aptitude, which sidestepped attempts to paraphrase its value yet somehow seemed to communicate something true about The Human Condition. The Human Condition being, basically, that we're alive and have access to beauty, can even erratically create it, but will someday be dead and will not."(less)

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Nov 17, 2011

Gail rated it

Is there a way to give a book six stars on here? Because I'd keep adding them if I could, I loved "The Art of Fielding" that much. Truly, I didn't want this novel to come to an end. Last night, I put the book down with 30 pages left. I honestly thought, "I want one more day to delve into this world." But then, 20 minutes later, there I was, picking it back up to reach its final page (and discovering a wholy satisfying resolution, which rarely happens for me with most books). ...moreIs there a way to give a book six stars on here? Because I'd keep adding them if I could, I loved "The Art of Fielding" that much. Truly, I didn't want this novel to come to an end. Last night, I put the book down with 30 pages left. I honestly thought, "I want one more day to delve into this world." But then, 20 minutes later, there I was, picking it back up to reach its final page (and discovering a wholy satisfying resolution, which rarely happens for me with most books).

This is one of those novels where the characters don't just live on the page. They live WITH you. Here I was, book nowhere in sight, and yet I still found myself at points of my day, wondering what Henry and Schwartz and Pella were doing at that very moment. The hype for this one? TOTALLY WORTH IT.

And to say "The Art of Fielding" is a book about baseball is to say "Friday Night Lights" is a TV show about football. Yes, yes, the book's protagonist is short stop (and baseball phenom) Henry Skrimshander. Yes, there are plenty of scenes that involve the diamond and batting cages (and a central plot point that involves Henry's first-ever errant throw). But it's SO much more than that so don't let all the sports talk dissuade you from reading it. Because wrapped up in all those baseball analogies are the universal themes of suffering and failure and that age-old question of "What am I doing with my life?" It may be a stretch for some, but for me, this is as good as it gets in earning that rare title of Great American Novel.

Finally, my love for "Art" may very well be jaded but that's only because I've learned so much about how it came to be. Chad Harbach spent NINE years laboring over this, his first-ever novel. NINE YEARS. Only to go from a poor guy with debt collectors after him to landing a book contract worth more than $600,000. If you've made it this far in this review (god bless you), and if you love "Art", you owe it to yourself to find a way to read the Vanity Fair story that details how this book came to be. Find it either in the October 2011 issue of Vanity Fair or online in this eBook (which, it may be $2 but it's worth the investment if you have an e-reader. It's a fascinating piece: http://www.vanityfair.com/magazine/ebook...)(less)

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Nov 23, 2011

Paul rated it

Graceful high school superstar shortstop Henry Skrimshander enrolls at Westish College and falls under the tutelage of Mike Schwartz, the team’s sophomore catcher. Soon the two are leading the way to a league championship. Ah . . . another baseball story, you say. Well, yes and no. Certainly the baseball backdrop adds an element of excitement to the novel. But author Chad Harbach has more in mind. Focusing on several of the denizens of the college (the president and his daughter, Pella; t...more

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Oct 25, 2011

Lillian rated it

Shelves: doorway-character, doorway-story, reluctant-readers, glbt

Henry Skrimshander is the star shortstop for the Westish College Harpooners. He is the fulcrum around which the lives of four other people revolve and they are profoundly affected when his star begins to fade.

Not since Russo's Empire Falls have I encountered such characters that breathe with life. Whenever I put the book down, I felt like the characters were sitting on the couch beside me waiting for me to get back to the action. There was one more individual whose life turned on Hen...more

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Jan 05, 2012

Julie Ekkers rated it

Shelves: fiction

The Art of Fielding is one of those old-fashioned, big-hearted, sink-into-it novels. The author's delight in his characters, all coming of age in different ways, is clear. It is a joy to be in such company. He writes of baseball with an ease that is very accessible. The opening chapter is delicious! My only complaint is that I felt the author's affection for his characters perhaps made him reluctant to do some judicious editing, from which I thought the book would have benefited overall. S...more

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Mar 09, 2012

John Swift rated it

I will say that my sophisticated writing teacher loved this book,as did, of course, the NYT. I hated it, and not just for those reasons, but they'd be a start. This is not really a book about Baseball, but is unfortunately the reason that I got hooked into plunking my own cash for this sorry excuse for a book. It has a promising start, much like walking out of the darkened tunnels into the stands at Wrigley Field and getting blinded by the sunshine and dazzled by the bright green grass, thri...more

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Mar 04, 2012

Graham Coursey rated it

Having read reviews in the NY Times, New Yorker, etc., I was convinced -- given that I'm not a sports fan by any stretch of the imagination -- that I'd probably hate the book, but I picked up a copy at my local bookstore and am so very glad that I did. It's really not a baseball novel, but, rather, a college novel in which many of the characters happen to play baseball. Though Harbach's book is certainly au courant with the social fabric of contemporary American life, The Art of Fielding is fa...more

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Mar 01, 2012

Rdturtle rated it

I've been reading this off and on since it was published in the fall, putting it down for weeks at a time and then resuming. Harbach writes wonderfully--passage after passage give pleasure. But there is something not quite fully formed at the heart of it for me--in spite of the ten years he spent writing it. While I could believe in each character in theory, I never lost, as I do in the books I love the most, the sense that they were created and not observed--the link to real life is not as stro...more

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Feb 29, 2012

Gene rated it

I'm not the biggest baseball fan. Generally I find it pretty slow and boring and I don't follow the seasons at all, unless the Yankees make the playoffs. (I'm a Manhattan native and my mother's from the Bronx -- deal with it. The New York Yankees are unquestionably the greatest team in baseball history.) My childhood was full of baseball, with a very jocky Irish-twin brother ("I just want to check the score.") and my inglorious Little League career, which lasted into junior high. I f...moreI'm not the biggest baseball fan. Generally I find it pretty slow and boring and I don't follow the seasons at all, unless the Yankees make the playoffs. (I'm a Manhattan native and my mother's from the Bronx -- deal with it. The New York Yankees are unquestionably the greatest team in baseball history.) My childhood was full of baseball, with a very jocky Irish-twin brother ("I just want to check the score.") and my inglorious Little League career, which lasted into junior high. I find baseball stultifying on TV and team identification rather stupid (except the Yankees -- see above) but going to a game itself, with the stadium's intense stimuli, rowdy crowd, and beer, rather fun once in a blue moon. That's all just to give you my baseball background. It's not a thing I would list among my favorites or even passing interests, but I know the rules and what it's like to stand in a manicured outfield on a beautiful summer day, wearing the sexy uniform with my balls sweating in a cup and my hand sweating in a leather glove.

The Art of Fielding is, comprehensively, a baseball book. It's fully immersed in the world of collegiate sports at a contemporary, quaint little liberal arts college on the banks of Lake Michigan, and the setting feels believably real. The players live and breathe baseball, and we see them train and play, in intricate, well-choreographed, engaging visual detail. Harbach is an excellently cinematic writer, and his action scenes bristle with easily-imagined excitement. I was never bored or confused by the activity, and stakes are kept high throughout. Parts read almost like a baseball thriller -- or really, like any classic sports underdog story, like the Bad News Bears, with their engaging emotional investment. This world, and its motion, is wonderfully rendered.

Besides the thrilling action scenes, the writing is solid throughout, even lyrical throughout, with a humanistic good humor and emotional understanding. Perhaps if I were nitpicking, I'd say that some of the descriptions of emotional and mental states becomes overindulgent and maybe a little whiny, but Harbach has set himself a difficult and ambitious task -- to illuminate the challenge of self-doubt from our modern existential crisis through the arena of baseball -- and that's extremely hard to accomplish without some serious navel-gazing. Really, it's impressive how much entertaining action and pleasurable soap opera is delivered to sustain us through this dark tea time of the soul.

Several characters are quite good, with captain and catcher and coacher Mike Schwartz perhaps the most vividly created. He's a full, exciting personality, filled with pain and strength. Henry Skrimshander, who the book revolves around, can seem sexless and cryptic, a bit more machine than man, even while struggling with weighty mental blocks. I like Henry, but wanted to know more about him to make his crisis more personal. The third in their awkward romantic triangle, Pella Affenlight, is pretty interesting and relatable, but perhaps a touch too adorkable. Her father, Guert Affenlight, the president of Westish college, fits into the puzzle neatly, and he's a fascinating intellect who makes a believable late-life veer into homosexual romance, although he sometimes read somewhat younger than his life experience would indicate. The final main character here is Owen Dunne, a Zenlike baseball player who gets all the best lines, and is notable for the deep respect the team shows him, but perhaps is too Magic Gay to provide a fully-rounded portrait. Still, I cannot complain too harshly about the inclusion of a complex gay romance as a major plot point in a baseball book -- it's a wonderful addition to a sports story, and makes the novel seem all the more modern and humanistic.

Overall, I'd give the book 4 1/2 stars. The prose is enjoyable, even superb and funny in places, and the vivid action, stronger characters, open-minded and open-hearted outlook, and solid literary and psychological ambition recommend The Art of Fielding greatly. I'd be remiss not to mention the problems of the more obtuse characterizations and self-indulgent soul-plumbing, but ultimately it's a gripping read that resonates.

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Feb 25, 2012

Bob Mustin rated it

Transforming Characters

The Art of Fielding, by Chad Harbach

This is an odd but compelling book. It covers so many bases (in the literary sense) that it’s hard to know where to start. So to the story. Mike Schwartz, a salt of the earth member of Westish college’s football and baseball teams, sees in shy Henry Skrimshander a pearl-in-the-rough baseball talent. He uses his influence, which is considerable, to have Henry recruited to the tiny, relatively poor liberal arts college ...moreTransforming Characters

The Art of Fielding, by Chad Harbach

This is an odd but compelling book. It covers so many bases (in the literary sense) that it’s hard to know where to start. So to the story. Mike Schwartz, a salt of the earth member of Westish college’s football and baseball teams, sees in shy Henry Skrimshander a pearl-in-the-rough baseball talent. He uses his influence, which is considerable, to have Henry recruited to the tiny, relatively poor liberal arts college to play shortstop. Henry is roomed with Owen Dunne, a gay member of the baseball team. As you might imagine, the team is an eccentric mix of talent and personalities, not unlike some professional ball clubs. The team slowly gels. In the meantime, Mike and Pella Affenlight, the school president’s daughter, become lovers. Guert Affenlight, the prez, a former flashy Harvard professor with a fascination for the work of Herman Melville and former ladies’ man, is drawn to Owen in – shall we say – a manner unbecoming to his station.

Harbach’s talent here is in making something coherent of these disparate characters – not a small challenge. He takes each into personal nadir, then brings each from those depths in unexpected ways that in the end make sense. They make sense, not in personal ways, but as a collective – much the same way a successful baseball team gels. In this way each becomes transformed into a person one could hardly have anticipated.

Baseball, then, is more than a backdrop – it’s a conveyance for the ways people in this modern era change and grow through interaction. It’s no coincidence, I think, that Harbach has this occur at a college, the traditional place of transformation for young minds. That Guert Affenlight, in his sixties, is changing, too, makes the statement even stronger, perhaps telling us that age and tradition aren’t the staid old things they used to be.

There are many more nuances to this book, but this will give you the idea. The only flaw I note in this book – and it’s a small, subtle one – is that the author seems to have a hard time finding a way to end the story. Still, Harbach is a literary talent, and I can only look forward to more such compelling, eminently readable books from him.
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Feb 22, 2012

E. rated it

I haven't read a hardback in 10 years. I have a super strong aversion to books that are getting a lot of buzz (art of fielding was sold at Barnes and Noble when I stopped by) and lugging around hardbacks drive me crazy.....carrying books that qualify as literature around with me is pretentious enough......when that book is ginormous it's even worse. But, Art of Fielding was referred to me enough times, by enough people I respect that I broke my own rule. And it was pretty much worth it.
...more

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Feb 20, 2012

Nicolemauerman rated it

Thus far I have some luck with highly praised books, but others were just disappointments (The Tiger's Wife, Swamplandia!) and I really wasn't excited to read this one. At just over 500 pages it could be quite the investment, but it's not. It's a really engrossing book about baseball and the young people that play it. This book is set at a liberal arts college in the midwest where football is king, but Henry a scrawny kid has so much potential that the baseball team capiton, Mike, convinces the ...more

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Feb 18, 2012

Kbryna rated it

It was an enjoyable read and held my interest (I was skeptical initially that it would), but it is not the transcendent masterwork some critics/readers suggest it is. There's a lot that feels familiar - casual sex, betrayals, lots of male drunkenness as coping mechanism - as well as a touch of pretension that I could have done without.
As I say, I enjoyed the story, but it did feel, ultimately, too long by maybe 80-100 pages. I never felt like I knew any of the characters really intimately;...more

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Feb 15, 2012

Tim rated it

Chad Harbach makes in his debut novel the typical rookie mistake of not editing himself, of throwing everything into the pot. That leaves "The Art of Fielding," at 512 pages, occasionally unwieldy in its own weight and with a bloated middle. Harbach gives us short chapter after short chapter that add little to the story, and the plot starts to drift. But he brings home this tale (3.5 stars) of baseball and love and friendship and academia with more-focused panache, saving a 4-star rati...moreChad Harbach makes in his debut novel the typical rookie mistake of not editing himself, of throwing everything into the pot. That leaves "The Art of Fielding," at 512 pages, occasionally unwieldy in its own weight and with a bloated middle. Harbach gives us short chapter after short chapter that add little to the story, and the plot starts to drift. But he brings home this tale (3.5 stars) of baseball and love and friendship and academia with more-focused panache, saving a 4-star rating from a 3.

In "The Art of Fielding," Henry Skrimshander, an obscure South Dakota shortstop with a vacuum-cleaner glove and a whippet arm, catches the attention of Westish College (Wisconsin) catcher Mike Schwartz at a summer Legion tournament. Schwartz encourages him to attend the Division III school, and under Schwartz's guidance, Henry becomes a star with the glove and attracts the attention of pro scouts. But Henry, on the cusp of tying legendary shortstop Aparicio Rodriguez's college errorless record, uncorks a tragic throw to first that changes everything.

The college's male president, Guert Affenlight, meanwhile, is having an illicit affair with Henry's teammate and roommate, Owen Dunne. Affenlight had attended Westish and was instrumental in its history. As an undergraduate, he discovered evidence of a lecture at the tiny college on Lake Michigan by Herman Melville. The college subsequently had latched on to its forgotten history, renaming its athletic teams the Harpooners and erecting a Melville statue. Affenlight's daughter, fleeing a bad marriage, shows up at the college and figures prominently in the lives of her father, Henry and Schwartz.

"The Art of Fielding" is, at its core, a baseball book, I suppose. The sport's fans will gain a knowing satisfaction from the fictional "Aparicio Rodriguez" name as well as its mention of notable major leaguers who, like Henry, suddenly lost the ability to throw: Steve Blass, Rick Ankiel, etc. But the book is more expansive than your run-of-the-mill sports novel. In fact, too often it strays from the Henry story to focus on the Affenlights. I wanted to know more about Henry as he suffers through a rash of throwing errors, but Harbach seldom lets us in.

"The Art of Fielding," to me, resembles "The Natural" in its black-and-white depiction of either perfection (Henry didn't make an error until his junior season) or hopeless struggles. That's a bit heavy-handed. It's interesting, too, how the author blurbs on the back cover are revealing. John Irving and David James Duncan both praise the novel, and I can see some similarities, particularly with Duncan's "The Brothers K" (regarding Irving, substitute baseball for wrestling and omit bears). Also, there's a little Jon Hassler here as well, along with, perhaps, the athlete/stud/mentor and odd introvert buddy relationship from such books as "Birdy."

Harbach writes well, though not spectacularly, and knows his way around baseball. When he focuses more clearly on the Harpooners and their unlikely run at nationals late in the book, everything picks up. "The Art of Fielding" is too long and has bland patches, but it's like a team that manages to win even when not always looking so great. Four stars for baseball nuts, three for everybody else.
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Feb 15, 2012

Richard Bray rated it

Perhaps by its very nature, baseball is a sentimental sport. It’s a sport about the perpetual chase of perfection, and the inevitable failure that goes along with that, and the mind set required to participate in such a sport at its highest levels.

THE ART OF FIELDING by Chad Harbach understands this better than any other book I’ve ever read. The novel initially drew my attention when I read reviews that compared it to “The Natural,” declaring it an entrant in the “best baseball novel e...morePerhaps by its very nature, baseball is a sentimental sport. It’s a sport about the perpetual chase of perfection, and the inevitable failure that goes along with that, and the mind set required to participate in such a sport at its highest levels.

THE ART OF FIELDING by Chad Harbach understands this better than any other book I’ve ever read. The novel initially drew my attention when I read reviews that compared it to “The Natural,” declaring it an entrant in the “best baseball novel ever” conversation. And it certainly didn’t hurt that one of the main characters, Henry, idolizes a sure-handed, Gold Glove-winning St. Louis Cardinals shortstop who goes by the name Aparicio in the book but is really a thinly-veiled version of Ozzie Smith, my own boyhood baseball idol.

But at the end of the day, it’s not really a book about baseball. Sure, three of the story’s five protagonists play baseball, and it’s obvious in Harbach’s writing that he truly loves and understands the game, but it’s really more of a coming-of-age novel, as all five of the protagonists struggle to figure out who they really are despite their very different backgrounds and viewpoints.

Somehow, after spending more than 500 pages with these characters, the outcome of the championship game in the book’s climactic scenes becomes secondary, even though Harbach does a masterful job of portraying one of baseball’s great truth’s throughout the book — that every pitch and every play, at that very moment, is the most important one in a player’s career. The baseball scenes are fantastic because they not only depict the drama of the game, but they advance each character’s story arc.

It’s not a perfect book — about 3/4 through, as one of our main characters goes into a funk and withdraws from his life, the pace really slows down — but it finishes strong, and it’s an amazing accomplishment. Non-baseball fans can certainly enjoy it, I believe, because so much of it takes place off the diamond, but I think to really understand the soul of this book, you have to understand the soul of baseball. I couldn’t recommend it highly enough to any real baseball fans out there. It certainly belongs in the “best baseball novel ever” conversation.(less)

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Feb 07, 2012

James Tierney added it · review of another edition

I think to be a successful reader, you sometimes need to put a book down and not pick it up again.

This isn't always because a book is bad.

In my case, it has often been because I'm not ready for the book that I've picked up.
I'm thinking particularly of my struggles in high school to 'get' authors such as Patrick White or Jane Austen. For very different reasons, I couldn't find that sympathetic place within me for either writer.
I did found it later (Persuasi...more

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topics	posts	views	last activity
21st Century Lite...: * General Discussion (read first! - no spoilers please!)	15	27	Mar 01, 2012 01:45am
21st Century Lite...: Art of Fielding: Chapters 61-82	15	21	Jan 29, 2012 01:58pm
Can we ID all the Moby Dick/ Melville Allusions in the Book?	2	35	Jan 29, 2012 01:54pm
Lady Canes: Recap from 1/12/2012	1	3	Jan 12, 2012 10:57am
21st Century Lite...: Art of Fielding: Chapters 21-40	5	12	Jan 06, 2012 01:55pm
21st Century Lite...: Chapters 1-20 Discussion	11	23	Jan 05, 2012 05:01pm

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About Chad Harbach

Chad Harbach grew up in Wisconsin and was educated at Harvard and the University of Virginia. He is a cofounder and coeditor of n+1.

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Quotes from The Art of Fielding

“It was strange the way he loved her; a side long and almost casual love, as if loving her were simply a matter of course, too natural to mention” — 11 people liked it

“Owen," Henry said excitedly, "I think Coach wants you to hit for Meccini."

Owen closed The Voyage of the Beagle, on which he had recently embarked. "Really?"

"Runners on first and second," Rick said. "I bet he wants you to bunt."

"What's the bunt sign?"

"Two tugs on the left earlobe," Henry told him. "But first he has to give the indicator, which is squeeze the belt. But if he goes to his cap with either hand or says your first name, that's the wipe-off, and then you have to wait and see whether--"

"Forget it," Owen said. "I'll just bunt.” — 10 people liked it

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