The Natural
by Bernard Malamud
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Richard Graf
World Literature
Mrs. Ebarvia
11-28-07
Book Review
The Natural is a story written in 1952 and is by Bernard Malamud. It is arguably the greatest baseball novel ever written. It was Bernard Malamud’s most successful books but he also wrote The Fixer and The Assistant. The Natural is about Roy Hobbs, a middle aged man, trying to help his team win the pinnate. Unfortunately, his dream and his teammate’s dreams don’t come true. Violence, alcohol, sex, and gambling are th...more
World Literature
Mrs. Ebarvia
11-28-07
Book Review
The Natural is a story written in 1952 and is by Bernard Malamud. It is arguably the greatest baseball novel ever written. It was Bernard Malamud’s most successful books but he also wrote The Fixer and The Assistant. The Natural is about Roy Hobbs, a middle aged man, trying to help his team win the pinnate. Unfortunately, his dream and his teammate’s dreams don’t come true. Violence, alcohol, sex, and gambling are th...more
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Read in October, 2007
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The book that I read was The Natural by Bernard Malamud. A few other books Bernard Malamud has written are The Assistant, The Magic Barrel, and The Fixer which won a National Book Award in 1966 and the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. A lot of his writings have to do with racial issues that he came into contact with while in New York. Other than writing he also taught at Oregon State University from 1949-1961. The Natural is a story about a man named Roy Hobbs. Roy is an older man who tries out for t...more
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Baseball book made famous by Robert Redford. Great read, Malamud is a talented writer. I suppose I should also add that I wrote a huge term paper on this novel comparing it to jousting and book Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. It was a lot of fun to look at the comparisons between baseball and a medieval pastime. Also, both two books aren't really about baseball or jousting...
FROM WIKIPEDIA:
The Natural was adapted into a film starring Robert Redford as Roy Hobbs in 1984. The movie is no...more
FROM WIKIPEDIA:
The Natural was adapted into a film starring Robert Redford as Roy Hobbs in 1984. The movie is no...more
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I never realized how different the book version is a compared to the popular motion picture version starring Robert Redford. As many of you know the protagonist, Roy Hobbs was a natural at baseball, but his career is sidetracked by a crazed woman that kills famous sports athletes with a silver bulleted gun right before his tryout with the Chicago Cubs. Roy never had a chance to play with a Major League Baseball club until he was in his mid-thirties and well past his prime and was signed to a min...more
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I first read about this book in a review in a sports magazine in the early 50s. I wish I had saved this review or could find it again. The author was very puzzled about the book, finding its descriptive material about baseball mildly interesting, but confused about the mythic and carnal subtexts which he treated as superfluous. Certainly I had to read it - I knew what "carnal" meant, of course - and I actually found it in a trash-pile outside my farm house in North Dakota, where my p...more
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Read in June, 2008
The greed, grandiosity, and gluttony frustrated antihero Roy Hobbs displays in this book is a powerful metaphor for baseball as it has recently been plastered all over the headlines, the steroid dilemma. The national pastime, this early 50s novel reminds us, has long been plagued by corruption and gambling, though what has not changed is the expectation of innocence that the public is then titillated by when it is destroyed. I was expecting a bittersweet irony towards baseball, but this book is ...more
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Read in October, 2007
I've seen the movie many times, finally got around to reading the book. I guess I was in the mood 'cause of the MLB post season.
What a great, fun read! It's sort of like the baseball version of "The Great Gatsby". And I don't think I'm saying that just 'cause Robert Redford played the lead in both movies.
Always amazing to me how much They change stories to make them into Hollywood movies. The main character, Roy Hobbs, is significantly less sympathetic in the book than in t...more
What a great, fun read! It's sort of like the baseball version of "The Great Gatsby". And I don't think I'm saying that just 'cause Robert Redford played the lead in both movies.
Always amazing to me how much They change stories to make them into Hollywood movies. The main character, Roy Hobbs, is significantly less sympathetic in the book than in t...more
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The more I think about this book the more I love it! At first glance, I was a bit disappointed because I absolutely love the movie that is based upon it. But, as I get more and more into the history of baseball the book opens up to all sort of revelations.
Malamud is a genius! His encyclopedic knowledge of the game makes each sentence drip with reference and intention. Ty Cobb, Connie Mack, John J. McGraw, Judge Mountain, Babe Ruth, the Black Sox, the beleaguered New York Giants and Washington ...more
Malamud is a genius! His encyclopedic knowledge of the game makes each sentence drip with reference and intention. Ty Cobb, Connie Mack, John J. McGraw, Judge Mountain, Babe Ruth, the Black Sox, the beleaguered New York Giants and Washington ...more
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Read in July, 2008
The Natural must be the most under-rated American novel. I read Malamud's The Assistant earlier this year because it is on Time's 100 Best Novels list. The two books have similar themes but I think I liked The Natural better because of it's baseball setting. Part Great Gatsby, part Arthurian legend, it is the American story set against the American pastime.
I read it in its entirety on the 3rd of July 2008 at Mount Rushmore. We arrived there at 6:00 a.m. to watch the fireworks that evenin...more
I read it in its entirety on the 3rd of July 2008 at Mount Rushmore. We arrived there at 6:00 a.m. to watch the fireworks that evenin...more
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recommends it for:
Anyone contemplating suicide, but lacking the nerve...
I love books. I collect, preserve, protect and treasure books. After reading this one, I immediately threw it in the trash.
This may well be the most badly written book in the history of the planet. Should there turn out to be alien civilizations elsewhere in the universe, and they've written books, this would also be far worse than anything they ever wrote.
The language, sentence structure, plot development (or extreme lack thereof), pacing and narrative could not possibly be worse. The...more
This may well be the most badly written book in the history of the planet. Should there turn out to be alien civilizations elsewhere in the universe, and they've written books, this would also be far worse than anything they ever wrote.
The language, sentence structure, plot development (or extreme lack thereof), pacing and narrative could not possibly be worse. The...more
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The phrase "truly magical" ought only be used with the greatest trepidation, but it realliy is the best phrase to describe this book. Lots of bits of baseball mythology wrapped around literary symbols in a way that made me feel like a kid again toward the game of baseball - please excuse the cliche here as well. I'm not sure if someone who is not a baseball fan, and a somewhat obsessive one at that, would love this book as much as I do. I loved it when I read it in my teen years, but ...more
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One of the most over-rated novels in all of American Literature. Malamud cannot write. Or he writes like a 13-year-old boy would write. It baffles me -- baffles me! -- why this book is considered a classic and why on earth we would teach it to high school students. It must be because it's about baseball. Big farkin' deal. Do yourself a favor -- skip the book and watch the movie. Redford is excellent in the film and gives the story more depth than the author ever could.
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Read in January, 2006
I was extremely impressed by Malamud's easy and often surprising writing. It's not just a baseball book. It's a phantasmagoria of the humorously wicked and tragic, all set off against the background of the great game, which is about so much more than fairytale endings. Its hard to explain exactly what the tone is; right now I keep thinking of The Tempest.
I suppose I have to add that this book deserves much better than, "oh they made it into that wonderful Robert Redford movie&q
I suppose I have to add that this book deserves much better than, "oh they made it into that wonderful Robert Redford movie&q
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Malamud's prose is elegant and evocative, and made this novel a pleasure to read. So different from the film! Roy Hobbs is larger than life, and not just in the way he swings the bat; his story is a charming, if occasionally repugnant, fable that doesn't turn a blind eye to human nature. The characters are well-drawn and familiar types, and the plot rushes you along like the ghostly train of Roy's nightmares. It was hard to put down. Thanks, Elizabeth!!
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Read in February, 2008
Nice book-much better than I expected. I had of course seen the film first, and as a baseball fan, enjoyed it. The tragic downfall of the hero/antihero in the novel, however, makes much more sense. The connections frequently drawn between Arthurian legend and the novel make it a much greater achievement than I expected. The irrationality of the film makes more sense when read in the scope of the fisher king myth hilighted int he novel. I look forward to reading The Fixer.
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Read in March, 2005
A darker novel than the film based upon it but despite some brilliant moments still a disappointment as a baseball novel or simply a novel, including its say it ain’t so, Joe/Mighty Casey strikes out ending. The blend of mythic epic and gritty realism never quite blends. And Hobbs, the hero, isn’t particularly likable. In the movie he hits the big homer and ends up with Iris; in the book, bubkus dissolving into tears. Both, however, have shallow invention in common.
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Read in April, 2008
After I finished the book, my wife asked me whether I liked the movie or the book better. I answered, "I'd love to see a movie about this book, and I'd love to read the book about the movie." The movie and the book are not the same. Sure, there is some dialogue and some scenes that are the same - but the main characters in the book are completely different from their movie characters. I loved both the movie and the book - but be warned - they are not the same.
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Easily the best baseball novel ever writen, and quite possibly the best sports novel--but don't let that discourage the non-sports fans among you: this book also rips apart the American Folktale and reconstructs it for the modern era, plays fast and loose with any notion of heroism, and has a wonderfully sad and cynical ending (quite unlike the movie they made from the book). A great read for the hours in between playoff games.
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Best book about baseball ever written (to my knowledge). This novel possesses literally every single literary device you learned in high school and accomplishes them masterfully. Perhaps that's why it's such a good text to teach. Nonetheless, The Natural captures the America that seems long gone: a country centered around baseball, fighting the communists, & getting laid and drinking lots of booze as social recreation.
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Read in January, 2003
One of the brilliant stories of it's generation. Bernard Malamud has a Pulitzer under his belt for another book, but I think this might be his best. Roy Hobbs is a compelling character. Yes, the Robert Redford film is great, but the plot is changed quite a bit, and the book is much better. I won't spoil the different ending for you, but it's not nearly so heartwarming.
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book data (includes all editions)
avg rating (all editions): 3.60 (562 ratings) avg rating (this edition): 3.61 (523 ratings) number of reviews: 69popular shelves
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"We have two lives... the life we learn with and the life we live after that. Suffering is what brings us towards happiness."
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