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You Know Me Al
by
Ring Lardner
"You Know me Al" is a classic of baseball--the game and the community. Jack Keefe, one of literature's greatest characters, is talented, brash, and conceited. Self-assured and imperceptive, impervious to both advice and sarcasm, Keefe rises to the heights, but his inability to learn makes for his undoing. Through a series of letters from this bush-league pitcher ...more
Paperback, 224 pages
Published
September 11th 1991
by Touchstone
(first published 1916)
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Baseball a hundred years ago wasn’t really much different than it is today. Only the names have changed. Talented pitcher Jack Keefe tells this story in the form of letters to his friend Al back in their hometown. Jack begins below the major leagues, but gets there with the White Sox. Jack shows his personality by his own descriptions of actions and events. Don’t expect him to spell well or use the finest grammar, but frequently laugh at his choices and apparent delusion about who and what ...more
I can't tell you how many times I read this book as a teen. One of Ring Lardner's great talents was his distinctive voice of the uneducated ballplayer in the 1910s or so. Here, we read letters from a pitcher, Jack Keefe, trying to squeak his way into the big leagues. Jack is sure of his ability; he doesn't just think he will be a star, he thinks he IS one. The novel is a wonderful look at the "fear and arrogance," to borrow a phrase, needed to succeed in professional sports.
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The way Jack Keefe tells it in these letters to his friend Al, he never lost a game, except when his teammates let him down or the manager forced him to pitch despite a sore arm. Lardner's Keefe is a pitcher with the White Sox during the teens of the last century. He talks big, borrows money and doesn't pay it back, and is certain that every woman he meets is in love with him. He's also not very wise in the ways of the world. A very entertaining book that offers a peak at the world of major leag...more
Not being much of a sports fan, but for many years standing close beside one, I knew nothing of Ring Lardner until I visited Niles, Michigan, pursuing a story of my own. In a quaint hometown treasures museum, we discovered the local author gone national, with a first edition of "You Know Me Al" under glass. Intrigued, I purchased a modern day copy soon after for my sports fan, but I had to read it first myself.
In full agreement with Virginia Woolf in the book's Introductio...more
In full agreement with Virginia Woolf in the book's Introductio...more
I had not never heard of Ring Lardner until a visit to his home town in Niles Michigan right near outside of Kalamazoo. Born in Niles Michigan in 1885 Lardner was a sports writer for the Chicago Tribyoon but he is best well known for these busher letters that he rote as instalmints for The Satirday Eevning Post.
The best letters were collected for this book You Know Me Al that were first published in 1914. It cronikles a bushers rise to the major league threw a serious of letters wri...more
The best letters were collected for this book You Know Me Al that were first published in 1914. It cronikles a bushers rise to the major league threw a serious of letters wri...more
Free e-book from http://www.manybooks.net, this one is excellent read! Lardner writes in the dialect of a bush-league pitcher who finds himself pitching for the Chicago White Sox. He has a very high opinion of his abilities, and the story is revealed in the letters he writes to his best friend from back home in Indiana. I enjoyed this one as much as I did another baseball story: Rhubarb, by H. Allen Smith.
A compilation of letters from a fictional 1910's White Sox pitcher to his hometown friend Al about his trials and tribulations in the Major League, complete with hillarious misspellings and malapropisms. I give it four stars instead of five because it begins to wear a little thin toward the end.
A lot of Goodreaders rated You Know Me Al with 4 shiny stars.
I thought this book was bland and frustrating.
Told in an epistolary style, the novella is about a pro baseball pitcher named Jack Keefe, who wrote letters to his pal Al Blanch in the span of 3 years (I think it was 3 years). He told us about his ups and downs but after 2 chapters, I got really, really bored. Really.
I thought this book was bland and frustrating.
Told in an epistolary style, the novella is about a pro baseball pitcher named Jack Keefe, who wrote letters to his pal Al Blanch in the span of 3 years (I think it was 3 years). He told us about his ups and downs but after 2 chapters, I got really, really bored. Really.
Jennpetes
marked it as to-read
This is supposed to be really great, and Ring Lardner was the inspiration for Abe North in Tender is the Night - the grand burn out of that group of writers, whose talent got spectacularly wasted. I find that compelling.
Ehbluemle Bluemle
added it
YOU KNOW ME AL; A Bushers Letters by Ring Lardner (1994)
What an artist with words.
One of the funniest books ever written. It is an epistolary novel, a collection of letters written by a fictional White Sox pitcher writing to his good friend Al, back home in Terre Haute, Indiana. Published in 1916, it captures a part of the beauty of baseball's historicity, displaying both the humor and the violence of the game at the time. Baseball has always had its John Rockers and Kruks, co-existing with its Jeters and Rodriguezes.
Does anyone know how to pluralize "Rodrigue...more
Does anyone know how to pluralize "Rodrigue...more
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I loved this book! A series of letters from a fictional bushleague pitcher circa 1914 written by Ring Lardner ( a great sports journalist from the early 1900's ). If you liked to hear stories from you ole grandpas about times past etc you'll love this book. The vernacular is pure american. Lou
Any baseball fan will love this book. I found myself chuckling on almost every page and apretty good history lesson on professional baseball in the early part of the last century. Ring Lardner is the Mark Twain of Sportwriting.
Hadn't read Lardner for many years and though Mencken is quoted as saying it has permanent value as a part of our national literature, I found little interest in reading letters written by a big leaguer in colloquial style.
Very funny book... it shows you that athletes really haven't changed at all from 80 years ago or so. Made me laugh and my knowledge of baseball is virtually nil. What more could you want?
Very funny book about a baseball player in the early 1900s as told in letters to an old friend back home. Lardner is a great writer and this book is very cleverly written and extremely humorous.
Good ol' Ring Lardner. Very amusing.
Chilly
marked it as to-read
Lizzy Kipps
marked it as to-read
Sarah Hebard
marked it as to-read
Jonathan
marked it as to-buy
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