The Seventh Babe: A Novel by Jerome Charyn

By Jerome Charyn

Book Overview

When Babe Ragland makes the hapless Boston Red Sox in a Spring Training tryout, he becomes baseball's "seventh Babe." He soon establishes himself as an acrobatic third baseman, and his rookie fright is soon replaced by a fierce competitiveness and a chip on his shoulder the size of the Green Monster.

Ragland clashes with his teammates, the entire American League, and finally the mighty Kenesaw "Mountain" Landis, which results in his sudden ejection from the major leagues - the only place he ever wanted to be. But soon Babe joins up with a barnstorming team of black players who live difficult lives and play in horrible conditions, but who share Ragland's passion and artistry for the game.

When the glamor of playing for the Red Sox and pleasures of a beautiful young wife come calling, the seventh Babe must choose between the fame and comfort of the major leagues and a hard life of pick-up games on the fringes of society.

Jerome Charyn is one of America's greatest and most prolific living novelists. The Seventh Babe, originally published in 1979, is a triumph of literary passion and imagination, an unforgettable tale that blends the harsh and dirty reality of early 20th century baseball and America with a magical reality every bit as uplifting as W. P. Kinsella's.

Charyn's prose style is clean, concise, and impossible to imitate, and the pace of the story never slows down. The Seventh Babe is a classic waiting on the sidelines to be recognized for what it is: one of the greatest baseball novels ever written.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1955398100
• ISBN13: 9781955398107
• Release Date: September 2022
• Publisher: Summer Game Books
• Length: 306 Pages
• Weight: 0.83 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.5" x 8.3"

Customer Reviews

Great

Thank goodness this baby came back into print! I echo what the guys below have said, and add only that if you've read other greats in this genre--The Great American Novel, The Celebrant, Shoeless Joe, Sam's Legacy--this will stand proudly along side them, and should be next.

Reality is just a word

In my misspent youth there was a confection that kept calling itself a gum and a candy. In fact, it was neither. "The Seventh Babe" is the literary equivalent of that product. It proports to be a baseball novel, yet how many novels on that genre tell us of a Neverland of baseball players, living outside of time and practicing the purest joyful form of the game. It might be a fantasy, yet the elements of out national pastime shape it's direction more then any dragon or demon. Did the baseball strike of a few years ago kill your love for the sport? Here is the remedy! Real yet magical. Jerome Charyn has show us there is no voice quite like his.