Anyone who writes about baseball — or who wants to write well about baseball — should know Updike’s famous essay, “Hub Fans Bid Kid Adieu,” which first appeared in the New Yorker in 1960.
He was no dilettante cashing in on the corny mythos Americans love to imbue baseball with. Read the Rabbit series, you’ll know he was a fan. Much of Harry “Rabbit” Angstrom’s life as we see it plays out with the Phillies in the background. One of the great complicated ironies of the four books, which chronicle Angstrom from ex-high school basketball star to overweight mediocrity in all aspects of life, is to see Rabbit stand still, or at least never move fast enough, to keep up as suburban post-war America scrolls past. Baseball is part of that scroll, banal and falsely consequential and reassuring.
Pop comes upstairs and tunes into the Phillies game on television. “They’re a much sounder team without that Allen,” he says. “He was a bad egg, Harry, I say that without prejudice. Bad eggs come in all colors.”
After a few innings, Rabbit leaves.
“Can’t you stay for at least the game, Harry? I believe there’s a beer still in the refrigerator, I was going to go down to the kitchen anyway to make mother some tea.”
Updike has died at the age of 76. Leave your appreciation in the comments, or tell us about your favorite piece of baseball-related writing.
