You Know Me Al: A Busher's Letters - Ring Lardner

This classic piece of baseball fiction takes readers on the witty and exciting journey of big leagues as they join player Jack Keefe on his journey as a pitcher for the Chicago White Sox. \nFirst published in 1914, You Know Me Al is an all-time classical baseball tale that takes readers into the life of Jack Keefe, a bush league baseball player who earns as spot in in the majors as a Chicago White Sox pitcher. \n \nSet in pre-World War I America, letters that Keefe sends to his old pal Al reveal Keefe's self-centered, regular struggles to maintain his spot in the big leagues, keep his personal life under control, and juggle his financial difficulties. \n \nFilled with Keefe's tales from on and off the field as he travels with the team, Ring Lardner's writing is full of wit, insight, and entertainment. \nYou 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 to his not-quite-anonymous friend Al, Lardner maintains a balance between the funny and the moving, the pathetic and the glorious. \n \nNostalgic in its view of pre-World War I America--a time before the live ball, a time filled with names like Ty Cobb, Charles Comiskey, Walter Johnson, and Eddie Cicotte--this is not a simple period piece. It is about competition, about the ability to reason, and most of all it is about being human. First published in 1914, You Know Me Al says as much to us about ourselves today as it did seventy-five years ago.\n