Baseball Writer Roger Angell Turns 100

SoxJox

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I doubt many know who he is, but the man has led an amazing life.

A nice piece in the WSJ. Gives a nod to Ted, Pedro...and Yaz.

[Jason Gay] The current Giants have a nice player in Mike Yastrzemski—Carl’s grandson.

[Angell] Y-A-S-T-R-Z-E-M-S-K-I.

[Gay] You did that right off the top of your head.

[Angell] Well, that’s the first thing you learn in baseball. You have to learn how to spell Yastrzemski.
 

terrynever

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You need to read the New Yorker website this week. They reprinted some of his best stories from that magazine, including one about his stepfather, E.B. White.
 

LoweTek

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I would think any baseball person over 40 would know who he is. He's a great baseball writer.

Quick wiki says he is the stepson of E.B. White. Never knew that...
 

SoxJox

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It's funny, the 2 immediate respondents to this thread are the only 2 SoShers I have met in person. But, of course, TN has a writing background himself. HEY GUYS, long time no see!
 

Dummy Hoy

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Add me to the list of admirers, although I am over 40.

The boys of summer was one of my formative baseball books, along with The Kid from Tompkinsville and the Duke of Flatbush (it's a wonder I didn't become a Dodgers fan).
 

bankshot1

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When I saw the truncated header, Baseball Writer Roger Angell..., given this fucking year i thought the worst.

I used to buy The New Yorker for him and Pauline Kael.

He had a fastball back in the day, The Boys of Summer is msut read, and for those who like the Sox, 5 Seasons includes a great read on the '75 World Series and Game 6.

Happy birthday Roger
 

terrynever

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My favorite baseball book writer was the other Roger, Kahn. Angell is an elegant writer but a little too rich and pompous for my blue blood.
 

terrynever

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It's funny, the 2 immediate respondents to this thread are the only 2 SoShers I have met in person. But, of course, TN has a writing background himself. HEY GUYS, long time no see!
Yeah, you can’t call Roger Angell unknown on this site.
 

Was (Not Wasdin)

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one nit-The Boys of Summer was Roger Kahn, not Roger Angell.

Roger Angell’s book was The Summer Game. One of the chapters was about the 67 season and WS.

I’ve read most, if not all, of Roger Angell’s baseball books.
 

Ted Cox 4 president

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They had an early 100th birthday party for him in Brooklin, Maine, a few weeks ago. Governor Janet Mills was there to declare Roger Angell Day, which was pretty cool. He's the only writer to be elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame (writers' section, of course) and also to the American Academy of Arts and Letters. I'll never forget his write-up of the 1975 World Series, and especially his account of Game Six.
 

joe dokes

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They had an early 100th birthday party for him in Brooklin, Maine, a few weeks ago. Governor Janet Mills was there to declare Roger Angell Day, which was pretty cool. He's the only writer to be elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame (writers' section, of course) and also to the American Academy of Arts and Letters. I'll never forget his write-up of the 1975 World Series, and especially his account of Game Six.
I put this in "one who don't have their own thread" thread.
His 1986 postseason write-up was even better, since he's something of a fan of both teams.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/09/14/roger-angell-at-a-hundred
 

Dummy Hoy

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one nit-The Boys of Summer was Roger Kahn, not Roger Angell.

Roger Angell’s book was The Summer Game. One of the chapters was about the 67 season and WS.

I’ve read most, if not all, of Roger Angell’s baseball books.
Ha. Of course...that's more than a nit. I did read and enjoy Five Seasons as a kid, but I was getting my Rogers mixed.
 

Norm Siebern

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My only complaint about the miracle of 2004 is that Roger Angell had retired and did not write about it they way he had 1967 in The Summer Game ("The Flowering and Deflowering of New England"), 1975 in Five Seasons ("Armageddon"), or 1986 in Season Ticket ("Not So, Boston"). I so much wanted to read what he had to say about our salvation and deliverance.
 

jon abbey

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Marciano490

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one nit-The Boys of Summer was Roger Kahn, not Roger Angell.

Roger Angell’s book was The Summer Game. One of the chapters was about the 67 season and WS.

I’ve read most, if not all, of Roger Angell’s baseball books.
I always confuse the two; Kahn wrote an excellent biography of Jack Dempsey called A Flame of Pure Fire.
 

Average Reds

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Arthur Daley is another old writer who I sometimes confuse with Angell and Kahn. (Although to be fair, it's his work that I sometimes confuse with them. I still have a copy of Times at Bat lying somewhere around m house.) Of course, Daley, primarily a NY Times columnist, died in 1974.

I feel old. (Not as old as Angell, but old.)
 

cornwalls@6

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Reading The Web Of The Game, his 1981 essay about spending a spring afternoon with Smoky Joe Wood at Yale, watching a Ron Darling/Frank Viola match up, and listening to Wood reminisce about his own career, is an annual right of opening day for me, and remains one of my absolute favorite pieces of baseball writing. I have it in a couple of book anthologies, but unfortunately couldn’t link it here, as it’s behind The New Yorker pay wall.
 

Deweys New Stance

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If you were a baseball fan in the 1970s, even as a kid, "Five Seasons" is an essential must-read.
I must have read my dog-eared paperback copy of Five Seasons about a dozen times growing up.

I wrote my college admission essay on the topic of someone I would like to have dinner with about Roger Angell. Roughly a dozen years later, I actually had the chance to have dinner with him as part of a work event. He was soft-spoken, but still engaging and thoughtful.

Curious to know if anyone has read his collection of autobiographical essays, Let Me Finish? I purchased it for my Kindle several months ago but haven't had a chance to get to it yet.