A Nice Little Place on the North Side: Wrigley Field at One Hundred [Kindle Edition] Author: George Will | Language: English | ISBN:
B00FIN0UT0 | Format: PDF, EPUB
A Nice Little Place on the North Side: Wrigley Field at One Hundred Free PDF
Free download A Nice Little Place on the North Side: Wrigley Field at One Hundred [Kindle Edition] Free PDF for everyone book with Mediafire Link Download Link “George Will on baseball. Perfect.”—Los Angeles Times
In A Nice Little Place on the North Side, leading columnist George Will returns to baseball with a deeply personal look at his hapless Chicago Cubs and their often beatified home, Wrigley Field, as it turns one hundred years old. Baseball, Will argues, is full of metaphors for life, religion, and happiness, and Wrigley is considered one of its sacred spaces. But what is its true, hyperbole-free history?
Winding beautifully like Wrigley’s iconic ivy, Will’s meditation on “The Friendly Confines” examines both the unforgettable stories that forged the field’s legend and the larger-than-life characters—from Wrigley and Ruth to Veeck, Durocher, and Banks—who brought it glory, heartbreak, and scandal. Drawing upon his trademark knowledge and inimitable sense of humor, Will also explores his childhood connections to the team, the Cubs’ future, and what keeps long-suffering fans rooting for the home team after so many years of futility.
In the end, A Nice Little Place on the North Side is more than just the history of a ballpark. It is the story of Chicago, of baseball, and of America itself. Direct download links available for A Nice Little Place on the North Side: Wrigley Field at One Hundred [Kindle Edition] Free PDF
- File Size: 3230 KB
- Print Length: 226 pages
- Publisher: Crown Archetype (March 25, 2014)
- Sold by: Random House LLC
- Language: English
- ASIN: B00FIN0UT0
- Text-to-Speech: Enabled
X-Ray:
- Lending: Not Enabled
- Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,296 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
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in Books > History > Historical Study & Educational Resources > Essays
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What we have here is a light little read about Wrigley Field. Well, sort of; it's really not too well focused. It has many diversions, some of them pleasant and some of them tedious, into such wide-ranging fields as history, economics, psychology, neuroscience, architecture, sociology, and urban planning. (The section on the surprising importance of beer to the formation of the first civilizations comes fairly close to being worth the price of admission in and of itself.)
The problem is, the book is very scattered. It's anecdotal; in addition to the above mentioned digressions, it offers stories by the dozen of memorable Wrigley games, memorable Cubs, memorable opponents, etc etc. I managed to shake a handful of baseball trivia questions loose (Who was the only Major League player who was a contemporary of both Babe Ruth and Hank Aaron? True or false: Major League teams have never combined for fifty runs in a single game.) Still, while190 pages of potpourri is not an unpleasant way to while away a few hours, I had expected more from Will.
There's something of a thesis to the book, one mentioned now and again in desultory fashion. It has to do with the idea that Wrigley Field's unique position as a stadium where the goal of making game day a pleasant experience regardless of the score has led to decade upon decade of leadership with no incentive to improving the team, thus leading to the poor Cubbies' never-ending futility. It's an interesting point, but it's lost in the general structure of a meandering yarn.
An okay baseball book.
By John Jorgensen
VINE VOICE
On the one hand, this book is, itself, as “nice {a} little place” to spend some time as the title promises of a day at Chicago’s Wrigley Field. George Will, a Cub fan from age 7, compiles an altogether pleasant -- funny, optimistic, smart -- collection of stories and statistics about the history of baseball, its players and its playing fields.
I recommend it ... as long as you go in knowing what is my “on the other hand”: that much of the content is about baseball in general, not the Cubs or Wrigley Field specifically. Also on the other hand, is a wholly frustrating lack of organization to the book’s content -- the narrative jumps all over the place in time and topic. Still, over the 200 pages, a bit of Cubs/Wrigley history does accumulate. I especially appreciated the look at the business side of baseball and attendance; the lack of standardized field specifications and how teams use their fields to their advantages; and how antiquated Wrigley has become in light of the amenities that fans (and players) expect at a ballpark (its newest owners are beginning to remedy that).
In the end, I was disappointed that this is not a satisfying history of Wrigley Field ... and I was entertained and informed by what it is.
By emmejay
VINE VOICE
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