The Natural

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Summary: The Natural: A novel for everyone
Review: The Natural, by Bernard Malamud, is a wonderful piece of literature. It is an explanation of human nature through use of baseball analogies. The story begins with Roy Hobbs, a promising 19 year-old baseball player, on a train ride to Chicago, for a tryout with the Cubs. Through a long and complex chain of events, Harriet Bird, an athlete-hating murderess shoots Roy in the stomach, seriously injuring him.

Fast-forward 15 years...
The New York Knights are a cellar-dwelling team, and their coach, Pop Fisher is extremely exasperated with his team's performance. Suddenly, in the middle of another pathetic performance, the now-34 year-old Roy appears on the scene, and declares that he is the team's new left fielder. Since Roy has a contract, he is allowed to "sit on the bench, like the other 'all-stars'". Meanwhile, Roy becomes attracted to Memo Paris, the niece of Pop Fisher. Coincidentally, Memo is in love with Bump Baily, the starting, self-centered left fielder. During practice Roy displaces his incredible talent, and sparks the team to work harder, including the lazy Bump. During one game, Bump is chasing a fly ball, and runs into the concrete wall, which causes his death. Roy takes his place in the starting lineup, though the fans are skeptical of his ability. Roy immediately grabs headlines with his incredible hitting, amazing fielding, and his heads up play.

Fans start saying that Roy deserves more than the $3,000 dollars that Judge Banner, the skinflint owner, is paying him. Roy asks Banner for a raise, and Banner turns him down cold. The fans, loyal to their hero, organize a Roy Hobbs Day, in which Roy promises to be the best player ever. Right after that, Roy goes into a slump, and the suddenly soaring Knights resume their losing streak. When he comes out of his slump, Roy battles with all his might for the Knights to win the pennant. Before the few final games of the tight race, Roy gets appendicitis. Banner visits him in the hospital, and offers him a large sum of money to throw the playoff game between the Knights and the Pirates. The ending of the story is a true stunner.

I would recommend this novel to anybody, but especially to baseball fans. My only hint is that Roy is reminiscent of Shoeless Joe Jackson in more than one way. Also, the Knights are reminiscent of the 1962 New York Mets, and episodes that they go through are really takeoffs of moments in baseball. The story of human nature, and how it dominates even the immortality of heroes.

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Summary: The Natural
Review: I liked the book because it was about sports and I like sports' books. I woul recommmend this book because The Natural by Bernard Malamud is a wonderful work of literature that can be enjoyed by anyone to learn about the many hardships of life. Malamud uses the appropriate theme of success and failure to demonstrate to his readers the challenges we often face in life that we eventually overcome. I highly recommend this book to anybody who enjoys reading about the trials and tribulations of characters in a great novel. The main element that Bernard Malamud uses in The Natural is the theme of success and failure. He talks about how Roy failures and how Roy succeeds in the game of baseball. Roy Hobbs is a young man just starting out in life. He's on his way to a major league baseball tryout when his agent dies. He meets Harriet Bird and visits her in her hotel room, and she shoots him. This is only the beginning of Roy Hobbs' many trials and tribulations in The Natural. This major complication sets Roy back many years in his desired career. . He does not return to the league until he is thirty-four years old. Everyone on his team feels as if he will be no good. As he begins to receive playing time, everyone realizes just how naturally talented he really is. He is soon on top of everything, but the nosy sports writer, Max Mercy, keeps trying to find out about Roy's past life. He also has to deal with Bump Baily, the team bully, and Memo Paris, the girl Roy thinks is his true love. Judge Banner, the owner of the baseball team, also always seems to be out to get Roy. Roy Hobbs has to figure out his own problems both on and off the field. Roy also feels as if he will become a hero, but then he gets into an awful hitting slump. He also falls ill right before a major play-off game. He then falls in love with Iris Lemon, which causes even more complications. Overall I thought that Bernard Malamud wrote a good book about how a man struggled to make it to the major leagues and when he got there he was one of the best players on the team. Overall I thought that Bernard Malamud wrote a good book about how a man struggled to make it to the major leagues and when he got there he was one of the best players on the team.

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Summary: Although I am a fan of baseball, I did not like this book!
Review: Perhaps I did not like this book because I was forced to read it. Perhaps I did not like it because I am over critical... At any rate, I absolutely did not enjoy this book at all. Bernard Malamud created a sex-crazed, egotistical moron who was better at hitting a ball than making passes at women. Malamud opens with a young, green, 19 year old Roy Hobbs who is too shy to order breakfast, but not shy enough to try to touch a woman in a *personal space.* After an unexplained 15 years, Roy comes back, plays great baseball, and brings the underdog Knights to the Penant. What I don't understand is, why did Malamud decide to end the book like he did! I won't give it away, in case someone actually wants to read this book, ...

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Summary: The Greatest Baseball Tale Ever Told
Review: Bernard Malamud's exceptional debut novel is the finest tale ever told about baseball. And yet it transcends its baseball setting to become a mesmerizing tale about how someone possessed by greatness fails to overcome his demons and ultimately falls far short of his promise. There are echoes of the Arthurian legends in Malamud's depiction of Roy Hobbs, the flawed hero, most notably with regards to Hobbs' bat "Wonderboy" (It certainly reminds me of King Arthur's sword Excalibur.). Anyone interested in reading a riveting tale about one man's tenuous hold on greatness should read "The Natural". Without question, it is one of the finest works of American fiction published in the last half of the 20th Century.

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Summary: A Morality Tale in the Ballpark
Review: As an author with my debut novel in its initial release, I am a great admirer of THE NATURAL. In my seldom humble opinion, I consider it superior to the Robert Redford movie, though I loved the film. The novel is darker than the motion picture. The book ends differently than the movie. In THE NATURAL, Mr. Malamud creates a modern American myth with suggestions of links to the Arthurian Legend. Hobbs, the eventual star of the New York Knights, is the flawed hero born with the potential to be the greatest who ever was. This story tells the tale of his hardships, his heroic accomplishments, and his larger-than-life failures. I loved the way Malamud mixed actual baseball lore in with the invented events of his story, but I don't want to give away too many more specifics in the fear of ruining the novel for people who haven't yet read it. THE NATURAL is a great book on many levels. It's not just about baseball. It's about life. (But isn't life what baseball is really about?)

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Summary: movie or book, which was better?
Review: I am a baseball enthusiast who enjoys reading and watching baseball stories, factual or fiction. The book "The Natural" seemed to me to be a bit flatter than the movie, perhaps because I have seen the movie about 15 times and only read the book once. I enjoyed the way Redford portrayed Roy Hobbs, making him moral, decent, intelligent, and above all, a hero. To me, the book sort of characterized Roy Hobbs as a bit less intelligent and definately with a rougher edge. The book was a great read in my opinion but my vote between the mediums would have to go to the movies side. The casting for the movie didn't exactly portray the characters as described in the book, however, it was a positive spin that actors Wilford Brimley, Robert Redford and others enhanced these characters with a true grace and emotion meant for the big screen and lovers of baseball history. Definately read this classic piece of baseball fiction, it is with out a doubt the energy that generates the love for America's pastime.

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Summary: A Natural Explanation
Review: The Natural, Bernard Malamud's work regarding a naive middle aged ballplayer entangled in a web of good versus evil, utilizes mythic parallels and dynamic symbols to portray the epic struggle of innocence in America. The work opens with Hobbs, the main character of the novel, traveling to Chicago to make his baseball debut. In route, he is challenged by the current batting champion in baseball, "the Whammer"(21), to a three-pitch duel. The situation is similar to that of the biblical myth of David slaying Goliath. Also, the scene takes on a resemblance to the Arthurian legend, Sir Percy lancing Sir Maldemer. The young and innocent Hobbs easily defeats the Whammer and attains the attention of Miss Harriet Bird, an ominous and mysterious figure. She is out to destroy the titans of sport. She takes advantage of Hobb's innocence and devastates his aspirations to enter the league young and become "the best there ever was"(26). Roy symbolizes ambition and youth while Miss Bird represents the corrupt members of society out to ruin the lives of others. Another powerful and mythic symbol of the novel is Hobbs' bat, Wonderboy. It is the weapon in which Hobbs battles for wins. Wins are so crucial because he feels obligated to attain for his manager, Pop Fisher, the pennant and save Pop's job. Wonderboy is like King Arthur's Excalibur, the sword presented to him to defend Camelot. The bat is so white that it glistens "like a leg bone in the sun"(65). The bat symbolizes the purity in the game of baseball for Hobbs. As opposed to life, baseball is simple to Hobbs; all he must do is play the game. The pennant struggle is also a parallel to the struggle of the Fisher King, Pop Fisher, and Sir Percival attempting to restore the fertility to the land. Hobbs acts as Percival trying to heal the wounds of Pop Fisher and restore life to the ball club. The name of the club is the Knights, another mythic quality of the novel. The Knights parallel to the Knights of the Round Table of King Arthur. These men symbolically battle on the field for the sake of pride. Memo, Gus, and the Judge all embody the evil and corrupt traits of society. They, like society, only care for themselves, and act selfishly to gain profit. They do not under any circumstances make sacrifice for others, and are against every characteristic of team sports. They serve to foil Hobbs' character, which devotes his life to others and his team. Like all Malamudian heroes, Hobbs also symbolizes the tragic figure, callously thrown from his course to fame, only to rise again to a pinnacle of greatness and to end where he began, with nothing to show for his marathon journey. His early conviction of his greatness led to a divine intervention of tragic events. It seems as though Hobbs was doomed before he began his passage to glory. The direct references to chivalric quests and heroic voyages render a semblance to the age-old struggle of moral versus malicious. Hobbs symbolizes the inherently good struggling in a world of vice. Malamud clearly depicts baseball as a representation of life, where the simple and pure are hunted by immoral predators.

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Summary: Critical Essay of The Natural
Review: In The Natural, by Bernard Malamud, Malamud uses mythical parallels and symbolic motifs to relate the tale of Roy Hobbes, a "natural" baseball player who fits Malamud's archetypal protagonist: the partially corrupted hero whose continued suffering gives him understanding about himself but leads to his eventual downfall. Roy Hobbes serves as a symbol for Percival the Grail-Knight, who must heal the Fischer-King's wounds and return fertility to the land. The Fischer-King is represented by Knights' manager Pop Fisher, who has athlete's foot on his hand. When Roy plays well, Pop's ailment seems to disappear and the grass on Knight's Field begins to grow again. During Roy's slump, Pop Fisher's athlete's foot begins to creep back up on him. Malamud also uses such symbols as Roy's hurt eye and Memo's "sick" breast to make clear the underlying story of Roy Hobbes. When Roy and Memo are in a small car accident, Roy's eye is hurt and Memo's already sick breast is further injured. Roy's optical injuries represent his inability to see the ball during this time that he is with Memo, since he is hitting very poorly. Memo's sick breast stands for her infertility, as nothing good appears to come from her and her presence negates the fertility that Roy brings to the team. Memo herself admits, "I am strictly a dead man's girl." Roy is deceived into accepting a bribe to win Memo's affection and then tries to redeem himself at the last minute, but like many of Malamud's tragic heroes, a personal weakness causes his downfall. Roy learns from his mistakes, but is not rewarded for his eventual change of heart.

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Summary: The American Game of Life
Review: Bernard Malamud uses symbolism and allusions to portray baseball as the quest of the American dream and not just a simple game He uses the women in Roy's life to symbolize the evil in society. The more time Roy devotes to them the worse his game gets because the women corrupt him. Roy plays his best when he seems pure which is why the color white is used in the book to describe Roy's bat. Wonderboy, the bat, symbolizes what seems pure in life. When one stays pure he will succeed in life, but when one contaminates himself with earthly pleasures those tools brought his success will terminate. The boy that he is asked to save by hitting a homerun symolizes all that is good in the human race. When one strives to do good for others than to attempt to achieve personal success for himself he will be more successful. Roy steps up for his first at bat of the game which happends to be in the ninth inning with the game on the line. He hits the third pitch with all his collossol might and sends the ball soaring out of the stands. His success is directly linked with his goal of helping others. Bernard Malamud also uses allusions to better establish baseball as the America of the twenties. He uses the allusion of Roy hitting the homerun to save the boy's life to Babe Ruth's mythical feat when he promises a dieing child that he would hit him a homerun if he will get better. He also has pop falling on his way around third to a player in the 1905 world series who lost the game for his team. The allusion shows no matter how close Pop gets he can never quiet reach his goals, just like in life. In baseball things do not always work out the way a person would want them to, but that is how life is and why Bernard Malamud wrote The Natural.

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Summary: ewww....wtf
Review: my class had to read this book for a book report, and it was like falling asleep every 2 pages of the book. like one person outta like 30 actually read it. I WOULD NEVER recommend this book to anyone, PLUS i love reading books...... sometimes lol. if you are forced into reading somethin so bad like this, i feel ur sympathy. good luck yoo.