Shoeless Joe
* By W.P. Kinsella. Joe and I have been lax about posting new books, so here's the first step in rectifying that.
Most people I know have seen Field of Dreams but not the book on which it was based — Shoeless Joe. That’s probably just as well, since this is one of the apparently rare instances when the movie surpasses the book.
The plot is basically the same: Iowa farmer hears voice, builds baseball stadium in his backyard, and coerces a reclusive famed novelist to travel cross-country with him, seeking out players for the game. Shoeless Joe, of course, comes of his own accord and then vanishes into the corn when he’s done. Then there's the irksome subplot of said farmer’s nasty brother in law trying to steal the farm out from under him, threatening the American dream, yuk yuk.
The main problem with the book is that it has way too many words. Let me rephrase that. The main problem with the book is that a good third of it is spent on figurative language. That’s right, your good old similes and metaphors. Basically, it seems that Kinsella stuck a simile or metaphor into as many sentences as possible to show off his questionable gift for the poetic. This results in two problems. First, many of the figurative comparisons feel forced. Try this one out for size, picked at random: “I feel like a rookie runner caught off base by a wily pitcher, hung up in that vast area between first and second [I’m with Kinsella so far; it’s a baseball book, after all], fluttering back and forth like a wounded bird who knows he’s doomed [WHAT?!?!? That’s like a simile within a simile!].” Second, there’s just so many that you find yourself rolling your eyes in anticipation.
Then there’s the ridiculous farm-stealing subplot. I do not remember if this was part of the movie, but I hope they pulled it off better than the book did. It was utterly melodramatic, unfulfilled, and, in my opinion, unnecessary. I would chop out all parts of this subplot along with about 90% of the figurative language, if I had my druthers.
Another thing that bugged Joe and me — though not nearly as much as it bugged J.D. Salinger, I feel certain — is that the reclusive writer in the story, who in the movie is a fictional character, is supposed to be — you guessed it — J.D. Salinger. Salinger is very famous, and part of that fame is his reclusiveness. It seems very presumptuous of Kinsella to have made use of a (finer) writer’s fame. Moreover, it felt unconvincing; we know Kinsella doesn’t know Salinger, so why should we accept Kinsella’s characterization of old J.D.? It was easier for me to pretend that the “Jerry” in the story was a figment of Kinsella’s imagination — which, as far as I can tell, he actually was.
Nuff of that. It’s more fun to write about books I dug.
Posted by Lisa on November 14, 2002 07:41 AM