Review: The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach
Don’t take Chad Harbach’s debut novel too seriously. It’s a traditional coming-of-age story against a baseball backdrop. (Basic baseball knowledge is enough to see you through: three strikes and you’re out, each team gets three outs an inning, etc.) The story is told from four perspectives, those of: Mike Schwartz, Henry Skrimshander, Guert Affenlight, and Pella Affenlight.
Mike Schwartz is an overly zealous baseball captain who takes the young and brilliant shortstop, Henry Skrimshander, under his wing at Westish College. The baseball scenes are written with reverence for the game, but the book is rife with odd spurts of humor to keep it loose. Obsessed with perfection, Henry Skrimshander plays one error free game after another. He follows fictional Aparicio Rodriguez’s zen-like approach to fielding as explained in The Art of Fielding, which he has memorized. Once he meets his goal of tying Aparicio’s record for error-free games, he begins to overthink his throws and no longer responds to the game reflexively. Without his reflexes, his uncanny ability to predict the flight of the ball becomes useless. As Henry’s descent into insecurity and inability deepens, he slides to the back of the story and other characters come to light. read more