O Holy Cow [Paperback]

Phil Rizzuto (Author), Hart Seely (Author), Tom Peyer (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 21, 1997

There has never been a baseball announcer like Phil Rizzuto. Gathered from over 25 years of broadcasts, "O Holy Cow!" captures the verse-inherent of Rizzuto's banter, his humor, and, indeed, his wisdom.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Found poetry is based on the idea that all kinds of texts, including conversational speech, are chock full of the stuff of poetry. Interesting sound-patterns, thematic repetitions, startling imagery--these typically poetic dimensions of language are always present, only in less-concentrated forms than one finds in poetry proper. Taking a leap of faith that the theory holds water, editors Tom Peyer and Hart Seely have gone through countless hours of baseball broadcasts and emerged with a book-length collection of what they are calling the verse of Phil Rizzuto, the beloved broadcaster of the New York Yankees. Rizzuto's "poems" are hilarious and often-insightful instances of the poetry of everyday speech. A total success.

Review

1961 And 1991
Alienation
Apodosis
Asylum
Boxes
The Bridge
Bubbles
Buns
California
Challenge To Youth
Champion
Chaos
Chess
Colorado
Concord
Confrontation
Dickie Poem Number One
Dickie Poem Number Two
Dimaggio's Bat
Doom Balloon
Dream Day
F.y.i.
Field Of Butterflies
Forever Young
From Slumber I Heard The Men At Work
Giliad
Glasses
Go Ahead, Seaver
Greenwich Time
Grew
Haiku
Hall And Nokes
Hero On The Goat
I Never Cried
I Really Should Be Going Home
I Walk With Fear
Imagine
The Indelible Smell
Instructions For The World
Joe R.
Kubek And Trautwig And Phillips Or Powers
Lake Effect
Legs
A Life For Mickey
A Life For Mickey
The Locked Door
Luck Of The Irish
The Man In The Moon
Mattingly's Surprise
Mere Anarchy Is Loosed Upon The World
My Nose
My Only Friend, The End
My Secret
Mythkill
Never Say Never
O What A Huddle Out There
Observation
Oklahoma
On Journalism
On The Couch With Myself
Paul Revere
The Penguin
Poem For Jesse
Poem For The Last Picture Show
Poem No. 61
Polonia's Hair
Possessions
Prayer For The Captain
The Prince
Q
The Question Of White's Wherabouts
Remember When
Reversal Of Opinion
Rocket Love
Squirrels
Surprise Attack
Symmetry
T-bone
Telly, Cary, And Frank
These Heaters
They Own The Wind
This Planet Warm And Human
Thought For Seaver
Time And Money
To Be Alone
To Blow A Story
To Finish A Story
To Speak With Espy, To Smile With Tears
Unwashed
Very Frustrated
Vincent
Wait A Minute
The Way Mattingly Wants Them To Do
White's Secret
Zamboanga
-- Table of Poems from Poem Finder®

Product Details

• Paperback: 128 pages
• Publisher: Harper Paperbacks (April 21, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0880015330
• ISBN-13: 978-0880015332
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.6 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.1 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,863,176 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Wonderful Tribute, December 2, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: O Holy Cow (Paperback)

For me, nothing better epitomizes my age of baseball innocence than falling in love with the WPIX broadcasts of Phil Rizzuto, Frank Messer and Bill White during the late 1970s. This offbeat collection of the Scooter's unintentional poetry in his broadcasts is a graphic illustration of why Rizzuto was a true joy in the broadcast booth even if he wasn't a professional in the Mel Allen-Red Barber mold. I loved the format so much that I've actually reviewed the hundreds of old Yankee radio and telecast tapes in my collection searching for supplements to the collected verse of the Scooter and have found enough that could fill a sequel volume. Thanks to Seely and Pyer for this wonderful collection that no Yankee fan should be without.

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars who knew?, January 14, 2002

By 

Orrin C. Judd "brothersjudddotcom" (Hanover, NH USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: O Holy Cow!: The Selected Verse of Phil Rizzuto (Paperback)

In the late 1970s, when the Mets really hit the skids and the Yankees got good again, it became necessary, if you were a kid in the Tri- State
area, to at least watch the Yankees, perhaps even to grudgingly root for them.  Forced into this spiritually untenable position, I chose to only
root for the scrubs, which made Cliff Johnson my favorite player.  I'll never forget the game where he tagged a pitch and Phil Rizzuto started
screaming that : "That one's outta here", bringing joy to the heart of every Heatchliff fan, only to have his towering popup caught by the
second baseman.  

"The Scooter" was easy to laugh at, with his myriad phobias, his propensity for saying unintentionally offensive things about minorities, his
tendency to leave the ballpark early when the Yankees were home, etc. But then there began appearing in The Village Voice a most
remarkable feature : verbatim text from Scooter's broadcasts rendered as poetry. We were suddenly confronted with the frightening prospect
that Scooter was not only making sense, but serving up literature, even profundity. Consider the wisdom, about baseball and about life [....]

As it turns out, this kind of exercise even has a name, it's called "found poetry." The Rizzuto poems are as good as any I've seen[...].

At any rate, this book is a hoot and once you read it you'll never again think of Rizzuto as just a good glove man, nor listen to a baseball
broadcast without noticing the frequently poetic nature of the announcer's line of patter.

GRADE : A

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Fun, for a while., September 25, 2003

By 

icemachine "kennisi" (Hong Kong China) - See all my reviews

This review is from: O Holy Cow (Paperback)

Even though it's a short book, a little bit goes a long way with this kind of thing. Use in moderation.

Plus, I miss Bill White's good-natured chuckling.

Still, these "poems" are pretty good at bringing back long-gone hot summer nights.