The Sportswriter: Bascombe Trilogy (1) [Paperback]

Richard Ford (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 13, 1995

As a sportswriter, Frank Bascombe makes his living studying people--men, mostly--who live entirely within themselves. This is a condition that Frank himself aspires to. But at thirty-eight, he suffers from incurable dreaminess, occasional pounding of the heart, and the not-too-distant losses of a career, a son, and a marriage. In the course of the Easter week in which Ford's moving novel transpires, Bascombe will end up losing the remnants of his familiar life, though with his spirits soaring.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

It's hard to imagine a book illuminating the texture of everyday life more brilliantly, or capturing the truth of human emotions more honestly, than Ford does in his account of an alienated scribe in the New Jersey suburbs. Frank Bascombe, Ford's protagonist, clings to his almost villainous despair in a way that Walker Percy's men don't, but the book is heavily influenced by Ford's fellow southerner nonetheless. Read this and you're ready for Ford's Pulitzer Prize-winning sequel, Independence Day.

From the Inside Flap

As a sportswriter, Frank Bascombe makes his living studying people--men, mostly--who live entirely within themselves. This is a condition that Frank himself aspires to. But at thirty-eight, he suffers from incurable dreaminess, occasional pounding of the heart, and the not-too-distant losses of a career, a son, and a marriage. In the course of the Easter week in which Ford's moving novel transpires, Bascombe will end up losing the remnants of his familiar life, though with his spirits soaring.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 375 pages
• Publisher: Vintage (June 13, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0679762108
• ISBN-13: 978-0679762102
• Product Dimensions: 5.2 x 0.8 x 8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (123 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #301,933 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

26 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A portrait of the unmoored life in a suburban purgatory., June 10, 2006

By 

D. Cloyce Smith (Brooklyn, NY) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Sportswriter: Bascombe Trilogy (1) (Paperback)

Taking place entirely over Easter weekend in 1983, "The Sportswriter" portrays Frank Bascombe, a 38-year-old man living in bland suburbia and suffering from the inertia and "dreaminess" of a mid-life crisis. The theme of middle-aged, middle-class male angst has pretty much become a genre unto itself (see John Updike, Philip Roth, Frederick Barthelme, et al.), and I confess that I've grown somewhat weary of it, but what rescues Ford's entry into the field is his compelling and wry prose.

Like the author himself, Bascombe hails from Mississippi, lives in New Jersey, published a well-received collection of short stories earlier in life, and works as a writer for a glossy sports weekly. There the resemblances between author and protagonist apparently end. Bascombe is suffering: he is still reeling from the loss of his son four years earlier and the subsequent demise of his marriage after his wife discovered evidence of his infidelity. He's the type of guy who knows a lot of people but has no real friends, and his male reserve prevents him from confronting the tragedies experienced by his family, the lingering feelings for his ex-wife, and the emotional vacuity of his life. Instead of therapy, he escapes to a fortune-telling psychic; unfortunately, she seems to be away for the weekend.

During the course of three days, Frank reunites with his wife briefly for the anniversary of his son's death. He travels to Detroit both for business (to conduct an interview with a permanently disabled football player) and for a short holiday with his latest girlfriend Vicki. The trip is a disaster on both counts. When he returns, Frank finds himself an unwilling confessor to the emotionally unstable and clearly distraught newest member of The Divorced Men's Club--a loose and unofficial support group to which both men belong.

In spite of the self-professed apathy of its narrator, the book boasts some extraordinarily touching and even occasionally humorous moments--such as the conversation between Frank and his son when the latter catches him spying outside his ex-wife's house, or the uncomfortable moment when Vicki finds Frank going through her purse. But the book is not without its missteps. Frank sublets part of his home to a black divinity student from Africa, whose almost ghost-like and peripheral presence in the novel seems, at best, gratuitous.

Although a lot happens to Frank over one holiday weekend, the aloof and defensive tone of its narrator can, at times, make his life seem more sluggish than it really is. To me, Bascombe's mid-life experiences--indeed, his entire milieu--seem like depictions from an alien world, but Ford somehow manages to create a convincing portrait of the unmoored life in a self-created purgatory.

35 of 41 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Want to peek inside the head of the modern American male?, September 22, 2003

By 

Peggy Vincent "author and reader" (Oakland, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Sportswriter: Bascombe Trilogy (1) (Paperback)

Okay, ladies: in spite of the title, go right out and buy this book. If you've ever complained that you just don't understand what makes men tick, The Sportswriter was meant exactly for you.
Frank Bascombe's young son has just died, his marriage has crumbled, and his promising career as a novelist has failed - and the guy's only in his late 30s. Depressing, right? Right. For sure. Sooooo, why bother, you might ask? Answer: Frank has a rich inner life that makes you want to stick with him. This is where his problems originate. We know he is sensitive (these days, we'd say he has a well-developed feminine side) and cares about the pleasures of life's small moments - but he's got a typical male problem: He can't express this side of himself to those closest to him, resorting to moral dishonesty rather than expose himself as a caring human.
Read it, ladies. Then read the sequel, Independence Day, which won the Pulitzer in 1996. But read this one first. It's important.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Story of an everyday man, November 26, 2004

By 

Reader from Singapore - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Sportswriter: Bascombe Trilogy (1) (Paperback)

Richard Ford's "The Sportswriter" by now has become the only slightly less heralded prequel to his Pulitzer Prize winning "Independence Day". While critics have been nearly unanimous in their praise for Ford's breakthrough novel, readers have been more divided about its merits. Some allege its lack of plot, others complain about the seemingly interminable stream of consciousness styled interior monologue of its central character. But what makes failed novelist turned sportswriter Frank Boscombe such an enduring figure in American literature may be his more than passing resemblence to Willy Loman and his litany of everydayman insecurities. Surely, the dank whiff of failure about Frank's middle aged crisis struck existence is a condition that most educated American males can relate to.

Bereaved of a child and divorced from a wife (referred to only as X) whom he still vaguely regards as part of his environment, Frank finds himself drifting into a permanent state of "dreaminess", which when he explains himself turns out to be a place we've all been before though few would care to admit it. X and sportsmen in general, he calls factualists. Their lives are purposeful, defined, nailed down by very specific goals. Sportswriting allows Frank to abdicate from making any real decisions because his duty is only to report. Should it surprise that Frank scores a big zero on the relationship front ? Dreaminess isn't conducive to the making of any real friendships. With women, there's at least sex, though his fling with Vicky proves to be another rudderless affair. With men, there's even less incentive to fake interest. When fellow divorced men's club member Walter confesses his dark secret, Frank doesn't want to know, so when Walter finally chucks it in, Frank's response is one of incomprehension.

The quality of Ford's writing is consistently excellent and never less than satisfying. Literate, sensitive and honest, he manages even to win sympathy for a hero whom many less charitable may regard as a wimp. For all Frank's faults, we root for him because we recognise something of us in him. The novel ends on a hopeful note which leaves a smile on our face. "The Sportswriter" is a wonderful novel.