Base-Ball Ballads

by Grantland Rice, Gary Mitchem (Editor), Mark Durr (Editor)

Published in 1910, Base-Ball Ballads was Grantland Rice's first book of poems, and the only one that contained baseball verse exclusively. The book includes some of the best-known poems about baseball ever written, including "Casey's Revenge" (a sometimes-anthologized piece that redeems Ernest Thayer's unlucky slugger), "Mudville's Fate," and the original version of "Game Called" (later revised on the occasion of Babe Ruth's death). An immensely popular writer of sports columns and essays, Rice was also well regarded for his humorous and sometimes touching verse. It is as the author of a couplet, in fact, that Rice may be best remembered: "For when the One Great Scorer comes to mark against your name / He writes--not that you won or lost--but how you played the Game." These lines, so strongly associated with baseball--though in fact they come from a poem about football--find their earliest expression in Base-Ball Ballads, where three poems ("Play Ball," "Game Called," and "The Test") provide different wordings of the same idea.

143 pages, Paperback

First published December 30, 2004

Reviews

[Anastasija · Rating 4 out of 5]

The spirit and excitement of baseball captured through verse

This was definitely an interesting read since it’s the first time I come across such poetry. I do not doubt that it’s a favorite classic among baseball enthusiasts, having the timeless beauty and nostalgia of baseball preserved in poetic form.