![]() ![]() The novel follows the intersecting fates of five characters at a fictional Wisconsin college named Westish. Ultimately, I think “The Art of Fielding” is a work of escapism-a work of escapism about the perils of escaping. To my mind, that pervasive lightness is one of the novel’s virtues and helps conceal some of its flaws. ![]() Though Gessen later describes the ways in which Harbach improved the novel in subsequent drafts (“more compact, less sentimental, funnier”), I think it’s fair to say that a lightness of tone and style (and to a lesser extent of subject matter) has persisted into the published version of the book. (The Bad News Bears go to liberal-arts college.) I was surprised that my friend had spent five years working on something so insubstantial. I didn’t say this at the time, but it felt a little like a Disney film. ![]()
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