Shakespeare Bats Cleanup

Author: Ron Koertge
Year Published: 2003
Publisher: Candlewick Press
ISBN#: 9780763621162
Pages: 116
Media Type: Book
Classification: Fiction
Subject: Baseball, Poetry
Reader's Annotation:
When a fourteen-year-old baseball player catches mononucleosis, he discovers that keeping a journal and experimenting with poetry not only helps fill the time, it also helps him deal with life, love, and loss.

Plot Summary:

Banished from the ballfield and confined to quarters with a severe case of mono, Kevin Boland is so desperately bored that he swipes his dad’s book on how to write poetry and versifies just for something to do. As he putters among various forms, from haiku and rhymed couplets to Pantoum and Estina, he begins to realize a few truths about poetry and himself. First, he’s better at this writing thing than he thought he would be. Second, he can say some things in the privacy of his notebook that he’d never admit aloud: like how much he mourns his deceased mom, and how his girlfriend has been little more than a passing physical pleasure. Third, maybe baseball and poetry can peacefully coexist; after all, they both rely on rules, or there’s no game. His efforts are, realistically, a mixed bag of strained blundering and swift, stunning insights, and his comments on struggling with his newfound craft are often quite witty: “So I re-visioned that sonnet. I didn’t/ change much, but I did remember how/ when I was looking for rhymes I was like/ some guy pawing through his sock drawer/ for a pair that matched.” Kevin’s collected works reach well beyond introspective meandering; they actually add up to a concrete plot which follows Kevin through weakness and recovery, back onto the ballfield, where he now “rides the pine” with the bench warmers he formerly pitied; into the heat of a new romance with a girl he respects as much as likes; and just possibly up to an open mike at a poetry reading. Koertge sturdily spans the intimidating literary/sports divide, and teen eggheads and athletes alike are invited to cross the bridge.

Reading Level: 4
Interest Level: 6-9
Author's website (if any): http://www.bookrags.com/biography/ron-koertge-aya/