[Mick]

[quote author=leftcoast link=topic=10113.msg92330#msg92330 date=1405325621]
I no longer believe in Roy Hobbs but I see Nuke Laloosh and Crash Davis on the sports page every baseball season.

Well, you're not supposed to believe in Roy Hobbs, not literally. He's supposed to be a mythical character, right?
[/quote]


There was lots of literary license involved, but Hobbs was based, at least in part, on Philadelphia Phillies player Eddie Waitkus.  As a rookie in 1941, Waitkus was known as "the Natural."  He earned four Bronze Stars in WWII, then when he returned, he made the NL All Star team in 1948 and 1949.  Ruth Ann Steinhagen was a fan who stalked him and shot him on June 14, 1949.  She figured out the name of one of Waitkus' classmates, went to the Phillies' hotel, checked in, left a note under his former classmate's name stating that she had an urgent matter for him.  He arrives at her hotel room, she shot him with a .22.  She called the front desk, reported the shooting, cradled his head in her lap until help arrived.  She never stood trial, she was remanded to a mental institution almost immediately.

She said "As time went on, I just became nuttier and nuttier about the guy, and I knew I would never get to know him in a normal way, so I kept thinking I will never get him, so if I couldn't have him, then no one would have him."

Bernard Malamud's book was published in 1952, and Hobbs' tragic end foreshadowed Waitkus' tragic end the next year when he died of esophageal cancer at age 53 in 1972, just two weeks before the Munich terrorist murders.

[Mick]

[quote author=leftcoast link=topic=10113.msg92330#msg92330 date=1405325621]
I no longer believe in Roy Hobbs but I see Nuke Laloosh and Crash Davis on the sports page every baseball season.

Well, you're not supposed to believe in Roy Hobbs, not literally. He's supposed to be a mythical character, right?
[/quote]


There was lots of literary license involved, but Hobbs was based, at least in part, on Philadelphia Phillies player Eddie Waitkus.  As a rookie in 1941, Waitkus was known as "the Natural."  He earned four Bronze Stars in WWII, then when he returned, he made the NL All Star team in 1948 and 1949.  Ruth Ann Steinhagen was a fan who stalked him and shot him on June 14, 1949.  She figured out the name of one of Waitkus' classmates, went to the Phillies' hotel, checked in, left a note under his former classmate's name stating that she had an urgent matter for him.  He arrives at her hotel room, she shot him with a .22.  She called the front desk, reported the shooting, cradled his head in her lap until help arrived.  She never stood trial, she was remanded to a mental institution almost immediately.

She said "As time went on, I just became nuttier and nuttier about the guy, and I knew I would never get to know him in a normal way, so I kept thinking I will never get him, so if I couldn't have him, then no one would have him."

Bernard Malamud's book was published in 1952, and Hobbs' tragic end foreshadowed Waitkus' tragic end the next year when he died of esophageal cancer at age 53 in 1972, just two weeks before the Munich terrorist murders.