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Writing About Baseball Heaven: 'Elysian Fields'

"It's an opening day White Sox fans have been longing for. Tonight, for the first time in almost a century their team takes the field as the reigning champions, with the 2005 World Series banner fluttering overhead. Finally the past has stopped haunting the White Sox."

That's just one example of the range of perspectives called forth by baseball. Whether objective or fanatical, poetic or hard-boiled, the sport inspires many of its fans to think far outside the batter's box.

On opening day of Major League Baseball's season, host John Ydstie shares his own childhood memories of the game and finds out why baseball has generated so much more literature than other sports. He interviews Tom Goldstein, editor of Elysian Fields Quarterly, a journal of baseball literature.

Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

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