On the Shelf
True: The 4 Seasons of Jackie Robinson
By Kostya Kennedy
St. Martin’s: 288 pages, $30
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April 15, 1947, dawned moist and chilly. Earlier than heading out to develop into the primary Black baseball participant in Main League Baseball, Jackie Robinson joked to his spouse that he’d be straightforward to identify: “I’ll be quantity 42.”
Seventy-five years later, this Friday, each main leaguer will put on 42 on Jackie Robinson Day, a reminder of Robinson’s lasting affect. However within the half century since his early loss of life, as with every legend burnished over time, his story has been worn clean — usually lowered to his accomplishments throughout that historic season.
The reality is way richer and extra difficult. Robinson was a pioneer of the civil rights motion, breaking floor earlier than President Truman built-in the troops, earlier than Rosa Parks refused to maneuver, earlier than the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. marched on Washington. The function outlined the remainder of his life.
Kostya Kennedy’s engrossing and entertaining new e-book, “True: The 4 Seasons of Jackie Robinson,” joins an extended listing of biographies (and autobiographies) of the participant. However Kennedy takes a singular method by focusing largely on 4 specific years, foregrounding untold or ignored tales to carry Robinson vividly to life:
1946, when he broke the colour barrier within the minor leagues; 1949, his MVP 12 months and a turning level in his battle with racist gamers; 1956, as Robinson neared retirement and solid his eye towards different prizes; and 1972, the 12 months of his loss of life and his ultimate reconciliations with the game and the world.
“I’m hoping these microscopic slices that present him at totally different phases reveal points of Jackie that haven’t been emphasised as a lot earlier than,” Kennedy mentioned in a video interview.
And since Robinson’s epitaph reads: “A life is just not necessary besides within the influence it has on different lives,” Kennedy additionally spoke to white Brooklyn Dodgers followers who credited him with altering their minds and their lives. “They have been stand-ins for hundreds of youngsters and classes they absorbed,” Kennedy says. “Jackie Robinson gave them a method to perceive issues they weren’t taught in class.”
This interview has been edited for size and readability.
Why does Robinson’s story nonetheless matter?
There was a consistency to his method, but he was clearly very adaptive on and off the sector.
Earlier than 1949 he didn’t need a newspaper column as a result of he didn’t wish to fire up controversy. However after that he turns into an agitator, far more open and engaged in discussing necessary civil rights points. If he didn’t develop into aggressive, would he have been MVP that 12 months? His capacity to react to the totally different conditions however maintain true to his beliefs is one thing we will study from.
Your e-book doesn’t focus a lot on his childhood: Born in Georgia however raised in Pasadena. How did Pasadena and his time at UCLA form him?
He confronted racism there however there was not the segregation of the American South. Enjoying with white athletes and having pals who have been Black and white helped make a brand new world appear doable. He won't have had that sense of chance in Georgia. Additionally, Pasadena was a hotbed for sports activities, place to excel and be challenged as an athlete.
You go over particular particulars of America after World Struggle II, together with the 1946 lynchings of Black veterans. Why was that necessary?
Individuals have been saying, “Hey, isn’t this nice, Jackie Robinson is attending to play baseball.” However these different issues have been occurring that formed who he was and it’s all a part of the identical story. He’s not the athlete he's with out all the pieces occurring inside him and round him — he was very clever and really conscious of his environment.
You additionally notice a letter within the Atlanta Structure in response to these murders about the necessity to give Black folks the “primary rights and alternatives of Americans.” That letter was by a 17-year-old — his first revealed piece — signed “M.L. King Jr.”
I wished to remind folks how early Jackie Robinson got here within the civil rights struggle. Clearly in a single sense the battle has been occurring for a whole bunch of years, however Martin Luther King had not but given a public speech when Jackie broke in.
For all of the biography, politics and sociology, that is additionally a baseball e-book. However you usually weave the weather collectively — noting that his aggressive conduct on the bases, particularly throughout rundowns, may very well be seen symbolically as bravery and defiance.
The way in which he performed can't be divorced from who he was, what he did and the message he despatched. He represents one thing in a bodily sense for folks, with out having to at all times say that is proper, that is improper. He may present it by the best way he performed and that was a vital a part of who he was and what he completed.
You employ fashionable metrics like “wins above substitute” to point out how dominant he was at his peak, but you additionally spotlight his psychological influence on teammates and opponents, which may’t be quantified.
He modified the sport in so some ways. There have been occasions the place he’s on third base, bouncing down the road, and it unnerves the pitcher a lot he hits the following batter with a pitch so now there’s one other runner on.
To Robinson even getting caught stealing may have worth. In 1949 he was caught 16 occasions, however 12 occasions it was with two outs and solely twice was it when Brooklyn was trailing. So it was at all times a calculated threat. And he knew this might maintain pitchers and catchers worrying about him in different conditions.
As you argue fairly persuasively, if Dodgers common supervisor Department Rickey had promoted Robinson to Brooklyn in late 1946, they might nicely have received the pennant, probably altering the way forward for their World Collection struggles. Even simply as a pinch-runner he may have been a game-changer that 12 months. Was Rickey too cautious?
From a baseball determination they need to have introduced him up, however from the social expertise, Rickey felt it was too harmful to the entire experiment. What if Robinson struggled at bat in August or dropped a ball? We all know solely in hindsight that the Dodgers didn’t win the pennant.
The Robinson experiment for probably the most half labored out so nicely, it’s arduous to criticize — it’s like saying the Beatles ought to have let George Harrison document extra songs. The Beatles have been so nice, so what are you able to say?
Ultimate query: Secure or out?
[Kennedy, knowing this refers to Robinson’s stunning steal of home in the 1955 World Series — a “safe” call Yankees catcher Yogi Berra always disputed — exhales and pauses.]
I’ve checked out it one million occasions and I don’t know the way anybody can inform. Whenever you watch him working down the road he appears out, no query, however if you see the blown-up model of the nonetheless picture and also you see Yogi’s place and Jackie’s foot, he appears secure.
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