Memories of Summer

When Baseball Was an Art, and Writing About It a Game

By: Roger Kahn

Narrated by: Mark Moseley

Length: 10 hrs and 52 mins

Publisher's summary

Acclaimed baseball writer Roger Kahn gives us a memoir of his Brooklyn childhood, a recollection of a life in journalism, and a record of personal acquaintance with the greatest ballplayers of several eras.

His father had a passion for the Dodgers; his mother’s passion was for poetry. Somehow, young Roger managed to blend both loves in a career that encompassed writing about sports for the New York Herald Tribune, Sports Illustrated, the Saturday Evening Post, Esquire, and Time.

Kahn recalls the great personalities of a golden era - Leo Durocher, Mickey Mantle, Willie Mays, Jackie Robinson, Red Smith, Dick Young, and many more - and recollects the wittiest lines from 40 years in dugouts, press boxes, and newsrooms. Often hilarious, always precise about action on the field and off, Memories of Summer is an enduring classic about how baseball met literature to the benefit of both.

©1997 Hook Slide, Inc. (P)2012 Audible, Inc.

Please learn how to pronounce famous names

I've read most of Roger Kahn's books and the benefit of that has always been, the voice in my head knows how to pronounce the names in these stories. These are famous names, well known in our culture, easy to pronounce.

But I decided to listen to this book and I wasted a credit for it. A complete waste.

The narrator absolutely butchered one of the most famous names in baseball history, Leo Durocher. He destroyed it. His awful and unnecessary mispronunciation was so profoundly bad, I could not listen to the entire book. I gave the story five stars because the writing was first class.

Kahn was a master of the craft. He and his readers -- or rather, listeners -- deserve so much better than this dreadful performance. I'm deleting this one from my library. Ugh.

A Disappointing Performance

Would you try another book from Roger Kahn and/or Mark Moseley?

Absolutely! Roger Kahn is the best of our baseball writers. I grew up in the 40s and 50s following the exploits of the Dodgers, Giants, Yankees, and Tigers. They comprised the mythology of my youth. Nobody brings this wonderful time to life better than Kahn. Nobody writes about baseball with this wonderful author's elegance.

What was one of the most memorable moments of Memories of Summer?

Kahn and Willie Mays discussing the art of fielding in Mays' living room. Any scene involving the Brooklyn Dodgers. The evolution of Kahn's relationship with his father. Okay, I've mentioned more than one moment. The book affects me much too powerfully to pick only one moment. This is a wonderful, special book.

How did the narrator detract from the book?

Anyone who cares about baseball history will be disappointed in Moseley's performance. How can a narrator presume to undertake this wonderful book without learning how to pronounce the players' names?! Moseley butchers many of them - Durocher, Bouton, Labine, Raschi - the list goes on and on. He also stumbles over a great deal of Kahn's rich use of vocabulary. Audible recordings are notable for solid performances. This is not one of them.

Was Memories of Summer worth the listening time?

I had read it before, so it was fun to return to it, in spite of the uneven preformance.

Any additional comments?

Roger Kahn is a national treasure. He is much more than merely a "baseball writer." He is an interpreter of the second half of the 20th century, with baseball as his focus. For old guys like myself, he evokes a simpler time, when our dreams and aspirations were still unsullied by experience.

Readers must pronounce names CORRECTLY!!

If you could sum up Memories of Summer in three words, what would they be?

I will add more when I finish the book.

How could the performance have been better?

C'mon... teach the reader how to pronounce names CORRECTLY! It's Leo Durocher not Durricher!!!! He was one of the greatest managers in baseball history. It is really sloppy not to be able to pronounce the names of real people correctly. I expect a higher standard from Audible. Roger Kahn is a remarkable writer and voice of the game of baseball, and deserves MUCH better.

Any additional comments?

Roger Kahn is one of my favorite authors, and one of America's best!

Great book from a great writer

Great book from a great baseball writer, a nice companion piece to "The Boys of Summer." Unfortunately Moseley mispronounces many names (somebody narrating a book largely about the Dodgers does not know Leo Durocher?), often giving multiple pronunciations to the same person, but great stories of Kahn's life as a writer and the people he covered.