Shoeless Joe by W. P. Kinsella

First published: 1982

Type of work: Novel

Type of plot: Fantasy

Time of plot: Late 1970’s

Locale: Iowa, northern midwestern United States, and New England

Principal characters

• Ray Kinsella, farmer, husband, and father
• Annie Kinsella, Ray’s devoted wife
• Karin Kinsella, their daughter
• J. D. “Jerry” Salinger, a famous American author
• “Shoeless” Joe Jackson, deceased former Major League Baseball player

The Story:

Young Ray Kinsella gains a lifelong love for baseball from tales told by his father, including the story of disgraced former star “Shoeless” Joe Jackson. Ray leaves his native Montana to attend college in Iowa. One day, he overhears the daughter of his landlady vow that she will marry him when she grows up. Years later, that vow comes to pass. Suddenly a husband to Annie and a father to Karin, Ray begins selling life insurance, a job he detests. When local former ballplayer Eddie Scissons grows too elderly to maintain his farm, Annie talks Ray into buying it. Ray knows little about farming, but he is able to keep the farm afloat.

One evening, while sitting on his front porch, Ray hears a disembodied voice say, “If you build it, he will come.” Ray somehow understands from this terse message that he is to plow away several acres of corn and build a baseball field, complete with outfield fences and lights. He also knows that, once complete, his field will be visited by the specter of Shoeless Joe. With Annie’s blessing, Ray complies. It takes three seasons, but, finally, Annie spots a man dressed in old-fashioned baseball flannels standing in the outfield. It is indeed Shoeless Joe. He and several phantom teammates materialize regularly and play baseball on Ray’s field. After each game, they vanish into the corn beyond the left-field fence.

Ray believes that he has accomplished his mission, until the voice revisits him and implores, “Ease his pain.” Again, despite the brevity of the message, Ray perceives a full set of instructions. He is to travel to Windsor, Vermont, to the home of reclusive writer J. D. Salinger and take Salinger to a baseball game at Fenway Park in Boston. Ray sets out for Windsor and encounters the famous author in his Vermont driveway. Ray entreats Salinger to join him. Fearful of unduly agitating this strange visitor, Salinger accedes. On the way, Ray details the story of his magical baseball field in Iowa. Salinger does not understand, but he envies Ray’s passion, and he relaxes enough to allow Ray to call him “Jerry.”

At the game, Ray again hears the voice, urging him to “go the distance.” Ray senses yet a third set of instructions: He must travel to Chisholm, Minnesota, and inquire after Archie “Moonlight” Graham, a ballplayer who appeared in a single game around the turn of the twentieth century but never got a turn at bat. To punctuate this directive, Graham’s meager statistics appear on the Fenway Park scoreboard. Plainly, no one else in the crowd hears the voice or sees the record, and the game ends with no further incident. Afterward, back in Jerry’s driveway, Ray is anxious to set out on this new quest. However, Jerry reveals that he, too, heard the voice and saw Graham’s record on the scoreboard. The two set off for Minnesota.

In Chisholm, they learn that Archie Graham became a doctor. The local citizens bombard them with warm memories of “Doc” Graham, who died twenty years earlier. Ray and Jerry accumulate much information but remain uncertain of what to do with it. This uncertainty robs Ray of sleep, and late one night he slips out of his hotel room for a walk. He passes the building that once housed Graham’s office. The door opens and an old man emerges. It is Doc Graham himself, alive and happy to talk. Graham explains how he came to be called Moonlight and divulges his greatest wish: To have come to bat in a Major League game. The next morning, Ray shares with Jerry the details of the encounter. The two have fulfilled their mission, and they decide to head for Iowa. Outside Chisholm, a young man stands beside the road, his thumb extended. His hair is slicked down, and he wears an old, featureless baseball uniform. Ray and Jerry pick him up. Their passenger’s name comes as no surprise: it is Archie Moonlight Graham.

When they reach Iowa, Moonlight Graham joins the other players in their games, and Ray finds that he has a surprise visitor. His long-estranged twin brother, Richard, has arrived for an extended visit. As the family reunites, Archie slips away and joins Shoeless Joe’s phantom team. Meanwhile, Annie’s brother Mark has been plotting. Mark is a stern man who teaches at the University of Iowa and owns property. Like Richard, Mark has not been touched by whatever magic has pervaded everyone else; neither man can see the ballplayers. Mark simply believes that Ray has taken leave of his senses. He knows Ray has lost income because he replaced some of his crops with his baseball field, so Mark blackmails Eddie Scissons into selling him the mortgage on the farm. Mark and his business partner, Abner Bluestein, set a date for foreclosure.

Mark and Bluestein arrive at the field to serve papers. Karin, startled by the confrontation, falls awkwardly from the bleacher seats. The impact renders her unconscious, and she stops breathing. The nearest medical facility is twenty minutes away. Archie Graham approaches from the baseball field. As he draws closer, he changes from the young hitchhiker to the aged doctor whom Ray encountered in Chisholm. The magic finally strikes everyone present: Richard, Mark, and Bluestein all see him. Doc Graham declares that Karin is choking; he dislodges the obstruction, and Karin resumes breathing.

Karin will recover, but Doc has crossed a line: He can never again be Moonlight Graham. Ray and Annie are dismayed, but Doc has already fulfilled his wish by taking turns at bat during the phantom games. He contentedly strolls beyond the left-field fence and disappears. Mark and Bluestein, mortified by their role in Karin’s mishap, withdraw.

Soon afterward, Ray overhears the phantom ballplayers inviting Jerry to accompany them into the cornfields after that night’s game. Ray feels slighted. Jerry points out that Ray has a wife and a child, whereas Jerry’s children are grown and he lives alone. Jerry promises Ray that he will write of their journey and of what it is like to realize a dream. Ray and Annie watch as Jerry and the players blend into the corn. They shut down the lights, and night falls.

Bibliography

Asinof, Eliot. Eight Men Out. New York: Pocket Books, 1979. A definitive account of the Black Sox scandal of 1919.

Dougherty, David. “Reviews: Shoeless Joe Jackson Comes to Iowa: Stories.” Studies in Short Fiction 32, no. 1 (Winter, 1995). Takes a dim view of the sentimentality in Shoeless Joe, but provides useful commentary on a small variety of other works by Kinsella.

Fischer, David Marc. “Dreams, Magic, and Peerless Plotting: Shoeless Joe.” Writing 22, no. 4 (January, 2000): 12-14. Lauds the plot structure of Shoeless Joe, finding much for other authors to emulate.

Jenkins, Clarence. “Kinsella’s Shoeless Joe.” Explicator 53, no. 3 (Spring, 1995): 179-180. Explores an interesting religious angle to the story of Shoeless Joe.

Kirtz, Mary. “Canadian Book, American Film: Shoeless Joe Transfigured on a Field of Dreams.” Literature Film Quarterly 23, no. 1 (1995): 26-31. Discusses the making of the film adaptation Field of Dreams (1989); offers many worthwhile insights on the novel.