Shoeless Joe (novel)

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Shoeless Joe
Author W.P. Kinsella
Country United States
Language English
Genre(s) Novel
Publisher Houghton Mifflin
Publication date 1982
Media type Print (Hardcover, Paperback, e-book)
Pages 265 (Paperback edition)
ISBN ISBN 0-395-32047-X (Paperback edition)

Shoeless Joe is a fantasy novel by W. P. Kinsella. It became much better known because of its film adaptation, Field of Dreams.

Contents

[edit] Plot summary

Ray Kinsella lives and farms in Iowa where he produces corn with his wife Annie and their five-year-old daughter Karin. Kinsella is obsessed with the beauty and history of American baseball, specifically the plight of his hero, Shoeless Joe Jackson, and the "Black Sox" of the 1919 World Series. When he hears a voice telling him to build a baseball field in the midst of his corn crop in order to give his hero a chance at redemption, he blindly follows instructions. The field becomes a conduit to the spirits of baseball legend. Soon, Kinsella is off on a cross-country trip to ease the pain of another hero, the reclusive writer J.D. Salinger, as part of a journey the Philadelphia Inquirer called "not so much about baseball as it is about dreams, magic, life, and what is quintessentially American."

[edit] Characters in Shoeless Joe

  • Ray Kinsella built the field for shoeless joe
  • Richard Kinsella, identical twin brother of Ray
  • Annie Kinsella, wife of Ray
  • Karin Kinsella, daughter of Ray and Annie
  • Mark, Ray's brother-in-law
  • Eddie Scissons, who originally owned Ray's farm and was locally known as the oldest living Chicago Cub
  • J. D. Salinger, the author of The Catcher in the Rye
  • Archibald "Moonlight" Graham, a baseball player who never had a chance at bat in the majors, who then later became a doctor
  • Shoeless Joe Jackson, a baseball player who was among 8 Chicago White Sox accused of being paid to throw the 1919 World Series

[edit] Major themes

  • Redemption
  • Father-and-son bond (bond between Ray and his father)
  • Dreams
  • Unexplained magic
  • New-found life
  • Religion
  • Love
  • Perseverance

[edit] Allusions/references from other works

 Please help improve this section by expanding it.
Further information might be found on the talk page or at requests for expansion.


[edit] Allusions/references to actual history and current science

The character Moonlight Graham was a real baseball player, whom the author found while looking through The Baseball Encyclopedia. The background of the character is based on his true life, with a few factual liberties taken for artistic reasons.

[edit] Awards and nominations

Shoeless Joe was the winner of the 1982 Books in Canada First Novel Award and a Houghton Mifflin Literary Fellowship.

[edit] Film or TV adaptations

Shoeless Joe was later adapted into a screenplay for the 1989 film Field of Dreams by Phil Alden Robinson. The original working title of Field of Dreams was the book's title, Shoeless Joe. Coincidentally, the original title of the book was Dream Field, but the publisher renamed the work Shoeless Joe.[citation needed]

[edit] Release details

[edit] Sources, references, external links, quotations

 Please help improve this section by expanding it.
Further information might be found on the talk page or at requests for expansion.