Quote of the Day (John Updike, on Ted Williams’ Last At-Bat)

“The ball climbed on a diagonal line into the vast volume of air over center field. From my angle, behind third base, the ball seemed less an object in flight than the tip of a towering, motionless construct, like the Eiffel Tower or Tappan Zee Bridge. It was in the books while it was still in the sky."—American fiction writer and essayist John Updike (1932-2009), "Hub Fans Bid Kid Adieu," The New Yorker, Oct. 22, 1960

Sixty years ago today, Boston Red Sox left fielder Ted Williams accomplished something that most players desire desperately but can’t achieve: retire on top, with a home run in their last at-bat. John Updike’s account of this game is one of the classic baseball articles.

As seen in this passage, Updike endowed the last homer of the Hall of Famer’s 521-HR career with mythic majesty. He did the same thing in evoking how the 42-year-old Williams, who had quarreled with the press and even fans throughout his career, stayed true to form, refusing to tip his cap or come out of the dugout to acknowledge the wild cheering from the roughly 10,000 fans in Fenway Park after his eighth-inning blast.

Updike summed up the disdain of “The Splendid Splinter” simply, in perhaps the most quoted line of the piece: “Gods do not answer letters.”