New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1952. First edition. A Near Fine copy in like dust jacket. Small scratch to bottom edge of lower board. Bookplate to upper pastedown. Price-clipped dust jacket with a bit of rubbing and pinpoint hole to back panel. An appealing copy, presenting very well.

In 1949, a mysterious event gripped the imagination of the American press and public: an obsessed fan shot and nearly killed the famous baseball player Eddie Waitkus. This bizarre incident served as the inspiration for Bernard Malamud’s first novel, The Natural, which follows the career of Roy Hobbs, a fictionalized version of Waitkus. Hobbs becomes the target of a woman's morbid fascination, which leads to a shooting that derails Hobbs' burgeoning baseball career; Hobbs survives the attack but struggles to return to the diamond.

Heralded as one of the finest American writers of the twentieth century, Malamud continued writing novels and garnering awards until his death in 1986. The Natural was famously adapted into a film starring Robert Redford, Glenn Close, Kim Basinger, and Robert Duvall. Near Fine in Near Fine dust jacket. (Item #8348)