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About Shakespeare Bats Cleanup
Product Description "This funny and poignant novel celebrates the power of writing to help young people make sense of their lives and unlock and confront their problems." — School Library Journal (starred review) When MVP Kevin Boland gets the news that he has mono and won’t be seeing a baseball field for a while, he suddenly finds himself scrawling a poem down the middle of a page in his journal. To get some help, he cops a poetry book from his dad’s den — and before Kevin knows it, he’s writing in verse about stuff like, Will his jock friends give up on him? What’s the deal with girlfriends? Surprisingly enough, after his health improves, he keeps on writing, about the smart-talking Latina girl who thinks poets are cool, and even about his mother, whose death is a still-tender loss. Written in free verse with examples of several poetic forms slipped into the mix, including a sonnet, haiku, pastoral, and even a pantoum, this funny, poignant story by a master of dialogue is an English teacher’s dream — sure to hook poetry lovers, baseball fanatics, mono recoverers, and everyone in between. From the Author RON KOERTGE: "I find it funny that kids will willingly follow the rules in any game, but if you give them rules for writing poetry, they rebel!" About the Author Ron Koertge, the author of several acclaimed novels for young adults - including STONER & SPAZ and THE BRIMSTONE JOURNALS - has been a faculty member for more than thirty-five years at Pasadena City College, where he has taught everything from Shakespeare to remedial writing. He also writes poetry for adults. Of SHAKESPEARE BATS CLEANUP, he says, "I find it funny that kids will willingly follow the rules in any game, but if you give them rules for writing poetry, they rebel!" Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. Their pitcher walks our leadoff man. Greg moves him up to second with a perfect sacrifice. Fabian loops one into right. I'm up. Two on, one out. I'm the cleanup man. My job is to bring these guys home. I take a pitch. Foul one off. Take a strike. Their left fielder drifts in. Bam! I lift one right over his head. A double! Two runs score. I slide into second. Safe! That's what I'm thinking, anyway, propped up in bed with some dumb book. Than Dad comes in and says, "The doctor called. Your tests came back. You've got mono." "So I can't play ball." He pats my knee. "You can't even go to school, Kevin. You need to take it real easy." He hands me a journal, one of those marbly black-and-white ones he likes. "You're gonna have a lot of time on your hands. Maybe you'll feel like writing something down." IN BED Being sick is like taking a trip, isn't it? Going to another country, sort of. A country nobody wants to visit. A country named Fevertown. Or Virusburg. Or Germ Corners. The border guards are glum-looking, with runny noses and pasty skin. Their uniforms don't fit and flap open in the back so you can see their big, ugly butts. Nobody wants to go there, but everybody does, sooner or later. And some stay. PRESSURE Dad's never talked to me about writing before. He's not nuts to have me be just like him. Len Boggs has a dad like that. It's been Boggs & Son ever since Lennie was about two seconds old. They're plumbers. "Got clogs? Call Boggs!" Don't laugh. Their vans are all over the place. They're rich. And Len hates it. Lennie's fourteen, like me. He doesn't know what he wants to do when he grows up. Maybe go in the Marines. Maybe play the cello. But he for sure doesn't want to be a plumber. His dad is already on his case, riding him about it. I think mine's just trying to be nice. HOME ALONE Well, not exactly. Dad's here, that's why we don't have to get somebody to come in and take care of me. First of all, I don't need much care. I sleep all the time, or at least it feels that way. Dad works at home. He and I pass each other in the hall— I in my sweats, he in his cap. When I was little and I got
