Michael Westbay
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Banzai Babe Ruth
- Baseball, Espionage, and the Assassination during the 1934 Tour of Japan
- De: Robert K. Fitts
- Narrado por: Robin Bloodworth
- Duración: 11 h y 42 m
- Versión completa
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General4 out of 5 stars 21
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Narración:3.5 out of 5 stars 16
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Historia4 out of 5 stars 16
In November 1934 as the United States and Japan drifted toward war, a team of American League all-stars that included Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Jimmie Foxx, future secret agent Moe Berg, and Connie Mack barnstormed across the Land of the Rising Sun. Hundreds of thousands of fans, many waving Japanese and American flags, welcomed the team with shouts of Banzai! Banzai Babe Ruth! The all-stars stayed for a month, playing 18 games, spawning professional baseball in Japan.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Excellent story, reader needs pronunciation chart
- De Michael Westbay en 03-17-13
- Banzai Babe Ruth
- Baseball, Espionage, and the Assassination during the 1934 Tour of Japan
- De: Robert K. Fitts
- Narrado por: Robin Bloodworth
Excellent story, reader needs pronunciation chart
Revisado: 03-17-13
Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?
Yes and no. I would recommend the book as it is a fascinating account of history that isn't covered in any text book, in English or in Japanese. (My kids, who came up in the Japanese education system, never heard of many of the incidents.)
But the reader, Robin Bloodworth, detracts from the story by getting most names of people and places wrong. Not simply poorly pronounced, but saying valid names of completely different people.
What was one of the most memorable moments of Banzai Babe Ruth?
How the Babe showed extreme patience with the thousands asking for his autograph in multiple places throughout the book.
Also, when photographers placed film roles on the legs of carrier pigeon to carry back to the newspapers, my first thought was how good the bandwidth for photo sharing was in in 1934.
How could the performance have been better?
Robin could have read the first chapter of any Japanese language textbook that explains that vowels are pronounced the same every time. I find myself on the verge of shouting the correct words at him as I listen. I can live with gaijin getting the "R" wrong, but almost EVERY VOWEL in names of people or places? Aihara and Iihara are two very different names, yet he says the latter as the former.
And saying "Rusa" instead of "Rusu"! Argh! That's just unacceptable!
Also, did Lefy O'Doul, a San Francisco native, really have a Jersey thug accent? I'd have never thought that.
Do you think Banzai Babe Ruth needs a follow-up book? Why or why not?
The natural follow up book to this would be Nagata Yuichi's "The Tokyo Giants North American Tour of 1935" (Toho Shuppan, 2007, ISBN 978-4-86249-076-6). It would need to be translated from Japanese, though.
Any additional comments?
Please re-record this with somebody in studio who can give direction to the reader about how names should be pronounced. The reader doesn't have to have perfect native pronunciation, but he/she needs to at least get vowels right.
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