NOTES OF A USED AND OUT-OF-PRINT BOOK DEALER

Issue 22. May 2, 2002

A free email newsletter published by Continental Books for customers and interested others. Another turn. Najinsky, his teeth clenching a single red rose, leaps and appears to float. Is it an illusion or has he momentarily transcended the force of gravity?

1. Espionage and all that
2. Books out of place
3. Strange sound from the city

BERG IN FROM THE COLD

Moe Berg was a professional baseball player. He was also a bona fide intellectual with an undergraduate degree from Princeton and a legal degree later. At the time of his greatest athletic renown, from the mid-1920's to the early 1940's, this association of brain and brawn was rare and, with his obvious Jewish and secular identity, it made him a draw in the large population centers of the Northeast and the Middle West. But the feature stories that exaggerated his achievements and established his public persona were at odds with his real self which was, especially as he aged, decidedly eccentric.

He might have passed with minor post-mortem attention except that during World War II he joined the OSS and contributed to the Manhattan Project by searching for news of Germany's atomic bomb development. His initial anomaly of athlete/scholar was now doubled by the unexpected appellation "spy."

The hype and secrecy, the dispersion of memory among those whom Berg encountered, the closed governmental files, all finally established Berg as a major enigma. "Who was he," his biographers began to ask, "really?"

Nicholas Dawidoff, in his study of Berg, insists on fact over puff and examines Berg's social, psychological, and professional life as a medical pathologist would his corporal. "The Catcher Was A Spy, The Mysterious Life of Moe Berg," 1994 is a social autopsy. It tells all in fabulous detail. Dawidoff doesn't miss a kiss, a shower, a righteous begging, or a throw down to second base. Berg, a contributing constructor of his own image, would have hated this book.

But beyond Berg himself, who was after all only another worker on the pyramid of American life, the book has other values:

-- The practical separation of occupational institutions: In a setting where it is athlete or scholar or spy Berg was unexpectedly on the inside of all three spaces. His life was like an interconnecting window. Through him others glimpsed the social lives to which they were not ordinarily privy.

-- Biography as social and psychological analysis: Dawidoff explains the unusual behavior and the odd career line by breaking through the blocks, locks, and traps Berg set to throw off all pursuers including himself for he, notoriously, avoided self-reflection. It is a sad story of loss balanced by unexpected achievements.

-- Without answering it opens the question of the nomadic life: Berg was always on the run and, even though slow getting around the bases, he covered a lot of territory. Beyond the requirements life laid on him, Berg was an inveterate traveler. Was it away from or toward? Or was it the pleasurable hiatus in transit? Or perhaps the itchy foot is a correlate of fame and fortune, first class hotels and restaurants defining the good life. Whatever the reason, it was a key Berg characteristic.

-- The use of the various media for public relations: The communication channels frequently transmit the made-up message. The relationship between famous person and his public is mediated by homespun myth. Each politician, entertainer, bureaucrat puts on the best face, and it is, very possibly, not his own. It is a lesson we in the audience have continually to learn.

Note

-Other books on Berg:

Kaufman, Fitzgerald, and Sewell. "Moe Berg: Athlete, Scholar, Spy."
Ethel Berg. "My Brother Morris Berg: The Real Moe."
Grey. "Moe Berg. The Spy Behind Homeplate."
Willinger. "The Spy in a Catcher's Mask, A Novel."
Andryszewski. "The Amazing Life of Moe Berg."

THE AVANT-GARDE BOOK

The museum is an unnatural venue for books. Its display areas are the wall, the closed and locked case, the floor and the ceiling, fine places for paintings and sculpture but very uncomfortable for the book and its companion and lover, the reader. The book belongs on the shelf from which it can be picked and then perused, handled and caressed. That's my main carp about the current Museum of Modern Art show, "The Russian Avant-Garde Book 1910-1934," (March 28-May 21, 2002),. and I know it is unreasonable but, as they say, "Stay with the feeling."

They're really pamphlets, not regular books, especially those from the pre-Bolshevik era put out by authors and artists in short print runs, making a point on the fly, as ephemeral as the daily newspaper. They are hard to see, way up there on the wall, above our heads, in Cyrillic or Hebrew, the colors fading. The perfection of the designs is only available in the explanatory material put out by the curators. There accessibility increases, perhaps more than ever before, and we on-lookers are back with the familiar visual and tactile connection.

But I am very grateful for the display and the collector who accumulated it. It is in the tradition of direct media access for the artists and producers and the makers themselves. It contributes to the history of the independent voice.

MORE ON ALTERNATE STREET NAMES IN NYC

To the casual pedestrian "Avenue of the Strongest" is a shocker. It doesn't sound right. Shouldn't it be "Strongest Avenue?" Or would this subtly change the meaning intended? A place for the strongest hardly jibs with the tired, poor, and huddled masses "yearning to breathe free" of Emma Lazarus. Sounds like a bias against equalitarianism. Perhaps the City Council had a moment of wrong-headedness.

Try another track: The NYC Police are the City's Finest; the NYC Firemen are the City's Bravest; and, eureka, the NYC Sanitation Workers are the City's Strongest. Still uncomfortable to the ear but now understandable. And the Sanitation Department does have a building on that part of Worth St, between Broadway and Centre St. to which this alternate name has been assigned.

This constant search for the superlative could lead to a parlor game. List the superlatives on one side and the occupations on the other and argue out the appropriate matches. For a book connection: search out the book title that ties the knot. Example: "The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner" by Alan Sillitoe leads to Runners are NYC's Loneliest.

You might find it diverting. For a start try the following titles, see where they lead.

"All the Pretty Horses" by Cormac McCarthy
"Wayward Reporter" by A.J. Liebling
"Violent Men" by Hans Toch

And you're on your way.

And here we are, the turn over.

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Au revoire

Alvin Katz copyright 2002