DiMaggioDiMaggio
the Last American Knight
Title rated 3 out of 5 stars, based on 1 ratings(1 rating)
Book, 1995
Current format, Book, 1995, , Available .The life story of Joe DiMaggio provides coverage of his youth as the son of an Italian fisherman, his service in World War II, his baseball career, his business dealings, and his brief marriage to Marilyn Monroe.
Joe DiMaggio was heralded as Babe Ruth's replacement when he showed up for his rookie season with the New York Yankees in 1936. The twenty-one-year-old left fielder had never even been east of the Rockies before, but he responded to the pressure with unflappable grace, lining a single to left field on his first trip to the plate and launching a legendary career. In the years that followed, he went on to become the American League batting champion and the league's most valuable player, led the Yankees to nine World Series victories in thirteen years, and hit safely for fifty-six consecutive games in 1941 - one of the few sports records that may never be broken.
Yet DiMaggio's story, as Joseph Durso reveals in this brilliant biography, has always been much larger than the baseball diamond. The son of an Italian fisherman, he is the embodiment of the American dream, celebrated as much for his integrity and decency as for his on-the-field heroics. As a soldier in World War II, as a private businessman, and as the husband, painfully briefly, of Marilyn Monroe, DiMaggio has lived an archetypal American tale of glamour and tragedy. In 1949 he captured the imagination of the entire country by overcoming injuries to both heels and then leading the Yankees to yet another World Series victory. And when Marilyn Monroe died, all of America felt his pain.
Though he lived his life at the very center of the public eye, DiMaggio was obsessed with privacy and loyalty. He shunned all but the few people he felt he could trust absolutely, and those who broke his trust fell into disfavor forever. Joseph Durso has been a friend of Joe DiMaggio's for forty years, and in this intimate biography, he examines the aspirations and obsessions of a man who has been throughout his life virtually unapproachable.
Joe DiMaggio was heralded as Babe Ruth's replacement when he showed up for his rookie season with the New York Yankees in 1936. The twenty-one-year-old left fielder had never even been east of the Rockies before, but he responded to the pressure with unflappable grace, lining a single to left field on his first trip to the plate and launching a legendary career. In the years that followed, he went on to become the American League batting champion and the league's most valuable player, led the Yankees to nine World Series victories in thirteen years, and hit safely for fifty-six consecutive games in 1941 - one of the few sports records that may never be broken.
Yet DiMaggio's story, as Joseph Durso reveals in this brilliant biography, has always been much larger than the baseball diamond. The son of an Italian fisherman, he is the embodiment of the American dream, celebrated as much for his integrity and decency as for his on-the-field heroics. As a soldier in World War II, as a private businessman, and as the husband, painfully briefly, of Marilyn Monroe, DiMaggio has lived an archetypal American tale of glamour and tragedy. In 1949 he captured the imagination of the entire country by overcoming injuries to both heels and then leading the Yankees to yet another World Series victory. And when Marilyn Monroe died, all of America felt his pain.
Though he lived his life at the very center of the public eye, DiMaggio was obsessed with privacy and loyalty. He shunned all but the few people he felt he could trust absolutely, and those who broke his trust fell into disfavor forever. Joseph Durso has been a friend of Joe DiMaggio's for forty years, and in this intimate biography, he examines the aspirations and obsessions of a man who has been throughout his life virtually unapproachable.
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- Boston : Little, Brown and Co., c1995.
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