Guide to the Roger Angell Papers

Collection Number

BA MSS 41

Title

Papers of Roger Angell

Inclusive Dates

1960-1998; bulk 1979-1998

Extent

27 linear feet (62 boxes, 5 oversized boxes)

Repository

National Baseball Hall of Fame Library
25 Main Street
Cooperstown, NY 13326

Roger Angell is the senior fiction editor and an eminent baseball essayist for The New Yorker magazine. Typescripts, galley proofs, notepads, notes, audio recordings, transcripts, scorecards, media notes, press releases, newspaper clippings, magazine clippings, programs, guides, photographs and correspondence document the author’s creative process over 38 years.

Acquisition Information

The records were a gift from Roger Angell, and accessioned in two parts in 1990 and 1998.

Preferred Citation

Roger Angell Papers, BA MSS 41, National Baseball Hall of Fame Library, National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.

1. Researchers wishing to examine the Roger Angell collection shall make written application to the author.
2. Roger Angell shall notify the researcher/applicant and the National Baseball Library in writing when permission is granted to examine the Roger Angell collection.
3. Roger Angell may designate a third party to review and approve or deny research applications on his behalf during this lifetime or in the event of his death. In the event no designee is named the librarian of the National Baseball Library shall have authority to determine access to the Roger Angell collection.
4. Email research@baseballhall.org for more information.

Copyright

Private rights reside with the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum. For information about permission to reproduce or publish, please contact the National Baseball Hall of Fame Library and Archives.

Roger Angell (1920- ) is the senior fiction editor and an eminent baseball essayist for The New Yorker magazine. His evocative essays, spanning over forty years, are told from a fan’s perspective and celebrate the game’s leisurely pace and gradual rewards. Angell’s collective work, writes Joe Pollock in The Sporting Scene Book Review (1972), “touches the heart and feel and rhythm and pace of the game as few writers have.”

Roger Angell was born in New York City on September 19, 1920, to Katherine and Ernest Angell. His father was a successful lawyer and his mother began serving as The New Yorker’s fiction editor shortly after its inception in 1925. Soon after her divorce from Ernest in 1929, Katharine Sergeant Angell married famed fiction author and New Yorker writer E. B. White, who produced humor pieces for the magazine. At an early age, Angell showed an interest in publishing and became editor of his school newspaper. In 1942, he graduated from Harvard and went on to write and edit short stories and essays for the next decade, including pieces for the Air Force’s Brief and Holiday magazine. He joined the staff of The New Yorker full time in 1956 as a fiction editor and has since written fiction, humor, editorial comment, criticism, and sports reports for the magazine.

In 1962, The New Yorker invited Angell to attend spring training and write a piece on baseball. Upon his return, he authored his first extended baseball essay for the magazine’s “The Sporting Scene” section, entitled “The Old Folks Behind Home”. Since that time, Angell has written two to three lengthy baseball pieces each year. His work spans over forty years of the game, during which time he has observed the rise of the franchise movement, the birth of free agency, expansion teams, ballooning player salaries, and a growing awareness of drug use. To date, Angell has written over one hundred articles for “The Sporting Scene”. In addition, collections of Angell’s essays have been published in a number of well-received compilations (The Summer Game (1972), Five Seasons (1977), Late Innings (1982), Season Ticket (1988), Once More Around the Park (1991), and Game Time (2003),) Angell wrote his first full-length book, A Pitcher’s Story: Innings with David Cone (2001), at the age of 81. In 2006, Angell published “Let Me Finish,” a collection of autobiographical essays published over the previous three years.

References

Haynes, Jared. “They Look Easy, But They’re Hard: An Interview with Roger Angell.” Writing on the Edge 4 (Fall 1992).

Italie, Hillel. “Big Apple Angell: New Yorker baseball scribe still strong at 85.” Daily News, May 21, 2006.

Kettman, Steve. “Roger Angell.” Salon.com. Aug. 29, 2000. http://archive.salon.com/people/bc/2000/08/29/angell/index.html (accessed on July 17, 2007).

Pollock, Joe. The Sporting News Book Review July 8 1972

“Roger Angell.” Dec. 24, 2006. http://www.baseball-reference.com/bullpen/Roger_Angell (accessed June 26, 2007).

Welch, Dave. “Roger Angell: Still Throwing Strikes.” Powells.com. Apr. 16, 2003. http://www.powells.com/authors/angell.html (accessed on May 12, 2003).

Typescripts, galley proofs, notepads, notes, audio recordings, transcripts, scorecards, media notes, press releases, printed material, newspaper clippings, photographs and correspondence document author Roger Angell’s creative process over 38 years (67 boxes, 1907, 1960-1998). His papers are arranged into three series: Series I. Baseball Articles and Related Material, Series II. Books and Related Material, Series III. Other Works and Related Material, Series IV. Correspondence, and Series V. General.
Series I. Baseball Articles and Related Material (62 boxes, 1962-1998) is the most extensive of the series and consists of typescript drafts of Angell’s creative works at various stages accompanied by related notes and other documentation in the form of handwritten and typewritten notes, transcripts, scorecards, audio recordings of player, management, and media interviews, and printed material including media notes and press releases, magazines, media guides, and newspaper articles. His game notes are extensive, and though the bulk of their volume is composed of media notes and press releases and other printed material not authored by Angell, his handwritten notes and transcripts and his recorded interviews offer insights and information unavailable elsewhere.
Series II. Books and Related Material (4 folders, 1977) is comparatively sparse, and contains a typescript, correspondence, notes, and reviews related to the publishing of Five Seasons (1977).
Series III. Other Works and Related Material (1.5 boxes, 1960-1974) documents the writing of some of Angell’s other New Yorker pieces, including movie reviews and other sports-related essays.
Series IV. Correspondence (3 boxes, 1970-1995, bulk 1979-1995) is arranged into two subseries: Reader Mail and Personal and Professional Correspondence. The first subseries (2.5 boxes) is composed largely of reader mail received by Angell between 1979 and 1995, and is arranged alphabetically by the author’s last name. Correspondence of a personal and professional nature (3 folders, 1970-1972, 1981) makes up the second subseries.
Series V. General (1 folder, 1907, 1964-1995) includes unidentified and miscellaneous documents.