The great American novel

Underrated among Roth’s works, The Great American Novel has retired sportswriter, WordSmith, narrating an account of the demise of the third major league—the Patriot League—whose entire existence has since been erased from history. Due to wartime concessions, the 1943 Port Ruppert Mundys (complete with a one-legged catcher and a one-armed outfielder) are forced to play their entire schedule on the road, losing 134 of 154 games. When their manager dies in 1944, the team is taken over by the sinister Gil Gamesh, who had previously been banned from baseball for nefarious activities. Gamesh, a Communist double agent causes a scandal that leads to the arrest of a number of Mundy players, the end of the Patriot League, and even the renaming of the cities involved in the league.