Sports Fact and Book Rec of the Day 11/21/2007

11/21/1968:
Top-heavy with starting pitchers but needing a shortstop in the worst way, the Minnesota Twins deal left-hander Jim Merritt to the Cincinnati Reds for veteran Leo Cardenas. Each club benefits from the exchange. Merritt will go 17-9 and 20-12 in his first two years with the Reds, helping them reach the World Series in 1970 before a sore arm shortens his career. Cardenas will solidify the Minnesota infield, helping them win divisional titles in 1969 and '70. Ironically, both players end their careers as teammates on the 1974-75 Texas Rangers.

Birthdays:
Stan Musial b. 1920
Earl Monroe b. 1944
Troy Aikman b. 1966
Ken Griffey Jr. b. 1969
Michael Strahan b. 1971

“You are about to begin reading Italo Calvino’s new novel, If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler. Relax. Concentrate. Dispel every other thought. Let the world around you fade.”

Submit to Calvino, and you’ll find that you are in the hands of a master. A favorite of book lovers throughout the world, If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler is about two characters who meet in a bookstore, both there to exchange flawed books for different ones. But each subsequent book is flawed. No matter: The characters fall in love, and the reader does too—with the author’s dazzling structural feats, the many layered stories within the one book, and his gorgeous, lyrical prose. Irresistible.

IF ON A WINTER’S NIGHT A TRAVELER, by Italo Calvino (1979; Harvest, 1982)