Philip Roth, American

 This passage is adapted from Philip Roth, American 

Pastoral. ©1997 by Philip Roth. “The Swede" was 

the nickname of Seymour Levov, a talented athlete 

from the narrator's hometown. 

One night in the summer of 1985, while visiting 

New York, I went out to see the Mets play the 

Astros, and while circling the stadium with my 

friends, looking for the gate to our seats, I saw the 

Swede, Thirty-six years older than when I’d watched

him play baseball for Upsala. He wore a white shirt, 

a striped tie, and a charcoal-gray summer suit, and he 

was still terrifically handsome. The golden hair was a 

shade or two darker but not any thinner; no longer 

was it cut short but fell rather fully over his ears and

down to his collar. In this suit that fit him so 

exquisitely he seemed even taller and leaner than I 

remembered him in the uniform of one sport or 

another. The woman with us noticed him first. “Who

 is that? That’s—that’s... Is that Mayor Lindsay?" she

asked. “No,” I said. “My God. You know who that 

is? It’s Swede Levov.” I told my friends, “That’s the 

Swede!”

A skinny, fair-haired boy of about seven or eight 

was walking alongside the Swede, a kid under a Mets

cap pounding away at a first basemen’s mitt that 

dangled, as had the Swede's, from his left hand. The 

two, clearly a father and his son, were laughing about 

something together when I approached and 

 introduced myself. “I knew your brother at

Weequahic.”

"You're Zuckerman?” he replied, vigorously

shaking my hand. “The author?”

“I’m Zuckerman the author.”"You're Zuckerman?” he replied, vigorously

shaking my hand. “The author?”

“I’m Zuckerman the author.”

“Sure, you were Jerry's great pal.” “I don't think

Jerry had great pals. He was too brilliant for pals. He 

just used to beat my pants off at Ping-Pong down in 

your basement. Beating me at Ping-Pong was very 

important to Jerry." 

 “So you're the guy. My mother says, 'And he

was such a nice, quiet child when he came to the 

house.’ You know who this is?" the Swede said to 

the boy. “The guy who wrote those books. Nathan 

Zuckerman.”

 Mystified, the boy shrugged and muttered, “Hi”

“This is my son Chris.” 

'These are friends,” I said, sweeping an arm out 

to introduce the three people with me. “And this 

man.” I said to them, “is the greatest athlete in the 

 history Weequahic High. A real artist in three sports.

Played first base like Hernandez1—thinking. A line -

drive doubles hitter. Do you know that?” I said to his 

son “Your dad was our Hernandez.”

“Hernandez is left-handed” he replied. 

 “Well, that's the only difference,” I said to the

little literalist, and put out my hand again to his 

father. “Nice to see you, Swede.”

“You bet. Take it easy, Skip.”

“Remember me to your brother,” 1 said. 

 He laughed, we parted, and someone was saying

to me, "Well, well, the greatest athlete in the historyof Weequahic High called you ‘Skip.’”

“I know, I can’t believe it,” And I did feel 

almost as wonderfully singled out as I had the one 

time before，at the age of ten, when the Swede had

got so personal as to recognize me by the 

playground nickname I’d acquired because of two 

grades I skipped in grade school.

Midway through the first inning, the woman 

 with us turned to me and said, “You should have

seen your face-you might as well have told us he was 

Zeus.2 I saw just what you looked like as a boy.”

1 First baseman for the New York Mets in the mid-1980s 

 2 In Greed mythology, the ruler of the gods

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