"A pair of standard dice. A scoresheet and a pencil. A little imagination (the more the better). That's all you need. Fun ensues. This foundational description of dice baseball encapsulates the minimal requirements for creating elaborate fictional worlds through imagination and simple mechanical systems."
"Over the course of 56 seasons, he has devised cults of personality around the players and developed lineages of ball-playing superstars. He has created whole teams (the Knickerbockers, the Bridegrooms, the Beaneaters, the Pioneers) and imagined political parties that draw in the players, demonstrating the depth of Waugh's imaginative construction."
Robert Coover's 1968 novel The Universal Baseball Association, Inc., J. Henry Waugh, Prop. follows J. Henry Waugh, a lonely middle-aged accountant who creates an entirely imaginary baseball league using dice and probability charts. Waugh serves as the sole proprietor, player, and god-like figure of the Universal Baseball Association, inventing players with vintage names and controlling their fates through three dice and complex systems he designed. Over 56 seasons, Waugh develops elaborate player personalities, team lineages, and even political structures within his fictional world. The novel represents postmodern fiction that ultimately argues for the vitality and necessity of imaginative storytelling itself.
#postmodern-fiction #dice-baseball-simulation #imagination-and-reality #fictional-worlds #american-literature
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