Dr. David Wanczyk
Ohio University alum and English faculty member Dr. David Wanczyk has authored the first book about blind baseball. Beep: Inside the Unseen World of Baseball for the Blind comes out in hardcover on Oct. 1.
“For me, the important thing was to tell the story of beep baseball without idealizing and without patronizing. The sport is more than a feel-good, rah-rah thing. It’s tough and exciting, and the players are as salty as anyone in a major league clubhouse. It was an amazing experience getting to know them and getting to report on this odd game,” says Wanczyk.
Wanczyk is Editor of New Ohio Review and Coordinator for Special Programs in the English Department. He earned an M.A. and Ph.D. in Creative Writing from the College of Arts & Sciences.
Abstract: In Beep, David Wanczyk illuminates the sport of blind baseball to show us a remarkable version of America’s pastime. With balls tricked out to beep three times per second like a troubling EKG and with bases that buzz, beep baseball is both innovative and intensely competitive. And when the best beep baseball team in America, the Austin Blackhawks, takes on its international rival, Taiwan Homerun, no one’s thinking about disability. What we find are athletes playing their hearts out for a championship.
Wanczyk follows teams around the world and even joins them on the field to produce a riveting inside narrative about the game and its players.
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