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Theodore Jacobs needs no introduction to readers of the psychoanalytic literature. With his gift for bringing to life the drama of the consulting room in clear, engaging prose, he is for many of us a favorite psychoanalytic writer. Freud once observed that his case histories read like short stories, and the same can fairly be said of Ted Jacobs's writings.
Jacobs has now made the jump to the major leagues of literature with the publication of his first novel, The Year of Durocher, a coming-of-age story about three Jewish adolescents in 1948 New York City. Baseball aficionados will recall that Leo Durocher was the feisty, blunt manager who caused an uproar in the New York sports world during the summer of 1948 when he left as manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers to take over the reins as manager of the Dodgers' hated crosstown rivals, the New York Giants. Here Durocher's switch from the Dodgers to the Giants serves as a background metaphor for the story of love, friendship, and betrayal that unfolds among the three principal characters over the course of the novel.
The book opens with its narrator, Jonathan Manheim, suiting up for the first time with his high school varsity football team as it prepares for the big game against its main rival, Ryder. Jonathan's school, Harmon, is in Manhattan, Ryder in Brooklyn, so the game carries the added freight of the larger rivalry between the two boroughs. In the stands watching the game is a statuesque brunette with a Katharine Hepburn profile who catches Jonathan's attention during warm-ups. Jonathan plays well for most of the game, but on the final play he ingloriously fumbles the ball after a ferocious hit by Ryder's top player, Stan Schneiderman, sealing his team's defeat. For Jonathan, the fumble encapsulates the fumblings and defeats that he feels have come to define his life as a teenager, especially with girls. But at a party that evening Jonathan is surprised to find