Chicago Tribune
Eric Simonson's beautifully imagined adaptation of Mark Harris' novel is in many ways the stage equivalent of a lusciously layered and moving work of prose literature, a marvel of simplicity in the depth of its feeling, while at the same time a profound reverie on the losing human contest against mortality...confronts death with complexity, never settling for easy sentiment, and is all the more stirring as a result.
Boston Herald
There's no denying the humor and power of the work, nor the audience's three-hankie response...a fascinating textural portrait of our national image.
New York Times
“Bang the Drum Slowly makes wonderful reading—whether one hates baseball or loves it. . . . It is awfully funny in parts, and laughter is rare enough on anybody’s bookshelf.”—New York Times
Time
“What makes Bang the Drum Slowly unique . . . is author Harris’s mastery of his offbeat scene. . . . The talk is natural, larded with casual humor, and earthiness. . . . Harris has measured [his characters] with his heart as well as his eye and ear.”—Time
Time
“What makes Bang the Drum Slowly unique . . . is author Harris’s mastery of his offbeat scene. . . . The talk is natural, larded with casual humor, and earthiness. . . . Harris has measured [his characters] with his heart as well as his eye and ear.”—Time
New York Herald Tribune
"Bang the Drum Slowly is more than just another novel about baseball. It is about friendship, about the lives of a group of men as one by one they learn that a teammate is dying. Henry's dead-pan, vernacular account of life in the dugout is refreshing, lively and often uproariously funny. His reactions to his doomed friend are poignant and profoundly touching. Bang the Drum Slowly is a fine bitter-sweet book."—New York Herald Tribune
New York Times - George Vecsey
"[Bang the Drum Slowly] has one of the loveliest last lines in American literature, a regret from Wiggen for the way the players made fun of a slow-witted and now dead teammate: ‘From here on in, I rag nobody.’ We could all use that on our coat of arms."—George Vecsey, The New York Times
