THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, November 7, 1994 TAG: 9411030011
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A06 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Opinion
SOURCE: By MARK G. MALVASI
LENGTH: Medium: 85 lines
Ken Burns, that self-appointed guardian of our national heritage, has now done for the history of our greatest national pastime what he did for the history our greatest national tragedy: distorted it almost beyond recognition.
In Burns' view, baseball is not a metaphor for life but a mirror held up before the visage of America. It reflects transformations worked on the country by the influx of immigrants, the rise of industrial capitalism and especially the advent of the civil-rights movement. Burns' obsession with race relations once again dominates this film, just as it did ``The Civil War.'' I almost wish that Burns would make a film about race in America, if only to confront directly the theme that apparently permeates the whole of his work.
There is no doubt that the integration of major-league baseball in 1947 marked an important advancement toward social justice for black Americans. What baseball fan does not feel a sense of regret at the thought of all those talented black ballplayers who never got an opportunity to perform in the major leagues, or those who, like Satchel Paige, got their chance only after their best seasons were behind them?
Who does not feel outrage at the indignities to which black players like Curt Flood and Bob Gibson were subjected even after Jackie Robinson abolished the color line? Who does not agree that baseball today would be that much poorer without the contributions of Ozzie Smith, Barry Bonds, Fred McGriff, Joe Carter, Frank Thomas, Albert Belle and Kenny Lofton?
But to argue, as Burns does, that ``when Jackie Robinson comes out at Ebbets Field in 1947, it is the first real broad progress in civil rights since the Civil War'' is nonsense. Such an interpretation ignores the accomplishments of Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Mary McLeod Bethune, W.E.B. DuBois, A. Philip Randolph and a host of other black leaders who struggled bravely and well to improve the lot of their people after emancipation.
The real problem with Burns' ``Baseball'' is that it is an arrogant and self-righteous film. He presses his version of American history beyond the limits that the evidence will support. He wants less to promote understanding than to elicit belief. As a consequence, ``Baseball'' is not history but propaganda, ideology concealed beneath the facts.
Burns pretends to be enamored with American history. But Burns is not interested in history at all. Rather, he revels in ``the emotions aroused by the past.''
So thoroughly has Burns mastered the art of making documentary films that he succeeds almost effortlessly in evoking the desired emotions in his audience. But what has he really taught us about the past? Despite all the attention that he lavished first on the Civil War and now on baseball, both films are superficial treatments of their subjects.
Burns examined the history of the Civil War from every conceivable perspective. Yet the film never explained why Americans fought. Before Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, the American Civil War, Burns argued, was so much meaningless slaughter.
``Baseball'' suffers from comparable deficiencies. Burns portrays baseball as ``a pretty broad mirror of the social activity of our country. . . .'' Yet the history of baseball becomes significant for him principally as it contributed to the racial integration of American society. Burns' vanity notwithstanding, his interpretation is another way of asserting that the history of the United States entailed a deferred commitment to racial equality that previous generations of Americans callously but inexplicably ignored. We can be grateful to Burns for correcting the error.
In ``Baseball'' as in ``The Civil War,'' Burns manipulated history as deftly as he manipulated the images on the screen to sanction his own values and convictions. His work assumes a self-satisfying, moralistic tone that renders the complex truths of history unimportant. His audience should be made to sit upright in an uncomfortable chair to watch his films if they desire fully to benefit from his stern and pious narrative.
The images that Americans see in Ken Burns' cinematic mirror are like those that reflect back to them from the mirrors in fun houses found at amusement parks and county fairs. Burns is concerned not with how and why the men and women of the past felt, thought and lived as they did. His real objective is to fashion a nostalgic vision of the past that sanctifies present misrepresentations. In his effective accomplishment of this task, Burns has unwittingly revealed one of the deep afflications of our time: the inability or the unwillingness to forgive others for the sin of not being like us. MEMO: Mr. Malvasi is assistant professor of history at Randolph-Macon College,
Ashland.
by CNB