Bring on the tough stuff - there’s not just one right answer.
- What's the deal with all the dreams and hallucinations in the novel?
- How much of Roy's ambition is fueled by jealousy of other people?
- Why does Malamud make Roy such a naïve backwoods kid in the first part of the novel?
- How would the novel be different if Roy had never been shot in the first place? Would he still have such bad luck?
- Kevin Baker says that Malamud converted "the national pastime into this life-and-death struggle." Why is baseball, which actually isn't a contact sport, portrayed as so violent in the novel?
- What do the novel's two subtitles ("Pre-Game," which refers to the first chapter, and "Batter Up," which is the title of the rest of the novel) tell us about the way we should understand the text?
- What does this novel suggest about the myth of the athletic hero?
- Why do you think Malamud jumps from Harriet shooting Roy to so many years later, when he walks onto the Knights' field? Why does he skip over all the odd jobs in between?
- Do you think the mystical elements of the novel enhance or detract from the story?
- Pretty much every dame who walks into the novel is a nutcase. And the guys aren't all that much better. How are men and women presented differently in the novel, and what do the descriptions of women as crazy or "whores" tell us about Roy's attitude toward the opposite sex?
- Why do you think Roy breaks down in the end and takes the Judge's offer?
- Robert Redford played Roy Hobbs in the 1984 film version of The Natural. What star would you choose for a remake today?
- Would the film have done as well at the box office if it stayed truer to the novel? (Spoiler alert: the movie has an awesomely happy ending. Shmoop gets goosebumps just thinking about it.)