Dribbling a Basketball on the Road to Damascus

A bildungsroman and the most autobiographical yet of Charley Rosen's many works of fiction, nonfiction and reportage on the subject of basketball, Dribbling a Basketball on the Road to Damascus tells the story of the life of Chazz Klein, a power forward and elite scorer who starts at Metropolitan College and ends up on the Knicks by way of the Detroit Pistons. Klein loves the game that helped him survive his childhood and find meaning. But his awkwardness early in life also stays with him, as both love and long-lasting meaning elude him except in small doses. And yet he does achieve, across the journey represented in these pages, that rarest of gifts, a kind of humility, an acceptance of himself, and the peace that goes with that. Along the way, Klein shaves points and helps us understand the appeal of doing so even though it goes against his love of the game that is pure and life-affirming. So why act against all that? Because everything good in this story is transient, including that joy in playing, and there is a sense here that nothing ever really changes. Different kinds of power converge, and a player who prizes the pure game of hoops above all else can at the same time be someone who breaks the rules and helps corrupt the competitive sport. These are some of the qualities that make Dribbling a Basketball on the Road to Damascus a wise novel as well as an adventurous one.