This novel from the 1970s, translated into English in 2003, mixes realism with fantasy. A middle-aged narrator is drawn into a strange tale in which his disabled son seems to link him with a vanished, dream-like world of ancestors. The book returns to Ōe's central themes of fatherhood, the pressure of history and the search for a way to live after trauma. Its title comes from the baseball role of a substitute who runs for another player. Playful and puzzling, it shows Ōe's gift for blending private life with myth and politics.