Boxing Fiction

Were Wood's books novels, J? And the Folstad novel, is it out yet?

 

Rick's novel's titled "Cornered." It just come out and he's travellin', doin' PR at various libraries and book shops.

Peter Wood's book, "Confessions of a Fighter," is a memoir of his training and fighting in the NY Gloves in the '70s. It's available on Amazon. I believe his other book, "Clenched Fist," also a memoir, is available on Amazon.

 

Thanx J. I'm going to pick up "Cornered", as that is where my real interest is.

 

http://www.thespectrum.net/manga_scans/hajime_no_ippo/ <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<best fictional story ever.

 

You give this high praise, S. Before I click on the link, what's it about?

 

It's a boxing manga.

 

Jack London's "A Piece of Steak" was one of my favourite short stories when I was at high school. "The Game" is a fascinating story of London's, especially if you know the background of it which can be found online. "The Abysmal Brute" is also a good one. London's boxing fiction is a great introduction to his other works, because it's London at his best: socialist yet realistic, inured to violence yet perceptive to human feelings, utterly Darwinian and yet utterly moral. Incidentally, London was a big fight fan and one of the more objective observers of his time: although a big Jefferies fan and very racialist in his conception of Jefferies-Johnson, he still praised Johnson and unlike many of his era was willing to look past race to see that boxers like Jack Johnson were extremely skillful.

I also recommend any of Hemingway's short stories on boxing; the anthology "Men Without Women" has a great story about a grizzled old veteran.

Some of H.P. Lovecraft's stories feature boxing and reflect how a white racist (a common enough set of fans at the time) approached boxing. "Reanimator" in particular basically sums up Lovecraft's understanding of boxing: a conflict between races pitting whitey's brains versus the "negro's" brawn.

The 1930s (especially the early 1930s) was really the peak period of fight fiction, perhaps because the heavyweight division lacked appealing real stories; perhaps also because it was a tough time for most Americans and Brits, when the uncompromising and brutal world of boxing seemed to be an apt metaphor for their lives. The boys' weeklies in particular of the time are full of boxing stories; excluding battles with apes (Conan the Barbarian must have been responsible for the extinction of half the ape species), I'd say boxing was the most popular single subject in cheap fiction during hte period.

The serials Fight Stories in America, Rover and Wizard in the UK, even Magnet all featured interest in boxing either as a primary or ancillary topic. These are obviously hard to get a hold of unless you have older relatives who were into that kind of stuff when they were younger. If nothing else, it gives one a sense of how big boxing was at the time, despite (or perhaps because of) the corruption, brutality, squalor and disunity of boxing during the period.

Perhaps boxing is at its most appealing when the heavyweight division seems to reflect the zeitgeist of the period: be it vicious unfairness (the 1910s), nihilistic gloom (the 1930s), a clash of generations (the 1960s) or a conflict turned into showbiz turned into a farce (the 1970s). I think, for instance, if there was a "scary" heavyweight from 2001 to the present (a Tyson, Foreman or Liston figure) it would have propelled the division into the public imagination. Pavlik, on the other hand, embodies the way a lot of Americans feel (hard-working and honest in spite of hardship) which is perhaps why he's been able to tap into the public imagination so quickly. People, especially intellectuals and casual fans, seem to like boxing to be a reflection of their lives.

 

Flesh and Blood by Peter Hamil

A young Denzel Washington was in the t.v. movie they made of from the book

 

Of Wee Mice and Men is one of my favorite books ever and I found it at a dollar store, lol. You can buy it for one cent on amazon.com. It's about an Irish guy who gets a chance at Mike Tyson in his prime and follows the writer covering the fight. Very very full of sarcasm, and dry wit.

Here is a review... Def worth a read.

http://www.amazon.com/Wee-Sweetie-M...=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1214630331&sr=8-1

 

who are the other characters in the professional based on? i was curious about doc carroll and also the writer who used to be great but now is an embarrassment, tom white