Sunday You Learn How to Box: A Novel

Wright, Bil

ISBN 10: 0684857952 ISBN 13: 9780684857954

Publisher: Touchstone, 2000

Synopsis

Strength and resilience fuel an urban teen’s fight for survival in this acclaimed novel from Bil Wright that “delivers a knock-out punch” (Venus Magazine).

Fourteen-year-old Louis Bowman lives in a boxing ring—a housing project circa 1968—and is fighting “just to get to the end of the round.” Sharing the ring is his mother, Jeanette Stamps, a ferociously stubborn woman battling for her own dreams to be realized; his stepfather, Ben Stamps, the would-be savior, who becomes the sparring partner to them both; and the enigmatic Ray Anthony Robinson, the neighborhood “hoodlum” in purple polyester pants, who sets young Louis’s heart spinning with the first stirrings of sexual longing.

Bil Wright deftly evokes an unrelenting world with quirky humor and a clear-eyed perspective in this “deeply felt coming-of-age novel” that “reads like the best of memoirs” (School Library Journal).

About this title

About the Author

Bil Wright is an award-winning novelist and playwright. His novels include Putting Makeup on the Fat Boy (Lambda Literary Award and American Library Association Stonewall Book Award), the highly acclaimed When the Black Girl Sings (Junior Library Guild selection), and the critically acclaimed Sunday You Learn How to Box. His plays include Bloodsummer Rituals, based on the life of poet Audre Lorde (Jerome Fellowship), and Leave Me a Message (San Diego Human Rights Festival premiere). He is the Librettist for This One Girl’s Story (GLAAD nominee) and the winner of a LAMI (La Mama Playwriting Award). An associate professor of English at CUNY, Bil Wright lives in New York City. Visit him at BilWright.com.

From the Back Cover

Sunday You Learn How to Box presents an unforgettable portrait of fourteen-year-old Louis Bowman in a boxing ring -- a housing project circa 1968 -- fighting "just to get to the end of the round." Sharing the ring is his mother, Jeanette Stamps, a ferociously stubborn woman battling for her own dreams to be realized; his stepfather, Ben Stamps, the would-be savior, who becomes the sparring partner to them both; and the enigmatic Ray Anthony Robinson, the neighborhood "hoodlum" in purple polyester pants, who sets young Louis's heart spinning with the first stirrings of sexual longing. Blending quirky humor and clear-eyed unsentimentality, Bil Wright deftly evokes an unrelenting world with lyricism and passion.

Reviews

Despite some wobbly mid-novel development, this coming-of-age tale is a strong debut for Wright, offering people and situations that could easily have been clichs in lesser hands. In 1968, Louis Bowman, an African-American 14-year-old, lives in a Connecticut housing project, a world that as depicted seems strangely innocent even for 30-odd years ago, neither drugs nor guns a presence. There is, however, plenty of brutality. In the riveting first scene, Louis's stepfather dies, probably of a heart attack, after a particularly vicious family fight. As Louis comes to grips with that death and the destructive family life that preceded it, his loyalty to his mother doesnt let him ignore her darker sides. While shes a woman whose charisma and intelligence set her apart, her unrealized ambitions have left her frustrated and angry, sometimes dangerously so. Described through her son's perceptive but only half-aware eyes, she remains a semi-revealed character, the nooks and corners of her life a mystery. The several visits Louis pays to his grandfather in Harlem only serve to deepen that mystery, because the old man himself is not allowed to become more than an enigma. In the meantime, Louis struggles to find his place as a bookish, physically awkward boy in a society where physical dominance is the rule of law. Unfortunately, the scenes in which Louis attends a mental-health facility seem journalistic and dont earn their weight. Much more engrossing are the passages in which he grows increasingly obsessed with the neighborhood hoodlum. As Louis's burgeoning sexuality entwines with his hunger for a male role model, Wright portrays a boy desperate for a man in his life, a need that is emotional more than physical. Wright doesnt connect all the dots in his story, but in Louis Bowman he brings to life a character who will be hard to forget. -- Copyright ©2000, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

YA-This deeply felt coming-of-age novel reads like the best of memoirs. It's 1968 in the projects, and 14-year-old Louis Bowman has committed the unforgivable social crime of sissyhood, preferring mental activities to physical ones. The beatings he takes on the streets prompt his mother to force him into Sunday boxing lessons from his disgusted stepfather, Ben. To Louis and to readers, these feel more like sanctified opportunities for Ben to take out his violent frustrations on the boy. Louis's hardworking mother, though motivated by concern for his safety, is desperate to please Ben, hoping he'll be the family's ticket out of the projects. Meanwhile, Louis's grades drop and his school counselor diagnoses him with depression. Keeping the boy afloat is his budding crush on Ray Anthony Robinson, an eccentric "hoodlum" as isolated as Louis. The crush (more romantic than sexual at this point in his life) helps Louis to hold on, offering him moments of beauty and awe to counterbalance the darker circumstances of his life. His homosexuality, rather than being a cause for self-torment, recalls him to the wonder and warmth one can find even in the midst of the bleakest conditions. Wright has a pitch-perfect ear for dialogue and a genuine gift for capturing the intricacies and indeterminacies of family and community life. Both ensure that Louis Bowman will live with teen readers long after they close the book.
Emily Lloyd, Fairfax County Public Library, VA
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Growing up in urban Connecticut's impoverished Stratfield Projects in the late '60s is hard enough for Louis Bowman, the 14-year-old narrator of this excellent, plainspoken debut novel: he's got a misguided mother who is by turns violent and vulnerable; a stepfather who both hates and ignores him; and an array of neighborhood bullies to dodge. To make matters more difficult, Louis is gay, a realization he comes to slowly as he becomes enthralled with Ray Anthony Robinson, an older boy his neighbors consider an "out-and-out-hoodlum." Enigmatic Ray becomes Louis's unofficial protector, though the two teens never speak of their bond. Louis's home life, meanwhile, becomes increasingly brutal and confusing. His mother, Jeannette, engineers Sunday boxing matches between Louis and his stepfather, Ben, hoping Louis will learn to protect himself from the other boys in the projects. Ben, however, uses the matches as an opportunity to knock Louis around the apartment. Jeannette dreams of owning a house outside the projects, but drinks a lot of scotch and often loses herself in the memory of her one brush with fame, years before, when she designed a dress for Billie Holiday. Louis is a likable na?f, a boy for whom a simple nod indicates a world of acceptance. He is keenly aware of how racial discrimination affects him; when his teacher insists on calling him Louie, he notes: "Mom says white people always do that with a black person's name, change it to something that sounds like nobody could take the person seriously." Wright's prose is both straightforward and subtle, and his ear for dialogue is first-rate. Louis is a winning character, an adolescent coping gracefully with his bitter lot, whose emotional strength and resilience ensure his survival into adulthood. (Feb.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Wright's first novel is a poignant coming-of-age story about a black youth discovering his homosexual longings. Fourteen-year-old Louis Bowman lives in a housing project in Connecticut, coping with neighborhood ruffians, budding homosexuality, and an ambitious mother, Jeanette Stamps, who places herself above the other project dwellers--and is resented for it. Stamps longs for a middle-class life with a home of her own and a son who is like other boys his age. Louis' struggles with his sexual awakening come in the midst of his mother's deteriorating marriage to his stepfather, Ben Stamps. Ben ignores the social and other strivings of his disappointed wife but finally consents when she insists he give Louis boxing lessons in an effort to make a man of the boy. A local tough, Ray Anthony Robinson--cool and macho, feared and admired--is the confusing object of Louis' affections. Louis and Ray begin an aloof friendship that Louis would like to see blossom into something more. Wright has written an unsentimental portrait of a vulnerable young black man. Vanessa Bush

Edition details

• Publisher: Touchstone
• Publication date: 2000
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0684857952
• ISBN 13: 9780684857954
• Binding: School & Library Binding
• Number of pages: 224