Writers on Boxing

Reading List

  • #107: ‘Pugilistic Queer Performance: Working Through and Working Out’ by Fintan Walsh

    #107: ‘Pugilistic Queer Performance: Working Through and Working Out’ by Fintan Walsh

    ‘Pugilistic Queer Performance: Working Through and Working Out’ by Professor Fintan Walsh was published in volume 26, issue 4 of GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies, and is also available to download (minus the featured images) via the Birkbeck University website. Walsh is currently Head of the School of Creative Arts, Culture and… Read more

  • #106: ‘Sweet Fighting Man: Ring of Truth’ by Melanie Lloyd

    #106: ‘Sweet Fighting Man: Ring of Truth’ by Melanie Lloyd

    Hi! It’s been a couple of months since I last posted. As I mentioned in my last post, I’m preparing to start a creative writing MA so have a lot of pre-reading (and writing!) that I’ve chosen to get into ahead of that course beginning. Also, for any of you that don’t already know, Lizzy… Read more

  • #105: ‘The Promise of Women’s Boxing: A Momentous New Era for the Sweet Science’ by Malissa Smith

    #105: ‘The Promise of Women’s Boxing: A Momentous New Era for the Sweet Science’ by Malissa Smith

    In The Promise of Women’s Boxing, the follow up to her book A History of Women’s Boxing, author Malissa Smith covers the international developments in women’s boxing between 2012 and 2014. The book is published by Rowman and Littlefield. (This will likely be my last book post for a while as I’m due to start… Read more

  • #104: ‘Fights’ by Steven J. Fowler

    #104: ‘Fights’ by Steven J. Fowler

    This 2nd edition of Steven J. Fowler‘s Fights was published in 2015 by Veer Books, and from what I understand is a more slimmed down, and considered, version of the 2011 1st edition (also Veer Books). I know Steven from when my life existed almost entirely beneath the shadow of poetry. This all seems so… Read more

  • #103: ‘Thirty Dollars and a Cut Eye: 50 years in boxing’ by J. Russell Peltz

    #103: ‘Thirty Dollars and a Cut Eye: 50 years in boxing’ by J. Russell Peltz

    Thirty Dollars and a Cut Eye is J. Russell Peltz’s look back at his 50-year career as a boxing promoter and matchmaker. Peltz took his first steps as a promoter in 1969, at the now legendary Blue Horizon in north Philadelphia. At the age of 22 this was, and still would be, a very bold… Read more

  • #102: ‘The Grass Arena’ by John Healy

    #102: ‘The Grass Arena’ by John Healy

    The Grass Arena is the, at times, harrowing autobiography of John Healy, recounting his years living homeless with a severe alcohol addiction. I have been wanting to read this book for a few years now, after watching the documentary about Healy’s life, Barbaric Genius. I had intended it to be a break from reading solely… Read more