--- In
rara-avis-l@yahoogroups.com, "Terrill Lankford"
<lankford2000@...> wrote:
>
> Don't know if anyone has mentioned this one yet, but
Joe Lansdale's
short novel THE BIG BLOW mixes boxing with the great
hurricane of 1900 that leveled Galveston. Jack Johnson is one
of the main characters.
>
> TL
>
Boxing does seem naturally inclined to Noir writing, doesn't
it? After all, it's been alleged for the past hundred years
that boxing was crooked, fixed, or otherwise shady-the
perfect breeding ground for gangsters and related types. And
then there's the aspect of punishment-two guys beating the
crap out of each other. Getting knocked to the canvas is a
perfect metaphor, especially considering that up until the
middle of the 20th century, the three biggest sports in
America were, in no particular order, baseball, horseracing,
and boxing.
To this I'll add another boxing tale: "Iron-Jaw" by Robert E.
Howard. If you have either The Iron Man or Boxing Stories, it
appears in those books as "Fists of the Desert." I would call
it proto-noir, and certainly, it would seem that REH was
headed in this direction at the end of his career. This was
written and sold just a few months before he died.
Mark Finn
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : 15 Feb 2007 EST