n  The power of one was based on the courage to remain separate, to think through to the truth, and not to be beguiled by convention or the plausible arguments of those who expect to maintain power.n

I love when I fall in love with a book that appears to be about a subject I don’t generally feel any enthusiasm for. In this case, that would be boxing. I watched a man named Kid Paret beaten senseless in a televised fight in 1962. He died a few days later. My father loved watching the fights, and we watched them frequently, but that is the only one I can remember in any detail. I remember my daddy saying “The ref needs to call this, he is killing him” and then the strange feeling that told me that was true. All of which is a roundabout way of saying I had reservations when I realized boxing was about to play a major part in this book’s plot.

Like so many books in which sports figure, this book isn’t about the sport at all. It is about the shaping of a boy. If you only view boxing as a “fight”, this book will give you some insight into why boxers are willing to take that beating or give it.

In teaching me independence of thought, they had given me the greatest gift an adult can give to a child besides love, and they had given me that also.

Peekay is an English South African, a child in the days just before World War II, and part of a country divided into the English, the Boers, and the black Africans. Peekay, because of circumstances, finds himself intimately involved with each of these groups, and with a marvelous German professor, known as Doc. And, because of this, the book becomes a story about racial injustice, overcoming adversity when the deck is stacked against you, finding your own place in the world, and having the power of one.

As Doc had pointed out, mystery, not logic, is what gives us hope and keeps us believing in a force greater than our own insignificance.

A reference that brought to mind perhaps my favorite book of all time, made me smile, when Peekay says, “Look, Doc, it’s like Merlin’s altar in the crystal cave!” I laughed and said to myself, this is really a book written for me.

There are moments of brilliance in this novel. It is a timely read, for much of it is about the bridges that can be built between races and the importance of recognizing individuals for who they are and for the wonder each of them brings to our lives.

Is this a good book? In the words of Doc, n  “Absoloodle!”n

A huge thank you to Bob, who has once again opened a new world for me in the pages of a great book.

4.5 Stars.


The Power of One is a very long but breathtaking story with characters and moments which I will never forget. It is coming of age story; a wonderful journey through the life of Peekay, a boy growing up in South Africa from 1930 to 1951. The book takes the reader through his life until the time he goes off to University. On an individual and societal level the story is marked by great struggles to overcome injustices and stiff odds. At the same time it imparts a real sense of South Africa and the friction between its diverse peoples: Dutch Afrikaners, native Boers, a host of black tribes, and the English.

This was a fabulous read offering picture perfect descriptions of people and landscapes. I felt I was there in South Africa, viewing African landscapes, from the outsides of the rural town of Barberton, to the deserts, to the beauty of the city of Johannesburg. I was completely immersed in this story from beginning to end and I fell in love with some of the characters and hated others.

Peekay is exposed to his first experiences of hatred and prejudice when his mother suffers a mental breakdown and he is sent to boarding school. He is called a rooinek (“redneck”) which refers to him being an Englishman and his classmates bully him because they blame him for everything the English have done in South Africa. His years at the boarding school are violent and traumatic.

After Peekay leaves boarding school he meets several mentors and friends who will influence his life and mold him as a person. Even on his first train ride home from boarding school he meets his first mentor, Hoppie, an amateur boxer.

Hoppie is a kind man who sees that young Peekay is alone on a train so he takes him under his wing and they have a wonderful time together. I breathed a sigh of relief (I think I had a little PTSD too) that Hoppie treated Peekay with kindness after the years of abuse he endured in boarding school, not to mention the final abusive bullying by way of a goodbye present. During this train journey Hoppie brings Peekay to a boxing match in which he competes. Hoppie beats a much larger opponent and after watching this Peekay immediately develops a deep passion for boxing and decides he wants to become the welterweight champ of the world. In this pivotal scene Hoppie explains how he beat a man much larger than himself, "first with the head, and then with the heart.” Along with this mantra is the idea of the Power of One, the power that one has inside his or herself to achieve anything. Hoppie repeats the mantra to Peekay several times before the two separate and it becomes Peekay’s mantra for the rest of the novel.

After Hoppie, Peekay meets a German music teacher, cactus collector and lover of South Africa and it’s people. Doc, is a wonderfully endearing character with whom I fell in love; my favorite friend and mentor of Peekay’s. They have many adventures together and throughout they help each other with Doc often offering Peekay priceless and unique philosophical advice on life.

There are other mentors and friends but I will not describe them all but I promise that you will want to meet them. As for boxing, I have always hated it and any form of fighting so this was not an obvious novel for me to read. But I’m so glad that I did read it because although there are boxing matches this is not a boxing story but a story about a boy growing into a man with the right moral and personal compass and the experiences he has along the way. It's a novel that has lessons about courage, responsibility, friendship and independence. As Peekay said, “I learned that in each of us there burns a flame of independence that must never be allowed to go out. That as long as it exists within us we cannot be destroyed.”

My only complaints are that at times Peekay's accomplishments strain credulity and that it sometimes felt like it could have used some editing.

I will end with my favorite scene in the book which is a piano performance by Doc of an original piece of music which he created and performed. This piece of music includes individual songs from each African tribe in the audience but in between these songs Doc weaves together lines of music from each tribal song into a harmonious whole of it’s own. I had goosebumps listening to the description of this concert.

I listened to the audio version of this book. The narrator, Humphrey Bower, was amazing. He captures innumerable accents and voices and pronounces words native to Zulu, Africaans, German, Latin and English.

Do I recommend this book? Absodoodle, as Doc would say in his thick German accent while speaking English.

Wow, what an emotional whopper of a book. The Power of One is the heart-breaking and heart-warming coming of age story of Peekay, an English boy growing up in the turmoil of a racially fractured and evolving South Africa in the 1930s and 40s. The characters are consisently powerfully rendered with compassion, warmth, hatred and hope and the narration by Humphrey Bower is a good as it gets. This book will make you cry and will fill your heart. My only complaint in this otherwise fabulous book was ending as Peekay finally gets his revenge and which I felt was just out of character. 5 stars.

Normally I refrain from writing long reviews, but this wonderful book offers so much to readers, that I must indulge. It is a broad sweeping book about rural South Africa, set in the late 1930s and 1940s prior to apartheid. It imparts a real sense of this exotic country and the friction between its diverse peoples: Dutch Afrikaners, native Boers, a host of black tribes, and the English.

The protagonist Peekay is an only child, sent to boarding school at age 5 when his mother is institutionalized. He is picked on mercilessly because he is youngest and English, and misses his black nanny. His nickname is Pisskop (pisshead) as he wets his bed. Peekay's only friend is a rebellious chicken. Things take a change for the better, when he is sent by train to his grandfather's distant home. He is adopted by conductor, Hoppie Groenewald, who cares for him and teaches one of this book's life lessons: "first with the head, and then with the heart." Hoppie is an amateur boxer, and uses his prodigious skills to beat a much larger opponent at the end of the first leg of Peekay's train journey. Peekay immediately develops a deep passion for boxing and decides he wants to become the welterweight champ of the world. Arriving at his grandfather’s home, Peekay is devastated by the disappearance of his nanny and subjected to his mother's religious fervor. Once again, Peekay is rescued by a mentor, Professor Karl von Vollensteen (a/k/a Doc),whom he meets on a distant mountaintop. Doc too, adopts Peekay, and teaches him about botany, especially cacti, piano, Africa, and of course, life. As a German, Doc becomes jailed as a possible spy, but becomes a popular figure in the local prison, with inmates, guards, and the Commandant. Meanwhile, Peekay visits Doc regularly, and eventually convinces the staff to allow him to train as a boxer. The downtrodden criminal, Geel Piet, teaches Peekay how to box and they develop a symbiotic relationship, as Peekay smuggles tobacco into the prison. Peekay and the local town librarian also start a postal service for the mostly black inmates. Peekay's open-minded acceptance of others, accords him a mythical status with the African people in the prison and community, and he becomes revered as the "Tadpole Angel", creating a large following as his boxing career advances.

Eventually, Peekay earns a scholarship and it sent to an exclusive prep school, where he meets his next good friend and mentor, a wealthy Jew named Morrie. Equally brilliant, the two develop businesses together, which allow them to afford getting Peekay trained at an elite boxing school. Peekay continues his unblemished record in the ring, eventually agreeing to fight a rising black champion, who has just turned professional, even though this is not legal and theoretically, a mismatch. And yet, there is great drama as this fighter's name is familiar to Peekay, he is a descendent of a tribal chief, and the legend of the Tadpole Angel is placed at risk. Peekay is a highly popular student and athlete, joining the elite leadership of the prep school, but he continues to work for the people, opening a school to teach local blacks to read and write, drawing the ire of the local white police. Morrie is accepted to Oxford, and Peekay does not win the coveted Rhodes Scholarship that would allow them to stay together. Instead, Peekay decides to take a grueling, dangerous job in the mines to build his strength and body mass. Once again, Peekay befriends a loner, in this case a huge Russian, who barely speaks English. Peekay's productivity makes him the envy of all, but he stays too long in this job, leading to disaster. My only complaint is that despite the final physical confrontation in the mine bar, with a lifelong foe, we don't know if Peekay achieves his life-long ambition so now I need to read the 900-page sequel. Given author Courtenay's gift for storytelling, I do not expect this will be too much of a chore.

I SO WANTED TO GIVE THIS BOOK FIVE STARS!!!!!

My impression is that this book was very well-written, with great character development and description of the land. I used the audible version, and the narration was excellent, adding to my enjoyment of the story. The relationship between the main character, Peekay, and his mentor, Doc, was so sweet and wonderful, and made the book worth the read. And I loved the many other supporting cast of characters, including his prison boxing coach, his teacher, and his buddy at school. Some of the symbolism and imagery was clever, and really added to the Paul-Bunyon-esque nature of the book. But this kind of leads me into the book’s flaws... It’s a little over the top with “hard-work-and-inspiration-leads-to-phenomenal-success," with an added large dose of the “white savior” theme. His whole Tadpole Angel, capable of uniting all the tribes of South Africa bit - was over the top. And there are two major coincidences with boxing partners that further contribute to the improbable vibe of the story. Finally (SPOLER ALERT), the ending truly disappointed me. Yes, I figured he would meet the Judge in the boxing ring at some point in time, and there was some gratification in it for me as the reader. However, the proposition that the final elimination of Peekay's loneliness birds and healing from the past - was achieved though beating the crap out of his formal rival and carving his initials in the guy’s arm - really was disappointing. It seems to me that it is far more likely that he could have achieved healing from the many, many positive relationships he was able to achieve in his life, and all of the support and love her received from those around him. The idea that he needed physical revenge with a pathetic, psychologically unwell and compromised school bully - did not do the story justice, in my opinion.

Excellent, superb and intellectually challenging.
I was impressed in different ways.
On Peekay his character development and self knowledge. From a boarding school 5 year old : facing daily physical brutality. That brought tears to my eyes. Even the 'matron' used a cane! His childhood friendship with the 'Doc' (really a Professor of Music) being the most influential on developing his intellect while giving him the most 'parental' love. His next boarding school experience, starting a few years later, was mostly shaped by friend Hyman. A youth who also had a complex character and sharp, curious intellect. Through this time Peekay's desire to be 'the welterweight champion of the world ' gained force.
The incredible cruelty of the social and political South African attitude to people of colour was brought out so clearly by Courtenay. A system which also brought out the worse in some white people also.
I have meet people over the years who have left South Africa to come to New Zealand. They, like Peekay, were people with no racist feelings. But who found living in South Africa to be a daily frightening experience.
This book appealed to me on many levels. Mostly the power of Courtenay's writing allowed me fully enter the minds of his character. Plus feel the horror of the 1940, 1950, South Africa political and social system: which also, I believe, handicapped the 'whites' too.
Unputdownable. Courtenay is now a top favourite author for me.

I thoroughly enjoyed many elements of this book, and I learned a tremendous amount about boxing and the history of South Africa, through a child's eye view. However, my opinion took a downward plunge toward the end of the book -- specifically the final 5 pages of the book. I don't want to include any spoilers, but what on earth was the author thinking?!? I interpreted the book's message so differently from what is depicted in the final scene. Perhaps I owe the author a second reading. STRANGE!!!

Update:
Just downgraded my review from 3 to 2 stars. The more I think about the story and try to derive meaning from it, the madder I get!

It's a long time since I read this but I remember very clearly comparing the treatment of White Boy as Hero in this book to Huckleberry Finn, and feeling outraged by the puerile lack of genuine empathy for the fate of South African blacks.

One sentence review: pretty solid high school book.


Multiple Sentence Review:
I kinda struggled with this book for awhile. This was the first modern novel I’ve read in a few years and wow do the writing styles change a lot from the 19th to the late 20th century. I’m not a huge fan of the writing style, so it put me at odds with the book immediately. Quick paragraphs barely 2 sentences long make me feel like I’m having an ADD attack. You may be able to describe a bunch of things, but it doesn’t pull you in. Shallow sentences and paragraphs make shallow story telling to me. That being said, playing in the shallow end of the pool can be kind of refreshing and relaxing, as long as you get acclimated to it. So, as the book progressed I ended up liking it more - maybe because I started reading it with a heavy Australian accent… (yes I know it’s a book about South Africa but the author is Australian and I really can’t be bothered to understand the difference so leave me alone)

The book is written from the first person perspective, with Peekay narrating (as an adult, looking back) and trusting the reader with his thoughts and feelings, as opposed to a detailed description of places and account of action. To be honest, his thoughts aren’t that interesting and I just overall didn’t really like him. I found the book to be at its best when showing the racism occurring in South Africa, and it honestly does a good job of this. The scene, towards the end of the book, with the police officer trying to shut down the night school best highlights this for me, as I got genuinely frustrated with the circumstances and the clear abuse of power.

The book does a good job of allowing you to navigate through the landscape of South Africa at a high level, but at the expense of not having a real main character. Peekay (or PK) is a ‘Marty Stu’ (male version of a Mary Sue), meaning he can go anywhere and basically do anything successfully – he’s free of any real weaknesses or flaws. He is put in different circumstances, not really because that’s what a real person (especially 5-18 year old boy) would do but because the story requires it, as it wants to expose you to as many of the different aspects of the world of 1940/50s South Africa as it can. Which, again to the authors credit, seems to have succeeded in doing for a younger audience, and to whom the book seems to be clearly aimed at. The multifaceted moods of South Africa are clearly captured in this book.

Supporting cast characters are bland, and pretty one dimensional, as their roles can be boiled down into a one sentence description. That being said, some of them fit into their roles very nicely, and I did like most of them – Doc the most.

The other theme, having ‘My destiny is in my own hands’ is fine I think for a younger audience in some regards, but I find this theme to always end up being shallow and a bit egotistical. From reading ‘A Man’s search for Meaning’ and ‘War & Peace’ I don’t really think highly of entertaining this theme anymore, to me it’s naive at best.


Quotes:
- Mediocrity is the best camouflage known to man
- The smile, Madame, is used by humans to hide the truth. The artist is only interested to reveal the truth.
- But sadness, like understanding, comes early in life for some. It is part of intelligence.

This is one of the most important books I have ever read. The reader really gets pulled into the life of PK, experiencing his trials and successes. There are some great laugh out loud moments, such as during his train ride with Big Hettie, and when Granpa Chook decides to express his opinion of The Judge and his Nazi party (though the surrounded circumstance is sad and grim). There are also some very dark times in his life, but these serve to prove the triumph of the human spirit and so are a valuable part of the story. One of the lessons I took away from the book was the value in accepting people how they are, no matter if their beliefs or behavior aligns with what you perceive as right or wrong. You can stay true to yourself and be kind to others without changing them.

“First with the head, then with the heart.”

"When men can be made to hope, then they can be made to win.”

This is a brilliant book with characters that will stay with you long after you finish the book. Categorised as a "Coming of age", I was a bit surpised to meet Peekay as a 5 years old in 1930s South Africa.

Peekay is British kid who is sent off to boarding school after his mom's mental broke down. As a redneck, he is bullied in boarding school for bedwetting and later held as "prisoner of war" when Germany is on ascension. By the time he finished boarding school, the trauma changes and influences his future actions.

Peekay meets Hoppie - a boxing champion who sees his potential, a German music teacher (in the background of WWII) called Doc, Mrs.Boxall the town librarian, Geel Piet a 'kafir' prisoner who teaches him boxing. Over the years he becomes a boxing champion for the prison team while running many enterprises including smuggling tobacco for the prisoners and writing letters. All under the tutelage of his mother who becomes a born again Christian and fires the heathen nanny.

There is a subtle introduction of Apartheid. By offering hope and doing the right thing (like acknowledging his coach even though he was black) Peekay becomes the Little Tadpole to the various Zulu tribes and he is seen as the one prophecised to unite them all. Told from the POV of Peekay, these gradual changes are not as shocking but then they make a distinct impact. The societal changes have been handled brilliantly into the story without being drawn attention to.

This is a story of human spirit and goodness. Loved it!

Technical knockout?

Pretension made me sceptical of Bryce Courtney. I have come to associate him with the dozen-volume-strong libraries found on the shelves of relatives I only visit on Christmas. But – softening as I get older – I thought I should form my own view by making my way through his best loved book.

Our narrator and hero, Peekay, begins his life in a boarding school where he is ruthlessly bullied by his Boer classmates for the crime of being English in Northern South Africa. Once free from the boarding school, Peekay determines to overcome future persecution by becoming a boxing champion and meets various friends, allies, and teachers that guide him on his journey across the country.

People talk about this book as if it’s a ground-breaking story of defiance in the age of apartheid, essential reading with something profound to say about race and injustice. Indeed, the narrator talks about his story in the same way - often mentioning the "power of one" - without ever taking to time to explain what this means. Both the reader and Peekay are wrong: it’s a straightforward coming of age story. I expected stories of revolution and political upheaval. I got a young man collecting cacti in a pleasant forest glade.

But my misguided apprehensions shouldn’t be taken as a criticism, the coming-of-age story was more than enough to make this a great book. It’s almost folkloric in its directness and – apart from several almost incongruous flashes of racial violence – a pastoral and nostalgic recollection of childhood. In fact, after his initial torture in boarding school, Peekay doesn’t face any problems that aren’t easily overcome in ten pages. The lack of tension made for perfect summer reading.

With direct, unfussy language, Courtney draws immersive settings and memorable characters. I can’t think of the last time I had such vivid mind pictures of a novel’s scenes as when I was reading this. The pictures Courtney paints of South Africa were both idealist and immersive.

But then there’s that ending: we suddenly go from pastel coloured grammar school hijinks to Dante’s inferno. The nightmarish narrative flash point in the flaming bowels of the earth doesn’t even get a whole chapter to itself and then the apparent climax doesn’t even get five pages. Once again though, Courtney snatches victory from the jaws of defeat and what is ostensibly terrible pacing comes across as exciting, hallucinatory, and profound.

So, like Peekay, this was a head versus heart experience. For all its strange and often lumpy characteristics, The Power Of One was unmatched in terms of reading enjoyment. If this was more closely aligned with my expectations, I probably would have found it pompous and bloated. As it is though, this is just a good read.

To indulge in cynicism on the way out, I will say that it confirms my suspicions that TPoO is the favourite book of people who have only ever read one.