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The Shadow Boxer
Already highly-acclaimed as a poet and short-story writer, The Shadow Boxer announces Steven Heighton's arrival as a major new novelist on the Canadian literary scene. Intricately patterned and multi-layered, this is the story of Sevigne Torrins, poet and boxer, who sets off into the world to make it, and whose romantic and professional misadventures take him as far as Egypt before he finds his way back to the Great Lakes. But the classic writerly dream that Sevigne pursues turns out in practice to have a different and darker reality than any he had foreseen. Haunting and splendidly evocative, this is a passionate love story about the power of dreams and regret.
400 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2000
1 person is currently reading
97 people want to read
About the author
Steven Heighton
39 books74 followersSteven Heighton (born August 14, 1961) is a Canadian novelist, short story writer and poet. He is the author of ten books, including two short story collections, three novels, and five poetry collections.[1] His most recent novel, Every Lost Country, was published in 2010.
Heighton was born in Toronto, Ontario, and earned a Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts degree, at Queens University.[2]
Heighton's most recent books are the novel Every Lost Country (May 2010) [3] and the poetry collection Patient Frame (April 2010).[4]
Heighton is also the author of the novel Afterlands (2006),which appeared in six countries.[5] The book has recently been optioned for film. Steven Heighton's debut novel, The Shadow Boxer (2001), a story about a young poet-boxer and his struggles growing up, also appeared in five countries.[6]
His work has been translated into ten languages and widely anthologised.[7] His books have been nominated for the Governor General’s Award, the Trillium Award, the Journey Prize, a Pushcart Prize, and Britain’s W.H. Smith Award (best book of the year).[8] He has received the Gerald Lampert Award, gold medals for fiction and for poetry in the National Magazine Awards, the Air Canada Award, and the 2002 Petra Kenney Prize. Flight Paths of the Emperor has been listed at Amazon.ca as one of the ten best Canadian short story collections.[9]
Heighton has been the writer-in-residence at McArthur College, Queen's University and The University of Ottawa.[10] He has also participated in several workshops including the Summer Literary Seminars, poetry work shop, in St. Petersburg, Russia (2007), and the Writing with Style, short fiction workshop, in Banff, Alberta (2007).[11]
Heighton currently lives in Kingston, Ontario with his family.[12]
Heighton was born in Toronto, Ontario, and earned a Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts degree, at Queens University.[2]
Heighton's most recent books are the novel Every Lost Country (May 2010) [3] and the poetry collection Patient Frame (April 2010).[4]
Heighton is also the author of the novel Afterlands (2006),which appeared in six countries.[5] The book has recently been optioned for film. Steven Heighton's debut novel, The Shadow Boxer (2001), a story about a young poet-boxer and his struggles growing up, also appeared in five countries.[6]
His work has been translated into ten languages and widely anthologised.[7] His books have been nominated for the Governor General’s Award, the Trillium Award, the Journey Prize, a Pushcart Prize, and Britain’s W.H. Smith Award (best book of the year).[8] He has received the Gerald Lampert Award, gold medals for fiction and for poetry in the National Magazine Awards, the Air Canada Award, and the 2002 Petra Kenney Prize. Flight Paths of the Emperor has been listed at Amazon.ca as one of the ten best Canadian short story collections.[9]
Heighton has been the writer-in-residence at McArthur College, Queen's University and The University of Ottawa.[10] He has also participated in several workshops including the Summer Literary Seminars, poetry work shop, in St. Petersburg, Russia (2007), and the Writing with Style, short fiction workshop, in Banff, Alberta (2007).[11]
Heighton currently lives in Kingston, Ontario with his family.[12]
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
January 11, 2026
BLUES PER IL BOXEUR SCRITTORE
È la storia di una lunga iniziazione alla vita, secondo il vecchio modello dei padri, modello drammaticamente sovrapposto alle nuove regole che il mondo moderno ci impone.
I Grandi laghi fra Canada e Stati Uniti, il perimetro d’acqua, ghiacci e bufere in cui si formò la prima vera scintilla della letteratura americana che diede fuoco all’ultimo dei Mohicani. La terra contesa ai coloni francesi dalle truppe di Sua Maestà Britannica. Il regno dei cacciatori di pellicce e degli indiani quando erano ancora selvaggi, prima che l’alcol bruciasse in modo irreversibile le loro magnifiche fonti.
Pescatori Ojibwe sulle rapide del fiume St. Mary, 1901.
Se nelle poesie vuoi metterci il cuore, fa’ gli addominali.
C’è tanto Hemingway in queste pagine, l’uomo, lo scrittore e i suoi personaggi.
Soprattutto nella prima parte e nell’ultima, quelle dove più si respira e agisce la natura, quelle dove il rapporto tra il protagonista e il padre, prima diretto poi simbolico, è più forte e vivo. Epos e mito insieme, i luoghi e la natura influiscono per l’eccezionale potenza del loro carattere estremo e per la forza evocativa che emanano, sulle vite e i destini dei protagonisti.
In certi momenti sembra che Heighton riesca a raccogliere da terra la fiaccola di Jack London, Malcom Lowry e Jack Kerouac – tutti, in un modo o nell’altro, ebbero a che fare col pugilato, il Canada, il bere e la leggenda del viaggio nordamericano – correndo insieme ai loro fantasmi per un bel tratto di strada.
Il figlio chiede al padre “Tu ci credi nella vita dopo la morte?” e il vecchio gli risponde “Sì, la mia sei tu”.
Ciascuno di noi diventa ciò che ha conquistato o che si è tenuto stretto, ma anche ciò che ha perso.
Un bel romanzo con un bellissimo titolo.
È la storia di una lunga iniziazione alla vita, secondo il vecchio modello dei padri, modello drammaticamente sovrapposto alle nuove regole che il mondo moderno ci impone.
I Grandi laghi fra Canada e Stati Uniti, il perimetro d’acqua, ghiacci e bufere in cui si formò la prima vera scintilla della letteratura americana che diede fuoco all’ultimo dei Mohicani. La terra contesa ai coloni francesi dalle truppe di Sua Maestà Britannica. Il regno dei cacciatori di pellicce e degli indiani quando erano ancora selvaggi, prima che l’alcol bruciasse in modo irreversibile le loro magnifiche fonti.
Pescatori Ojibwe sulle rapide del fiume St. Mary, 1901.
Se nelle poesie vuoi metterci il cuore, fa’ gli addominali.
C’è tanto Hemingway in queste pagine, l’uomo, lo scrittore e i suoi personaggi.
Soprattutto nella prima parte e nell’ultima, quelle dove più si respira e agisce la natura, quelle dove il rapporto tra il protagonista e il padre, prima diretto poi simbolico, è più forte e vivo. Epos e mito insieme, i luoghi e la natura influiscono per l’eccezionale potenza del loro carattere estremo e per la forza evocativa che emanano, sulle vite e i destini dei protagonisti.
In certi momenti sembra che Heighton riesca a raccogliere da terra la fiaccola di Jack London, Malcom Lowry e Jack Kerouac – tutti, in un modo o nell’altro, ebbero a che fare col pugilato, il Canada, il bere e la leggenda del viaggio nordamericano – correndo insieme ai loro fantasmi per un bel tratto di strada.
Il figlio chiede al padre “Tu ci credi nella vita dopo la morte?” e il vecchio gli risponde “Sì, la mia sei tu”.
Ciascuno di noi diventa ciò che ha conquistato o che si è tenuto stretto, ma anche ciò che ha perso.
Un bel romanzo con un bellissimo titolo.
April 19, 2012
Boats, books and boxing. Steven Heighton's debut combines three of my favorite things. How could it miss?! Young Sevigne Torrins comes from a line of pugilist sailormen, self-taught intellectuals with a love for the Sweet Science (that's punching people in the face). He grows up on the Canadian side of Lake Superior -- the Soo -- boxing and playing literary "name that reference" games with his Hemingway-esque father. After Torrins Sr.'s boozing splits the family apart, Sevigne stays with his dad on the banks of the lake while his mother and older brother start a new life and family in Cairo.
When he's not belting it out in amateur boxing bouts (I thought Canadians just did hockey), Sevigne dreams of becoming a great writer, feverishly dashing off poems to arts publications. No surprise, Heighton also started his literary life as a poet, so he waxes a lot about the search for transcendence or some such jazz. But brother, can the guy write about boxing. Like a boxer himself, Heighton varies his verbal attack, writing in short, choppy, fragmentary jabs, then unleashing a torrent of words in great haymaker paragraphs that run for a page or more.
After his father's death, Sevigne, in his mid-20s, sets out for the big city -- Toronto!!! -- to make his fortune as a novelist. He hooks up with Eddy, a friend from high school, who has big plans to start a radical and revolutionary literary magazine (tho he can't settle on a name for it that's sufficiently radical and revolutionary). Eddy's prone to saying things like "Nobody knows what postmodern means -- that's what's so postmodern about the term!" Eddy gets Sevigne a job writing pithy but shallow capsule reviews of great novels (which is absolutely NOTHING like what I do here on goodreads, just so we're all clear). Sevigne finds the arts scene in Toronto is less about art than catty gossip, fashionable drugs and fashionable fashions, and being seen at all the hippest clubs. Still, hot sex with poet babes can make living with trendoid ayholes tolerable.
I much preferred the first half of "The Shadow Boxer" to the second. The scenes of Sevigne frustratedly watching his father's daily disintegration felt more genuine and honest than his trip to the big city. In the second half of the book, Heighton's prose turns precious, his metaphors labored as Sevigne guzzles down gallons of rye to dull the pain of being artistic or something. Other than its Canadian origin, there's not a lot to set "The Shadow Boxer" dramatically apart from thousands of other wandering-youth novels in the tradition of the Jacks, London and Kerouac. Of course it's pretentious. It's meant to be. Young men aspiring to literary lionhood are supposed to be pretentious. But it's pretentious without being insufferable.
On the face of it, this sounds like a stupid statement, but "The Shadow Boxer" is a book for readers. Not in the sense of "pick up a paperback before a plane trip to kill time for a couple chapters before falling asleep," but for READERS: people with an honest passion about books, who pick apart sentences and peer at the mechanics, who value the power of words and what they can accomplish. It's a book in love with literature and language, at times in opposition to good sense and restraint. It's not exactly a good novel, and parts of it are outright bad, but it works so hard, it's so damn determined to be meaningful, that I couldn't find it in my heart to be cruel to it. It's a poopin-on-the-carpet puppydog of a book by an author who's likely to find something more interesting to say now that he's got this out of his system.
When he's not belting it out in amateur boxing bouts (I thought Canadians just did hockey), Sevigne dreams of becoming a great writer, feverishly dashing off poems to arts publications. No surprise, Heighton also started his literary life as a poet, so he waxes a lot about the search for transcendence or some such jazz. But brother, can the guy write about boxing. Like a boxer himself, Heighton varies his verbal attack, writing in short, choppy, fragmentary jabs, then unleashing a torrent of words in great haymaker paragraphs that run for a page or more.
After his father's death, Sevigne, in his mid-20s, sets out for the big city -- Toronto!!! -- to make his fortune as a novelist. He hooks up with Eddy, a friend from high school, who has big plans to start a radical and revolutionary literary magazine (tho he can't settle on a name for it that's sufficiently radical and revolutionary). Eddy's prone to saying things like "Nobody knows what postmodern means -- that's what's so postmodern about the term!" Eddy gets Sevigne a job writing pithy but shallow capsule reviews of great novels (which is absolutely NOTHING like what I do here on goodreads, just so we're all clear). Sevigne finds the arts scene in Toronto is less about art than catty gossip, fashionable drugs and fashionable fashions, and being seen at all the hippest clubs. Still, hot sex with poet babes can make living with trendoid ayholes tolerable.
I much preferred the first half of "The Shadow Boxer" to the second. The scenes of Sevigne frustratedly watching his father's daily disintegration felt more genuine and honest than his trip to the big city. In the second half of the book, Heighton's prose turns precious, his metaphors labored as Sevigne guzzles down gallons of rye to dull the pain of being artistic or something. Other than its Canadian origin, there's not a lot to set "The Shadow Boxer" dramatically apart from thousands of other wandering-youth novels in the tradition of the Jacks, London and Kerouac. Of course it's pretentious. It's meant to be. Young men aspiring to literary lionhood are supposed to be pretentious. But it's pretentious without being insufferable.
On the face of it, this sounds like a stupid statement, but "The Shadow Boxer" is a book for readers. Not in the sense of "pick up a paperback before a plane trip to kill time for a couple chapters before falling asleep," but for READERS: people with an honest passion about books, who pick apart sentences and peer at the mechanics, who value the power of words and what they can accomplish. It's a book in love with literature and language, at times in opposition to good sense and restraint. It's not exactly a good novel, and parts of it are outright bad, but it works so hard, it's so damn determined to be meaningful, that I couldn't find it in my heart to be cruel to it. It's a poopin-on-the-carpet puppydog of a book by an author who's likely to find something more interesting to say now that he's got this out of his system.
January 18, 2011
An excellent book, but it's weighted down by an oppressive tone that makes it very difficult to love. Its bleakness is authentic, but relentless. A well realized cast of characters helps to keep it from being crushed under the weight of its own cynicism.
February 22, 2012
I read this a few years ago and fell in love with the writing almost immediately, though it took a little longer to get into the plot. The language more than made up for my slow start though - it was delicious and lyrical, and I wanted to savour every single word. Then, as I got to know the characters I was totally hooked. By the end of the book I was struggling to slow down & continue to take in every line, and not to speed ahead to find out what was going to happen to the main character, Sevigne, who I was absolutely in love with.
Definitely one of my favourites & I'm so glad I have a signed copy!
Definitely one of my favourites & I'm so glad I have a signed copy!
April 15, 2024
I read this several years ago, it is the story of a young man off on his own living a somewhat clichéd 90’s GenX life in Toronto where he struggled to become a poet and with relationships, while flashbacks take us to his teen years in the Soo where he grew up with a Hemmingway like father and learns the arts of manliness, poetry, drinking, and boxing. And ice cold swims in Lake Superior where real men ply their trade. While acknowledging the cliché of this I loved the characters.
I really enjoyed the story and found it all very well developed but the writing was a bit too lyrical for my tastes. Not pretentious but I felt the author over worked it, choosing words and phrases more obsure when simple would have kept the pacing up for us simpletons. As a result it took me months to finally finish this book as it exhausted me just to read and I ended up putting it down and reading something lighter.
The story and characters are worthy of a four star rating and I would read the story again but were it for the writing, just too many bad memories of how it frustrated me. I understood the author is a poet so I surmise this is just his style of writing.
I really enjoyed the story and found it all very well developed but the writing was a bit too lyrical for my tastes. Not pretentious but I felt the author over worked it, choosing words and phrases more obsure when simple would have kept the pacing up for us simpletons. As a result it took me months to finally finish this book as it exhausted me just to read and I ended up putting it down and reading something lighter.
The story and characters are worthy of a four star rating and I would read the story again but were it for the writing, just too many bad memories of how it frustrated me. I understood the author is a poet so I surmise this is just his style of writing.
September 27, 2017
Couldn't finish this one.
November 2, 2021
I love this book so much! Tells the story of a growing poet.
This book made me want to pack my bags and travel to Cairo right away. Steven's writing style satisfied my senses, my soul, and my heart. I love it with every bit of me.
To be honest, the plot is kind of slow in the first 100 pages. However, after the 100th, things will get better—the pacing will speed steadily.
Its realness might sometimes bore others, that's why I won't recommend it too easily. Either way, this book deserves to be one of my favorites!
This book made me want to pack my bags and travel to Cairo right away. Steven's writing style satisfied my senses, my soul, and my heart. I love it with every bit of me.
To be honest, the plot is kind of slow in the first 100 pages. However, after the 100th, things will get better—the pacing will speed steadily.
Its realness might sometimes bore others, that's why I won't recommend it too easily. Either way, this book deserves to be one of my favorites!
December 1, 2011
An interesting read - certainly a book about a life journey. The story starts on the shores of Lake Superior, which I liked. Interesting range of relationships and characters in this book.
I liked this book.
I liked this book.
May 26, 2010
Almost.
August 6, 2011
Insight into the past and present mind of a would-be Romantic poet. At times very dark and emotionally upsetting.
December 22, 2015
pretty cool, a romantic boxer's life before during after his fighting days, his loving days. debut novel by this canadian author.
November 25, 2012
Read the first chapter and, not for me.
March 20, 2015
This is still one of my most beloved books! Heighton's stories are masterfully woven together; I found myself completely immersed in the world of both father and son.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews