Customer Reviews

The Professional

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If you're going to read THE PROFESSIONAL written by the great sports writer W.C. Heinz (who also wrote MASH), skip the foreward by Elmore Leonard until you've read the book. The ditz gives away the ending.
Other than that, the book is pretty much what one might expect after reading the blurb by Hemingway: "THE PROFESSIONAL is the only good novel about a fighter I've read and an excellent novel in its own right." It reminded me a whole lot of THE SUN ALSO RISES. Rather than the minutia of fishing and bullfighting we get boxing: how to wrap a fighter's hands, how the fighter eats during training (Lots of tea and boiled eggs), how to fake a missed right hand, followed by a left hook. All of this is narrated by a somewhat cynical sports writer named Frank Hughes, who follows middle weight fighter Eddie Brown around as he prepares for a championship bout. Eddie is the professional in the title. He's fought ninety times, losing only three, one of which his manager, Doc Carroll, set him up to lose because he was becoming too cocky. W.C. Heinz has a pretty good reason for entitling the book, THE PROFESSIONAL. Carroll resents the champion because he's pretty much all glitz and show. At one point Heinz has his narrator say, "The amateurs have always crowded the highways to everywhere, so it's never been easy for the pros to get through."
I've never been a big Hemingway fan, but this book is chock full of interesting minor characters. There's Eddie's "cold fish" of a wife. There's Johnny Jay, the trainer, a non-stop talker who never makes a whole lot of sense, but is tolerated because he was Doc Carroll's first fighter. There's Al Penna, who steals a ring off a dead man's finger. But my favorite is Jean Girot the recovering alcoholic who owns the hotel at the training camp. He's sad because he misses his favorite drink, the dry martini, which he took nips from out of a milk bottle.
If you're looking for an action packed novel, this one's not for you. There's really only one fight scene and that's at the end when Eddie fights for the title; but if you're tired of the "same old same old" THE PROFESSIONAL fits the bill.

The prose is so clean and clear, you wonder if it is possible to write any better. The dialogue is perfect: each character has a personal voice that identifies him or her and makes that person real. Then there is the compelling story, dry wit, and the education on life and boxing.

There are a lot of reasons to read this book, including the fact that almost all sports writers (and a lot of others besides) consider W.C. Heinz to be one of the best ever, but mainly it should be read because it is great writing.

Eddie Brown, known as "The Pro" for his mature, professional approach to boxing, is a contender for the Middleweight Championship. Sportswriter Frank Hughes, the narrator of the novel, spends a month at a boxing camp in the Catskills with Eddie and his cantankerous old-school manager, Doc Carroll, to observe their training and pre-bout preparation for use in a magazine article. Because this will be the peaking Eddie's best shot at the title, as well as the aging Doc's final opportunity to see one of his charges crowned as world champion, the tension surrounding the bout is intense and addictive.

A simple story, to be sure, but it is not the story line per se that interests Mr. Heinz. Rather, he uses the world of boxing as a medium to distinguish the few, heroic champions from the multitude of pretenders. This echoes Papa Hemingway's view of the world, where people must be separated into those who have grace under pressure and those who are phony imitators. Boxing, like Hemingway's bullfighting, succeeds wonderfully as a backdrop for development of this theme, particularly given the prevalence of corruption in the sport, the number of unskilled athletes and managers, and the increased focus on profiteering by the media with the advent of the television age.

My sport is running, not boxing. Yet I thoroughly enjoyed this novel. The author's dissection of what it really means to be a champion, how the code by which an athlete lives and competes is every bit as important as the result of the competition. Despite a few holier-than-thou passages, in which the author may have gone a bit overboard in drawing his distinction between the heroes and the anti-heroes, this is an impressive work harkening back to a time when there was a greater appreciation for a straight-forward story told in the journalistic style perfected by Hemingway.

Kevin Joseph, author of "The Champion Maker"

The manager Doc Carroll is a fictonalized version of Heinz's hero Jack Hurley, about whom he wrote a memorable essay. Doc and his fighter Eddie Brown are consummate professionals. They are endearing characters, although the writing is without sentimentality. They are honest and straightforward and give their best, as a matter of course. I intend to re-read this book.

I'm not sure what the rest of you are talking about. I thought there was so much unlocked potential in this subject. There were so many opportunities for interesting settings, and intriguing minor characters. The sparring partner 'Memphis' was pretty cool and the trainer Doc Carrol was alright. Eddie the fighter seemed without a personality at all to me. I guess I missed something.

Elmore Leonard, in the introduction, says Bill Heinz is the missing link between he and Hemingway. Hemingway can, for me, get a little too romantic, abstract, and self-conscious (that said he's one of my favorites and certainly one of my most revered), and Elmore Leonard can be a little too pared down, concise, plot-driven. If Hemingway is too hot and Leonard is too cold, Heinz is just right. Buy this book. From a long-time sports writer, it is tough prose at its best, written for men, even men who don't read.

I loved this book. The dialogue is smart and the story envelopes you. I was expecting there to be more action, considering the subject, but I was not disappointed.

Red Heinz died last year, and we miss him already. A sports writer of great insight and talent, he brought those attributes to the typewriter when he wrote this book. Deadpan, efficient, clean, spare prose characterize The Professional, an account of the training routine leading up to the big fight. Graphic in every detail, the story moves by inches and leaves an impression of internalized, absorbed authenticity. If you want to read a story about an athlete--troubled, dedicated, honest--this is your book. If you want the same stuff with humor, get (also from Amazon) Monk Rose's Philadelphia Mercy.

Great book. Heinz used his knowledge of sports writing to supplement trying to talk about what a fighter is thinking. It made the book a lot less cheesy and a lot more honest. The parallel between what Eddie was going through as a fighter and the sportswriter's interpretation of it created an accessible, believable look at the boxing game. That is why I believe Hemingway gave it the credit he did. Heinz wrote with skill and made a very enjoyable read for any boxing fan. I would highly recommend to anyone who is at all interested in boxing.

Being a boxing writer myself for many years, I can now totally appreciate it when people told me for years that "The Professional" by W.C. Heinz was the best boxing book ever written and one of the greatest novels of all time. There's even an introduction by the iconic Elmore Leonard, where he credits Heinz as being one of his mentors.

The book, written in 1958, is basically the life in the training camp of a fighter named Eddie Brown, who after a long boxing career, is finally getting a shot at a world's title. His crusty manager Doc Carroll has been around boxing forever, but Eddie Brown is Doc's last shot at achieving immortality in a sport Doc so obviously detests. Eddie seems to like everyone and Doc trusts no one, which makes for some interesting discourses concerning the inner workings of a sport that has been run by crooks and thieves since the start of the 20th Century.

The book is written from the third person view point of sportswriter Frank Hughes, who accompanies Eddie to training camp, trying to grasp the essence of a boxer, while he's preparing for the biggest moment in his life. Frank is no more than a fly on the wall, trying to help out Eddie and Doc, but at the same time keeping a detachment that will make his magazine article impartial and true.

The Professional is a must read for boxing fans, but those who don't really care for the sport can enjoy this book too, firm in the knowledge that W.C. Heinz is right on the mark with his observations about a slimy sport that has not changed much from when this book was written 52 years ago.