Today I Am A Boy [Deckle Edge] [Hardcover]

David Hays (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 5, 2000

"Can I now, a white-haired man who gets into the movies at reduced cost, Do I have any magic words left? Can I get a miracle? If I can recall my youth and understand it, that may be the miracle I seek now."

When David Hays was 66 and had joined a synagogue for the first time in over fifty years, he decided to study Hebrew and be a bar mitzvah. And so this world-renowned theatrical designer, founder of the legendary National Theatre of the Deaf, father of two grown children and coauthor of the best-selling "My Old Man and the Sea," borrowed his grandson's beginner's Hebrew workbook and joined a class of twelve-year-olds. It launched a wondrous journey of faith and community.

In "Today I Am a Boy," Hays's new world begins to intersect with his own history: on Yom Kippur, Hays, who has sailed around Cape Horn with his son, reads the story of Jonah to the congregation and gives a sermon on the Old Testament and the sea. His long-dormant love of learning is wholly rekindled. At the stage of life when most of us begin to slow down, Hays feels more alive than ever, rejuvenated by newfound connections to his youth and faith.

His recently deceased mother, his grand-children and children all play roles in this funny and ultimately moving narrative. In the world of these pages, the generations do not simply pass from one to another; they intertwine, learning from one another. The ardent boy in this eminent man has been reawakened, and in his words, "I now understand that everything that I've done in my life that has been fine has been done in the spirit of that boy."

"Today I Am a Boy" is a brave, clear-eyed and joyous examination of life.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

At age 66, theatrical designer HaysDcoauthor of the best-seller My Old Man and the Sea (with his son Daniel)Ddecided to study for his bar mitzvah, making up for decades of neglect in his religious education. This charming but slight memoir mixes the author's account of his classroom experiencesDamong a bunch of 12-year-olds he dubs the "Hormone Hurricanes" and a rabbi younger than his sonDwith reflections on his family and his own life path. (Trouble at the acclaimed National Theater for the Deaf, which he founded, has left him unmoored.) Hays's deft touch (not to mention his wife's delightful malapropisms) makes the book an easy read, but the narrative can be choppy: for example, a chapter devoted to a heartfelt account of his mother's death is followed by one that includes his musings on the stresses his preteen classmates must face. The sincerity of Hays's quest can't be doubted; for class, he wrote (and here reprints) a thoughtful essay on what might have happened if Anne Frank had lived. However, his classmates aren't that compelling (they're just kids, after all), and there's discontinuity between his life and his religious experience: he notes that he has already written about the themes of "growing older and lost love" in a book about stage lighting. Following his bar mitzvah, he has yet to grapple with some of the deeper questions provoked by the Jewish tradition. This book lacks the magic touch of Hays's last one and is unlikely to perform at a commensurate level; his theatrical background, however, should energize his 6-city tour. Agent, Martha Kaplan. (Oct.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

As the 21st-century begins, Reform Judaism in the United States is experiencing a revival, especially as older secular Jews make the effort to learn what their parents or grandparents knew as practicing Jews. Hays's spiritual autobiography is yet another excursion into this territory (see, for instance, Lee M. Hendler's The Year Mom Got Religion: One Woman's Midlife Journey into Judaism, LJ 11/15/98). Hays gives us a completely charming and spellbinding narrative as he shares his hesitating and then more confident steps toward his adult bar mitzvah at the age of 66. Along the way, he grows sensitive and loving toward his fellow Hebrew school classmatesDenergetic boys and girls of 12 and 13. Readers familiar with My Old Man and the Sea, the best seller Hays coauthored with his son, will recognize the author's voiceDat times self-serving, at times overconfident, then sad and pensive. This book will surely be appreciated by young and old alikeDand will most certainly be a welcome gift item for those wondering where to find an appropriate bar or bas mitzvah present. Recommended for general religion collections in public and college libraries.
-DOlga B. Wise, Compaq Computer Corp., Austin, TX
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster; 1St Edition edition (October 5, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0743201264
• ISBN-13: 978-0743201261
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,011,988 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great story of a great journey, January 2, 2001

By 

Eileen Galen (USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Today I Am A Boy (Hardcover)

This is one of those books that you could borrow from your library, or from a friend, but you will likely need to buy your own copy since there are so many passages that are either so wise, so funny, or so meaningfully touching that you will need to use your pencil in order to happily jot checkmarks, brackets, and asterisks throughout the book. I know that I did.

David Hays has a surfeit of academic, personal, and professional accomplishments. In his sixties, he was semi-retired, kids grown, had good health and a happy family life. His mind is unquestioningly fertile (yet organized) and he seems to embrace new experiences. As a child he gazed into a mud bubble, and glimpsed eternity. As an adult he throws himself into the grass in his back yard, in order to look more closely at the earth. His life was full, and meaningful, but he does not brag, and he is likable from the outset.

Rather than rest on his not inconsiderable laurels, he decides to become a Bar Mitzvah, joining a class of local eleven and twelve-year olds - in order to devote himself to study with his congregation's rabbi, Doug, for more than a year. It is this journey - and there is a steady unfolding, with no outburst of religiosity - that forms the starting point for this wonderful narrative.

Hays has an ability to tell you a lot about himself by telling you about other people. He respects himself, and he respects others. He is never boring. His parents, in-laws, grown children, grandchildren, his wide circle of friends and acquaintances, and his classmates are interesting to him, and worthy of reportage. He lets you in on these people and their lives and their histories with unstinting (and never maudlin) respect, even awe. In doing this you find out a lot about Hays and his subjects. Their privacy is never violated, and their dignity is sustained.

There is uncloying, laugh-out-loud humor throughout. Family lore emerges, and it is often funny. Hays delights in his wife Leonora's knack of elegantly summing up a situation with a trenchant malapropism. Of his new-found fervor for religious study, she says, "He hooked, line and sinker!" Of the Bahamas: "It's a third-war country." He also shares his family history, including a terrific (true) story, "How my family saved Israel." His feelings and observations as a sensitive member of his class (of the kids at recess he marvels, "They always know where to go.") - and his relationship with his wonderful rabbi - are a pleasure to watch unfold.

Hays includes a piece on Anne Frank that is dramatic, thoughtful, and not at all funny. It is appropriately included, given that the concerns of an adult approaching his bar mitzvah are different from those of a child. And at one point, he attends a Harvard reunion - which maybe could have been left out of this book, with no loss of substance to this great story.

In all, a wonderful book.

3 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Should've stuck to the topic, IMO, April 12, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Today I Am A Boy (Hardcover)

The topic of this book as stated is highly misleading. Yes, Mr. Hays traces some of his experiences on becoming a Bar Mitzvah at age 66. However, he digresses so much from this theme that it was downright annoying!

I was really looking forward to reading about a 66-year-old man's journey into spirituality and rediscovery of Judaism, rather than a name-dropping autobiography.

What little Mr. Hays did write about his spiritual journey back into Judaism was sparse, and even his way off-topic autobiographical sections didn't include much of his family's, friends',or peers' reactions to his becoming a Bar Mitzvah, which to me would have been very interesting.

He also didn't talk much at all about contemporary Jewish renewal and problems of assimilation and how others might, as he did, find meaning in a religious path they've ignored or rejected.

Why, instead, should I care that he went back for a school reunion and one of his class members won the Nobel Prize? Why should I have to wade through the life stories of some of his uninteresting relatives who are not even marginally part of his spiritual story?

In this catch-all manuscript, Mr. Hays also tangentially subjects the reader to an entire fantasy theatrical piece he has imagined about a grown-up Anne Frank (for which I wouldn't buy a ticket, BTW).

What we also get is too much information and commentary about the 12- and 13-year-olds in his class, including an inappropriate (IMO) dwelling on one of the pubescent girls about whom Mr. Hays admitted over and over he had major sexual fantasies.