Peekay

Character Analysis

From Pisskop to Peekay

He may be little, but he's mighty—well, after some hardcore boxing training, anyway. Peekay is the protagonist and narrator of the novel. He's a boy growing up in South Africa in the 1940s and 50s, and his dream is to become the welterweight boxing champion of the world. This dream has its roots in ugly experiences at boarding school, where older boys who called him Pisskop (which translates to the lovely term "Pisshead") tortured him.

Later a nice man will shorten this to Peekay, and in his first act of independence Peekay takes on the name as his own and only name, to the surprise of his mother:

My mother turned to me. "What on earth have you been telling the Professor? Who is Peekay?"

"It's my new name. I—I haven't told you about it yet," I said, flustered. My mother laughed, but I knew she was annoyed. (9.79-80)

This act will change Peekay's life—from now on he's a self-made man, or at least a self-made boy. He starts out as a victim, the owner of a terrible name. But in an act of independence, he appropriates the name and makes it his own, empowering himself to define his identity and his future (kind of like Yankee Doodle).

A One-Track Mind

In a chance meeting with a boxer on a train ride home, Peekay learns the important lesson that little can beat big. After he sees Hoppie Groenewald beat Jackhammer Smit in a mismatched fight, he learns an important lesson:

Hoppie pulled me close to him and put his hand around my shoulder. "We showed the big gorilla, heh, Peekay?"

"Ja, Hoppie." I was suddenly a bit tearful. "Small can beat big if you have a plan."

Hoppie laughed. "I'm telling you, man, I nearly thought the plan wasn't going to work tonight."

"I'll never forget, first with the head and then with the heart." I hugged him around the top of the legs. Hoppie rubbed his hand through my hair. The last time someone had done this, it was to rub s*** into my head. Now it felt warm and safe. (6.92-95)

After this moment, which is lottery-winner-level life-changing for Peekay, he knows that if he can use his head just like Hoppie, he can overcome seemingly impossible challenges. He also learns that not everybody is like the Judge—there are people he can trust out there in the big bad world.

He decides to become the welterweight champion of the world and basically never thinks about anything except that. Everything has to do with that feeling he had when he was six and the bullies killed his pet chicken (May he cluck in peace), and he spends his life fighting back against problems that are even bigger than bullying, like racism, apartheid, and downright injustice.

With a Little Help From His Friends

Once Peekay gets out of bully-land, he makes some really great friends. And they will be the people that make him who he is, cheer him on, and love him—kind of like his very own cheerleading squad.

First up: Doc, a music professor, who takes him under his wing and teaches him to think:

Doc never talked down. Much of what he said would take me years to understand, but I soaked it up nevertheless, storing it in my awkward young mind where it could mature and later come back to me. He taught me to read for meaning and information, to make margin notes and to follow these up with trips to the Barberton library [...]. (9.14)

By treating Peekay like an adult, Doc helps him grow up mentally and emotionally, which is something he definitely wasn't getting at the boarding school of horrors.

Geel Piet, a prisoner at the prison where Doc is held during the war, teaches Peekay how to box:

Geel Piet claimed he saw intelligence and speed in me that more than made up for my lack of size. He was a fanatic about footwork. "You must learn to box with your feet, small baas. A good boxer is like a dancer, he is still pretty to watch even if you only look at his feet." He taught me how to position myself so the full weight of my body was thrown behind a punch, and despite my size and my speed my punches were capable of gaining respect from a bigger opponent. "If they do not respect your punch, they simply keep going until they knock you down, man. A boxer must have respect." (12.2)

He is killed tragically, protecting Peekay. It's something that our poor little hero is forever grateful for, but never really gets over. As the story goes on, he never takes for granted the lessons he learned from his pal.

Morrie, his best friend at school when he's older, teaches him how to make money and fend for himself. What's important about Morrie is that he's an outsider, just like our guy Peekay. Peekay's different from all the kids at school because he's not rich like them; Morrie is the only Jew at the school for Christian gentlemen.

We were, he decided, odd-bods, he a Jew and me with only one name. (16.61)

The boys bond and, though they come from very different worlds, they remain fiercely loyal to one another and learn a lot from each other. Also, did you notice that Morrie is Peekay's first friend his own age?

This ragtag gang really makes Peekay who he is, and he's lucky, because they're pretty good guys. You know what they say, pick your friends wisely, but not your friends' noses. Or, wait…how does it go?

Pride Comes Before…

Peekay is a really proud kid, but it doesn't seem to hurt him too much. He gets great grades, is an undefeated boxer, and is well-liked. But he is unable to accept, or acknowledge, help from his friends. He wants so badly to be independent that even when people save his life he just feels indebted to them. Maybe this has to do with how alone he was when he was a little boy at boarding school. Peekay wishes he could be free and take care of himself:

I was a user. It had become a habit; winner that I seemed to be, I had become a mental mendicant. I was conscious also of the price I had paid. That in return people took strength from me. Morrie, Miss Bornstein, Mrs. Boxall all needed me as a focal point. I was required to perform for them in return for their unstinting help and love. (23.4-5)

For Peekay, love is a sort of pressure. He thinks that he needs to fulfill all of the expectations for the people who care about him in order to keep them happy. This shows how his strength, independence, is also a weakness.

Little Beats Big

Peekay goes from being a weak, helpless child who takes a beating rather than fight back, to a ruthless boxer that refuses to ever lose. This change in his character is the whole point of the book, so be sure to pay attention:

I knew that [...] I was alone. That I had permission fro myself to love whomsoever I wished. The cords that bound me to the past had been severed. The emptiness was a new kind of loneliness, a free kind of loneliness. [...] I would be in control, master of loneliness and no longer its servant. (8.99)

It's all about him finding "the power of one": the power of an individual to overcome difficulties. And we're not just talking meanies at school; we're talking serious hardships, like a racist society, financial difficulties, and even threats to his life.