YEAR 7 - 28 February 2025 - The Boxer March

March 2025

Dear Parents and Carers

Year 7 – Novel Selection in English

 We are excited to share with you the next unit of work we will be covering in Year 7 English.  We have chosen ‘The Boxer’ by Nikesh Shukla (pictured) for our novel this year and wanted to share our reasons for this choice of book. 

Shukla is a Bristol-based author who is well known for writing about race, identity, and immigration.  

He feels passionately about writing books for young people, as well as tackling the issue of racism in the UK.  In fact, the inspiration for this novel was a racist attack which Shukla was subjected to himself on a train journey. 

In a new community, Sunny has a shifting sense of identity and he is trying to figure out what to do with his future. 

Sunny experiences a brutal racist attack.  He finds himself struggling with both the physical and emotional aftermath of this.  Sunny finds support and friendship in a boxing gym and learns the importance of taking up space.  Most importantly, he also learns the power of knowing himself and learning when to walk away. 

We want you to be aware in advance that as English teachers we have chosen this novel very carefully. As part of Sunny’s story, teachers will tackle a racist term which appears in the book about people with Pakistani heritage.  Shukla also uses a small number of swear words in the book.  We are keen to take this opportunity to reassure our students, parents and carers that use of this language within our school community is not tolerated. 

Where it is used in the book, we will be using it as a learning opportunity to consider the damage which racist language can have, and why Shukla chose to include it in his book. Students last year were enthusiastic about this unit of study: many felt that it allowed them to explore issues which were important to them and led to greater understanding of ideas around identity.   

Above all else, we hope your child is gripped by this compelling and empowering storyline. 

If you are interested in discussing this novel with your child, here is a link to Nikesh Shukla doing an interview on ‘The Boxer’ with some schoolchildren, as well as his own website:  

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p07vk84v  

http://www.nikesh-shukla.com/  

 If you have any concerns about the book or themes in it, please contact your child’s English teacher at school. 

Yours faithfully,

 The English Faculty Team.