69 pages • 2 hours read
Walter Dean MyersHoops
Fiction | Book | Middle Grade | Published in 1981A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Symbols & Motifs
The Game
Although Hoops is, on the surface, a novel about basketball, it is also about Black identity and success in a white society. The game becomes a symbol for life on and off the court, for Lonnie and for the other characters like Cal and Paul. Towards the end of the novel, Lonnie reflects on what Cal taught him, marveling that Cal “had enough of his game left, his all-the-time, off-the-court game, to give some of it to me” (182). In this context, “game” becomes something more than skills on the basketball court; Cal’s game was about how he dealt with people, especially nefarious people, and how he was able to come out on top. Having “game” becomes about how, as a young Black man, Lonnie can find success for himself.
The game on the court also parallels Lonnie’s developing understanding of his social context. During the championship, Lonnie reaches a new level of playing, thinking to himself, “I could feel the game. I could feel everything that was going on” (174). Feeling the game, for Lonnie, means being fully in touch with all the dynamics on the court. This is a direct mirror to other mentions of game: Having or feeling the game means being able to understand what is going on around and how to deal with it appropriately.
Walls, Windows, and Doors
Physical spaces play a huge role in Hoops as symbols for larger social issues and personal conflicts. Floors and walls become metaphors for things that close a person in or stop someone for reaching their goals, while windows and doors are exits and places to dream from. For example, when Lonnie ends up on the floor after fighting with Paul, he is astonished because he didn’t think he “would ever have a serious fight” (88) with Paul. The floor is a bottom, literally, and a representation of a low point for Lonnie as he engages in this significant conflict with his close friend. Similarly, when Lonnie struggles with his feelings about his parents fighting and his dad leaving, he hits “the wall with [his fist]” (158) until he numbs himself. Walls and floors are hard, limiting physical objects, and they symbolically reflect the difficult conflicts that hold Lonnie back. In contrast, windows and doors reflect opportunity, dreams, and growth. One particularly profound example is in the first chapter of the book, as Lonnie reflects on his father’s belief that “your days pil[e] up on you” (6), Lonnie starts understanding his father more as he sits in the window of his motel. From his position in the window, Lonnie starts thinking differently about his father, his goals, and his dreams.
Dreams
Dreams feature heavily in Hoops as a motif. Almost every character describes their dreams and their difficulty in reaching those goals, though the book centers primarily on Lonnie. Many of the older characters who influence Lonnie tell him about their dreams: His father describes laying “days out in front of yourself like an imaginary road” (2), while Aggie talks about going to sleep “at night with ‘how come’” (136). Lonnie struggles with how to achieve these dreams, especially since he’s seen so many Black adults in his life not reach their goals, like his father and Aggie. For Lonnie, dreaming is a useful activity, but it feels like it always ends “in the same way: Somebody else got over, and I just had another day to pile up with the rest” (22). To some extent, the frequent mention of dreaming throughout the novel is a long foreshadowing of Lonnie’s eventual ability to make one of his dreams start to come true. In addition, the conclusion of the novel shows a more mature Lonnie, who can recognize that dreams are only productive if he can take the small steps to achieve them.
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