Signifying Nothing
by
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On a spring evening in 1979, in the house where he had lived all of his nineteen years, Lester Hobbs did what no one had ever heard him do: he spoke. One moment he was galumphing across the living room in his undershirt and jeans, skinny arms swinging, hands trembling slightly as they sometimes did; the next, he stopped, arms going stiff at his sides, neck craning forward, a fierce expression taking over his normally placid, baby-smooth brown face. His words were not spoken in the soft, halting way that a thirteen-month-old says ‘Momma’ for the first time; they were full-throated, even loud, like the words of a man accustomed to speaking authoritatively, a drill sergeant or film director. Even more surprisingly, they not only made sense — they were delivered with rhyme and rhythm. In short, the boy was rapping . . .
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About the Book
The novel is set in Washington, D.C., in 1979 and focuses on the Hobbs family. Lester Hobbs, nineteen years old, is mentally retarded and mute ― until the day he suddenly begins to rap at the top of his lungs about life with his parents and older siblings. That development has a profound effect on the rest of the family, whose members struggle to figure out what it means, for Lester and themselves.
Lester’s wise-cracking brother, Greg, the middle child, who has long alternated between being protective of Lester and being jealous of the attention Lester receives, tries with a spectacular lack of success to profit from his brother’s new ability.
Lester and Greg’s sister, Sherrie ― bright, pretty, responsible, and aloof ― tries to learn the medical explanation for Lester’s condition, which leads her to an affair with George Greer, a brilliant, married, womanizing neurologist.
Meanwhile, Lester’s mother, Maddie, tries to adjust emotionally to the change in her son, and Pat, the father, works to figure out the right course of action once the cause of Lester’s rapping is revealed.
About the Author
Clifford Thompson grew up in Washington, D.C., and attended Oberlin College, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in creative writing. His essays on literature, film, jazz, and other subjects have appeared in publications including The Threepenny Review, Commonweal, Cineaste, Film Quarterly, The Iowa Review, Black Issues Book Review, and The Best American Movie Writing. He is the editor of the H.W. Wilson publication Current Biography. Thompson lives in Brooklyn, New York, with his wife and two children. Signifying Nothing is his first novel.