The Basketball Diaries: The Classic About Growing Up Hip On New York’s Mean Streets

Jim’s individual existence and the culture he lives in are both greatly influenced by war. Jim was born in 1949, post-World War II. During the 1950s and 1960s, the Cold War was looming over the United States and fearmongering constantly broadcast and printed for people to see. The Vietnam War is beginning, and Jim is vehemently against it, along with all forms of war. Jim’s parents, who are pro-war, often berate their son for his “communist” views; Jim spends less time at home as a result. He attends peace marches and parties but does not identify with the political label of communism, clarifying that he “think[s] more about a fire truck passing late at night than I do about Karl Marx when [he’s] out yelling for them to fuck your wars” (127). Rather, Jim is against the notion of politics all together and idealizes about a world where such things no longer exist. His desperation to escape society and war are reflected in his love of nature and drugs.

Despite being born post-World War II, a young Jim was still very much afflicted by nightmares and waking fears about being attacked by Germans. Whenever he heard sirens as a child, he would become afraid of potential air raids. He is deeply traumatized by being surrounded by war and states “I’ve got to break loose” (38). Jim is not the only one who experiences this constant state of low panic. When the power goes out throughout the Eastern Seaboard, the people of New York City speculate that it is the result of a Russian attack. Jim explains that “the ‘war baby’ gig ain’t no smartass headshrinker’s dumb theory, and all the people who grew up when I did can tell you that” (137). The experiences and fears that Jim goes through are very real and very common. He also feels that he is living on borrowed time, wondering if he will be drafted into the Vietnam War or if a bomb will take his life. Jim is extremely reckless with his safety and drug use as a result of his sense of impermanence.

Jim has one major positive influence in his life: basketball. Despite his basketball career having a rough start (his coach Lefty groped him), Jim is happy to be a part of a real basketball team which he calls “Biddy League” (3). When Jim transfers to a Catholic school, he continues playing basketball, but his drug habit catches up with him and he starts attending games and practices high. In the last few months of his diary, he stops mentioning basketball and only discusses drugs and how he obtains money for them. Basketball symbolizes a sense of cooperation, an even playing field regardless of skin color, religion, or sexuality. Jim appreciates the sport because he excels at it, because he makes friends through the team, and because he can play with all types of people. Basketball makes Jim “enthused about life” (3) in a way that nothing else seems to. Jim Carroll chose to title his autobiography The Basketball Diaries which signifies that the sport is close to his heart and perhaps what allowed him to survive his youth.

Jim despises all forms of authority, the reasons for this being complex and many. Authority is a recurring motif in Jim’s diary entries and comes in a variety of forms, none of which have a positive effect on Jim. In his very first entry, Jim describes his basketball coach’s habit of groping boys—and there is already a sense that the authority figures in his life are not trustworthy, supportive, or good models of behavior. When Jim gets a job at Yankee Stadium selling snacks for a summer, his boss picks on him, further deepening his disdain for authority figures. He also spends very little time at home, because both his mother and father seem to dislike him and only use him as a person to argue with when he is around.

Jim has regular interactions with the police as well. Though he manages to get out of all but one cop-related situation, he dislikes police and their intrusion on his life, his drug habit, and his beliefs about freedom and equality. The authority figure that Jim feels most strongly about, however, is the government itself. Growing up surrounded by major wars, Jim is strictly against the idea of government. He believes it exists for profit, control, and to instill fear and cause suffering. Jim attends peace marches and often voices his disdain for the way the government traumatized him, those he knows, and how it will continue doing so. In the Spring of 1965, Jim has a conversation with a 10-year-old girl, who asks him why his hair is long. They end up discussing Christ and God, and the girl states that she believes Christ would fight in the Vietnam War. Jim responds, “Well, did you ever read about Christ killing, or using a gun?” (100) in an attempt to show the girl the flaw in her logic. She understands him and concedes, and Jim reflects on the moment with a sense of pride.

Many of Jim’s diary entries are written about his sexual experiences growing up. Some of these experiences are relatively innocent and positive for Jim, while others are traumatizing and at times, disturbing and dangerous. For Jim, sex serves two main purposes: the first is pleasure, and the second is a means to earn money for drugs. He has sex with both men and women. He speaks of his gay partners in a derogatory fashion but simultaneously enjoys his time with them. Jim also describes an experience he had as a child which he refers to as his “first exposure to drag queens” (112): Two girls asked him and a friend to play doctor and turned out to be boys. This experience shaped Jim’s curiosity towards different kinds of sexuality. He has several girlfriends and female friends whom he sleeps with, most of their encounters being fairly innocent. While Jim is adventurous with his sexuality, he does not appreciate sexual harassment (i.e., when Benny molests him in Part 9), or being asked to do overtly immoral acts (i.e., when a client asks him to whip a cat to death in Part 7).