Boyhood is the stretch of a male person’s life when he is still a boy — the years from a little child until he is grown, before the adult years. People use it when they look back: “in his boyhood” means when he was a boy. It can name the time itself (“his boyhood was happy”) or the world of being a boy (“boyhood friends,” “boyhood home”). It is a slightly warm, story-like word; in everyday talk many people just say “when I was a boy” or “as a kid.” Writers like it because one word paints a whole period. Though actually it is not a boy, and it is not a place — it is a time. Childhood covers any child; boyhood is the male version of that idea.