L’esclavage fait partie de l’Islam. L’esclavage fait encore partie du jihad, et le jihad durera aussi longtemps que l’Islam. Sheikh Saleh Al-Fawzan (imam saoudien, nov . 2003)
Cassius Marcellus Clay, surnommé « Le Lion de White Hall » (The Lion of White Hall) (Comté de Madison Kentucky 19 octobre 1810 – 22 juillet 1903) est militant républicain et un abolitionniste américain, partisan d’une émancipation graduée. Issu d’une des plus riches familles de planteurs-possesseurs d’esclaves du comté de Madison (Kentucky), il était le cousin germain du politicien Henry Clay. Ami d’Abraham Lincoln, il fut son ambassadeur auprès du tsar Alexandre II de Russie et a favorisé l’achat de l’Alaska par les États-Unis en 1867. Wikipedia
On November 11, 1912, nine years after the death of Cassius Marcellus Clay, Herman H. Clay, a descendant of African-American slaves, named his son Cassius Marcellus Clay in tribute to the abolitionist. This Cassius Clay gave his own son the same name. Cassius M. Clay, Jr., developed as a heavyweight champion boxer who gained international renown. After joining the Nation of Islam, Cassius Clay, Jr. changed his name to Muhammad Ali, later embracing orthodox Sunni Islam after leaving the Nation. Wikipedia
En 1999, il est couronné « Sportif du siècle » par Sports Illustrated et « Personnalité sportive du siècle » par la BBC. Il est nommé sportif du XXe siècle par une assemblée de journalistes internationaux, précédant Pelé. Il reçoit, à Berlin en 2005, la médaille de la paix Otto Hahn, au nom de l’Organisation des Nations unies « pour son engagement en faveur du mouvement américain contre la ségrégation et pour l’émancipation culturelle des noirs à l’échelle mondiale ». Au-delà de ses performances sportives, il atteint une notoriété inégalée chez un sportif par son goût du spectacle, sa personnalité provocatrice, ses prises de positions religieuses et politiques, puis son destin personnel. Wikipedia
Nous exprimerons notre appréciation profonde de la foi musulmane qui a tant fait au long des siècles pour améliorer le monde, y compris mon propre pays. Barack Hussein Obama (Ankara, avril 2009)
Les Etats-Unis et le monde occidental doivent apprendre à mieux connaître l’islam. D’ailleurs, si l’on compte le nombre d’Américains musulmans, on voit que les Etats-Unis sont l’un des plus grands pays musulmans de la planète. Barack Hussein Obama (entretien pour Canal +, le 2 juin 2009)
L’avenir ne doit pas appartenir à ceux qui calomnient le prophète de l’Islam. Barack Obama (siège de l’ONU, New York, 26.09.12)
Il est tout à fait légitime pour le peuple américain d’être profondément préoccupé quand vous avez un tas de fanatiques vicieux et violents qui décapitent les gens ou qui tirent au hasard dans un tas de gens dans une épicerie à Paris. Barack Hussein Obama
Al-Qaïda et le groupe Etat islamique recherchent désespérément une légitimité. Ils tentent de se dépeindre comme des leaders religieux et ils diffusent l’idée que l’Occident est en guerre contre l’islam. Nous ne devons jamais accepter les principes qu’ils mettent en avant, et nous devons leur refuser la légitimité qu’ils recherchent. Ce ne sont pas des leaders religieux, ce sont des terroristes ! Barack Hussein Obama
L’Islam a toujours fait partie de l’Amérique. Alors qu’une écrasante majorité des musulmans du monde voient leur religion comme une source de paix, il est indéniable qu’une petite fraction de musulmans propagent une vision pervertie de l’Islam. c’est la vérité. Barack Hussein Obama (Centre islamique de Baltimore, 3 février 2016)
Segregation and racism had made me loathe aspects of the white South, but had scarcely left me less of a patriot. In fact, to me and my family, winning a place on our national team would mark my ultimate triumph over all those people who had opposed my career in the South in the name of segregation. (…) Despite segregation, I loved the United States. It thrilled me beyond measure to hear the umpire announce not my name but that of my country: ‘Game, United States,’ ‘Set, United States,’ ‘Game, Set, and Match, United States.’ (…) There were times when I felt a burning sense of shame that I was not with blacks—and whites—standing up to the fire hoses and police dogs. (…) I never went along with the pronouncements of Elijah Muhammad that the white man was the devil and that blacks should be striving for separate development—a sort of American apartheid. That never made sense to me. (…) Jesse, I’m just not arrogant, and I ain’t never going to be arrogant. I’m just going to do it my way. Arthur Ashe
I’ve always believed that every man is my brother. Clay will earn the public’s hatred because of his connections with the Black Muslims. Joe Louis
I’ve been told that Clay has every right to follow any religion he chooses and I agree. But, by the same token, I have every right to call the Black Muslims a menace to the United States and a menace to the Negro race. I do not believe God put us here to hate one another. Cassius Clay is disgracing himself and the Negro race. Floyd Patterson
Clay is so young and has been misled by the wrong people. He might as well have joined the Ku Klux Klan. Floyd Patterson
War is against the teachings of the Holy Qur’an. I’m not trying to dodge the draft. We are not supposed to take part in no wars unless declared by Allah or The Messenger. We don’t take part in Christian wars or wars of any unbelievers. Muhammad Ali
I ain’t got no quarrel with them Viet Cong—no Viet Cong ever called me Nigger. Muhammad Ali
My enemy is the white people, not the Viet Cong … You’re my opposer when I want freedom. You’re my opposer when I want justice. You’re my opposer when I want equality. You won’t even stand up for me in America because of my religious beliefs, and you want me to go somewhere and fight, when you won’t even stand up for my religious beliefs at home. Muhammad Ali
We who follow the teachings of Elijah Muhammad don’t want to be forced to integrate. Integration is wrong. We don’t want to live with the white man; that’s all. Muhammad Ali
‘I dodge those questions. ‘I’ve opened up businesses across the country, selling products and I don’t want to say nothing and, not knowing what I’m doing, not being qualified, say the wrong thing and hurt my business.’ Mohammed Ali (about al-Qaeda)
I remember the teachers at my high school didn’t like Ali because he was so anti-establishment and he kind of thumbed his nose at authority and got away with it. The fact that he was proud to be a Black man and that he had so much talent … made some people think that he was dangerous. But for those very reasons I enjoyed him. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
My first impression of Malcolm X was how could a black man talk about the government and white people and act so bold and not be shot at? How could he say these things? Only God must be protecting him. Malcolm was unlike anyone he had ever met. He was fearless. That really attracted me. Mohamed Ali
Bluebirds with bluebirds, red birds with red birds, pigeons with pigeons, eagles with eagles. God didn’t make no mistake! (…) I don’t hate rattlesnakes, I don’t hate tigers — I just know I can’t get along with them. I don’t want to try to eat with them or sleep with them. (…) I know whites and blacks cannot get along; this is nature. (…) I like what he [George Wallace] says. He says Negroes shouldn’t force themselves in white neighborhoods, and white people shouldn’t have to move out of the neighborhood just because one Negro comes. Now that makes sense. Muhammed Ali
A black man should be killed if he’s messing with a white woman. (…) We’ll kill anybody who tries to mess around with our women. Muhammed Ali
Special mention is due to Mohammed Ali. For in a very real sense he is the saint of this revolution in sports. He rebelled at a time when he, as an athlete, stood alone. He lost almost everything of value to any athlete – his prestige, his income and his title. But he maintained and enhanced the most crucial factor in the minds of black people everywhere – black dignity. … Young blacks and old revere him as a champion in the struggle for black liberation. … for a significant proportion of people – black people in particular – he is still champion and the warrior saint in the revolt of the black athlete. Harry Edwards (1969)
In the sanitised factory of Hollywood myth-making only sweetness and light prevail. Director Michael Mann downplays, for example, Ali the ruthless self-promoter, and glosses over the fighter’s devotion to the thuggish cult leader Elijah Mohammad. He also ignores the egregious race-baiting that Ali typically used to taunt boxing rivals. At the height of his fame, Ali loved to portray himself as the true black man whose faithfulness to his race made him superior to other fighters. Sonny Liston was an ugly bear, Ali ranted, who lived in a white neighbourhood and didn’t like his own people. Joe Louis was a shuffling Uncle Tom. Floyd Patterson was « a white man’s Negro, a yellow Negro », and George Foreman fought for « White America, Christianity, the flag and pork chops ». Under the influence of Elijah Mohammad – who preached that blacks should refuse to integrate with « white devils » – Ali made a point of dating only black women and lashed out at men and women who engaged in interracial sex. In an interview with Playboy, he declared: « A black man should be killed if he’s messing with a white woman. » When the interviewer asked about black women crossing the colour barrier, Ali responded: « Then she dies. Kill her, too. » It’s unlikely that a white athlete who made such remarks would receive the praise that Michael Mann heaps on Ali. He says that the fighter « personified racial pride and self-knowledge ». The Playboy journalist, who interviewed the boxer, was closer to the mark when he observed of his subject: « You’re beginning to sound like a carbon copy of a white racist. » But images are more powerful than words, and Ali’s unfortunate remarks do not diminish the mesmerising beauty of his moves in the ring. (…) The problem is that neither he nor his admirers can accept that he was the « greatest » only in the ring. They want him to be a social hero who changed the world by fighting injustice. As he approaches his 60th year – his birthday is January 17 – Ali is increasingly portrayed in the media as just such a hero, an icon of courage and integrity. Michael Mann’s film is meant to give this trend an enormous boost and thus to propel Ali into the orbit of superheroes who demand unquestioning admiration. But – to be honest – outside the ring, what is there to admire? His domestic life has been a shambles. During his heyday, he ran through wives (four in all) and girlfriends (too numerous to count) with amazing speed, never allowing his sex life to be impeded by his conversion to Islam or his vows to be faithful to one woman. (…) When Elijah and his henchmen threatened Malcolm X with death for daring to oppose the Nation of Islam, Ali stayed silent. In the early years of his career, he and Malcolm X were very close – almost like brothers – yet he kept his distance after Elijah turned against his friend and did not break with the Nation of Islam after Malcolm was assassinated. (Although all signs point to Elijah’s thugs as the killers, Michael Mann suggests that the FBI murdered Malcolm.) (…) One reason that Ali turned against his former hero Floyd Patterson is that the older boxer was so unsparing in his criticisms of the Black Muslims. A kind and dignified man, Patterson tried his best to lure Ali away from the fold, but soon gave up in frustration. Joe Louis was also alarmed by the racist attitudes of the group and warned Ali that he was being exploited. Like Patterson, he made a point of calling the young fighter by his original name. (…) His admirers often cite his opposition to the war as an example of his social importance. But lots of people opposed the war and went to prison for their beliefs. Ali, however, eventually won his case and was treated with much more deference than many other war resisters. Moreover, when he went back to boxing, he never explained why, in principle, it was acceptable to fight strangers in the ring, but not on the battlefield. How could he reconcile his pacifist claims with his often brutal aggressiveness against other boxers? A pacifist usually isn’t found at a boxing match screaming, as Ali once did: « Somebody’s gonna die at ringside tonight. » But this contradiction in the fighter’s position is now rarely mentioned. In the 1960s, however, it was difficult to ignore and the absurdity of it was widely ridiculed. The transformation of Ali from a great fighter to a celebrated man of conscience and social purpose has succeeded so well because the actual history of his career has been altered to reflect the kinder, gentler man of today. Unpleasant remarks or facts from the past have been swept away or excused. In a kind of history-free zone, the contemporary myth-makers in Hollywood and elsewhere blithely craft their heroes to suit some political agenda or cinematic formula. And, then, endowed with the smiling face of a film star, the retooled historical figure becomes difficult to resist. It’s one thing to criticise the real Ali, but who wants to question the charming Will Smith? At the end of Mann’s film, we see an amiable Ali sparring with young street kids after his « Rumble in the Jungle » with George Foreman. Corrupt and impoverished Zaire is made to seem like the Holy Land, a place where the great fighter has finally found his roots and a renewed sense of purpose. Little effort is made to show that the local strongman, President Mobutu, was a rapacious tyrant who robbed his country blind and who exploited Ali with as much zest as Elijah Mohammad. (…) A more historically accurate appraisal of Ali would conclude that he was far from heroic outside the ring and was pitifully misused by his masters in the Nation of Islam. For his purposes, Elijah hijacked the impressionable young man’s career and filled his head with racist nonsense. By the time he finally broke free of the old Nation of Islam, in the 1970s, his career was in its last stages. He continued to fight long past his prime, in part to recover the money and time he had lost in his misadventures with the Black Muslims. Today, he is paying the price of his mistakes, suffering from health problems exacerbated by overstaying his time in boxing. Looking at the sad toll that his life has exacted from his body, anyone should be able to see that his career was not that of a Hollywood romance but of an old-fashioned tragedy. By exchanging his « slave name » of Cassius Clay for the one that Elijah bestowed on him, he merely exchanged one form of perceived servitude for another form that was all too real and irretrievably damaging. Michael Shelden
Ali’s actions changed my standard of what constituted an athlete’s greatness. Possessing a killer jump shot or the ability to stop on a dime was no longer enough. What were you doing for the liberation of your people? What were you doing to help your country live up to the covenant of its founding principles? William Rhoden (NYT)
The Nation became Ali’s family and Elijah Muhammad became his father. But there is an irony to the fact that while the Nation branded white people as devils, Ali had more white colleagues than most African American people did at that time in America, and continued to have them throughout his career. Jerry Izenberg
‘One of the many paradoxes about Ali is that he embraced an ideology that disparaged white people; yet he was never cruel to white people, only blacks. Except for occasional humorous barbs, Ali’s white opponents were treated with dignity and respect. But things got ugly with Floyd Patterson, Ernie Terrell and Joe Frazier. And sure, Patterson and Terrell might have asked for it because of things they said. But Joe was innocent. And to deny the cruelty of what Ali did to Joe Frazier is to continue to be cruel to Joe. Randy Roberts (historian)
What’s happening to Ali now is typical of what has happened to so many black figures. It’s a commodification and a trivialisation. Maybe the idea is that, by embracing Ali as a society, we can feel good about having become more tolerant. Jeffrey Sammons (historian)
The Nation of Islam taught that white people were devils who had been genetically created by an evil scientist with a large head named Mr Yacub. It maintained there was a wheel-shaped, half-mile wide ‘Mother of Planes’ manned by black men in the sky and that, on Allah’s chosen day of retribution, 1,500 planes from this Mother of Planes would drop deadly explosives destroying all but the righteous on earth. Neither of these views is part of traditional Islamic thought or finds justification in the Koran. Moreover, while the concepts of Heaven and Hell are central to traditional Islamic doctrine, the Nation of Islam rejected both.
From 1964 through his conversion to orthodox Islam in 1975, Muhammad Ali was the Nation of Islam’s most visible and vocal spokesman in America. Nation of Islam teachings were at the core of who he was at that time in his life. Among the positions Ali preached were: On integration: ‘We who follow the teachings of Elijah Muhammad don’t want to be forced to integrate. Integration is wrong. We don’t want to live with the white man; that’s all.’ On intermarriage: ‘No intelligent black man or black woman in his or her right black mind wants white boys and white girls coming to their homes to marry their black sons and daughters.’ On the need for a separate black homeland: ‘Why don’t we get out and build our own nation? White people just don’t want their slaves to be free. That’s the whole thing. Why not let us go and build ourselves a nation? We want a country. We’re 40 million people, but we’ll never be free until we own our own land.’
In truth, it takes a certain amount of cruelty to be a great fighter. Let’s not forget that Ali beat people up and inflicted brain damage on them as his livelihood and way of life for years. And the time when he was at his peak as a fighter coincided with the time when he was most openly angry at the circumstances he found. (…) Ali’s legacy today is in danger of being protected in the same manner as the estate of Elvis Presley is protecting Elvis’s image. New generations are born; and to them Ali is more legend than reality, part of America’s distant past. (…) In sum, the experience of being black changed for millions of men and women because of Ali. But one of the reasons Ali had the impact he did was because there was an ugly edge to what he said. And by focusing on Ali’s ring exploits and his refusal to serve in Vietnam, while at the same time covering up the true nature of Nation of Islam doctrine, the current keepers of Ali’s legacy are losing sight of why he so enthralled and enraged segments of American society. (…) Ali stood up for his convictions and sacrificed a great deal for them. So why hide the true nature of what his principles were? (…) Great men are considered great, not only because of what they achieve, but also because of the road they travel to reach their final destination. Sanitising Muhammad Ali and rounding off the rough edges of his journey are a disservice both to history and to Ali himself. Rather than cultivate historical amnesia, we should cherish the memory of Ali as a warrior and as a gleaming symbol of defiance against an unjust social order when he was young. The Observer
J’ai lutté avec un alligator, je me suis battu avec une baleine, j’ai passé les menottes à un éclair et emprisonné la foudre. La semaine dernière encore, j’ai tué un rocher, blessé une pierre, fait hospitaliser une brique. Je suis si méchant que je rends la médecine malade. Mohamed Ali
Je vais le taper tellement fort qu’il aura besoin d’un chausse-pied pour mettre son chapeau. Mohamed Ali
Je suis si rapide que la nuit derrière, j’ai éteint la lumière dans ma chambre d’hôtel. J’étais dans mon lit avant que la pièce soit plongée dans l’obscurité. Mohamed Ali
Frazier est tellement moche que lorsqu’il pleure, ses larmes font le tour et passent derrière sa tête quand elles coulent. Mohamed Ali
Flotte comme un papillon, pique comme une abeille, ses mains ne peuvent frapper ce que ses yeux ne peuvent pas voir. Mohamed Ali
Je n’ai pas de problème avec les Vietcongs. Aucun Vietcong ne m’a jamais traité de nègre. Les Vietcongs sont des Asiatiques noirs. (…) Je ne veux pas avoir à combattre des Noirs. Mohamed Ali
Je suis musulman et tuer des gens innocents à Paris, San Bernardino ou n’importe où ailleurs dans le monde, ça n’a rien d’islamique. Les vrais musulmans savent que la violence impitoyable de soi-disant djihadistes islamiques va contre les principes mêmes de notre religion. Nous, musulmans, devons nous lever contre ceux qui utilisent l’islam pour faire avancer leur propre ordre du jour. Ils ont perverti la perception de l’islam. Les vrais musulmans savent ou devraient savoir que c’est contre notre religion d’essayer d’imposer l’Islam de force à quiconque. On ne m’a jamais accusé d’être politiquement correct, mais je crois que nos dirigeants politiques devraient utiliser leur position pour faire progresser la compréhension de la religion islamique et pour dire clairement que ces meurtriers égarés ont perverti les idées des gens sur ce qu’est l’islam. Mohamed Ali
Je voudrais que l’on se souvienne de moi comme d’un homme qui a remporté le titre de champion des poids lourds à trois reprises, qui avait de l’humour, et qui traitait chacun avec respect. Comme un homme qui n’a jamais regardé de haut ceux qui levaient les yeux vers lui, et qui a aidé autant de personnes qu’il a pu. Comme un homme qui s’est dressé pour défendre ses croyances, quelles qu’elles fussent. Comme un homme qui a tenté d’unir toute l’humanité à travers la foi et l’amour. Et si tout cela est trop demandé, je suppose que je me contenterai d’être seulement évoqué comme un grand boxeur qui est devenu le leader et le champion de son peuple. Et ça ne me dérangerait même pas, si les gens oubliaient comme j’étais mignon. Mohamed Ali
C’était quelqu’un de merveilleux, pas seulement comme boxeur mais comme être humain, comme icône. Mohamed Ali ne mourra jamais, il est comme Martin Luther King. Son esprit vivra à jamais. Don King
Long before he died, Muhammad Ali had been extolled by many as the greatest boxer in history. Some called him the greatest athlete of the 20th century. Still others, like George W. Bush, when he bestowed the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2005, endorsed Ali’s description of himself as “the greatest of all time.” Ali’s death Friday night sent the paeans and panegyrics to even more exalted heights. Fox Sports went so far as to proclaim Muhammad Ali nothing less than “the greatest athlete the world will ever see.” As a champion in the ring, Ali may have been without equal. But when his idolizers go beyond boxing and sports, exalting him as a champion of civil rights and tolerance, they spout pernicious nonsense. There have been spouters aplenty in the last few days — everyone from the NBA commissioner (“Ali transcended sports with his outsized personality and dedication to civil rights”) to the British prime minister (“a champion of civil rights”) to the junior senator from Massachusetts (“Muhammad Ali fought for civil rights . . . for human rights . . . for peace”). Time for a reality check. It is true that in his later years, Ali lent his name and prestige to altruistic activities and worthy public appeals. By then he was suffering from Parkinson’s disease, a cruel affliction that robbed him of his mental and physical keenness and increasingly forced him to rely on aides to make decisions on his behalf. But when Ali was in his prime, the uninhibited “king of the world,” he was no expounder of brotherhood and racial broad-mindedness. On the contrary, he was an unabashed bigot and racial separatist and wasn’t shy about saying so. In a wide-ranging 1968 interview with Bud Collins, the storied Boston Globe sports reporter, Ali insisted that it was as unnatural to expect blacks and whites to live together as it would be to expect humans to live with wild animals. “I don’t hate rattlesnakes, I don’t hate tigers — I just know I can’t get along with them,” he said. “I don’t want to try to eat with them or sleep with them.” Collins asked: “You don’t think that we can ever get along?” “I know whites and blacks cannot get along; this is nature,” Ali replied. That was why he liked George Wallace, the segregationist Alabama governor who was then running for president. Collins wasn’t sure he’d heard right. “You like George Wallace?” “Yes, sir,” said Ali. “I like what he says. He says Negroes shouldn’t force themselves in white neighborhoods, and white people shouldn’t have to move out of the neighborhood just because one Negro comes. Now that makes sense.” This was not some inexplicable aberration. It reflected a hateful worldview that Ali, as a devotee of Elijah Muhammad and the segregationist Nation of Islam, espoused for years. At one point, he even appeared before a Ku Klux Klan rally. It was “a hell of a scene,” he later boasted — Klansmen with hoods, a burning cross, “and me on the platform,” preaching strict racial separation. “Black people should marry their own women,” Ali declaimed. “Bluebirds with bluebirds, red birds with red birds, pigeons with pigeons, eagles with eagles. God didn’t make no mistake!” In 1975, amid the frenzy over the impending “Thrilla in Manila,” his third title fight with Joe Frazier, Ali argued vehemently in a Playboy interview that interracial couples ought to be lynched. “A black man should be killed if he’s messing with a white woman,” he said. And it was the same for a white man making a pass at a black woman. “We’ll kill anybody who tries to mess around with our women.” But suppose the black woman wanted to be with the white man, the interviewer asked. “Then she dies,” Ali answered. “Kill her too.” Jeff Jacoby
Muhammad Ali was the most controversial boxer in the history of the sport, arguably the most gifted and certainly the best known. His ring glories and his life on the political and racial frontline combine to make him one of the most famous, infamous and discussed figures in modern history. During his life he stood next to Malcolm X at a fiery pulpit, dined with tyrants, kings, crooks, vagabonds, billionaires and from the shell of his awful stumbling silence during the last decade his deification was complete as he struggled with his troubled smile at each rich compliment. (…) He was a one-man revolution and that means he made enemies faster than any boy-fighter – which is what he was when he first became world heavyweight champion – could handle. (…) but (…) His best years as a prize-fighter were denied him and denied us by his refusal to be drafted into the American military system in 1967. At that time he was boxing’s finest fighter, a man so gifted with skills that he knew very little about what his body did in the ring; his instincts, his speed and his developing power at that point of his exile would have ended all arguments over his greatness forever had he been allowed to continue fighting. Ali was out of the ring for three years and seven months and the forced exile took away enough of his skills to deny us the Greatest at his greatest, but it made him the icon he became. “We never saw the best of my guy,” Angelo Dundee told me in Mexico City in 1993. Dundee should know. He had been collecting the fighter’s sweat as the chief trainer from 1960 and would until the ring end in 1981. (…) He had gained universal respect during the break because of his refusal to endorse the bloody conflict in Vietnam, but he often walked a thin line in the 70s with the very people that had been happy to back his cause. He was not as loved then as he is now, and there are some obvious reasons for that. In 1970 there were still papers in Britain that called him Cassius Clay, the birth name he had started to shred the day after beating Sonny Liston for the world title in 1964. In America he still divided the boxing press and the people. In the 70s he attended a Ku Klux Klan meeting, accepted their awards and talked openly and disturbingly about mixed race marriages and a stance he shared with the extremists. His harshest opinions are always overlooked, discarded like his excessive cruelty in the ring, and explained by a misguided concept that everything he said and did, that was either uncomfortable or just wrong, was justifiable under some type of Ali law that insisted there was a twinkle in his eye. There probably was a twinkle in his eye but he had some misguided racist ideas back then and celebrated them. In the ring he had hurt and made people suffer during one-sided fights and spat at the feet of one opponent. He was mean and there is nothing wrong with that in boxing, but he was also cruel to honest fighters, men that had very little of his talent and certainly none of his wealth. The way he treated Joe Frazier before and after their three fights remains a shameful blot on Ali’s legacy. I sat once in dwindling light with Frazier in Philadelphia at the end of three days of talking and listened to his words and watched his tears of hate and utter frustration as he outlined the harm Ali’s words had caused him and his family. Big soft Joe had no problem with the damage Ali’s fists had caused him, that was a fair fight but the verbal slaughter had been a mismatch and recordings of that still make me feel sick. I don’t laugh at that type of abuse. (…) Away from the ring excellence he went to cities in the Middle East to negotiate for the release of hostages and smiled easily when men in masks, carrying AK47s, put blindfolds on him and drove like the lunatics they were through bombed streets. “Hey man, you sure you know where you’re going?” he asked one driver. “I hope you do, coz I can’t see a thing.” He went on too many missions to too many countries for too long, his drive draining his life as he handed out Islamic leaflets. He was often exploited on his many trips, pulled every way and never refusing a request. On a trip to Britain in 2009 he was bussed all over the country for a series of bad-taste dinners that ended with people squatting down next to his wheelchair; Ali’s gaze was off in another realm, but the punters, who had paid hundreds for the sickening pleasure, stuck up their thumbs or made fists for the picture. The great twist in the abhorrent venture was that Ali’s face looked so bad that his head was photo-shopped for a more acceptable Ali face. Who could have possibly sanctioned that atrocity? During his fighting days he had men to protect him, men like Gene Kilroy, the man with the perm, that loved him and helped form a protective guard at his feet to keep the jackals from the meat. When he left the sport and was alone for the first time in the real world, there were people that fought each other to get close, close enough to insert their invisible transfusion tubes deep into his open heart. His daughters started to resurrect their own wall of protection the older they got, switching duties from sitting on Daddy’s lap to watching his back like the devoted sentinels they became. In the end it felt like the whole world was watching his back, watching the last moments under the neon of the King of the World. Steve Bunce
I think Ali is being done a disservice by the way in which he’s these days cast as benign. He was always a lot more complicated than that. (…) Ali has been post-rationalised as a champion of the civil rights movement. But far from promoting the idea of black and white together, his was a much more tricky, divisive politics. John Dower
Far from being embarrassed about sharing jaw-time with the Grand Chief Bigot or whatever the loon in the sheet called himself, Ali boasted about it. The revelation of his cosy chats with white supremacists comes in a television documentary screened on More4. As Ali finds himself overtaken as the most celebrated black American in history, True Stories: Thrilla In Manila provides a timely re-assessment of his politics. (…) Before his third fight with Frazier, Ali was at his most elevated, symbolically as well as in the ring. Hard to imagine when these days he elicits universal reverence, back then he was a figure who divided America, as loathed as he was admired. At the time he was taking his lead from the Nation of Islam, which, in its espousal of a black separatism, found its politics dovetailing with the cross-burning lynch mob out on the political boondocks. Ali was by far the organisation’s most prominent cipher. The film reminds us why. Back then, black sporting prowess reinforced many a prejudiced theory about the black man being good for nothing beyond physical activity. But here was Ali, as quick with his mind as with his fists. When he held court the world listened. Intriguingly, the film reveals, many of his better lines were scripted for him by his Nation of Islam minders. Ferdie Pacheco, the man who converted Ali to the bizarre cause which insisted that a spaceship would imminently arrive in the United States to take the black man to a better place, tells Dower’s cameras that it was he who came up with the line, « No Viet Cong ever called me nigger ». There was never a more succinct summary of America’s hypocrisy in forcing its beleaguered black citizenry to fight in Vietnam. (…) The film suggests it was his opponent who got the blunt end of Ali’s political bludgeon. The pair were once friends and Frazier had supported Ali’s stance on refusing the draft. But leading up to the fight Ali turned on his old mate with a ferocity which makes uncomfortable viewing even 30 years on. Viciously disparaging of Frazier, he calls him an Uncle Tom, a white man’s puppet. Ali riled Frazier to the point where he entered the ring so infuriated that he abandoned his game plan and blindly struck out. So distracted was he by Ali’s politically motivated jibes, he lost. Indeed, what we might be watching in Dower’s film is not so much the apex of Ali’s political potency as the birth of sporting mind games. Jim White
In 1974, in the middle of a Michael Parkinson interview, Muhammad Ali decided to dispense with all the safe conventions of chat show etiquette. “You say I got white friends,” he declared, “I say they are associates.” When his host dared to suggest that the boxer’s trainer of 14 years standing, Angelo Dundee, might be a friend, Ali insisted, gruffly: “He is an associate.” Within seconds, with Parkinson failing to get a word in edgeways, Ali had provided a detailed account of his reasoning. “Elijah Muhammad,” he told the TV viewers of 1970s Middle England, “Is the one who preached that the white man of America, number one, is the Devil!” The whites of America, said Ali, had “lynched us, raped us, castrated us, tarred and feathered us … Elijah Muhammad has been preaching that the white man of America – God taught him – is the blue-eyed, blond-headed Devil! No good in him, no justice, he’s gonna be destroyed! “The white man is the Devil. We do believe that. We know it!” In one explosive, virtuoso performance, Ali had turned “this little TV show” into an exposition of his beliefs, and the beliefs of “two million five hundred” other followers of the radically – to some white minds, dangerously – black separatist religious movement, the Nation of Islam. At the height of his tirade, Ali drew slightly nervous laughter from the studio when he told Parkinson “You are too small mentally to tackle me on anything I represent.” (…) By the time he met Ali in 1962, Malcolm X was Elijah Muhammad’s chief spokesman and most prominent apostle. His belief that violence was sometimes necessary, and the Nation of Islam’s insistence that followers remain separate from and avoid participation in American politics meant that not every civil rights leader welcomed Muhammad Ali joining the movement. “When Cassius Clay joined the Black Muslims [The Nation of Islam],” said Martin Luther King, “he became a champion of racial segregation, and that is what we are fighting against.” The bitter irony is that soon after providing the Nation of Islam with its most famous convert, Malcolm X became disillusioned with the movement. A trip to Mecca exposed him to white Muslims, shattering his belief that whites were inherently evil. He broke from the Nation of Islam and toned down his speeches. Ali, though, remained faithful to Elijah Muhammad. “Turning my back on Malcolm,” he admitted years later, “Was one of the mistakes that I regret most in my life.” (…) By then, though, Ali’s own attitudes to the « blue-eyed devils” had long since mellowed. In 1975 he converted to the far more conventional Sunni Islam – possibly prompted by the fact that Elijah Muhammad had died of congestive heart failure in the same year, and his son Warith Deen Mohammad had moved the Nation of Islam towards inclusion in the mainstream Islamic community. He rebranded the movement the “World Community of Islam in the West”, only for Farrakhan to break away in 1978 and create a new Nation of Islam, which he claimed remained true to the teachings of “the Master” [Fard]. “The Nation of Islam taught that white people were devils,” he wrote in 2004. “I don’t believe that now; in fact, I never really believed that. But when I was young, I had seen and heard so many horrible stories about the white man that this made me stop and listen. » The attentive listener to the 1974 interview, might, in fact, have sensed that even then Ali wasn’t entirely convinced about white men being blue-eyed devils. He had, after all, set the bar pretty high for “associates” like Angelo Dundee to become friends. “I don’t have one black friend hardly,” he had said. “A friend is one who will not even consider [before] giving his life for you.” And, despite calling Parky “the biggest hypocrite in the world” and “a joke”, he could also get a laugh by reassuring the chat show host: “I know you [are] all right.” Adam Lusher
It would be hard to imagine two people, let alone two sportsmen of the same era, whose personalities diverged as much as theirs did. Ashe was cautious and cerebral, Ali brash and outrageous. Ashe excelled in a genteel sport, Ali in a brutal one. Ali refused to be drafted into the Vietnam War; Ashe was a lieutenant in the U.S. Army. Ali joined the separatist Nation of Islam and befriended Malcolm X; Ashe dedicated his life to the cause of Martin Luther King and integration. If we think of Ali by his given name, Cassius Clay, even their surnames—Clay and Ashe—represent opposing states of matter. Yet it was fitting that they should be honored together on a night of African-American celebration. During the same tumultuous period, they had proved what a powerful impact engaged athletes can have on the world. Ashe had once said of Ali, “He was largely responsible for it becoming an expected part of a black athlete’s responsibility to get involved.” Ashe was one of those who had followed Ali’s lead. Ali and Ashe were born within a year of each other, in 1942 and 1943, respectively, in large cities in the segregated South. Ali grew up in Louisville, Ashe in Richmond. Their lives would run on parallel tracks for five decades, as each rose to the top of his sport and, at the same time, transcended it. They became spokesmen for African-Americans during the revolutionary ’60s, took their messages to Africa in the ’70s, and recorded their final triumphs in 1975. Through the ’80s, each man would show courage in the face of tragically early physical deterioration. Ali and Ashe brought different messages to a country, and a black community, that had been upended by civil rights. Ali’s experience as an African-American in the South led him to believe that the U.S. would never live up to its professed ideals of equality when it came to blacks; Ashe’s experience led him to try to prove that the nation could. Their lives can be read as a conversation about what it means to be an African-American and, by extension, what it means to be American. (…) In 1955, Ali—then known as Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr.—turned 13 in Louisville and Ashe turned 12 in Richmond. That summer, both boys were deeply affected by the story of another African-American their age, from Chicago. While visiting relatives in Mississippi, it is believed 14-year-old Emmett Till had made the fatal mistake of calling a white cashier at a grocery store “baby.” Four days later, the woman’s husband and half brother dragged Till out of his great-uncle’s house, beat him, gouged out his eye, shot him in the head, and dumped his body in the Tallahatchie River. At the same time that Till’s death was confirming Cassius Clay Sr.’s sense of injustice in Louisville, it was also confirming the long-held fears of Arthur Ashe Sr. in Richmond. Ashe, a single father whose wife, Mattie, had died five years earlier, was a stern, responsible (…) maintenance man who watched over his two sons, Arthur Jr. and Johnnie, closely. Now his efforts were given a new sense of urgency. (…) Ashe Sr. believed that trouble lurked in all directions for young African-Americans in Richmond, and did his best to help his elder son navigate the all-powerful white world that surrounded him. Each day, Arthur Jr. was expected to return home 10 minutes after the final bell at school rang, and he was never to argue with whites or blame them for his problems. Young Arthur, naturally deferential, did as he was told. (…) Ashe, a straight-A student, became famous for his thoughtful reserve and his ability to move easily between white and black worlds. But he would also be accused of not being militant enough in the African-American cause. (…) The self-effacing patience and prudence Ashe learned in Richmond were just as much a product of the black experience in the South as the self-dramatizing rebelliousness that Ali learned from his own father in Louisville. By the time Ali and Ashe entered their teens, each had found a refuge from their highly circumscribed surroundings. The boxing ring and the tennis court became places where they could remake their worlds the way they wanted. (..) By 1960, the 18-year-old Clay was accomplished enough to win a gold medal at the Olympics in Rome. The ring wasn’t a place of violence for Clay; it was a stage where he could express the showmanship and artistry that he had inherited from his father. Clay won with speed rather than power. Ashe discovered tennis at age 7, when his father took a job as a policeman at one of Richmond’s segregated recreational facilities, Brookfield Park. The younger Ashe may not have seemed a likely future tennis champion; in the 1950s, the sport was still the province of exclusive all-white clubs. But with daily access to the courts at Brookfield, he quickly caught the eye of local teaching pro Ron Charity. Like Cassius Clay, Ashe’s playing style belied his personality. Cautious off court, he was a slashing, risk-taking attacker on it. By the time he was 10, Ashe’s reputation had spread as far as Lynchburg, Va., and the home of Dr. Robert Walter Johnson. In between his medical rounds, Johnson had pioneered the idea of the junior tennis academy on a court in his backyard. His goal was to develop the Jackie Robinson of tennis, a player good enough to break the sport’s color barrier and beat whites at their own game. In 1950, he succeeded when his star student, Althea Gibson, became the first African-American to compete in the U.S. Nationals (now the U.S. Open). As the ’50s continued, Johnson found a new goal: mentoring a black player who could win the National Interscholastic Championships, an annual all-white tournament held at the University of Virginia. It was one thing to integrate an international event in New York, another to do it in the South. Johnson was adamant; he didn’t just want a black player to enter the Interscholastics, he wanted one to win it. “What made me maddest,” Johnson told Time magazine two years before his death in 1971, “was this idea that colored athletes were only good as sprinters or strong boys, who couldn’t learn…finesse.” To break tennis’ color barrier, Johnson believed he needed not just a standout athlete, but one who also possessed manners that were beyond reproach. “Never question a line call, never confront anyone on a court,” is how one student of Johnson’s described his philosophy. “If one of us was to challenge a player, they [officials at white tournaments] might say, ‘See, this is why we don’t let them in.’” Ashe, it was soon apparent, was the perfect vessel for Johnson’s ideas about decorum, as well as his regimented training program. “I always did exactly what Dr. Johnson told me to do,” Ashe said. “Usually, his strategy was right.” In 1961, eight years after joining Johnson’s program, Ashe fulfilled the older man’s dream by winning the Interscholastics. Ashe would not only be the first black winner of the tournament, he would also be its last winner in the South. That same year, after hosting the tournament for 14 years, the University of Virginia asked to have it moved elsewhere. Clay and Ashe entered the 1960s as two of the most promising young African-American athletes. What each of them would mean to this revolutionary era was summed up in a pair of magazine covers that appeared in 1968, the year when that decade reached its unruly nadir. In April, Esquire portrayed the boxer—now with a new name—as St. Sebastian, pierced by arrows, above the headline “The Passion of Muhammad Ali.” Esquire was the bible of the counterculture, and Ali one of its icons. Three months later, Ashe appeared on the cover of Life. He was photographed playing tennis, in all-white clothes, under the headline “The Icy Elegance of Arthur Ashe.” While Esquire was the hip chronicler of ‘60s youth, Life was the graying photo album of the establishment. Ashe was celebrated in its pages for his calm under pressure, and held up as an antiradical black athlete—an anti-Ali. How had Ali gone from smiling gold medalist in 1960 to being shot through with metaphorical arrows eight years later? The transition began in 1964 when, as a 7–1 underdog, Clay upset heavyweight champion Sonny Liston in Miami. Liston was a glowering ex-con, while the other heavyweight contender of that era, Floyd Patterson, was his opposite: polite, nonthreatening, a favorite of liberals. Ali didn’t fit either mold. He was youthful, charismatic, funny, and he didn’t defer to anyone. It was only a matter of time before he would test the limits of white America’s tolerance for a confident black athlete. That tolerance began to crack soon after the Liston fight, when Clay revealed that he had joined Elijah Muhammad’s Nation of Islam, and that the group’s leader had chosen a new name for him, Muhammad Ali. Ali never shared Muhammad’s belief that whites were “blue-eyed devils,” but he respected the fact that he “made people feel it was good to be black.” Many viewed the Nation as a criminal organization, and longtime boxing writers viewed Clay’s—they refused to call him Ali—association with it as an act of treason. Ali’s revelation in ’64 that he was a Muslim made him unpopular with many Americans; his announcement three years later that he wouldn’t fight for his country turned him into public enemy No. 1. The day after Ali announced his conversion, FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, who feared the destabilizing influence of the Black Muslims, instructed his agents to look into the young troublemaker’s draft status. It turned out that, six weeks earlier, Ali had failed an Army intelligence test. “I said I was the greatest, not the smartest,” Ali joked. Unable to force Ali to pass its aptitude tests, the Pentagon decided to lower its standards. Ali had scored between the 16th and 18th percentile; in November 1965, the passing grade was conveniently dropped from the 30th to the 15th, and Ali was made eligible for the draft. According to reporter Robert Lipsyte, who was with Ali in Miami when he got the news, “Somebody asked, ‘What do you think about the Vietcong?’ By this time, [Ali] was angry, tired, pissed off, and he gave his quote, which is, ‘I ain’t got nothing against them Vietcong.’” “With that one sentence about the Vietcong,” columnist Jerry Izenberg told Bingham and Wallace, “Ali became the patron saint of the anti-war movement. Before that, none of the protesters could really articulate why they were against the war. He gave them the reason.” In April 1967, Ali, claiming that his role as a minister of Islam should make him exempt, refused to step forward to be drafted. For that he was stripped of his heavyweight title, banned from boxing for three years, and sentenced to five years in prison; it took a jury about 20 minutes to find him guilty. Yet Ali’s antiwar commitment only deepened. From 1967 to ’70, as his case made its circuitous way through the courts, Ali traveled the country giving antiwar speeches. Through his fiery words, he helped change mainstream America’s attitude toward the war, and toward himself. Nowhere was Ali’s impact on the country more obvious than in the verdict that the Supreme Court handed down in 1971. Four years earlier, Ali had been quickly and decisively found guilty of draft evasion; now the country’s highest court unanimously upheld his status as a conscientious objector. While Ali was telling the world that he didn’t have anything against those Vietcong in early 1966, Arthur Ashe was flying to Fort Lewis, Wash., to begin six weeks of basic training with the Army. Ali saw segregation as fundamental to the United States. Ashe saw it as a regional derangement to be cured, a way of life that was ultimately antithetical to the nation’s character. Ashe’s attitude can be summed up in his feelings about Davis Cup, tennis’s international team event. Nothing would give him more satisfaction than becoming the first black man to be chosen for the U.S. team. (…) Ashe began the ’60s by joining the Reserve Officers Training Corps (ROTC) at UCLA. Ashe’s uncles had fought in the Marines and the Navy, and his younger brother, Johnnie, would join the Marines and fight in Vietnam. In college, Ashe was a study in moderation when it came to political and racial issues. He thought deeply about the problems, but took no part in the demonstrations after the Watts riots in L.A. in 1965, and didn’t travel back to the South for the protests against segregation there. When Ashe listened to the speeches of African-American activists at UCLA, he heard echoes of the white segregationists he had happily left behind in the South. Unlike Ali, Ashe believed that civil rights had made a difference, and that racial progress in the U.S. was possible. For the war effort, Ashe played exhibitions, met with troops, and worked as a tennis coach at West Point. He got to hit balls rather than dodge bullets, while the Army got to show off an African-American officer and star athlete in its ranks. It was the type of arrangement that Ali, who was offered the chance to put on boxing exhibitions for the Army instead of fighting, had risked jail time to reject. By 1968, Ashe could no longer resist the pull of politics or the example of Ali. This was the year of the Revolt of the Black Athlete, illustrated most vividly by U.S. sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos, who raised gloved fists on the medal stand at the Mexico City Olympics. At a meeting of black athletes that year, Jesse Jackson challenged Ashe to use his fame to greater effect. (…) In March 1968, Ashe accepted an invitation to speak at the Church of the Redeemer in Washington, D.C., from the same pulpit where Stokely Carmichael, the man who coined the term “black power” two years earlier, had recently given an impassioned oration. Ashe’s speech was modest by comparison. He emphasized personal responsibility—“poverty is half laziness,” he asserted—and echoed the words of King. According to Ashe, African-Americans needed militants like Carmichael to lead, but they also needed moderates like himself to back them up. The mostly black congregation gave him a standing ovation. Ashe now knew that his words mattered, and his self-assurance grew accordingly. Six months later, he would become the first black man to win the U.S. Open. As he stood on the trophy stand at Forest Hills with his arm around his father, Ashe’s win was hailed as a victory for race relations in America. But it hadn’t come without controversy. In the quarterfinals, Ashe had faced his friend, Cliff Drysdale of South Africa. There was talk that Ashe, a child of segregation, should withdraw to protest apartheid; earlier that year, he had told a reporter that he would consider such a boycott. But Ashe, who knew that Drysdale was against segregation, decided to play. When he won the match, Ashe was saluted by New York sportswriter Arthur Daley. “He proved his own superiority,” Daley wrote. “If he had withdrawn in protest, he would have proved nothing.” To Daley, “direct confrontation” was the best way for this black athlete to deal with the situation in South Africa. Over the next five years, Ashe would put that theory to the test. (…) It was November 1973, and Ashe was fulfilling a long-held but still controversial dream: becoming the first black man to play in the South African Open. In 1970, Ashe had applied for a visa into the country. Instead, he had been banned by the South African government. Saying, as he had, that “I just want to take an H-bomb and drop it right on Johannesburg” probably hadn’t helped his cause. Ashe’s 1969 ban only made him more determined to isolate South Africa from the international community. The following year, he succeeded in having the nation suspended from the Davis Cup, and he began to travel in other parts of Africa. In 1971, on a visit to Cameroon, Ashe singled out a talented 11-year-old named Yannick Noah for further attention. Seven years later, they would play doubles together at Wimbledon. Finally, in 1973, talks began between Ashe, the South African government, and the promoters of the South African Open about bringing him to Johannesburg. Many people, believing that the regime would only use Ashe to make itself look humane and reasonable, tried to persuade him not to make the trip. But Ashe thought that the sight of a free black man competing with whites, and beating them, would offer hope. (…) four decades later, many people, including Drysdale, now view the trip as a starting point in the eventual demise of apartheid. Ashe had used sports to crack open a door; over the next two decades, he would use his powers as an anti-apartheid activist—he was arrested during a protest in Washington, D.C., in 1985—to help push that door wide open. (…) Eleven months after Ashe departed Johannesburg, Muhammad Ali began his own journey to Africa. The boxer’s excursion, not surprisingly, wasn’t quite as sober-minded as the tennis player’s. Ali went to Zaire to fight George Foreman, the fear-inspiring Texas slugger, in what became known as the Rumble in the Jungle. (…) He had been back in the ring for three years, and was still looking to reclaim his belt; now he had a chance to take it back from Foreman. Ali spent two months in Africa regaling the press with tales of how “I done wrestled with an alligator, I done tussled with a whale; handcuffed lightning, thrown thunder in jail.” Ali also injected political drama into the proceedings. He cast Foreman as a symbol of colonialism and U.S. hegemony to the Zaireans, and cast himself as the native African. (…) It worked; the Zaireans rallied around Ali. The global respect he had earned by refusing to fight in Vietnam preceded him even here. Ali had no trouble whipping 60,000 people into a deafening chant of “Ali, bomaye!”— “Ali, kill him!” In truth, while Ali and Ashe had been successful as activists, by 1974 it had been some time since either had won anything significant as athletes. Ali had been stripped of his belt seven years earlier, and had yet to win it back. Ashe hadn’t won a major title since the U.S. Open in 1968. A new generation of pros, led by Jimmy Connors and Bjorn Borg, had leaped in while he wasn’t looking. But in 1974 and ’75 Ali and Ashe were rewarded for their good works with three career-capping triumphs. Each man would, in the words of Ali, rope a dope. Ali invented the tactic in the second round of his fight with Foreman. After spending two months telling the world that he was going to dance Foreman to death, Ali retreated to the ropes and made himself an easy target for his opponent’s roundhouse blows. By the sixth round, Foreman had done what Ali thought he would do: punched himself out. Ali asked, “That’s all you got, George?” and then, when the eighth round started, told him, “Now it’s my turn.” In the closing seconds of that round, Ali climbed off the ropes, popped Foreman with a right hand to the face, and sent the giant tumbling. Ali was champion again. As with Foreman, it was widely believed that the 22-year-old Connors was unbeatable. The Brash Basher from Belleville had won the tournament the previous year and was No. 1 in the world. In 1974 he had gone 99–4, and there was talk in the locker room about how he would “go on winning everything for years.” But there was one person in that room at Wimbledon who had to believe he could beat Connors. After winning his semifinal in five sets, Ashe walked into the player lounge and watched Connors shred their countryman Roscoe Tanner. Tanner was the game’s hardest server, but every ball he hit came back even harder from Connors. Now Ashe knew that his usual hammer-and-tongs aggressiveness wasn’t going to work. Could he do something different, just once? (…) Before the final, Ashe huddled with his agent, Donald Dell, and fellow player Dennis Ralston, and came up with a plan based on the rope-a-dope. Instead of feeding Connors, a born counterpuncher, the pace he craved, Ashe would slice and dice. Instead of cracking the flat serve he loved, and which Connors loved to crack back, Ashe would bend it away from him. But not all of Ashe’s tactics were ripped from the Ali playbook. Where he cast Foreman as the American in their fight, Ashe claimed that status for himself at Wimbledon. He walked onto Centre Court wearing his red-and-blue Davis Cup team jacket, with “USA” emblazoned across the back. It was a not-so-subtle message to Connors, a self-styled maverick who had refused to play for his country that year. Ashe’s strategy worked perfectly. He rolled the ball gently, swung Connors from side to side, and gave him no punches to counter. Ashe won the first two sets 6–1, 6–1. In the end, like Ali, he let rip two knockout backhands to break serve in the fourth set. When tennis historians speak of strategic masterpieces, this is the match they point to first. After his final winner, Ashe turned to his player box and raised his fist, briefly, in celebration. He had become the first black man to win Wimbledon, and many believed he was making a black-power salute. Ashe said it was merely a gesture of triumph toward his friend Dell. But he also said he was happy, later, to hear that “Among blacks, I’ve had quite a few say [the win] was up there with Joe Louis in his prime and Jackie Robinson breaking in with the Dodgers in 1947.” Ashe and Ali were born at the same time, became politically aware at the same time, and reached the summits of their sports at the same time. They would also suffer physical decline at the same time. (…) Ali had begun to show the symptoms—slurred speech, slowed reactions—that would be diagnosed as Parkinson’s disease in 1984. Four years after winning Wimbledon, in July 1979, Ashe suffered a heart attack while teaching a tennis clinic in New York. After two rounds of heart surgery, it was discovered in 1988 that he had contracted HIV from a blood transfusion. He died of pneumonia, a complication of AIDS, on February 6, 1993. Ashe and Ali ended their lives as they had lived them, with courage and a flair for the dramatic. In 1992, Ashe stood bravely before TV cameras to confirm that the stories circulating that he had AIDS were true. Four years later in Atlanta, Ali delighted the world when he appeared, seemingly from nowhere, to light the Olympic torch. Stephen Tignor
Ce livre coup de poing retrace le destin hors du commun d’un boxeur de légende, né Cassius Clay, devenu champion du monde de boxe poids lourds. Découvrez les multiples facettes de cet athlète aux combats héroïques, à la fois homme de spectacle, poète et penseur engagé. Agrémenté de superbes photographies, cet ouvrage est un hommage incontournable au talent, aux exploits et à la personnalité d’un des plus grands sportifs de l’Histoire. Decitre
Né Cassius Clay, il était devenu Mohamed Ali après sa conversion à l’islam. Figure légendaire de la boxe à travers le monde, il était devenu le champion du monde poids lourds, mais derrière l’athlète hors du commun, un homme s’est révélé, capable de mener des combats héroïques. Tout à la fois homme de spectacle, poète et penseur engagé, Mohamed Ali fut une figure majeure des sportifs du XXe siècle. ActuaLitté
Avec Mohamed Ali disparaît la première vedette à notoriété globale et absolue –le sportif le plus photogénique du XXe siècle fut longtemps le visage le plus reconnu de la planète. Les Beatles étaient peut-être les premières stars planétaires (ou, plus justement, du monde occidental) mais Ali seul était connu de tous, Noir ou Blanc, habitant du tiers-monde ou Américain repu. Avant de devenir l’astre mort vaguement sanctifié des trois dernières décennies, condamné au silence et aux tremblements par Parkinson, le boxeur était tout à la fois: l’athlète ultime, le corps politique, le gentil et le méchant, la radicalité et l’œcuménisme. Dans une catégorie où il a longtemps s’agit d’être le plus dur, Ali a révolutionné la boxe des lourds en devenant le plus intelligent. Conteur de sa geste allant jusqu’à jouer son propre rôle dans son biopic (The Greatest, 1977), promoteur à la verve inégalée, Ali le rimailleur impénitent a inventé le trash talk, l’insulte comme premier jab. Héraut de la fierté noire des années 60, l’activiste a imposé sa célébrité omnipotente et envahi tous les champs: sportif, politique, médiatique, culturel. Manipulateur roublard mais sincère, il a transcendé tout événement le touchant en histoire (avec et sans majuscule), qu’il s’agisse de multiplier les «combats du siècle» ou de libérer des otages à Bagdad en pleine guerre du Golfe. «La plus grande attraction du monde depuis l’invention du cinéma parlant», dixit l’intéressé, est aussi l’une des premières figures de subversion pop, dont le seul égal est Che Guevara – en témoignent leurs effigies respectives encore affichées dans nombre chambres d’ados. (…) inflexible et éloquent, Ali est devenu une figure incontestée de la contre-culture, adorée dans les ghettos comme dans les facs où il vient discourir sur le racisme et le pacifisme. (…) Hors du ring, le cirque Ali grandit exponentiellement, l’argent aussitôt gagné s’évanouit. Un entourage pléthorique l’accompagne, il entretient deux ex-femmes, couve son épouse –la tempétueuse et ceinture noire de karaté Belinda, épousé à 17 ans en 1967– et ses maîtresses. Il a huit enfants, une ferme dans le Michigan, un palace à Chicago, une villa à Los Angeles et un camp d’entraînement en Pennsylvanie, des Cadillac de toutes les couleurs… Son manager, Herbert Mohamed, trouve une ficelle pour rentabiliser la marque: l’export diplomatique, résumé dans un haïku: «invitez Ali à combattre / et votre pays sera sous les projecteurs du monde entier». C’est ainsi qu’avec l’entregent du promoteur mégalo Don King, Ali débarque à Kinshasa en 1974 pour retrouver son dû, flanqué de James Brown, B.B. King et Norman Mailer (entre autres) pour défier George Foreman devant Mobutu, qui a allongé 10 millions de dollars pour l’occasion, et n’a pas peur de ruiner le pays pour accommoder les deux boxeurs. (…) L’année suivante, il pose son dernier jalon mythologique chez un autre autocrate exotique. La belle entre Frazier et Ali a lieu aux Philippines, alors sous la loi martiale décrétée par le président Ferdinand Marcos. A Manille, Ali pousse la dégueulasserie de son trash talk dans ses derniers retranchements. Agitant un singe en plastique devant les journalistes, il compare constamment Frazier à un gorille repoussant, insiste sur ses traits fins en comparaison avec le visage censément simiesque de son adversaire. Ali, bien plus tard, s’en excusera. Frazier ne pardonnera jamais. (…) Ali n’était pas un saint, il pouvait même carrément être un salaud –Joe Frazier en savait quelque chose (…) Certaines de ses victoires ont l’odeur de soufre et le flou artistique qui font le sel du sport d’avant les ralentis à la milliseconde et autres palettes graphiques. Libération
En 1984, on lui diagnostique la maladie de Parkinson. L’homme consacre alors son existence à délivrer un message de paix, celui qu’il dit avoir trouvé dans l’islam. Il a même une étoile sur Hollywood Boulevard, à Los Angeles. Mais elle est accrochée sur un mur à l’entrée du Kodak Theater, et non placée sur le trottoir comme pour les autres stars, car il ne souhaite pas qu’on piétine le nom du Prophète. Le Monde
Après sa victoire contre Liston, en 1965, je me suis retrouvé avec Ali dans son motel. Un Mexicain lui a demandé un autographe et lui a dit qu’il avait beaucoup d’amis au Mexique. Ali a répondu : ’’Mexico ? Ah oui, tant mieux. Comment écrivez-vous Mexico ? Je ne suis pas allé à l’école longtemps. William Klein (réalisateur de Muhammad Ali, the Greatest, 1969)
Malgré toutes ses qualités de boxeur, Ali a survécu à de nombreux moments difficiles en étant un grand bluffeur. Il était dur à toucher, et quand vous arriviez enfin à l’atteindre, il se montrait plus intelligent… Vous pouviez lui faire mal et ne jamais vous en rendre compte. De son propre aveu, je l’ai mis en difficulté une fois ou deux, mais je ne m’en suis jamais rendu compte. George Chuvalo
Mains basses, menton au vent. La vitesse d’un welter et la frappe d’un lourd. Au début des années 60, le style d’Ali est une parfaite hérésie. Campé derrière un excellent jab (le direct du bras avant), il boxe sur le reculoir, élude les frappes par ses mouvements de buste. «Il n’a sans doute pas le punch de Louis et Marciano, écrit George Peeters, envoyé spécial de L’Equipe après la victoire d’Ali face à Henry Cooper, en 1966. Mais sa morphologie, sa classe et surtout sa prodigieuse mobilité lui ont permis de créer une sorte de style, un jeu sans précédent chez les hommes de son poids et où l’intelligence affleure à chaque geste.» Sans être un grand puncher, Ali épuise ses adversaires par des séries précises et incessantes. Mais à boxer les mains basses, sa carrière a souvent frôlé le désastre. (…) Après trois ans d’inactivité (1967-1970), conséquence de son refus d’aller au Vietnam, Ali ne sera plus jamais le même. A 27 ans, l’homme qui «vole comme un papillon» et «pique comme l’abeille» n’est plus qu’un lointain souvenir. Plus statique, Ali se découvre alors des qualités d’encaisseur insoupçonnées. Alors qu’il survolait ses combats, il semble pour la première fois vulnérable. (…) De son propre aveu, nombre des défaites d’Ali sont dues à un manque de sérieux dans ses préparations. (…) L’arrogance d’Ali l’a autant desservi qu’elle l’a sublimé. Sa victoire face à Foreman restera à jamais un chef-d’œuvre d’intelligence. A lui seul, Ali représente l’âge d’or des poids lourds. Tous les autres ont végété dans son ombre, ou pris la lumière en l’affrontant. (…) A la fin de sa carrière, il n’est plus qu’une coquille vide et n’a que son courage à opposer à ses adversaires. L’Equipe
A la limite du mielleux, le biopic de Michael Mann dépeint un Ali pacifiste, héros de la lutte pour les droits des Noirs américains, mythe politique majeur de la société civile et conscience d’une partie du peuple américain : un portrait consensuel qui semble s’être affranchie de l’Histoire et des controverses. Deux heures trente de film pendant lesquelles le soutien militant et contesté d’Ali à la Nation of Islam, est à peine effleuré. Oubliée, sa bienveillance pour les discours extrêmes de cette mouvance – dans une interview à Playboy, il déclare : «un homme noir qui fricote avec une femme blanche mérite la mort» – et ses propos machistes. (…) Ali n’a jamais hésité à user de la notion de race – dans le sens très politique de la soumission à une autorité supérieure – pour pointer quiconque s’opposait à son discours. Patterson, Louis, Frazier ? Des «Oncle Tom» (un noir soumis aux blancs), insulte suprême pour un Afro-américain. En marge de ses trois combats avec Joe Frazier (1971, 1974 et 1975), Ali n’aura de cesse d’humilier son rival, le traitant publiquement de «gorille» entre autres gestes simiesques. En 1967, Ali s’attire le dégoût d’une partie de l’opinion. Plutôt que d’abréger les souffrances de son challenger, Ernie Terell, qui par provocation avait refusé de l’appeler Ali, le nom qu’il s’était choisi après sa conversion, considérant que Cassius Clay était «son nom d’esclave», il prolonge la punition. «Horrible, venimeux, écœurant, pouvait-on alors lire en une de l’Evening Standard. Clay est tombé de haut dans l’échelle de l’idéal sportif.» (…) Ali n’en a pas moins porté les espoirs de liberté de millions de Noirs américains. Avec sa belle gueule et son phrasé insolent, il bouleverse l’image du sportif noir dans une société où, vingt ans plus tôt, le seul espoir pour Joe Louis de faire carrière était de passer pour un «bon nègre», modeste et bon chrétien. Il rappelle aux Noirs américains la place de l’Afrique dans leur histoire collective. Pour toute une génération, l’opposition d’Ali à la guerre du Vietnam l’élève en symbole de résistance. Son influence dépasse largement le cadre sportif. Déchu de son titre, privé de son passeport et de sa licence de boxe, Ali remporte son combat juridique en 1971 devant la Cour suprême des États-Unis. «Aucune de ses victoires jamais remportées sur un ring ne pouvait surpasser celle-ci, explique Elliot J. Gorn dans Muhammad Ali, le champion du peuple (1995). N’aurait-il jamais gagné à nouveau sur un ring, son statut de légende était assuré.» (…) sa prise de distance avec la Nation de l’Islam amorce sa réhabilitation. Celui qu’on taxait d’anti-Américain est reçu à la Maison Blanche par Gerald Ford (1974) et Jimmy Carter (1977). Coup d’éclat médiatique, son périple en Irak (1990), où il négocie avec Saddam Hussein la libération de quinze otages américains, achève de polir sa nouvelle image. Infatigable coureur de jupons, malgré ses principes religieux, Ali épouse sa quatrième femme en 1986. Dès lors, Lonnie Ali s’attache à réhabiliter son image en choisissant Thomas Hauser comme biographe officiel. «Hauser est accusé d’avoir été un partisan d’Ali plus qu’un biographe, écrit Michael Ezra dans Muhammad Ali, the making of an icon. De 1988 à 1998, personne n’a fait plus pour construire l’image légendaire d’Ali.» Ses ouvrages, nombreux, participent d’un élan pour «canoniser l’ex-champion en une figure d’autorité morale éternelle.» En 1996, l’image d’Ali, tremblant pour allumer la flamme olympique lors des JO d’Atlanta, suscite l’empathie du monde entier. A mesure qu’il s’enfonce dans la maladie, ses prises de parole se raréfient et s’aseptisent. En 2002, lors d’une interview télévisée, Ali est interrogé sur la politique et le terrorisme. «J’évite ces questions… J’ai ouvert des commerces à travers le pays, je vends des produits… Je n’ai pas envie de dire quelque chose qui ferait mal à mon business.» «Difficile d’imaginer Ali dans les années 60 se retenir de parler du Vietnam pour protéger ses intérêts commerciaux», ironise Thomas Hauser, devenu beaucoup plus critique depuis sa rupture avec le clan Ali, au début des années 2000. De Mohamed Ali, un des personnages les plus controversés du XXe siècle, il ne reste aujourd’hui que l’histoire consensuelle d’un champion qui s’est opposé au système. Une légende aseptisée, message d’espoir sur fond d’humanisme et de réconciliation des peuples. L’Equipe
Attention: un aveuglement peut en cacher un autre !
Boxeur poète, penseur engagé, icône vivante, champion de la cause des droits civiques, ambassadeur de la paix, saint …
Au lendemain de la disparition, sous les tombereaux de louanges habituels, d’un boxeur noir américain …
Qui, pour soi-disant abandonner son nom d’esclave, échangea son nom d’abolitionniste pour celui d’un prophète dont la religion n’a toujours pas condamné l’esclavage …
Et qui, descendant d’un immigrant irlandais ayant épousé une esclave libre embrassa, sous les vivats des foules, la religion la plus rétrograde de la planète ayant asservi une dizaine de millions d’esclaves …
Comme le suprémacisme noir le plus débridé pour qui les blancs n’étaient rien de moins que des formes génétiquement créées du diable lui-même …
Comment ne pas voir l’incroyable aveuglement non seulement de celui qui passa une bonne partie de sa vie à traiter les autres d’Oncle Tom …
Mais surtout de toute une classe intellectuelle et politique qui à l’instar d’un président vantant ad nauseam les prétendus apports de l’islam au monde …
Tente aujourd’hui encore de nous faire passer les pires aberrations pour religion de paix ?
Let’s not pretend Ali was Gandhi
A new Hollywood life of Muhammad Ali ignores the boxer’s controversial stance on politics and race, says Michael Shelden
The Telegraph
04 Jan 2002
ON the night in 1964 when 22-year-old Cassius Clay defeated heavyweight champion Sonny Liston, the brash newcomer did a victory dance in the ring and claimed that he was not only the greatest boxer in history but also the prettiest. In a sport dominated by hulking men with battered faces, the sleek young fighter was indeed as pretty as they come. « Don’t have a mark on me! » he boasted, and stuck out his smooth jaw as proof.
Four decades later, that jubilant kid – who soon remade himself as Muhammad Ali – is a quiet, seemingly gentle figure hobbled by Parkinson’s disease and those afflictions common to old boxers who have taken one punch too many. But so potent is the legend of the « Louisville Lip » that his career is now the subject of Hollywood’s biggest « biopic » in years, Ali, which stars charismatic Will Smith as – to quote the published screenplay – « the warrior saint in the revolt of the black athlete ». This very expensive, very long and very uncritical film is the kind of reverential tribute that Hollywood used to reserve for statesmen, war heroes and nuns.
The young champ’s big smiles and funny rhymes (« You want to lose your money, bet on Sonny ») are as entertaining as ever, but there is a darker side to him that is anything but pretty. You won’t see much of it in this new film, however, because in the sanitised factory of Hollywood myth-making only sweetness and light prevail.
Director Michael Mann downplays, for example, Ali the ruthless self-promoter, and glosses over the fighter’s devotion to the thuggish cult leader Elijah Mohammad. He also ignores the egregious race-baiting that Ali typically used to taunt boxing rivals.
At the height of his fame, Ali loved to portray himself as the true black man whose faithfulness to his race made him superior to other fighters. Sonny Liston was an ugly bear, Ali ranted, who lived in a white neighbourhood and didn’t like his own people. Joe Louis was a shuffling Uncle Tom. Floyd Patterson was « a white man’s Negro, a yellow Negro », and George Foreman fought for « White America, Christianity, the flag and pork chops ».
Under the influence of Elijah Mohammad – who preached that blacks should refuse to integrate with « white devils » – Ali made a point of dating only black women and lashed out at men and women who engaged in interracial sex. In an interview with Playboy, he declared: « A black man should be killed if he’s messing with a white woman. » When the interviewer asked about black women crossing the colour barrier, Ali responded: « Then she dies. Kill her, too. »
It’s unlikely that a white athlete who made such remarks would receive the praise that Michael Mann heaps on Ali. He says that the fighter « personified racial pride and self-knowledge ». The Playboy journalist, who interviewed the boxer, was closer to the mark when he observed of his subject: « You’re beginning to sound like a carbon copy of a white racist. »
But images are more powerful than words, and Ali’s unfortunate remarks do not diminish the mesmerising beauty of his moves in the ring. Unlike almost all his competitors, he was an elegantly powerful fighter who had a real sense of style and was not afraid to revel in it. In the art of boxing, he made dancing almost as important as throwing a punch, and was able to wear down his opponents with elusive moves as well as sudden blows.
The problem is that neither he nor his admirers can accept that he was the « greatest » only in the ring. They want him to be a social hero who changed the world by fighting injustice.
As he approaches his 60th year – his birthday is January 17 – Ali is increasingly portrayed in the media as just such a hero, an icon of courage and integrity. Michael Mann’s film is meant to give this trend an enormous boost and thus to propel Ali into the orbit of superheroes who demand unquestioning admiration.
But – to be honest – outside the ring, what is there to admire? His domestic life has been a shambles. During his heyday, he ran through wives (four in all) and girlfriends (too numerous to count) with amazing speed, never allowing his sex life to be impeded by his conversion to Islam or his vows to be faithful to one woman.
His first wife, Sonji Roi, left him after little more than a year of marriage, claiming that he had coerced her into adopting Muslim dress and customs. After the divorce, she complained that Elijah Mohammad’s Nation of Islam had « stolen » Ali’s mind and threatened her with reprisals. « I wasn’t going to take on all the Muslims. If I had, I probably would have ended up dead. »
When Elijah and his henchmen threatened Malcolm X with death for daring to oppose the Nation of Islam, Ali stayed silent. In the early years of his career, he and Malcolm X were very close – almost like brothers – yet he kept his distance after Elijah turned against his friend and did not break with the Nation of Islam after Malcolm was assassinated. (Although all signs point to Elijah’s thugs as the killers, Michael Mann suggests that the FBI murdered Malcolm.)
Ali’s own father, Cassius Clay Sr, repeatedly warned him that the Nation of Islam was brainwashing him and taking advantage of his fame and wealth. Complaining bitterly that his « boy » had been ruined by association with the group, the elder Clay snarled: « They should run those Black Muslims out of the country before they ruin other fine people. »
One reason that Ali turned against his former hero Floyd Patterson is that the older boxer was so unsparing in his criticisms of the Black Muslims. A kind and dignified man, Patterson tried his best to lure Ali away from the fold, but soon gave up in frustration. « Clay is so young and has been misled by the wrong people, » he said. « He might as well have joined the Ku Klux Klan. »
Joe Louis was also alarmed by the racist attitudes of the group and warned Ali that he was being exploited. Like Patterson, he made a point of calling the young fighter by his original name. « Clay is a good enough fighter, but it’s unfortunate that he’s a Black Muslim. A champion should represent all sects, not one. »
It was apparently his devotion to his new religion that prompted Ali to refuse military induction in 1967. He protested that he was opposed to war in general and the Vietnam War in particular. It was a matter of conscience, he insisted, and he claimed that he would not fight anyone without good reason. He suffered for his stand, sacrificing three years of his career while he fought his case with the American government.
His admirers often cite his opposition to the war as an example of his social importance. But lots of people opposed the war and went to prison for their beliefs. Ali, however, eventually won his case and was treated with much more deference than many other war resisters. Moreover, when he went back to boxing, he never explained why, in principle, it was acceptable to fight strangers in the ring, but not on the battlefield.
How could he reconcile his pacifist claims with his often brutal aggressiveness against other boxers? A pacifist usually isn’t found at a boxing match screaming, as Ali once did: « Somebody’s gonna die at ringside tonight. » But this contradiction in the fighter’s position is now rarely mentioned. In the 1960s, however, it was difficult to ignore and the absurdity of it was widely ridiculed.
The transformation of Ali from a great fighter to a celebrated man of conscience and social purpose has succeeded so well because the actual history of his career has been altered to reflect the kinder, gentler man of today. Unpleasant remarks or facts from the past have been swept away or excused.
In a kind of history-free zone, the contemporary myth-makers in Hollywood and elsewhere blithely craft their heroes to suit some political agenda or cinematic formula. And, then, endowed with the smiling face of a film star, the retooled historical figure becomes difficult to resist. It’s one thing to criticise the real Ali, but who wants to question the charming Will Smith?
At the end of Mann’s film, we see an amiable Ali sparring with young street kids after his « Rumble in the Jungle » with George Foreman. Corrupt and impoverished Zaire is made to seem like the Holy Land, a place where the great fighter has finally found his roots and a renewed sense of purpose. Little effort is made to show that the local strongman, President Mobutu, was a rapacious tyrant who robbed his country blind and who exploited Ali with as much zest as Elijah Mohammad.
Instead, as dawn rises over the Congo river, Will Smith walks off the screen like a romantic hero from some ancient legend, triumphant and secure in the knowledge that his legacy is safe. There are no questions lingering in the air about Mobutu or even about the fight’s unsavoury promoter, Don King. Everything is washed clean in the blue dawn.
A more historically accurate appraisal of Ali would conclude that he was far from heroic outside the ring and was pitifully misused by his masters in the Nation of Islam. For his purposes, Elijah hijacked the impressionable young man’s career and filled his head with racist nonsense.
By the time he finally broke free of the old Nation of Islam, in the 1970s, his career was in its last stages. He continued to fight long past his prime, in part to recover the money and time he had lost in his misadventures with the Black Muslims. Today, he is paying the price of his mistakes, suffering from health problems exacerbated by overstaying his time in boxing. Looking at the sad toll that his life has exacted from his body, anyone should be able to see that his career was not that of a Hollywood romance but of an old-fashioned tragedy. By exchanging his « slave name » of Cassius Clay for the one that Elijah bestowed on him, he merely exchanged one form of perceived servitude for another form that was all too real and irretrievably damaging.
- Ali opens in Britain next month
Décès de Mohamed Ali, le boxeur poète
Nicolas Gary
ActuaLitté
04.06.2016
Né Cassius Clay, il était devenu Mohamed Ali après sa conversion à l’islam. Figure légendaire de la boxe à travers le monde, il était devenu le champion du monde poids lourds, mais derrière l’athlète hors du commun, un homme s’est révélé, capable de mener des combats héroïques. Tout à la fois homme de spectacle, poète et penseur engagé, Mohamed Ali fut une figure majeure des sportifs du XXe siècle.
Muhammad Ali est mort ce 3 juin 2016 à Scottsdale, en Arizona. Bien entendu des livres et des témoignages ont retracé son parcours, mais c’est encore son style, peu académique et clairement pas sorti d’une école, que l’on retiendra.
Parmi les ouvrages qui lui furent consacrés, difficile de passer à côté de celui de Toni Morrison, qui avait réalisé une édition de l’autobiographie du boxeur. Mais en ce jour, l’un des hommages les plus touchants venait certainement de… JK Rowling.Elle qui reste la célébrité la plus adulée et dont l’autographe est encore le plus prisé sur notre petite planète, loin devant des stars comme Mohammed Ali, a retrouvé les mots du boxeur pour lui rendre hommage.
Je voudrais que l’on se souvienne de moi comme d’un homme qui a remporté le titre de champion des poids lourds à trois reprises, qui avait de l’humour, et qui traitait chacun avec respect. Comme un homme qui n’a jamais regardé de haut ceux qui levaient les yeux vers lui, et qui a aidé autant de personnes qu’il a pu. Comme un homme qui s’est dressé pour défendre ses croyances, quelles qu’elles fussent. Comme un homme qui a tenté d’unir toute l’humanité à travers la foi et l’amour. Et si tout cela est trop demandé, je suppose que je me contenterai d’être seulement évoqué comme un grand boxeur qui est devenu le leader et le champion de son peuple. Et ça ne me dérangerait pas, si les gens gardaient à l’esprit que j’étais mignon.
Le sportif, atteint de la maladie de Parkinson, avait été admis jeudi aux urgences d’un centre hospitalier de la région de Phoenix. Il est décédé vendredi soir
On se souviendra également que la société Kobo avait eu maille à partir avec ses avocats : en réutilisant la phrase « Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee », le libraire avait « fait un usage commercial du slogan utilisé par Mohamed Ali, et du nom de Mohamed Ali sans autorisation ni compensation pour Muhammad Ali Enterprises ». Et ça, c’était direct un crochet !
Mais plutôt que les conflits d’avocats, on gardera l’image de cette force de la nature, récitant des poèmes, en plein plateau télé. Chose qu’il ne manquait pas de faire, en toutes sortes d’occasions, y compris pour haranguer et provoquer ses adversaires – Frazier en tête de liste.
Voir aussi:
Mohamed Ali, la construction du mythe
Pacifiste, héros des temps modernes, le culte dont jouissait Mohamed Ali s’est affranchi des controverses. Il demeure l’un des personnages qui a le plus fasciné son temps.
L’Equipe
04/06/2016
Fonte et protéines au menu. Pour incarner Mohamed Ali au cinéma en 2001 (Ali), l’acteur américain Will Smith s’est lesté de 20 kilos de muscles. Et si son interprétation lui vaut d’être nominé aux Oscars, le film, lui, reçoit un accueil mitigé. A la limite du mielleux, le biopic de Michael Mann dépeint un Ali pacifiste, héros de la lutte pour les droits des Noirs américains, mythe politique majeur de la société civile et conscience d’une partie du peuple américain : un portrait consensuel qui semble s’être affranchie de l’Histoire et des controverses.
Deux heures trente de film pendant lesquelles le soutien militant et contesté d’Ali à la Nation of Islam, est à peine effleuré. Oubliée, sa bienveillance pour les discours extrêmes de cette mouvance – dans une interview à Playboy, il déclare : «un homme noir qui fricote avec une femme blanche mérite la mort» – et ses propos machistes. Ali n’était pas Gandhi. Les louanges qui affluent du monde entier ne sauraient le faire oublier.
L’insulte facile
Parfois cruel, Ali n’a jamais hésité à user de la notion de race – dans le sens très politique de la soumission à une autorité supérieure – pour pointer quiconque s’opposait à son discours. Patterson, Louis, Frazier ? Des «Oncle Tom» (un noir soumis aux blancs), insulte suprême pour un Afro-américain. En marge de ses trois combats avec Joe Frazier (1971, 1974 et 1975), Ali n’aura de cesse d’humilier son rival, le traitant publiquement de «gorille» entre autres gestes simiesques.
En 1967, Ali s’attire le dégoût d’une partie de l’opinion. Plutôt que d’abréger les souffrances de son challenger, Ernie Terell, qui par provocation avait refusé de l’appeler Ali, le nom qu’il s’était choisi après sa conversion, considérant que Cassius Clay était «son nom d’esclave», il prolonge la punition. «Horrible, venimeux, écœurant, pouvait-on alors lire en une de l’Evening Standard. Clay est tombé de haut dans l’échelle de l’idéal sportif.»
Un statut de légende
Sans être un saint, Ali n’en a pas moins porté les espoirs de liberté de millions de Noirs américains. Avec sa belle gueule et son phrasé insolent, il bouleverse l’image du sportif noir dans une société où, vingt ans plus tôt, le seul espoir pour Joe Louis de faire carrière était de passer pour un «bon nègre», modeste et bon chrétien. Il rappelle aux Noirs américains la place de l’Afrique dans leur histoire collective. Pour toute une génération, l’opposition d’Ali à la guerre du Vietnam l’élève en symbole de résistance. Son influence dépasse largement le cadre sportif.
Déchu de son titre, privé de son passeport et de sa licence de boxe, Ali remporte son combat juridique en 1971 devant la Cour suprême des États-Unis. «Aucune de ses victoires jamais remportées sur un ring ne pouvait surpasser celle-ci, explique Elliot J. Gorn dans Muhammad Ali, le champion du peuple (1995). N’aurait-il jamais gagné à nouveau sur un ring, son statut de légende était assuré.»
Battu à son retour, (face à Frazier, en 1971, et Norton, en 1973), Ali gagne l’admiration de tous en reprenant son titre à George Foreman en 1974. Un an plus tard, sa prise de distance avec la Nation de l’Islam amorce sa réhabilitation. Celui qu’on taxait d’anti-Américain est reçu à la Maison Blanche par Gerald Ford (1974) et Jimmy Carter (1977). Coup d’éclat médiatique, son périple en Irak (1990), où il négocie avec Saddam Hussein la libération de quinze otages américains, achève de polir sa nouvelle image.
Une collection de phrases cultes
Infatigable coureur de jupons, malgré ses principes religieux, Ali épouse sa quatrième femme en 1986. Dès lors, Lonnie Ali s’attache à réhabiliter son image en choisissant Thomas Hauser comme biographe officiel. «Hauser est accusé d’avoir été un partisan d’Ali plus qu’un biographe, écrit Michael Ezra dans Muhammad Ali, the making of an icon. De 1988 à 1998, personne n’a fait plus pour construire l’image légendaire d’Ali.» Ses ouvrages, nombreux, participent d’un élan pour «canoniser l’ex-champion en une figure d’autorité morale éternelle.»
En 1996, l’image d’Ali, tremblant pour allumer la flamme olympique lors des JO d’Atlanta, suscite l’empathie du monde entier. A mesure qu’il s’enfonce dans la maladie, ses prises de parole se raréfient et s’aseptisent. En 2002, lors d’une interview télévisée, Ali est interrogé sur la politique et le terrorisme. «J’évite ces questions… J’ai ouvert des commerces à travers le pays, je vends des produits… Je n’ai pas envie de dire quelque chose qui ferait mal à mon business.» «Difficile d’imaginer Ali dans les années 60 se retenir de parler du Vietnam pour protéger ses intérêts commerciaux», ironise Thomas Hauser, devenu beaucoup plus critique depuis sa rupture avec le clan Ali, au début des années 2000.
De Mohamed Ali, un des personnages les plus controversés du XXe siècle, il ne reste aujourd’hui que l’histoire consensuelle d’un champion qui s’est opposé au système. Une légende aseptisée, message d’espoir sur fond d’humanisme et de réconciliation des peuples. Des heures de documentaires, tours de magie, phrases cultes à noircir des recueils et un humour qui ne l’avait jamais quitté. A son interprète au grand écran, Will Smith, Ali avait confié dans un sourire. «Tu es presque assez beau pour jouer mon rôle».
Voir également:
Boxe
Ali Dix choses que vous ignoriez peut-être sur Mohamed Ali, décédé vendredi à 74 ans
Décédé vendredi à l’âge de 74 ans, Mohamed Ali a vécu une vie fascinante, remplie d’anecdotes savoureuses.
L’Equipe
04/06/2016
1. Cassius Clay, son «nom d’esclave»
En 1964, Cassius Clay annonce sa conversion à l’islam et abandonne son «nom d’esclave» pour celui de Mohamed Ali. Paradoxe : le nom de Clay lui est issu d’un fervent abolitionniste américain du 19e siècle.
2. Ali était d’origine irlandaise
Plus surprenant encore pour un homme qui a parfois tenu des discours prônant la séparation des races (à l’époque de son engagement pour le mouvement Nation de l’islam) : l’arrière-grand-père d’Ali, Abe Grady, était un Irlandais installé dans le Kentucky dans les années 1860. Après avoir épousé une esclave libre, il donne naissance à John Grady, lui-même père d’Odessa Lee Grady Clay, la mère de Mohamed Ali. En 2009, l’ancien champion du monde s’était d’ailleurs rendu à Ennis, une petite ville de l’ouest de l’Irlande, pour rencontrer les membres de sa famille lointaine.
3. Première «victime» : sa mère
«La première personne que j’ai mis KO, c’est ma mère», disait-il. A l’âge de 2 ans, le premier crochet d’Ali coûtera deux dents à sa mère, Odessa Clay.
4. Une idole nommée Sugar
En 1960, alors qu’il n’a que 18 ans, le jeune Cassius Clay fait du tapage devant le restaurant de Sugar Ray Robinson, dans le quartier d’Harlem à New York. «Tu es le roi, mon maître, mon idole ! Quand j’aurai gagné la médaille d’or aux Jeux, je veux que tu sois mon manager.» Robinson lui intime l’ordre de déguerpir. «A ce moment, je me suis juré de ne jamais repousser un fan», dira plus tard Ali.
Ses cinq plus grands combats
5. Ali n’a jamais jeté sa médaille olympique dans la rivière Ohio
C’est une des nombreuses légendes qui persistent : à son retour des Jeux Olympiques de Rome (1960), Ali se serait vu refuser le service dans un restaurant de Louisville et, de rage, aurait jeté sa médaille dans la rivière. Pure invention. Ali avouera plus tard l’avoir simplement égarée. Une réplique de sa médaille lui est offerte en 1996, lorsqu’il allume la flamme olympique aux JO d’Atlanta.
6. Ali était un mauvais élève
L’anecdote est rapportée par William Klein, réalisateur de Muhammad Ali, the Greatest (1969), dans L’Equipe du 17 janvier 2012. «Après sa victoire contre Liston, en 1965, je me suis retrouvé avec Ali dans son motel. Un Mexicain lui a demandé un autographe et lui a dit qu’il avait beaucoup d’amis au Mexique. Ali a répondu : ’’Mexico ? Ah oui, tant mieux. Comment écrivez-vous Mexico ? Je ne suis pas allé à l’école longtemps.’’ C’était ça Ali. Malin comme un singe, mais sans grande culture.»
7. Boxeur, danseur mais aussi chanteur
Au-delà de ses dons d’orateur, Ali avait un autre talent, plus méconnu. En 1964, peu avant son Championnat du monde contre Sonny Liston, celui qui se nomme encore Cassius Clay sort un album, sobrement intitulé I am the greatest, mélange d’auto-adulation musicale et d’interprétations de grands classiques. Après la conversion d’Ali à l’Islam, Columbia records s’empressera de retirer l’album des ventes.
8. Ali a sauvé un homme du suicide
Los Angeles, 1981. Un jeune homme de 21 ans se tient debout sur le bord de la fenêtre du 9e étage d’un building, menaçant de mettre fin à ses jours. La situation paraît sans issue : policiers et psychologues ont tenté en vain de l’en dissuader. Mohamed Ali, qui arrive par hasard sur les lieux, se porte volontaire pour lui parler. «Je suis ton frère, je veux t’aider», lui crie l’ancien champion du monde de la fenêtre la plus proche. Vingt minutes tendues s’écoulent au bout desquelles l’homme renonce finalement à son geste funeste. «Sauver une vie est plus important pour moi que n’importe quelle ceinture», dira Ali.
9. Son rapport à la maladie
En 1984, après une semaine d’examens dans un hôpital new-yorkais, Ali apprend qu’il souffre de la maladie de Parkinson. «C’est un jugement de Dieu. Il m’a donné cette maladie pour me rappeler que je ne suis pas le numéro 1. C’est lui.»
10. Une étoile pas comme les autres
En 2002, Mohamed Ali obtient son étoile à Hollywood, mais pas sur le fameux Walk of Fame. A sa demande, la sienne est incrustée dans le mur du Kodak Theater, où se déroule la cérémonie des Oscars. Ali ne souhaitait pas que son nom soit piétiné.
Voir encore:
Boxe
Ali Mohamed Ali et l’explosion de l’industrie de la boxe
Combats historiques, bourses records, Ali a redynamisé l’industrie de la boxe et gagné plus d’argent que n’importe quel athlète de son temps.
L’Equipe
04/06/2016
Au début des années 60, nombre de vedettes ont raccroché les gants : Joe Louis, Rocky Marciano, Jake La Motta… Tandis qu’à chaque combat, Archie Moore et Sugar Ray Robinson se rapprochent de la fin, un certain Cassius Clay court déjà les cabarets de Greenwich Village à New York, criant à qui veut l’entendre qu’il est le plus fort. Avec son grand caquet, le jeune champion olympique est une aubaine pour les promoteurs. Un produit à fort potentiel, dans une industrie où un bon direct du gauche ne suffit plus.
A ses débuts chez les professionnels, Clay est pris en charge par un conglomérat d’homme d’affaires blancs de Louisville, avides de futures retombées économiques. Outre une prime à la signature de 10 000 dollars, il touche un salaire mensuel de près de 300 dollars. A mesure qu’il gravit les échelons, ses cachets explosent. A 22 ans, sa bourse pour affronter Sonny Liston s’élève à 600 000 dollars.
Record au Madison
Champion du monde, Ali fait marcher la planche à billets. En 1965, pour retrouver Floyd Patterson, il touche 800 000 dollars. Face à lui, ses adversaires encaissent les plus grosses sommes de leur carrière, 180 000 marks pour l’Allemand Juergen Blin (1971), 65 000 dollars pour George Chuvalo, lors de leur revanche (1972).
En mars 1971, le premier duel d’Ali face à Frazier, disputé au Madison Square Garden (défaite d’Ali par décision), va briser tous les records. A la clé : 2,5 millions de dollars pour chacun des boxeurs, la plus grosse bourse jamais perçue par un athlète à l’époque. Avant 1971, d’autres duels avaient porté l’étiquette de «combat du siècle», comme le Jack Dempsey-Georges Carpentier de 1921. Mais aucun des protagonistes n’avait alors approché pareil revenu.
Droit d’entrée
Retransmis dans plus de 50 pays, le duel Ali-Frazier I attire près de 300 millions de téléspectateurs. Au Canada et dans tous les Etats-Unis, cinémas et salles de spectacle projettent les images en circuit fermé, avec un droit d’entrée entre cinq et quinze dollars. Durant toute sa carrière, Mohamed Ali est une attraction majeure du circuit fermé, et participe à son évolution.
La construction d’un mythe
En 1975, le premier combat retransmis en «pay-per-view», retransmission payante à domicile aujourd’hui de rigueur pour les grands combats, est le «Thrilla in Manilla», troisième et dernier épisode de la trilogie Ali-Frazier.
Cinq millions de dollars face à Foreman, huit contre Larry Holmes (escroqué par le promoteur Don King, il n’en touchera finalement que sept), Mohamed Ali a brisé tous les records de bourse et d’audience. Et ouvert la voie à des boxeurs comme Floyd « Money » Mayweather, l’athlète le mieux payé au monde en 2014 selon Forbes, avec 105 millions de dollars de revenus.
Sources : archives L’Equipe et Alias Ali, de Frédéric Roux
Voir de plus:
Ali La révolution technique de Mohamed Ali
Les reins qui saignent
Aérien, Ali est mal à l’aise quand son adversaire parvient à l’approcher et travailler au corps, annihilant ainsi ses avantages d’allonge et de taille. «Après notre deuxième combat (1966), Ali a été emmené à l’hôpital à Toronto avec les reins qui saignaient, se souvient George Chuvalo dans les colonnes de Ring Magazine. Moi, je suis allé danser avec ma femme.»
«Malgré toutes ses qualités de boxeur, Ali a survécu à de nombreux moments difficiles en étant un grand bluffeur, poursuit Chuvalo. Il était dur à toucher, et quand vous arriviez enfin à l’atteindre, il se montrait plus intelligent… Vous pouviez lui faire mal et ne jamais vous en rendre compte. De son propre aveu, je l’ai mis en difficulté une fois ou deux, mais je ne m’en suis jamais rendu compte.»
Encaisseur sur le tard
Après trois ans d’inactivité (1967-1970), conséquence de son refus d’aller au Vietnam, Ali ne sera plus jamais le même. A 27 ans, l’homme qui «vole comme un papillon» et «pique comme l’abeille» n’est plus qu’un lointain souvenir. Plus statique, Ali se découvre alors des qualités d’encaisseur insoupçonnées. Alors qu’il survolait ses combats, il semble pour la première fois vulnérable.
Un an après son retour, Joe Frazier lui inflige sa première défaite sur un ring (1971). Deux ans plus tard, il est battu par Ken Norton, un «amateur» qui lui brise la mâchoire. De son propre aveu, nombre des défaites d’Ali sont dues à un manque de sérieux dans ses préparations. Comme celle face à Leon Spinks (1978), seul boxeur à l’avoir jamais détrôné de son titre, qui disputait alors son huitième combat professionnel…
Le Concorde de la boxe
Sorti en 2014, le documentaire I am Ali laisse entendre le champion, articulant difficilement. «J’étais le Concorde de la boxe, au-dessus de tout le monde. J’allais plus vite que les autres… Mais on ne peut pas rester au sommet indéfiniment.» A la fin de sa carrière, il n’est plus qu’une coquille vide et n’a que son courage à opposer à ses adversaires. Face à Larry Holmes (1980), il est brisé, roué de coups pendant dix reprises et arrêté par son coin ; l’Amérique voit s’éteindre une légende sous ses yeux. Trois mois plus tôt, lors d’un examen médical pour obtenir sa licence de boxe, Ali avait peiné à se tenir debout sur un pied…
Mohamed Ali, «The Greatest», est mort
Jean-Charles Bares
L’Equipe
04/06/2016
Mohamed Ali s’est éteint à l’âge de 74 ans, vendredi à Phoenix, en Arizona. Champion olympique, champion du monde à trois reprises, il aura régné sur l’âge d’or des poids lourds et forgé sa légende par ses luttes et ses engagements en dehors du ring.
L’immense champion de boxe Mohamed Ali est décédé vendredi soir à Phoenix, à l’âge de 74 ans, selon NBC, citant un porte-parole de la famille. Hospitalisé depuis jeudi pour des problèmes respiratoires, l’ancien triple champion du monde de boxe et champion olympique 1960 a succombé à des problèmes respiratoires. Sa famille avait annoncé précédemment que le traitement de son état était rendu plus difficile par la maladie de Parkinson dont il souffrait depuis trois décennies.
A la croisée du mythe et du scénario hollywoodien, la vie de Cassius Clay – le nom d’origine de Mohamed Ali – bascule sur un banal larcin. Et qui sait, celle-ci aurait été sans doute radicalement différente si, cet après-midi d’automne 1954, parti s’empiffrer de pop-corn, l’étourdi n’avait pas laissé son vélo tout neuf à la merci du premier voleur de passage. Vexé, le jeune Clay veut en découdre et se rend dans une salle de boxe. Douze ans, quarante kilos tout mouillé, mais déjà plein d’aplomb. «Ce gars est foutu, je vais le terminer à la première reprise», prédit-il à la gazette locale avant son premier combat.
Fils d’une famille modeste, Clay grandit à Louisville, cité industrielle du Kentucky déchirée par la ségrégation raciale. Plus à l’aise sur les rings que sur les bancs de l’école, il remporte, en 1959, le prestigieux tournoi des Golden Gloves. A Rome, l’année suivante, il surpasse sa peur de l’avion pour s’adjuger l’or olympique, chez les mi-lourds. Après une centaine de rencontres amateurs, le phénomène passe professionnel à 18 ans sous la tutelle d’Angelo Dundee, son homme de coin de toujours.
Spectaculaire, par son jeu de jambes et ses esquives d’un temps nouveau, Clay monte rapidement dans la hiérarchie des poids lourds. A peine quatre combats à son actif, il ridiculise Ingemar Johansson, ex-roi de la catégorie, lors d’une séance de sparring. Insolent, il déclame, parfois en vers, des odes à son talent devant la presse qui se délecte. En 1962, il envoie au tapis Archie Moore, ancien champion du monde des mi-lourds. Un an plus tard, il triomphe d’Henry Cooper à Wembley et s’offre une chance mondiale face à Sonny Liston.
De Cassius Clay à Mohamed Ali
«Tout le monde pensait que Sonny lui fermerait sa grande gueule et le renverrait à Louisville dans un linceul», résume Nigel Collins, journaliste américain, cité par Frédéric Roux dans Alias Ali. Trop jeune, trop tendre, les bookmakers donnent Clay perdant à 7 contre 1 ; même L’Equipe parle du «championnat du monde le plus commercial» jamais mis sur pied.
Ce 25 février 1964, le sacre de Clay est escorté par la controverse : Liston, invoquant une blessure à l’épaule, abandonne sur son tabouret. «Je suis le plus grand… J’ai choqué le monde !», s’exclame alors le vainqueur, hystérique face à la presse. Des archives du FBI déclassifiées en 2014 tendent à accréditer les suspicions de fraude. Les mêmes doutes naîtront de la revanche, remportée par Clay un an plus tard sur une droite anodine, le tristement célèbre « coup de poing fantôme ».
Fort de son titre, Clay annonce sa conversion à l’islam et prend le nom de Mohamed Ali. Il s’affiche au coté de Malcom X et Elijah Muhammad, leaders de la Nation de l’Islam, un groupuscule sectaire afro-américain qui prêche la haine des Blancs et la séparation des races. Dès lors, plus qu’il n’amuse, Ali divise et cristallise les peurs de l’Amérique blanche. Sa déclaration sur le Vietnam, alors que les États-Unis y sont en guerre – «je n’ai rien contre le Vietcong, aucun Vietnamien ne m’a jamais traité de nègre» – lui vaut l’opprobre des patriotes. Le fossé avec le public se creuse, ses victoires ne font plus recette. Le refus de son incorporation, en 1967, entraîne la perte de son titre. Le début d’un exil de trois ans et demi loin des rings.
Exil et reconquête
Malgré sa condamnation à cinq ans de prison, Ali reste un homme libre ; héros de la jeunesse pacifiste, le champion déchu enchaîne les conférences universitaires, joue dans une pièce à Broadway, ou vend ses talents comme sparring-partner. Blanchi par la Cour suprême en 1970, il perd quatorze kilos, revient sur le ring et surclasse Jerry Quarry. En son absence, Joe Frazier s’est imposé en patron des poids lourds. Leur premier duel, vendu par le promoteur Don King comme le «combat du siècle» (1971), se solde par la première défaite d’Ali et la naissance d’une rivalité immuable.
Pour Ali, la reconquête de son titre passera par le Zaïre, sous la bienveillance financière du dictateur Mobutu. Dans la moiteur de Kinshasa, le 30 octobre 1974, il fait tomber George Foreman au 8e round du fameux «Rumble in the jungle». Le sommet de sa gloire, mais aussi le seuil de son déclin. Un an plus tard, Manille verra la dernière étincelle de son talent. Dans un des combats les plus violents de l’histoire, Ali scelle par une victoire l’épilogue de sa trilogie avec Joe Frazier (Ali a remporté la revanche en 1974). «J’ai vraiment eu le sentiment que j’approchais de la mort», confiait-il à L’Equipe en 2001.
Déchéance
Orgueil ou inconscience, Ali enchaîne alors les combats de trop. Dernier baroud d’honneur, il reprend son titre à Leon Spinks, qui l’avait détrôné en 1978. Quand il capitule face à Larry Holmes, deux ans plus tard, Ali n’est plus que l’ombre du champion qu’il a été. Il tire sa révérence sur une ultime défaite l’année suivante, dans l’indifférence générale. Dès 1984, les premiers symptômes de la maladie de Parkinson apparaissent.
Loin des lumières du ring, Ali n’en reste pas moins sur le devant de la scène. Réhabilité depuis sa prise de distance avec la Nation de l’Islam, il est reçu à la Maison Blanche par Gerald Ford et honoré par George W. Bush. En 1990, aux prémices de la Guerre du Golfe, il se rend à Bagdad et obtient de Saddam Hussein la libération de 15 otages américains. Sous le poids de la maladie, sa déchéance physique s’accentue ; ses sorties publiques se font de plus en plus rares. L’image d’Ali, vieux avant l’âge, tremblant pour allumer la flamme olympique d’Atlanta, en 1996, bouleverse le monde entier.
Plus qu’un athlète, une icône culturelle, une force sociale et politique. Brillant, naïf, charmeur, impertinent, Ali laisse tant de visages de lui-même et de facéties qu’il est presque impossible de percer l’homme. Devenu le visage des malades de Parkinson, il n’avait cessé de s’engager pour la recherche contre la maladie. Digne face à son déclin, alors que l’avancée du syndrome le privait peu à peu d’élocution. Triste ironie de voir le plus grand hâbleur de l’histoire du sport réduit au silence. Reste une maxime, répétée à l’envi. L’épitaphe d’une vie de luttes, de conquêtes amoureuses et d’investissements douteux. «Les gens humbles ne vont jamais très loin.»
Voir de plus:
Obama, Don King, Tyson… Pluie d’hommages pour « le grand » Mohamed Ali
De nombreuses personnalités ont rendu hommage au triple champion du monde de boxe, mort dans la nuit de vendredi à l’âge de 74 ans, dont le président américain, mais aussi de nombreux sportifs de renom.
Le président des Etats-Unis Barack Obama a rendu ce samedi un hommage appuyé et émouvant au boxeur de légende Mohamed Ali, décédé vendredi, saluant un homme qui a « secoué le monde » et « s’est battu pour ce qui était juste ».
« Son combat en dehors du ring lui a coûté son titre, lui a valu nombre d’ennemis. Mais Ali a tenu bon », a souligné le premier président noir de l’histoire des Etats-Unis, dans un texte à la tonalité très personnelle. « Il a été aux côtés de (Martin Luther) King et (Nelson) Mandela, il s’est élevé quand c’était difficile, il a parlé quand d’autres ne le faisaient pas », a-t-il poursuivi, évoquant l’implication de « The Greatest » dans la lutte pour les droits civiques. « Mais ce qui faisait de lui le plus grand, quelqu’un de complètement à part, est que tous les autres vous disaient la même chose », a souligné Barack Obama dans un texte à la tonalité très personnelle.
George Foreman, ancien champion du monde des lourds, battu par Ali dans l’un des combats les plus célèbres de l’histoire The Rumble in the Jungle, a de son côté déclaré, sur son compte Twitter: « Ali, Frazier et Foreman, nous ne faisions qu’un. Une partie de moi s’en est allée, la plus grande partie ».
« Nous avons perdu une légende, un héros et un grand homme. Il est l’un de ceux qui m’ont ouvert la voie pour que je devienne celui que je suis. Les mots sont insuffisants pour dire ce que Mohamed Ali a fait pour notre sport. Personnellement, ce qu’il m’a montré, c’est qu’il ne faut jamais avoir peur, jamais arrêter de croire et jamais se contenter de moins », a déclaré Floyd Mayweather, ancien champion des welters, invaincu en 49 combats et jeune retraité.
Dans un autre message, rédigé cette fois sur son compte Instagram, Floyd Mayweather a également déploré la perte d’une « vraie légende » et d’un « héros dans tous les sens du terme ».
Mohamed Ali ne mourra jamais
Pour Evander Holyfield, ancien champion du monde des lourds, la mort d’Ali est « une perte énorme. Je voulais être comme lui, il m’a inspiré ».
Et pour Don King, promoteur du Rumble in the Jungle, Ali était « quelqu’un de merveilleux, pas seulement comme boxeur mais comme être humain, comme icône. Mohamed Ali ne mourra jamais, il est comme Martin Luther King. Son esprit vivra à jamais ».
« Un modèle pour tous les jeunes »
La pluie d’hommage ne s’est pas arrêtée là. Oscar de la Hoya, ancien champion sacré dans six catégories différentes, désormais promoteur, a lui aussi regretté la perte de l’ancien champion. « Il est celui qui a propulsé la boxe dans son âge d’or et rendu populaire notre sport. Ali incarnait le courage, il n’a jamais choisi la facilité, que ce soit sur les rings de boxe et en dehors. Au moment de célébrer sa vie, il faut se souvenir qu’il a toujours cherché la grandeur dans tout ce qu’il a fait », a-t-il expliqué.
Même Donald Trump, le candidat républicain à la Maison blanche qui s’est récemment fait (re)remarquer pour ses déclarations racistes, a tenu à saluer, « Un véritable grand champion et un homme merveilleux ».
Tout comme l’ancien président des Etats-Unis Bill Clinton. « Hillary [son épouse, candidate à la Maison blanche, NDLR] et moi sommes profondément attristés par la disparition de Mohamed Ali. (…) Nous l’avons vu grandir, passant de l’assurance impétueuse de la jeunesse et du succès à un âge adulte empli de religion et de convictions politiques qui l’ont mené à faire des choix difficiles et à en assumer les conséquences. (…) En chemin, nous l’avons vu courageux sur le ring, offrir un modèle aux jeunes, plein de compassion envers ceux qui étaient dans le besoin, et fort et plein d’humour face à ses problèmes de santé », a-t-il écrit dans un communiqué publié sur le site de la Clinton Foundation.
« Nous avons perdu un géant, la boxe a beaucoup profité des talents de Mohamed Ali, mais pas autant que les hommes de son humanité », a résumé Manny Pacquiao, légende philippine de la boxe.
Voir de même:
«The Greatest» est décédé à Phoenix à l’âge de 74 ans, terrassé par Parkinson. Vedette planétaire à la verve cinglante, Ali a révolutionné son sport et envahi les champs politique, médiatique et culturel.
Ding. Dernière reprise, l’arbitre à la grande faux arrête le combat. Ali s’en est allé. Celui qui se disait «si méchant qu’il rend la médecine malade» et ne s’était jamais écroulé avant le gong a dû se résoudre à la finitude des choses. Mais «The Greatest», le plus grand, dans sa deuxième vie d’ex-boxeur rongé par la maladie, s’est accroché. Longtemps. Au-delà de ce qu’on prétendait possible ou raisonnable. Comme il l’avait fait sur le ring à Manille, en 1975, au bout des 14 rounds les plus violents de l’histoire de la boxe face à l’ennemi juré Frazier; ou même dans la défaite, debout malgré sa mâchoire en vrac, en 1973 contre l’oublié Ken Norton. Plus longtemps en tout cas que ce que n’importe quel neurologue aurait prédit, puisque la médecine l’avait déjà enterré debout, le cerveau en miette, au début des années 80.
Hospitalisé à Phoenix (Arizona) depuis jeudi pour des «problèmes respiratoires» annoncés dans un premier temps comme relativement bénins, l’icône pugilistique a vu son état se détériorer dès le lendemain. Vendredi, des «proches» cités par le tabloïd le New York Post et l’agence AP ont confié sous couvert de l’anonymat que la légende était en fait sous assistance respiratoire, au plus mal. Sa mort a été annoncée tôt ce samedi par sa famille dans un communiqué: «Après un combat de trente deux ans contre la maladie de Parkinson, Mohamed Ali est décédé à l’âge de 74 ans», a annoncé son porte-parole Bob Gunnell.
Avec Mohamed Ali disparaît la première vedette à notoriété globale et absolue –le sportif le plus photogénique du XXe siècle fut longtemps le visage le plus reconnu de la planète. Les Beatles étaient peut-être les premières stars planétaires (ou, plus justement, du monde occidental) mais Ali seul était connu de tous, Noir ou Blanc, habitant du tiers-monde ou Américain repu. Avant de devenir l’astre mort vaguement sanctifié des trois dernières décennies, condamné au silence et aux tremblements par Parkinson, le boxeur était tout à la fois: l’athlète ultime, le corps politique, le gentil et le méchant, la radicalité et l’œcuménisme.
Dans une catégorie où il a longtemps s’agit d’être le plus dur, Ali a révolutionné la boxe des lourds en devenant le plus intelligent. Conteur de sa geste allant jusqu’à jouer son propre rôle dans son biopic (The Greatest, 1977), promoteur à la verve inégalée, Ali le rimailleur impénitent a inventé le trash talk, l’insulte comme premier jab. Héraut de la fierté noire des années 60, l’activiste a imposé sa célébrité omnipotente et envahi tous les champs: sportif, politique, médiatique, culturel. Manipulateur roublard mais sincère, il a transcendé tout événement le touchant en histoire (avec et sans majuscule), qu’il s’agisse de multiplier les «combats du siècle» ou de libérer des otages à Bagdad en pleine guerre du Golfe. «La plus grande attraction du monde depuis l’invention du cinéma parlant», dixit l’intéressé, est aussi l’une des premières figures de subversion pop, dont le seul égal est Che Guevara – en témoignent leurs effigies respectives encore affichées dans nombre chambres d’ados.
De Louisville à l’or olympique
Louisville, Kentucky, le 17 janvier 1942. On doit sortir le gamin au forceps tant sa tête est grosse. L’aîné des Clay (il aura un frère cadet) reçoit le nom de son père, Cassius, peintre en bâtiment. Sa mère, Odessa, est domestique. L’enfant est élevé dans l’effroi causé par le lynchage d’Emmet Till, ce double de son âge sauvagement assassiné dans le Mississippi en 1955. Car si Louisville n’est pas l’Alabama, la métropole à cheval entre Midwest ouvrier et Sud raciste applique la ségrégation raciale et Clay se verra refuser plus d’un repas dans les dinners locaux. La légende veut que Cassius Clay se mette à la boxe après la disparition de son vélo. Il a 12 ans et jure d’aller «botter le cul» du voleur, peu importe qui. Joe E. Martin, flic blanc et entraîneur local lui conseille d’apprendre à cogner d’abord. Six ans plus tard, Martin voit son poulain emporter l’or chez les mi-lourds aux Jeux olympiques de Rome en 1960. Cassius Clay a 18 ans, il est temps de passer pro. 1,91 mètre sous la toise et une allonge de quasiment 2 mètres, le visage poupon, «l’insolent de Louisville» comme on l’appelle alors, ne perd aucun combat et boxe comme un poids coq –tout en esquives et piques précises. Le papillon et la guêpe.
Quatre ans plus tard, Sonny Liston, machine à démolir qui a appris la boxe à l’ombre lui offre sa chance de décrocher le titre de champion du monde des poids lourds. La stupeur emplit la salle bondée de Miami le 25 février 1964 quand «l’ours» Liston reste assis sur son tabouret à la sixième reprise, prétexte une douleur à l’épaule et abandonne son titre à un frêle gamin au visage intact. La thèse d’un combat arrangé, fortement étayée par une note retrouvée dans les archives du FBI en 2014, plane encore aujourd’hui… Aux premières loges, un leader noir et rouquin en costume immaculé, lunettes sévères de prof de fac sur le nez, assiste dans le brouillard des fumées de cigares à la naissance d’un phénomène. Le lendemain, Clay annonce qu’il devient Cassius X, effaçant à jamais son «nom d’esclave», comme l’avait fait avant lui Malcolm X, l’homme discret au bord du ring, «conseiller spirituel» du nouveau champion du monde des poids lourds et porte-voix en disgrâce des Black Muslims.
L’acte de naissance d’Ali
Les deux hommes se connaissent en fait depuis 1962, et ça fait un moment que Clay garde le secret sur ses accointances avec la Nation of Islam, mouvement afro-nationaliste qui file les pires suées à l’Amérique, du FBI à Martin Luther King. Pieux mais non-moins ambitieux, Clay savait qu’il ne deviendrait jamais un challenger s’il affichait ouvertement ses attaches à un groupe si sulfureux. Maintenant champion, il peut bien faire ce qu’il veut, et, un mois après sa double victoire (contre Liston, contre l’Amérique blanche), Cassius X devient Mohamed Ali. Et oublie Malcolm X, renié par les siens et assassiné l’année suivante.
Ali et Liston s’affrontent à nouveau en 1965, dans un bled du Maine –aucune ville majeure ne voulait prendre le risque d’organiser ce combat entre un nationaliste noir dont l’ex-mentor vient d’être dessoudé et un ancien taulard présumé lié à la mafia. Liston s’écroule en deux minutes, touché par un coup si subtil (pichenette disent les uns, «punch fantôme» jurent les autres) que personne ou presque de ne l’a vu. Le public crie «chiqué!». Peu importe, la photo de Neil Leifer est belle et restera gravée dans les mémoires: Ali, bras replié comme s’il promettait une nouvelle trempe, hurle à Liston, étalé les bras ouverts, de se relever. «L’herbe pousse, les oiseaux volent, les vagues mouillent le sable. Moi, je tabasse des gens», se gargarise un Ali toujours plus outrancier, toujours plus narcissique. La légende demande qu’on l’alimente, et l’acte II se joue hors du ring.
«Je n’ai rien contre les Vietcongs»
En 1967, Ali refuse de rejoindre la jeunesse américaine qui se bousille dans une guerre sans fin et sans but au Vietnam. «Je n’ai rien contre les Vietcongs. Aucun Vietcong ne m’a traité de nègre…» se justifie-t-il, invoquant sa religion et sa conscience. La World Boxing Association lui retire son titre, les Etats ses permis de boxer. L’armée le condamne à cinq années de prison, il fait appel. Libre mais interdit de combattre, il l’emporte finalement devant la Cour suprême en 1971, mais ses meilleures années d’athlète sont derrière lui. Reste qu’en quatre ans, inflexible et éloquent, Ali est devenu une figure incontestée de la contre-culture, adorée dans les ghettos comme dans les facs où il vient discourir sur le racisme et le pacifisme.
Entre-temps, un nouveau champion a émergé, invaincu, comme lui, champion olympique, comme lui: Joe Frazier. Celui-ci s’est démené en coulisse, allant jusqu’à supplier le président Nixon (pas encore impeached) pour qu’Ali, qu’il considère comme son rival naturel, retrouve le chemin du ring. Ali lui en sera tout sauf reconnaissant, transformant Frazier le fils de métayer de Caroline du Sud en «Oncle Tom», traître à sa race, dans une démarche qui tient autant de l’idéologie que du marketing –il s’agit toujours avec Ali de dramatiser les enjeux.
Le 8 mars 1971, les deux hommes qui se vouent désormais une haine évidente s’affrontent dans l’enceinte du Madison Square Garden de New York pour le «combat du siècle» –et une bourse de 5 millions de dollars. Un record, évidemment. Autre première: Ali va au tapis, allongé par un crochet du gauche rageur de Frazier. Mais il se relève. Le combat se poursuit jusqu’à la décision des arbitres. Frazier gagne nettement aux points, n’en déplaise à Ali, qui n’accepte pas la défaite. Après deux victoires pour se remettre en selle (contre Ellis et Patterson), Ali se fait briser la mâchoire par Ken Norton en 1973. L’Amérique blanche exulte de voir le fanfaron se faire littéralement casser la bouche. Le champion déchu part se ressourcer à Louisville, du fil de fer plein les dents et une envie terrible d’en découdre à nouveau avec Frazier, ce bon «négro» trop humble et inintelligible. Et même plus champion du monde: il a perdu son titre face à George Foreman en 1973.
Les premiers coups sont échangés sur un plateau télé en 1974, et la suite quelques jours plus tard sur le ring. Victoire sans éclat d’Ali, mais qui lui permet d’être le challenger naturel de Foreman. Pour le vaincre, Ali le boxeur virevoltant, garde basse et menton haut des débuts va devoir se muer en stratège dur au mal, qui encaisse les coups malgré ses arcades toujours lisses en attendant de trouver la faille, en embuscade.
Le rendez-vous de Kinshasa
Hors du ring, le cirque Ali grandit exponentiellement, l’argent aussitôt gagné s’évanouit. Un entourage pléthorique l’accompagne, il entretient deux ex-femmes, couve son épouse –la tempétueuse et ceinture noire de karaté Belinda, épousé à 17 ans en 1967– et ses maîtresses. Il a huit enfants, une ferme dans le Michigan, un palace à Chicago, une villa à Los Angeles et un camp d’entraînement en Pennsylvanie, des Cadillac de toutes les couleurs… Son manager, Herbert Mohamed, trouve une ficelle pour rentabiliser la marque: l’export diplomatique, résumé dans un haïku: «invitez Ali à combattre / et votre pays sera sous les projecteurs du monde entier» (1). C’est ainsi qu’avec l’entregent du promoteur mégalo Don King, Ali débarque à Kinshasa en 1974 pour retrouver son dû, flanqué de James Brown, B.B. King et Norman Mailer (entre autres) pour défier George Foreman devant Mobutu, qui a allongé 10 millions de dollars pour l’occasion, et n’a pas peur de ruiner le pays pour accommoder les deux boxeurs.
Ali est accueilli comme un dieu vivant, joue la carte de l’icône panafricaine face à Foreman (25 ans, dans la force de l’âge et invaincu) qu’il façonne en nouvel avatar de l’Oncle Tom, son ennemi favori. Les Zaïrois crient «Ali Bomayé» («Ali tue le») dans les rues, Foreman devient parano et le dictateur à la toque en léopard biche: le «Rumble into the Jungle» («la baston dans la jungle») est «le plus grand événement sportif du XXe siècle». C’était le but. Tout au long du combat, Foreman travaille au corps Ali, réfugié dans les cordes. «Une sauterelle accrochée à son roseau dans la tempête», écrit Mailer. Toujours à la frontière de la ruse et de la fourberie, l’entraîneur d’Ali, Angelo Dundee, a un tantinet détendu les cordes pour permettre à Ali d’y rebondir et d’esquiver –le fameux rope-a-dope (l’«enroule-gogo»). Sous la tempête tropicale, le coup de tonnerre a lieu sur le ring: Ali se réveille au huitième round quand il sent Foreman rincé et le met KO. Ali est à nouveau et plus que jamais «le plus grand».
Trash à Manille
L’année suivante, il pose son dernier jalon mythologique chez un autre autocrate exotique. La belle entre Frazier et Ali a lieu aux Philippines, alors sous la loi martiale décrétée par le président Ferdinand Marcos. A Manille, Ali pousse la dégueulasserie de son trash talk dans ses derniers retranchements. Agitant un singe en plastique devant les journalistes, il compare constamment Frazier à un gorille repoussant, insiste sur ses traits fins en comparaison avec le visage censément simiesque de son adversaire. Ali, bien plus tard, s’en excusera. Frazier ne pardonnera jamais. Le combat est une violence inouïe. Au bout de 14 rounds, les deux boxeurs sont à bout physiquement: Frazier est quasiment aveugle et Ali ne veut pas y retourner, a l’impression qu’il va crever. Il demande à son coach de couper ses gants, Dundee refuse. A l’inverse, Frazier veut retourner coller des parpaings, mais pas son entraîneur, qui a peur qu’il y laisse sa peau et jette la serviette pour son combattant. Ali, chancelant, triomphe modestement.
En 1978, il perd puis regagne son titre la même année face au médiocre Leon Spinks. Il est donc triple champion du monde à 37 ans –un record de longévité que Foreman fera tomber quelques années plus tard. La suite, c’est un crépuscule interminable. Une première retraite en 1979, puis un retour sur le ring l’année suivante pour 8 millions de dollars face à Larry Holmes, son ancien sparring-partner. Holmes, qui pourtant retient ses coups et s’en veut, massacre son mentor, qui montre les plus premiers signes de la maladie de Parkinson en public. C’est le soixantième combat pro d’Ali, c’est trop. «Un suicide» en direct devant des millions de spectateurs. Toujours pour l’argent, Ali remet le couvert en 1981 face à Trevor Berbick et perd dans un simulacre de combat que beaucoup ont préféré oublier.
Une icône malade
En 1984, Mohamed Ali ne peut plus cacher l’évidence: il est «punch drunk», il a trop combattu, Parkinson l’a mis KO. La maladie a affecté ses deux plus grands atouts: ses mains, autrefois précises comme un dard, et sa voix qui n’est plus que murmure monotone. Ali est à peine quadra mais déjà un vieillard marmonnant, monolithique. Son aura est malgré tout intacte, et à l’image d’un Mandela dont même les adversaires oublient la radicalité passée, il devient une icône presque consensuelle. Fin 1990, il passe un mois à Bagdad pour tenter de négocier la libération d’otages américains, rencontre Saddam Hussein. Il repart avec quinze d’entre eux.
Le film When We Were Kings, oscar du meilleur documentaire en 1996, remet l’Ali-mania au goût du jour dans les années 90. On scande à nouveau «Ali Bomayé» dans les cours d’école. La même année, la faiblesse d’Ali tremblotant au moment d’allumer la flamme olympique à Atlanta marque les esprits tant elle contraste avec l’image de l’icône toute puissante du film. Malgré les plus hautes récompenses nationales et humanitaires (messager de la paix pour l’ONU depuis 1998), il disparaît presque complètement de la vie publique par la suite. Il sera toutefois présent lors de l’investiture de Barack Obama en 2009. Le symbole, toujours. Converti à l’islam sunnite en 1975 puis plus récemment au soufisme, Ali était pour la dernière fois sortie de sa réserve pour condamner les propos incendiaires et racistes de Donald Trump sur les musulmans.
Ali n’était pas un saint, il pouvait même carrément être un salaud –Joe Frazier en savait quelque chose-, mais il était le meilleur, et comme il le disait: «Ce n’est pas de la vantardise si tu peux le prouver.» Certaines de ses victoires ont l’odeur de soufre et le flou artistique qui font le sel du sport d’avant les ralentis à la milliseconde et autres palettes graphiques. D’autres triomphes ont la pureté incontestable de son jab, lui qui reste considéré par les spécialistes comme le poid lourd le plus rapide de tous les temps. Le plus grand, le plus cher, le plus vicieux. Une constante: Ali était hors-norme, surhumain dans tout. Forces et faiblesses comprises.
(1) «Invite Ali to fight/And your country will share the world spotlight»
Voir encore:
The unforgiven
Muhammad Ali never had a tougher fight. Joe Frazier never felt more bitter about defeat and continues even today to hate his great rival. Thirty years after the Thrilla in Manila, America’s leading boxing writer Thomas Hauser remembers the greatest heavyweight bout of them all and discovers why Frazier thinks the ailing Ali has been ‘shut down by God’
Thomas Hauser
The Observer
4 September 2005
On 1 October 1975, Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier entered a boxing ring in Quezon City, six miles outside Manila, the Philippines, to do battle for the third time. Ali was the odds-on favourite. The fight was scheduled for 15 rounds and began at 10:45 in the morning to accommodate closed-circuit television viewers in the United States. As it unfolded, everyone at ringside understood that they were watching greatness.
‘Joe was nowhere near the fighter he’d once been,’ Dave Wolf, a member of Frazier’s camp, would recall. ‘And neither was Ali. But as occasionally happens in boxing, their declining curves crossed at exactly the same spot. And they were so evenly matched and put so much of themselves into the fight that it was historic.’
‘What it came down to in Manila,’ Jerry Izenberg, a leading American sportswriter, says now, ‘wasn’t the heavyweight championship of the world. Ali and Frazier were fighting for something more important than that. They were fighting for the heavyweight championship of each other.’
The result was a battle of epic proportions. Jack Johnson versus Jim Jeffries and the rematch between Joe Louis and Max Schmeling were more historically significant. But no heavyweight title fight ever had more dramatic sustained action.
Ali and Frazier fought three fights that are the pyramids of boxing. Their first encounter, at Madison Square Garden in 1974, in which Frazier prevailed, was rife with social and political overtones. Muhammad evened the score at the same venue three years later in Ali-Frazier II, which was more muted, in and out of the ring. As a fist-fight, Ali-Frazier III was their greatest confrontation. The bout was the promotional creation of Don King and Bob Arum. It took place in the Philippines for one simple reason. Money. The country’s President, Ferdinand Marcos, wanted the glory that would come from presiding over the bout and saw to it that the necessary funds were made available. Not everything went smoothly. Security was tight because of insurgent political activity and early-morning roadwork conflicted with an overnight military curfew. Also, Ali caused a bit of a stir by bringing his mistress (Veronica Porche, later his third wife) to a reception at the presidential palace. Marcos referred to Veronica as Muhammad’s ‘wife’, which made Belinda Ali more than a little unhappy.
Like its predecessors, Ali-Frazier III featured two great fighters with distinctly different personalities. In one corner, Joe Frazier: a decent hard-working man with rural roots and little formal education. In the other: the most famous man on Earth. Ali, in the 1960s, was the most beautiful fighting machine ever. After beating Sonny Liston to capture the heavyweight crown in 1964, he had nine consecutive title defences before being stripped of his championship for refusing induction into the US army at the height of the war in Vietnam. During Ali’s three-year absence, Frazier knocked out Jimmy Ellis to become heavyweight champion. But it was a ‘paper’ title. Then Ali returned and, in 1971, ‘Smokin’ Joe’ defeated the former champion on points over 15 brutal rounds.
Frazier thought that, once he had beaten Ali in their first fight, he would be accorded wider respect. It never happened. Even though Joe was the undisputed heavyweight champion, Ali was still The Man as far as most black Americans were concerned.
‘Joe Frazier was an available symbol behind whom people who hated Ali could unite,’ American sports broadcaster commentator Bryant Gumbel has noted. ‘Was it Joe’s fault? Of course not. In fact, one of the sad stories to be written about that era is that Joe Frazier never got his due as a man. In some ways, he symbolised what the black man’s struggle was about far more than Ali did. But it was Joe’s misfortune to be cast as the opponent of a man who was the champion of all good things.’
After beating Ali, Frazier was dethroned by George Foreman. Then he lost a rematch on points to Ali. Following that, Muhammad journeyed to Zaire for the ‘Rumble in the Jungle’ in 1974. There he knocked out Foreman to reclaim the throne. The stage was set for Manila.
‘You have to understand the premise behind Ali-Frazier III,’ Ferdie Pacheco, Ali’s cornerman and ring physician, recalled. ‘The first fight was life and death, and Frazier won. Second fight; Ali figures him out, no problem, relatively easy victory for Ali. Then Ali beats Foreman, and Frazier’s sun sets. I don’t care what anyone says now; all of us thought that Frazier was shot. We all thought Manila was going to be an easy fight. Ali comes out, dances around, and knocks him out in eight or nine rounds.’
Wrong.
In Manila, Frazier was fuelled by pride as a fighter and by hatred for Ali. Before their first fight, Ali had branded Joe as ‘dumb’ and an ‘Uncle Tom’. In promoting Ali-Frazier II, he had called Joe ‘ignorant’ during a joint television interview, which led to an ugly studio brawl. Then, at a press conference in advance of Ali-Frazier III, Muhammad went further over the line.
The insults began with a poem:
It will be a killer
And a chiller
And a thrilla
When I get the gorilla
In Manila
Then Ali reached into his pocket, pulled out a black rubber gorilla, and announced, ‘This is the way Joe Frazier looks when you hit him.’
Ali began pummeling the gorilla. ‘Come on, gorilla,’ he taunted as Frazier glowered and the assembled media laughed. ‘We’re in Manila. Come on, gorilla; this is a thrilla.’
‘Joe Frazier is so ugly,’ Ali said, pouring more salt into the wound. ‘His mother told me that, when Joe was a little boy, every time he cried, the tears would stop, turn around, and go down the back of his head.’
‘I don’t want to knock him out,’ Frazier said afterwards. ‘I want to hurt him. If I knock him down, I’ll stand back, give him a chance to breathe. It’s his heart I want.’
The early rounds belonged to Ali. He outboxed Frazier, landing sharp clean punches, and had the challenger staggering several times. Frazier moved inexorably forward. Ali continued to pile up points. Then, in the middle rounds, the tide turned.
‘Joe Frazier’s not a great boxer,’ Ali once said. ‘But he’s a great slugger, a great street fighter, a bull fighter. He takes a lot of punches, his eyes close, and he just keeps coming.’
In Manila, Frazier kept coming. The heat was oppressive. The pace of the fight and brutality of the blows was unprecedented for heavyweight combat. ‘In the sixth round,’ Ed Schuyler, who was at ringside for the Associated Press, recalled, ‘Frazier hit Ali with a left hook that’s the hardest punch I’ve ever seen. Ali’s head turned like it was on a swivel, and his response was to look at Frazier and say, « They told me Joe Frazier was washed up ».’
‘They lied,’ Frazier countered.
In round 12, Ali regained the initiative, staggering Frazier again and measuring him for hard punishing blows. In round 13, a jolting left hand knocked Joe’s mouthpiece into the crowd. Round 14 was more of the same. Frazier was spitting blood. His left eye was completely closed and his right eye was closing. He could no longer see the punches coming.
After the 14th round, Frazier’s trainer, Eddie Futch, stopped the fight. Shortly before his death 26 years later, Futch said, with certainty in his voice: ‘To this day, some people say to me, « There were only three minutes left. Why did you stop it? » And my answer has never changed. I tell them, « I’m not a timekeeper. I’m a handler of fighters ».’
The stoppage was fortuitous for Ali. Years later, Wali Muhammad, one of Ali’s cornermen in Manila, acknowledged: ‘After the 14th, Ali came back to the corner and told us, « Cut ’em off ». That’s how tired he was. He wanted us to cut his gloves off. Angelo [Ali’s trainer] ignored him. He started wiping Ali’s face, getting him ready for the 15th. We sponged him down. I don’t know if he’d have gone out for the last round or not. Ali’s not a quitter; he’d never quit. But I’d never seen him exhausted like that before.’
‘Frazier quit just before I did,’ Ali told me in 1990. ‘I didn’t think I could fight any more.’
Ali conducted his post-fight interview while sitting on a stool in the ring. ‘I was surprised Joe had so much stamina,’ he said. ‘There was too much pressure. He’s the greatest fighter of all times next to me. This is too painful. It’s too much work. I might have a heart attack or something.’
The young Ali had been virtually untouchable. When Ali fought Cleveland Williams in 1966, in the three rounds that the fight lasted, Williams hit him only three times. In Manila, Joe Frazier bludgeoned Ali with 440 blows.
‘Ali took a beating like you’d never believe anyone could take,’ Ferdie Pacheco recalled. ‘When he said afterward that it was the closest thing he’d ever known to death – let me tell you something: if dying is that hard, I’d hate to see it coming. But Frazier took the same beating. And in the 14th round, Ali just about took his head off. I was cringing. The heat was awesome. Both men were dehydrated. The place was like a time-bomb. I thought we were close to a fatality.’
‘Ali-Frazier III was Ali-Frazier III,’ says Jerry Izenberg. ‘There’s nothing to compare it with. I’ve never witnessed anything like it. And I’ll tell you something else. Both fighters won that night, and both fighters lost.’
Neither was the same again. Ali fought 10 more times, but the speed and reflexes were gone. Ultimately, he would lose three of his last four fights, including a brutal defeat in 1980 at the hands of Larry Holmes. Frazier never won a fight after Manila. He was knocked out by George Foreman for the second time in 1976, retired, and came back in 1981 for a draw against Jumbo Cummings in his last hurrah.
Thirty years have passed since that fateful encounter in Manila. And the combatants, while linked by history, have long since gone separate ways. Ali, now 63, is still arguably the most recognisable person on the planet. His status as a world icon was confirmed by the outpouring of love that accompanied his lighting the Olympic flame in Atlanta in 1996.
Frazier, 61, owns a gym in Philadelphia. Both men have a following in the sports memorabilia market, although Ali commands higher fees. Each is in declining health. Ali’s battle with the ravages of Parkinson’s syndrome is a matter of public record. Frazier walks with a limp as a consequence of injuries sustained in a car accident. Neither man talks as clearly as he once did. But Joe’s voice is now the louder of the two and, when the subject is Ali, there is an ugly edge to what he says.
In the ring, Ali hurt people. Outside the ring, he tried not to. One of the few exceptions to the latter half of that equation was his treatment of Frazier. Outside the ring, Ali hurt Joe a lot; and Joe didn’t have the verbal skills to match him.
Ali played the race card against Frazier in a mean-spirited way. For the entertainment of white America, he labelled Joe as ugly and dumb. And at the same time, speaking to black America, he branded Frazier an Uncle Tom, turning him into an object of derision and scorn. The latter insult was particularly galling. Joe Frazier is not, and never was, an Uncle Tom. Yet to this day, there are people who think of him as a less-than-proud black man because of Ali’s diatribes.
‘One of the many paradoxes about Ali,’ says historian Randy Roberts, ‘is that he embraced an ideology that disparaged white people; yet he was never cruel to white people, only blacks. Except for occasional humorous barbs, Ali’s white opponents were treated with dignity and respect. But things got ugly with Floyd Patterson, Ernie Terrell, and Frazier. Patterson and Terrell might have asked for it because of things they said. But Joe was innocent. And to deny the cruelty of what Ali did to Joe Frazier is to continue to be cruel to Joe.’
‘I’m sure Ali has forgotten most of what he did,’ Dave Wolf observed years after he watched from Frazier’s corner in Manila. ‘But the damage he did to Joe was never undone. There were moments when Joe was so hurt and which he remembers so vividly. And Ali probably doesn’t remember them at all.’
‘You don’t do to a man what Ali did to Joe,’ says Bert Watson, Frazier’s business manager in the Eighties and Nineties. ‘Ali robbed him of who he is. To a lot of people, Joe is still ignorant, slow-speaking, dumb, and ugly. That tag never leaves him. People have only seen one Joe: the one created by Ali. If you’re a man, that’s going to get to you in a big way.’
To prove the point, Watson tells the tale of the first trip that he and Frazier took together. ‘We were driving in Florida and stopped for gas,’ he recalls. ‘We’d been talking about Ali. Right before I got out of the car to go to the bathroom, I said, « One thing you’ve got to admit; the man was a great fighter ». Anyway, I go to the bathroom, come back, and Joe is gone. I had to hitchhike to the motel where we were staying. Finally, I got there. Joe was in his room. I went in and said, « What happened? Why’d you leave me like that ». And Joe told me, « When you work for me, you don’t say nothing good about Ali ».’
Some things never change.
‘I hated Ali,’ Frazier told me 15 years ago. ‘God might not like me talking that way, but it’s in my heart. I know things would have been different for me if he hadn’t been around. I’d have gotten a lot more respect. I’d have had more appreciation from my own kind. Twenty years I’ve been fighting Ali, and I still want to take him apart piece by piece and send him back to Jesus.’
‘He shook me in Manila,’ Frazier said of their final fight. ‘We were gladiators. I didn’t ask no favours of him and he didn’t ask none of me. I don’t like him but I gotta say, in the ring, he was a man. In Manila, I hit him punches, those punches, they’d have knocked a building down. And he took ’em. He took ’em and he came back, and I got to respect that part of the man. But I sent him home worse than he came. He was the one who spoke about being nearly dead in Manila; not me.’
Joe Frazier is not a forgiving man and his bitterness continued to flow.
‘Look at him now. He’s damaged goods. I know it; you know it. Everyone knows it; they just don’t want to say. God has shut him down. He can’t talk no more because he was saying the wrong things. He was always making fun of me. I’m the dummy; I’m the one getting hit in the head. Tell me now. Him or me; which one talks worse now? He can’t talk no more and he still tries to make noise. I don’t care how the world looks at him. I see him different, and I know him better than anyone. Manila don’t matter no more. He’s finished, and I’m still here.’
Earlier this year, speaking of Ali’s current physical condition, Frazier said with satisfaction: ‘I did that to him. I’ll outlive him.’
Meanwhile, Ali has long since put down his guns. ‘Joe Frazier is a good man,’ he told me in a moment of reflection. ‘I couldn’t have done what I did without him, and he couldn’t have done what he did without me. If God ever calls me to a holy war, I want Joe Frazier fighting beside me.’
Then, looking back over his career, Ali called Frazier ‘the roughest and toughest’ opponent he’d ever faced and rated his fights as follows: ‘When I was at my best – against Cleveland Williams. The fight that meant the most to me – beating George Foreman to win the championship of the world again. And the best fight for fans – against Joe Frazier in Manila.’
· Thomas Hauser is the author of ‘Muhammad Ali: His Life and Times’, which won the 1991 William Hill Sports Book of the Year. His latest book, ‘Muhammad Ali: The Lost Legacy’, (Robson Books) will be published in October
Voir enfin:
The Revolt of the Black Athlete
Harry Edwards
The conspicuous position of black athletes in American culture contrasted sharply with the inferior place of African Americans as a people. Seizing upon this disparity, black activists sought to illustrate the issue through a number of confrontations around athletic event: Heavyweight boxing champion Muhammad Ali, who had an nounced his conversion to the Nation of Islam and changed his name from Cassius Clay, refused induction into the armed forces on religious grounds in 1967. He was stripped of his title. Ali’s case ended in a 1971 Supreme Court decision upholding his constitutional guarantees. He did not regain the championship until 1974, however.
Not only was 1968 a presidential election year, but it was an Olympic year as well. The Olympic Project for Human Rights was organized to use the international spotlight of the Olympics to highlight race problems. A number of American basket ball players joined in a boycott of the Olympics, while track and field athl etes staged personal demonstrations on the victory stand. Harry Edwards, black sociologist and former athlete, recounts the issues and ramifications of these activities.
Since the time of Jesse Owens it has been presumed that any poor but rugged youngster who was able to jump racial fences into a college haven was happy all day long. He – the All ‐ American, the subsidized, semiprofessional racer – was fortunate. Mostly, this is a myth. In 1960, for example, I was recruited by San Jose State College, a prominen t « track school. » Fine things were promised. « You’ll be accepted here, » the head coach and deans assured me. It d eveloped that of 16 campus fraternities (as Greek in name as Plato, who revered the de mocracy of the Olympic Games) not one would pledge Harry Edwards (or anyone of color). The better restaurants were out of bou nds and social activity was nil – I was invited nowhere outside « blood » circles. Leaving California, I spent two years acquiring a Master’s degree at Cornell University. Returning to San Jose State as a teacher, I knocked on door after door bearing « vacancy » sign s, but Mr. Charley was so sorry – the rental room suddenly wasn’t available. The end ‐ up: a cold cement ‐ floor garage, costing $75 a month. Not long after I came to know Tommie Smith, who se 0: 19.5 is the world 220 ‐ yard record and whom this same state college uses to impress and procure other speedsters and footballers of his race. « I have you beat, » he said. « My wife’s pregnant. We have no decent house. So far 13 lovely people have turned me down. » …
During the spring months of 1968, the Olympic Committee for Human Rights, in addition to mobilizing and counseling black athletes and students on various campuses, had continued its drive to keep the Olympic Project for Hu man Rights in the forefront of public concern ….
Some athletes had to be convinced to comp ete. Typical of these were Tom mie Smith and John Carlos. They had to be convinced that for them to boycott under the existing circumstances would be in a vain sacrifice. For unlike Lew Alcindor, the great black basketball star, they could easily have been replaced by Negroes more than willing to compete for the United States ….
Undoubtedly, there would be some defections in Mexico City. But if only one single black athlete stag ed a gesture of protest during the course of victory ceremonies in Mexico City, the millions of oppressed black people in America would have been remembered ….
Because of the overawing of some black athletes by the Olympic men’s track and field coaching staff and by Avery Brundage, it became necessary to make certain changes with regard to the forms of protest outlined in the Statement to the Black Power Conference. The center of the protest did not, however, move from the victory stand. It was decide d that each athlete would determine and carry out his own « thing, » preferably focusing around the victory stand ceremonies. In this way, potential repercussions from a so ‐ called « Black Power » conspiracy could be avoided and, also, each athlete would be free to determine his own course of protest. The results of this new strategy, devised for the most part by the athletes themselves, were no less than revolutionary in impact ….
The first test of support for the Olympic Project for Human Rights came when Jim Hines and Charles Greene took the victory stand after finishing a close 1 ‐ 2 in the 100 ‐ meter dash. The two took the stand and stood stolidly, facing the flag. Neither made so much as an utterance in protest of black degradation in America ….
Then came the victory ceremonies for the 200 ‐ meter dash. Tommie Smith the gold medalist, and John Carlos, the bronze medalist, had made it crystal clear that they intended to go through with their planned protest at the victory stand. Subtle attempts at intimidating the two had been made by members of both the U.S. Olympic Committee and the U.S. track and field coaching staff. But Carlos and Smith would not bend. They climbed the victory stand shoeless, each wearing a black glove. Smith had a black scarf tied around his neck. They were joined on the victory stand by Peter Norman, the silver medalist from Australia, who wore the official badge of the Olympic Project for Human Rights to underscore his support of the black liberation struggle. The men were presented with their me dals and then each turned toward the flag of the coun try represented by the gold medal winner. The U.S. National Anthem was played. Smith and Carlos immed iately raised their gloved flsts and bowed their heads. In a taped interview with Howard Cosell, Smith explained the pair’s protest gestures. He stated, « I wore a black right ‐ hand glove and Carlos wore the left ‐ hand glove of the same pair. My raised right hand stood for the power in black America. Carlos’ raised left hand stood for the unity of black Amer ica. Together they formed an arch of unity and power. The black scarf around my neck stood for black pride. The black socks with no shoes stood for black poverty in racist America. The totality of our effort was the regaining of black dignity. » Smith later confided to me that the gesture of the bowed head was in remembrance of the fallen warriors in the black liberation struggle in America – Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Jr., and others.
The impact of the protest was immediate. The U.S. Olympic Committee, acting hastily and rashly, warned all other U.S. athletes, black and white, that « severe » penalties would follow any further protests. Smith and Carlos were given 48 hours to get out of Mexico and were suspended from the Olympic team.
Voir par ailleurs:
When this provocative Esquire cover image was released in 1968, Muhammad Ali had been stripped of his title for refusing to be inducted into the U.S. Armed Forces and serve in the Vietnam War.
Ali, who had recently converted to the Nation Of Islam, believed that the war was against the teachings of the Holy Qur’an. As a result, he was arrested, tried and found guilty of draft evasion. The case would later be overthrown in the Supreme Court.
The idea of the cover image came from famous art director George Lois1, who decided to depict Ali as Saint Sebastian.
Lois believed that “everything you do has to be a unique surprising solution. The bigger the idea, the more shocking and memorable it will be. It’s really simple.”
One of my favorite quotes from him is that: “Creativity can solve almost any problem. The defeat of habit by originality, overcomes everything.”
With over 90 Esquire covers to his credit, Lois’s work was so influential that it was displayed at the MoMA and into this coffee book collection.
According to photographer Carl Fischer, who worked with Lois on many of his covers:
“We worked over the telephone. Lois never made layouts, never made drawings for the covers. He just had the idea of what the cover should be and he would call up and say, “We have a story about Ali and the fact that he lost his title. Why don’t we do something with him as Saint Sebastian?”
In an interview with Juxtapoz magazine, Lois described the process of connecting with Ali and his hesitancy during the shoot:
I get Ali on the phone and told him that I need him in NYC for 2 days, and he says “Gee George, I can’t…”. And I said, “Fuck you, you’re not doing anything.”
There wasn’t a fight. He had no license to fight, and he would just go to colleges and give talks. He was funny as hell.
Anyways, so I said “I’m going to take a photo of you as Saint Sebastian, blah blah blah.” And Ali says okay. I told him to bring his pretty white fucking trunks and his pretty white shoes and bring your sorry ass.
The day of the shoot, I had looked at hundreds of pictures of the great painting of Saint Sebastian and they are all really bright. But I told Ali, “I want you to pose where your body is very quiet but your head is in pain because I don’t want to show your body like that. I want to show your body strong, but your head is in pain.”
So he’s looking at this postcard of the painting and he looks at it and says, “Hey George, is he a Christian?” And I say, “Saint Sebastian… yes he’s a Christian!”
And Ali says. “George I can’t pose as a Christian.” I said, “It’s a symbolic thing. Anyone in the world can look at this thing and understand the imagery. And the imagery doesn’t say that you’re a Christian, the imagery says that you are a martyr. And what I am saying is that you a martyr to your race, you are a martyr because of the war. It’s a combination of race, religion, and war in one image, you’re symbolizing it in one image.”
And he says, “George, I can’t pose as a Christian, this is against my religion.”
I go holy shit, “Who can I talk to? He didn’t know who. And I said, “Can I talk to Elijah Muhammad? Can you get him on the phone?”
It takes about 2 minutes, but Ali gets him on the phone, so I pick up and have about a 15 minute talk about what religion am I, how old am I, etc. I’m talking to him about symbolism, how Ali is a martyr, blah blah blah. Finally, Elijah asks to speak to Ali.
Then, Ali gets off the phone with him and says, “Lets do it!”
Footnotes:
1 Lois’s most recognizable Esquire cover is probably this one of Andy Warhol. He also once put Sonny Liston in a Santa Clause outfit and explained: « If I were a black guy back then I would have been a terrorist! I showed the meanest mother fucker, the nastiest man who ever lived, scowling at the camera in a Santa Clause outfit. The last man America wants to see go down a chimney is Sonny Liston!”
photo via Newmanology
Voir aussi:
Leonard Shecter
Esquire
Jun 4, 2016
The ex-heavyweight champion of the world fools around in Chicago these days, more or less in exile, because he won’t go. He isn’t kidding.
It was Chicago, September, 1962, the week of the first Floyd Patterson-Sonny Liston heavyweight championship fight. The nature of the match, evil (Liston) vs. good (Patterson), had attracted an impressive delegation of the nation’s literati, among them Norman Mailer and James Baldwin. Gathering place was press headquarters, a windowless meeting room in a Loop hotel full of busy typewriters, empty glasses and chatting groups of reporters from places like Quincy, Illinois, London and Sydney. Into this gabbling scene, one late afternoon, a time when the room was usually filled, walked a large, handsome, collegiate-looking young man dressed in sport shirt, sweater and tight pants. « Gentlemen, » he shouted. « Your attention please, gentlemen. » His voice was strident, his eyes glittered and he smiled. « Is the A.P. here? » he said. He did not have to stand on his toes in order to see over everybody’s head. He just lifted his chin and looked around the crowded room. « Is the U.P.I. here? Very good. Reuters? Anybody here from Time? Nobody from Time? What about Newsweek? Fine. Very good. Gentlemen, I have a poem. But first I have to tell you that Mr. Archie Moore shook me up by inventing a new punch which he called ‘the lip-buttoner.’ I had to invent myself a new punch, too. I call it the old-age pension punch. »
There was a rumble of laughter.
« Now my poem. »
It was that night in the Coliseum That’s when I annihilated him,I gave him a lot of sand The one they call the old man;You could tell by the bombs I threw,I had left jabs to fire like pistons They were twice as rough as Liston’s;The people cry « Stop the fight! »Before Clay put out the light,He was trying to remain the great Mr. Moore For he knew Clay had predicted four;I swept that old man clean out of the ring For a good new broom sweeps up anything, Some say the greatest was Sugar Ray But they haven’t seen Cassius Clay.
He hung around the press room for a while, chatting, shouting, mugging and bragging. And when he left, it was as though somebody had cleaned out the ashtrays, cleared the cigar smoke and left the place with a feeling of open windows. He would do the same for boxing, I thought, and he would have a good time doing it.
And that’s the way it seemed to go. He knocked out old Archie Moore in the predicted four rounds and he went on to win the title. Everywhere he went there was noise and laughter and people. Once he went on television with a new poem:
Me.Wheeeee!
Then he added: « I’m very modest. »
Before his second fight with Liston he showed up with the largest entourage since King Saud brought his harem to the Waldorf Astoria. There were four sparring partners, three cooks, a valet, a chauffeur, a personal photographer, a secretary, a masseur and Stepin Fetch it (the only movie star who ever made two million dollars in Hollywood and frivoled away five million; Cassius Clay understood flamboyance). And then, of course, there was always Drew (Bundini) Brown, the man who invented Clay’s fighting slogan: Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee.
And the bus. It was fire-engine red and in letters four feet high on both sides was painted the legend: Heavyweight Champion of the World. (In this bus, he said, all the white men rode in the back.) Before his fight with George Chuvalo he drove the bus—Big Red, he called it affectionately—up to Chuvalo’s Catskill training camp and as he arrived he managed to drive it off the road. This made all the wire services, including Reuters. Anywhere he was, it was like a seventy-five-piece band had arrived.
Even after he cut back some of the noise, having won his campaign for the title, fun-and-games was all around him. Children followed him wherever he went and all over the world adults adulated him. « The only difference between me and the Pied Piper, » he once said, « is he didn’t have no Cadillac. »
And another time: « I’m so popular I have to hide. I get everything free, invitations to countries. I get letters from all kinds of kings. They want me to live in their castles. Don’t no Negro get better treatment than me. If I retired tomorrow, I can say I’ve had my fun. »
Muhammad Ali, shirtless, dressed in jeans and chukka boots, sat in the corner of his blue velvet couch. He ran his hands over his milk-chocolate torso, caressing, slapping, pinching the new flesh around his middle. The color television, set into a marble fireplace opposite him in this narrow living room, was tuned to a morning game show. He had used the remote-control gadget to turn the sound off but the animated lollipops on the screen continued their mindless charade. His eyes, big and brown, kept drifting back to the screen. He was talking about how busy he was.
« And tonight they’re having this big musical and they want me to say a few words about whatever I want to talk about. Then I got a call from this college in Hartford—I forget the name of it—and they want me up there. And some old Negro lady group in New York is going to give me an award and they want me up there on Sunday to accept that. There’s always something. Everybody wants me. »
The expression on his face turned to one of bemused pain. His handsome face, unmarked but for a thin white scar in his left eyebrow (the result of a childhood accident), is as mobile as that of a rubber puppet and he tugs and twists at it to underline emotion. When he is surprised his eyes pop out of his head and show white all around the pupil. When he is sad, his face collapses and one can almost see the tears forming. When he is happy his face glows like a pinball machine and his even white teeth gleam free games. He uses his voice the way he does his face; he never merely quotes anybody, he imitates. He drops it and whispers, he raises it to sound like a woman. He straightens up and tightens his throat and enunciates his g’s and d’s and he sounds like a white man. He is a performer and he glances often at the mirrored wall behind the fireplace to see how he’s coming across.
« It’s impossible for me to dry up and have nothing to do, » he is saying. « I mean I just don’t represent boxing. I’m taking a stand for what I believe in and being one thousand percent for the freedom of the black people. Naturally those who have the same fight, but on a smaller scale, they come to me, » and here he whispers, « ‘You speak for me, too, brother, you speak for me too. I make my money from Charley but I’m with you. Man, I just jump and shout every time I see you tell them.' » Now he raises his voice again. « So I got hundreds of places to go and talk and I’ll always have them as long as I’m talking for freedom. »
Ah, freedom. He now is free to talk. He used to be free to fight and he was something to see, the speed of him and the beauty of his motion, his huge, smooth body gliding in a ballet of boxing, his white ring shoes becoming a furry flurr. He was perhaps the best anybody has ever seen, because he had the modern athlete’s body, as swift as it was large, and no boxer ever had one like it before. But then a sergeant in a Houston Selective Service office asked him to take a step forward and he refused because, he said, he was a minister of the Muslim faith in the Nation of Islam. The boxing commission revoked his title as heavyweight champion of the world. Rumors started, around the fight business first and then in newspapers. Rumor: he was stony-broke, living on heaven knows what, and what had happened to his money? Rumor: he had earned more than two million dollars in the ring—his gross earnings as a champion were probably twice that, except that fifty percent is conceded to his managers—but his co-religionists had stolen it, extorted it, conned him out of it. Rumor: and guess who put up the $135,000 for a mosque in Miami?
« I’ll tell you one thing about that, » Muhammad Ali said. Then he told a lot of things. They poured out of him like one of his sermons, most of which he excerpts from Message to the Blackman by Elijah Muhammad, the self-anointed Messenger of Allah. « Many reporters and many people ask me, they say, ‘Champion, how you gonna live? Champion, how you eating? How you gonna make it?’ I have this to say to all the reporters and all the critics who want to know why I don’t fall and when I’m gonna fall. They seem to want to see that. The power structure seems to want to starve me out. I mean the punishment, five years in jail, ten-thousand-dollar fine, ain’t enough. They want to stop me from working, not only in the country but out of it. Not even a license to fight an exhibition for charity. And that’s in this twentieth century. You read about these things in the dictatorship countries where a man don’t go along with this thing or that and he is completely not allowed to work or to earn a decent living. So this is my position. I rely on Allah. I leave it up to Allah. I believe that there is no God but Allah and I believe Elijah Muhammad is his own true messenger and I’m standing up for my religion and my salvation. If it means suffer, if it means get out of the house, give up the cars, I’ll do it. Just give me a pair of blue jeans and a leather jacket, give me a stick with a rag on the back with some food in it and say, Get on the railroad tracks, and I will do it. I believe that Allah would lead me to a gold mine on the train. I might find a million-dollar bill. »
When he is happy his face glows like a pinball machine and his even white teeth gleam free games.
He has been saying this sort of thing for years and finally it is apparent that he believes it. He is burning with fervor. He might even believe that Allah, if not the judicial system, will save him from prison. « I am looking for Allah to do something, » he says. « I am his servant. Allah, they’re punishing your servant. »
Not all the Muslims are this fervent. Says Herbert Muhammad, one of Elijah Muhammad’s eight children and a man who acts as Muhammad Ali’s manager: « Yes, we believe Allah will provide. We also believe that Allah helps those who help themselves. »
In fact, Allah will not be called on to step in immediately, not about the money anyway. There was a sum deposited in his name by the group of Louisville businessmen who managed him when he was Cassius Marcellus Clay that now amounts to $76,000. He cannot touch this until he is thirty-five or has retired. He is twenty-five years old now. (Hard to believe he is not much more. « I’d be dead by now if I was a Christian under this much pressure. ») By the time he is thirty-five that money should have grown to $125,000, perhaps more. In the meantime, Herbert Muhammad pointed out, he owns sixty percent of an oil well near San Antonio and receives monthly royalty checks. He has been offered $50,000 for a book about his life. But Herbert Muhammad added: « I think we all have to worry about money. He has to worry. But he still has a little, and he don’t owe nobody. [A New York lawyer named Covington says he owes him $284,000 in legal fees, but this is being disputed in court.] He’s in no immediate danger unless he overspends himself. »
Not likely. He has become downright frugal and he enjoys it. « Everybody is cutting down, not just me, » he says. « America has to cut down on her space program. America has to cut down on this and that. But you’ll never see me hungry. When I get to a city there’s a hundred Muslims waiting for me. ‘Get in my car, brother.’ ‘No, get in my car, brother.’ I go to their house. They have prepared dinner. ‘This house is yours,’ that’s what they tell me. ‘You need a hundred dollars?’ What I need money for? I don’t spend no money. Don’t drink, don’t smoke, don’t go nowhere, don’t go running with women. I take my wife out and we eat ice cream. My wife is such a good cook I never go to a restaurant. I give her $20 for a whole week and it’s enough for her. We can eat on $3 a day. She just came off a three-day fast. How can you look at a man like me, a son of Allah, and ask how you gonna eat? Who feeds the birds? Who feeds the tigers? Who feeds the fish? Who feeds the ants? »
Who gave Elijah Muhammad $135,000 for his Miami mosque?
« That’s a joke, » Muhammad Ali said. « They went and made a special law for boxers like me, the Joe Louis Law. The group in Louisville made an agreement with the American Government that I could get none of my money until I paid ninety percent of the maximum tax to the government first, just because they feared me helping my religion. You write that. They feared me helping to educate black children and take them out of the slums. I made in my boxing career two million dollars and ten percent of two million is two hundred thousand. What’s two hundred thousand to Elijah Muhammad? He has a newspaper that costs $80,000 a week to keep going. He’s all over America. He’s got six or seven hundred thousand followers. What’s my money gonna do for a whole nation? Man, I could fight for the rest of my life and not pay for one block of his property. It’s so vicious the way they talk, trying to make people think I’ve been robbed. Elijah Muhammad has turned down my money. He said, ‘No, brother, you need it. You ain’t got no money after taxes.’ They say he stole my money and they say he told me not to go to the Army. But they got to let one of them go. I could make ten million dollars if I went to the Army. If he’s out to rob me he wants me to go. But he never said a word, either way. And I would never ask him. »
By now it was twelve-thirty and he said he had to leave to pick up his wife in the Loop. He put on a striped shirt, open at the neck, and a black leather jacket and we went out the back door and through the two-car garage. The house is modest, long and narrow with the dining room at one end of the living room and the kitchen beyond that. Off the dining room there is a bathroom and two bedrooms. The house was newly furnished in comfortable modern pieces, thick, sculptured wall-to-wall carpeting, and a few posh touches, like a false fireplace of marble and a dining-room buffet with a top that lights up. That was all of it, except that the basement was being made over into two more bedrooms and a bath. This house is pink brick on the outside and sits on a tiny corner plot, close to all the other homes; when you look down the street they appear to be attached. « They say Muslims hate, » Muhammad Ali said. « If I hated would I live in this neighborhood? There are only three Negro families living here. » Still, there are a lot of visible For Sale signs on the little lawns and the taxicab driver who brought me said the neighborhood was « going down, like all the rest of South Chicago. »
The garage was empty, but he rolled up one of the doors to let us out. When he closed it I could see that someone had written on it in large letters with a purple marking pen: White Power. He laughed when he saw I had noticed it. « That don’t bother me none, » he said.
The car at the curb was a sparkling tawny Cadillac, a palomino Eldorado, he said. It had a white leather top. « This is America’s best, » he said. « Caaadillac Eldooooraaado. I’ve always had one of these since I was nineteen. I should do a commercial for Cadillac. »
Ali drove north on Lake Shore Drive at forty miles an hour, five less than the posted limit. « Look at all the po-lice, » he said every time a police car went by, which was often. « There is more po-lice in this town than anything. You ever see so many po-lice? » He shook his head and laughed. « I lost my license here three times. I won’t do it no more. Elijah Muhammad teaches us to obey the laws of the land. As long as they don’t conflict with your religion. »
As he drove, adjusting his record player from time to time—the car has everything, including air conditioning and a forty-five-r.p.m. record changer—he talked again about how little time he had. He said he wished he had more time for study. « Just the other day, » he said, « I found out what holy means. And I found out the Bible is not holy. Holy means never changed. And the Bible has been changed lots of times. You see, I’m a minister and I have to know these things because of the questions they ask me. »
There are many things Muhammad Ali cannot be relied upon for. He wears a watch only occasionally because, one suspects, time has little meaning for him. He shows up hours late for an appointment, or hours early, or not at all. He says he will call and then he does not. He is very surprised if this upsets you. But he was precisely on time to meet his wife.
There are many things Muhammad Ali cannot be relied upon for. He wears a watch only occasionally because, one suspects, time has little meaning for him.
Her name is Belinda and she is his second wife. He divorced his first wife not, he says, because he didn’t love her, but because she insisted upon wearing mini-skirts rather than the long gowns Muslim women affect. Belinda is tall and lovely and eighteen years old and her skin is the same marvelous color as her husband’s. (« People sometimes take us for brother and sister, » he says, chuckling.) She is attending secretarial school so she can, he says, help him answer letters, keep up with some of the demands put upon him. Each morning Muhammad Ali drives his wife to school. Each afternoon he picks her up. She was wearing a standard uniform, a two-piece dress with a skirt that flowed to her ankles. Although she was expecting a child in six months he insisted that she climb into the rear of the two-door car while we remained seated in front. He did not get out of the car to help her.
He dropped his wife at the house, instructing her to cook steak and vegetables for lunch. « We got something important to do, » he said, and we drove off again. What he had to do was have his already sparkling palomino Eldorado washed. As we tooled around the South Chicago streets Muhammad Ali talked about the music he was playing. « James Brown, » he said. « He’s a good buddy. I know all the Negro entertainers. They come over to the house all the time. Makes you feel good to know these people on top. You know, James Brown, he makes so much money he’s got a bus for his group to travel in and he’s got a jet for himself. An eight-passenger Lear jet. I was gonna get me one of those. I mean lease it. It costs too much to buy. And I was gonna build a new house after the Terrell fight. I had it all designed, with a movie theatre in the basement and everything. But with the Army and all…. » He shrugged his massive shoulders, shook his head, sighed, reached down and turned over the stack of records.
The car-wash place—he patronizes Muslim-owned establishments whenever possible—was closed and he drove home. Belinda had turned the FM radio on and the speakers in the living room were blaring. Muhammad Ali went to the couch, picked up the remote control, turned on the television, raised his voice and answered some questions about his refusal to take that step forward in Houston.
I wondered if anybody had encouraged him, offered him a deal perhaps, told him if he would just go into the Army he could spend two years entertaining troops, fighting exhibitions and the like.
« Every day, » he said. « Everybody. Wherever I go. Businessmen. Black and white. They all tell me that. But we don’t take part in no war regardless of who America is fighting. »
I pointed out that pacifism could hardly be part of his religion. Moslems had been fighting, often fiercely, for centuries.
« Well, if it was their country at war, like if I was an Egyptian or Arabian or Sudanesian and I lived there and it was under attack, well naturally you’d fight. »
He added that he had been urged to protest on grounds other than his religion. « Every day people call me and say, ‘Why don’t you make a protest?’ Joe Namath ain’t in. He’s playing football on TV every weekend. George Hamilton ain’t in. He has to support his mother and he has twelve bathrooms in the house. Negroes want me to say these things. Why should I? If two men rob a bank and I get caught, how come I should say, Well, you didn’t get George. We roll the dice, we’ll finish the game.
« Look, the government is nice enough to let me out on bond and travel the country. They could confine me to Houston if they want to. So I’m not going to get up and talk against the country and do all that protesting. I’m at their mercy. »
If this sounds contradictory, it’s only because it is. On the one hand, he says the government is nice to let him travel. And on the other he adds: « You got airplanes worth eight million dollars apiece taking off every minute on the minute. You’re just loaded with wealth and bus lines and farmland, and one little Negro, who wasn’t nothing, you fix it now he can’t make a dollar or two. Imagine, because he don’t go along with your way, and he’s not an Uncle Tom for you, the whole nation takes more press time with him than a plane crash with a hundred of your white people on it. See how devilish this makes this race look? »
On the one hand he says he has lost interest in boxing. « It’s a barbaric European sport, » he says in his haughtiest manner. « The more religious I get, the more I don’t miss it. » And on the other hand, when he catches a glimpse of himself in a mirror as he walks by, he’ll whirl, strike a fighting pose, and start throwing his lightning punches. « Pow, pow, pow! » he says. He likes the way it looks and the way it feels and he does roadwork to keep his belly in bounds. If he looks forward to anything at all, it’s climbing into the ring with the winner of the heavyweight elimination now being staged to replace him as champion. « Look, there’s the championship belt. » It was at the bottom of a small china cabinet in the dining room. « It ain’t worth a quarter. But it say I won the championship from Sonny Liston. What is it going to say on the belt of the other champion, that this title was taken from Muhammad Ali with a ink pen? »
On the one hand he says he has lost interest in boxing. « It’s a barbaric European sport, » he says in his haughtiest manner. « The more religious I get, the more I don’t miss it. »
On the one hand he says, « What’s the use complaining? One man complains because he got no shoes. One man complains because he got no feet. » But he complains that the U.S. Government is trying to starve him into being an Uncle Tom and he complains about not being accepted as a minister of his faith. « My leader has recognized me as his minister, » he says. « It’s not for the white man to say this is not your servant, Allah. If Pope Paul wrote a letter over here tomorrow that said this man is my priest, what you think would happen? What you think would happen? »
He shouted into the kitchen now to ask if the food were ready. His wife said the vegetables were cooked but the steak wasn’t. He said he’d start on the vegetables. We moved to the table and, following Muslim custom, Belinda did not eat with us. She served the vegetables, boiled cabbage and okra, liberally peppered. He shook more pepper on them.
« Belinda, bring me some diet cola. »
« Belinda, bring the steak. »
« Belinda, bring me some brown sugar. »
He grumbled to his wife that he didn’t like the way the vegetables were prepared. He said the okra was too runny. He said the steak, cooked au poivre and really quite good, was too tough.
« Bring me some chicken. »
« It’s cold. »
« Bring it anyway. »
« What’s the use complaining? One man complains because he got no shoes. One man complains because he got no feet. »
He ate quickly, noisily, complaining mildly, chatting furiously. (« And the day after they took my title away I got an oil well, ain’t that something? ») When he was through he leaped from the table and began changing his clothes. I lifted my plate to carry it into the kitchen but Belinda whispered, « No, no. Don’t do that. I’ll do it. »
I went back to the couch and watched television while Muhammad Ali dressed. He was singing a song to his wife, something the Temptations do called Ain’t too Proud to Beg.
I don’t mind, ’cause you mean that much to me.Ain’t too proud to beg and you know it, Please don’t leave me, girl….
This was followed by some cooing sounds from around the corner.
When he emerged, Muhammad Ali was dressed elegantly in a shiny black suit, white shirt, dark tie, neat handkerchief. He may not spend much money on food, but his clothes have to cost.
« C’mon, » he said to me. « I’ll show you what I do. »
We went through the basement again, the champion pausing to show me two large trunks which, he said, were full of unanswered mail from all over the world. « Someday I got to answer all of that, » he said. « Maybe when my wife learns to type. »
We went through the White Power door again and climbed into the palomino Eldorado. We were headed for South Drexel and LaTees Beauty Parlor and Barber Shop. « I come here a lot, » Muhammad Ali said. « We just sit around and talk. »
This was a slow day at LaTees. The only customer was a dazzlingly dressed young man who was combing his conked, or straightened, hair (Muslims frown mightily on this process), and after a desultory exchange of as-salaam-alaikum, alaikum-salaam, and Hello, soul, there was a shout of « That you, soul? » from a back room. Muhammad Ali disappeared, there was a quick and kidding conversation, he reappeared, removed his coat, combed his hair, put his coat back on and left.
The next stop was at Seventy-ninth and Champlain where Muhammad Ali parked illegally in front of the Muhammad Speaks office. He carefully introduced me to each of the half-dozen people working at their desks, took me in back where he showed me Herbert Muhammad’s dusty office, asked a man to open the cabinet drawer where thousands of pictures of him were filed. He took out a fistful and reminisced about them for a while. Then we left.
We drove to a nearby cleaning shop and when he got out of the car he was spotted by kids in a passing school bus. « There’s the greatest, » one of them shouted. He waved and smiled. « That’s the people every day, » he said. « They act like they can’t read. » This was a reference to the press which, with certain exceptions, has been hostile to him for years. When he was campaigning for a title shot he was called a loudmouth who couldn’t fight. When he proved he could he was charged with being an un-American braggart. And when he announced his membership in the Black Muslims, a group which counts as it membership less than three percent of a ten percent minority, he was considered a menace to the American way of life. His refusal to be drafted set off a series of self-righteously patriotic editorials all around the country.
When he was campaigning for a title shot he was called a loudmouth who couldn’t fight. When he proved he could he was charged with being an un-American braggart.
Muhammad Ali carried an armful of clothing into the shop. « Hello, soul sister, » he said to one of the pretty girls behind the counter.
« Hello, soul brother, » she said.
Then she recognized him and laughed. The first thing people do when they spot him is laugh. Perhaps it’s a reaction to his own broad and friendly smile, perhaps a certain embarrassment at not having recognized him sooner, perhaps merely a response to the warmth he projects.
He watched with what seemed deepening shock as the cleaning bill was totaled. « Would it be cheaper somewhere else? » he asked rather plaintively. The girl said no.
He folded the cleaning tickets, put them in his pocket and started searching for his car keys. He does this every time. They always seem to be in a different pocket. Often, he says, he locks them in the car. It is one of the minor signs of the disorganization of his life.
There are others. In the space of less than an hour he told me he had decided to fly to California Friday to see the Floyd Patterson-Jerry Quarry fight (he had not been invited, although his presence certainly would have caused excitement and helped the promotion), that he would set out instead for New York by car the next day (Wednesday) if I would help him drive, that he would go Thursday instead and stop off to see friends in Pittsburgh, and that maybe he would get to Los Angeles after all. Then he added: « I don’t have to go. I done been everywhere, seen everything, whipped everybody. I don’t have to prove nothing. »
As we drove through the Negro district again, passing what seemed to be a particularly run-down block, crumbling, unpainted houses with tilted porches and broken windows, he said, « I wanted to get me an apartment in a poor district, the poorest I could find, and just live there for a while. Just to get the feel of being poor. You know, that’s one of the reasons we fast. It keeps us in contact with the poor people. »
He pulled the palomino Eldorado in to a parking space almost in front of the Shabazz Restaurant, on Seventy-first Street, small, neat, and clean with a long counter down one side separated by a partition from the table section. A mirror lines the wall opposite the counter so that the restaurant looks much bigger than it is. There is a No Smoking sign over the counter and a pile of Muhammad Speaks at one corner. There is one customer. He is eating soup and crackers.
Muhammad Ali’s huge body seems to fill the restaurant. He sits at the counter and orders « a piece of that chocolate cake » and a glass of milk. He kids with the waitresses.
« This sugar isn’t brown, it’s integrated.
« How you drink your coffee, sister, black or integrated?
« Would you believe you’re on television? Look, the camera’s right back there. This man here, » pointing to me, « is the director.
« How old are you, sister? »
« Fourteen, » she says in a tiny voice.
« You know my wife used to work here. I stole her. »
The girl giggles.
He turns to me, laughing. « I love to do that. I walk up to a man on the street and I tell him I’m looking for a fight. First he’s scared, then he sees who I am, then I tell him, ‘You’re on television.' » He imitated a man in shock, and laughed out loud.
A young man comes out of the kitchen and they talk about the new car.
« Man, that’s out of sight, » the young man says. « I heard you had a black top on it, but I said naw, not him. »
« Well, I did have a black top on it. But I didn’t like it. I changed it. »
« I got to go to the bank. Can I drive it? »
Muhammad Ali hesitated. Then he said, « Sure. But it’s fast. Don’t let it jump away. » He fumbled through his pockets for the keys.
He put away the large piece of chocolate cake in five bites, turned to me again and said, « This is one of my hangouts. I can sit here two, three hours, read the papers, talk to people. Hey, what time is it? I got to be there at seven-thirty. »
It’s four-twenty-five.
« I got to give that little talk. It’s like that all the time. Somebody always wants me. »
After another fifteen minutes he began to scan the street anxiously for his car. « I hope he didn’t dent it, » he said. « Those dents are expensive to fix. I mean expensive. »
I wondered if I could hear him make his speech. I was somewhat uncomfortable about it. I had had a strange experience in New York with him. We had arranged to meet at the Americana Hotel where he was staying and go to the « Armory on Forty-second Street » together. This turned out to be the 369th Artillery Armory at Fifth Avenue and One Hundred Forty-second Street in Harlem. Muhammad Ali was led to a side room when we arrived—almost two hours early—and as I walked into the room with him a heavyset man stopped us, whispered in his ear. « Um, » Muhammad Ali said. « They have to, um, search you. »
I was led out into the corridor where there was a long row of perhaps twenty-five hard-eyed young men, each dressed in a somber business suit, each seeming to have been stamped out on an assembly line: medium height, medium weight, hair closely cropped. One of them stepped out of line to accommodate me. « Please take all large objects out of your pockets, » he said, « and hold your hands up. »
I removed the notebook, pencils and card case. The search was quick, thorough, professional; up the insides of my coat, along the seams, into the shoulder pads, then around the belt, the hands moving lightly and swiftly, down the sides of my trousers.
« What’s that? »
« Uh, money clip, I guess. »
« Remove it, please. »
Juggling a handful of my ragged possessions, feeling undignified, I dug it out.
Another quick brush of the hands. « Fine. That’s it, » hard-eyes said.
I wondered if I should say thank you. Decided against it.
When I went back into the room where Muhammad Ali was making notes for his speech, I sat opposite him across a large table. He was silent for a few minutes, then, without looking up, he tried to explain the frisk. « It’s very bad, » he said, « but we as a people carry guns, we carry switchblades, some of us take dope and some try to get another man’s girl. So when a lot of our people get together there are fights and somebody gets hurt. There are no fights when Elijah Muhammad has a meeting. »
Maybe so. But there was no search when Malcolm X, who split with Elijah Muhammad, was gunned down in the Audubon Ballroom not long ago and there have been rumors since that one day Malcolm X’s supporters were going to make somebody in Elijah Muhammad’s camp render bloody payment. (The rumors were particularly strong when Muhammad Ali fought Liston the second time, in Lewiston, Maine, and a press agent-inspired report had it that Muhammad Ali was the target. Frantic Lewiston police settled for searching ladies’ handbags.)
The purpose of this gathering was to raise money for a mosque Elijah Muhammad was building on One Hundred Sixteenth Street. Muhammad Ali was just one of a large group of performers and speakers who would take part. His speech would again be a reworking of a set pattern he had developed. « …In the past you supported the Red Cross, the Blue Cross and the White Cross. And all you got was the double cross…. The truth shall make you free, not sitting in or laying in…. What is a Negro? Negro comes from the Greek word nekro, meaning death…. »
He turned to Louis Farrakhan, a thin, slight, light-skinned man who is Elijah Muhammad’s New York minister, and said, « I don’t have too much to say. »
Farrakhan laughed. « You never do till you get up there. »
I asked Muhammad Ali if I could have his notes after he was through with his talk and he said, « I’d give them to you, but I’m ashamed. I don’t spell so good. I’ll read them to you if you want. » Then he got up to go out to the floor of the armory, although it was still early. I trotted out behind him, but somebody tapped me on the shoulder. I turned around and looked into another pair of hard-eyes. « You wait here, » the man said. I waited there. Before I turned back, though, I was treated to a strange sight—perhaps twenty-five men lined up with their hands in the air, their legs spread wide, being searched by the assembly-line men. It was a scene out of an old James Cagney movie.
There were two pairs of hard-eyes in the room with me, who resisted when I tried to strike up a conversation. They were there to frisk certain of the customers who showed up packing heat. Their pistols were taken and the serial numbers recorded before being put behind an unused bar for safekeeping. I didn’t keep count of how many guns were checked that way, but after a while I had the distinct feeling the room was beginning to tilt in the direction of the hardware.
I sent word via one of the hard-eyes that my only interest in the proceedings was to hear Muhammad Ali speak. After two hours, leafing through Message to the Blackman which Muhammad Ali saw to it I was able to purchase, I came to the conclusion that no white man would see any part of the meeting and I said I wanted to leave. I was courteously escorted to the door.
Later Muhammad Ali said he was sorry, that he had not been informed I was waiting and that there was no reason I couldn’t have witnessed the affair. Perhaps so, but I went through much the same thing when I tried to catch him in Hartford some weeks later.
So I wondered now what would happen at this Chicago meeting. I need not have.
His car was returned without any dents and we started to leave the Shabazz. Muhammad Ali’s bill was fifty-five cents. Mine was fifteen. I put down a dollar bill. « I’m not gonna pay, » he said. « I don’t have to pay. I’m the heavyweight champion of the world. What you do if I don’t pay? »
The girl was embarrassed. She shrugged.
At last he gave her a dollar. « Keep it, » he said. Then he pointed to my dollar. « Keep that, too, » he said. « Big men are big tippers. »
As we were about to leave he stopped and said to me, « See that pie? What kind of pie is that? » I said I didn’t know. Custard pie maybe. « How much is that pie? » he said to the girl. « Thirty-five cents, » she said. « You got thirty-five cents? » he said to me. I had thirty-five cents.
He demanded I taste the pie. It was rich and delicious. He demolished most of the rest of it with two huge bites. « That, » he announced, « is bean pie. » He was glowing with pride. He seemed to count the bean pie as a personal accomplishment of Elijah Muhammad.
Back in the palomino Eldorado again, we drove north and then west. « I do like to drive this car, » Muhammad Ali said. « Look at this, » he said, pointing to the speedometer. « I got it six days and I got a thousand miles on it. I average eight hundred miles a week just driving around town. Know what I do sometime? Drive up to Milwaukee. When I get there I turn around and come back. »
I asked if there was anything else to keep him busy. He said, Oh, so many things. He watched television a lot. « Sometimes I’ll go rent a film and show it in the basement. I’ll go out and sellMuhammad Speaks. The garbage needs putting out. I go to the store to buy the food. Go to the cleaners. I study about three hours a day, too. I’m sorry I didn’t learn to read like I should. That’s all a man needs, reading and spelling. He can learn anything if he can read and spell. »
We found ourselves going over some old ground about why he had decided to refuse to be drafted. He groped for a new analogy. « You’re Jewish, » he said, « right? Well, suppose you was the heavyweight champion of Germany and Germany was going to war against Israel and you had a chance to make ten million dollars leading the Germans against Israel. What would you do? »
Although it was a thoughtful, even disturbing analogy, I did not believe it quite held together. He would not, I said, could not, identify with the Vietnamese as closely as a German Jew would identify with Israel. He cheerfully conceded this was true and then went on to explain what he had told a delegation of well-known Negro athletes who had come to discuss his views with him and perhaps prevail upon him to accept military service. When they met, Muhammad Ali said that he would talk first and then he would answer questions. He talked for an hour. This is some of what he said: « I love my people. The little Negroes, they catching hell. They hungry. They raggedy. They getting beat up, shot, killed, just for asking for justice. They can’t eat no good food. They can’t get a job. They got no future. They was nothing but slaves and they the most hated people. They fought in all the wars, but they live in the worst houses, eat the worst food and pay the highest rent, the highest light bill, the highest gas bill. Now I’m the one’s catching hell, too. I could make millions if I led my people the wrong way, to something I know is wrong. So now I have to make a decision. Step into a billion dollars or step into poverty. Step into a billion dollars and denounce my people or step into poverty and teach them the truth. Damn the money. Damn the heavyweight championship. Damn the white people. Damn everything. I will die before I sell out my people for the white man’s money. »
Muhammad Ali turned toward me, taking his eyes off the road. They were clear and luminous. His face was tight-lipped, serious. « They cried, » he said. « They put their head down and they said, ‘You’re right, we’re with you.’ And one of them said, ‘One day we might have to do the same thing. Would we be man enough to stand up for what we believe?’ «
The important thing for Muhammad Ali, despite the hate he manages to engender, is to be loved. On the night before a fight he will walk through the Negro district, stopping to chat with people on stoops, sit on a garbage can and hold court for a large group of open-mouthed little boys and giggling girls. « My people love me, » he says, « because they know I gave up all I had for them. » But it’s equally true that Muhammad Ali needs their love. That was apparent when we arrived at the theatre where he was to speak. It was on the West Side, in another and even poorer Negro section. « This is the worst, » Muhammad Ali said, looking around. « You can see just by looking at the people’s faces that they ain’t eating good. » It was not yet six o’clock, almost two hours before he was due. He found the doors to the theatre locked, so he went across the street into a sporting-goods shop and bought some sweat suits. (« You got five dollars? » he said to me. I had five dollars.)
« Nobody will believe me when I say you were here, » the small, bustling woman in the shop kept saying.
« Why don’t you take a picture? » Muhammad Ali said.
She told him that she didn’t have a camera.
The sweat suits stowed in the trunk of the palomino Eldorado, Muhammad Ali stood in the middle of the sidewalk and started shouting. « I’m looking for a fight, » he said. « Who’s the baddest man around here? » It was cold and dreary, just turning dark, and the few people in the street were hurrying. Some recognized him and started smiling. Soon there was a crowd, women searching purses for scraps of paper for him to sign.
« Good luck, champ. »
« I’m not the champ no more. »
« I’m not the champ no more. »
« Don’t you worry what they say. You still the champ. »
When the crowd deserted him, he went into a busy drugstore, announced he was looking for a fight, and the performance began again. Outside in the street, it was repeated.
« That him? »
« It sho is! »
« Look at him. Not a mark on him. »
At the fringes of the little crowd he caught my eye and said: « If this was summertime they’d have to call the po-lice. »
They didn’t have to call the police. The crowd started drifting away in the cold and Muhammad Ali, who wore no coat, danced to keep his blood moving and then made a run for the theatre. By now there was somebody to let him in.
This was not a Muslim meeting. It was a musicale, run by a Muslim entrepreneur. The music consisted of local rock groups, and Muhammad Ali was asked to show up, presumably to hypo the gate. The ploy did not work.
The few people who did show up drifted in slowly. Muhammad Ali sat on a table near the door and greeted the ticket holders as they arrived. When little boys flattened their noses against the glass doors to get a glimpse of him, he signaled the doorman to let them in. An older lad got a $5 bill from him for two tickets. (What’s he doing with $5, I wondered.)
Soon he was surrounded by little boys, and he staged one impromptu boxing match after the other. He was begged to do the Ali Shuffle. He did the Ali Shuffle, a quick dance for the ring, designed more for showmanship than strategy. « I’m the baddest man in town and I want to whup somebody. » The boys came up to punch him in the shoulder.
He mentions Elijah Muhammad and the kids want to know who he is and he explains that he is the leader. He goes into a proselyting speech, but keeps it short because he loses the attention of the kids very quickly. « Cleanliness, no smoking, no drinking, no stealing, and love for one another, » is the credo of the Muslims, he tells them. For the benefit of the children he has edited out the rest of the dogma: « No prostitution, no fornicating, no homosexuality, no adultery. »
One of the kids asks when he is going to jail. He says he doesn’t know. That it is up to Allah. Allah, he explains, is God.
« What you wanna go to jail for? »
« They’re railroading me, hoping you won’t follow in my path. »
« What’s your path? »
« Religion. The Muslim religion. »
He decides to be less serious. « I’d rather be in jail fed, than in Vietnam dead. »
The kids laugh. « You gonna fight Patterson again? »
« He’d rather go through hell in a gasoline sport coat. »
« What about Liston? »
« He’d rather shave a wild animal with a dull razor. »
He moved to the orchestra of the theatre and there were a dozen or more kids around him.
« They’re schoolboys, » he said to me. « And I fit right in with them. » He seemed delighted by this.
After a while he started making loud clucking noises with his tongue and was joined by the other kids. « What time is it? » he said. « I’m getting sleepy. » It was seven-forty-five.
It was an hour more before the entrepreneur gave up waiting for more people to come in and started the show. During that time, Muhammad Ali continued to kid with the little boys. One of them said, « You know what that nigger said to me…. » Muhammad Ali interrupted, much shock in his voice. « Don’t call anybody nigger. Not with a white man sitting here. » The boy said, « You know what that dude said to me…. »
Muhammad Ali leaned toward me. « See how they trained? I tell them not to do something because there’s a white man here and they obey me right away. »
There were perhaps a hundred people in the audience when Muhammad Ali got up to do his bit. « You all must not have been told I was coming, » he said. « Why don’t you all open your mouths so I can see you. »
They did, in laughter.
« Who’s the baddest cat out there? I want the baddest dude out there to come up here and fight me. »
A thin young man sitting near the front stood up.
Muhammad Ali looked down at him. « Boy, if you dreamed of coming up here you’d apologize. » The thin young man sat down.
Muhammad Ali did not preach the Muslim faith. He chatted briefly and said, « Anything supporting black folks, I’m there. » Applause. « I was offered ten million dollars, but I couldn’t be an Uncle Tom Negro. » Loud applause.
« Who’s the baddest cat out there? I want the baddest dude out there to come up here and fight me. »
Later, on the way back to the South Side, he recited Muslim prayers for me. « None deserves to be worshiped besides Allah…. He is one and has no associates. His is the kingdom and for him is praise and he has power over all things…. I bear witness that none deserves to be worshiped besides Allah and I bear witness that the honorable Elijah Muhammad is his last servant and greatest apostle. Amen. »
He said he and his wife arose every morning at sunup, washed, wrapped their bodies in shawls, kneeled on their prayer rug and recited this prayer.
I said: « Every morning? »
He said: « Got to, or I’ll feel bad all day. »
There were two more things I wanted to discuss with him. I asked him what he wanted out of his life. He said that was easy. « All I want is to be a well-versed minister in the Islamic faith. I’d rather be that than have ten million in cash or be the greatest fighter in history. I’d rather live in one room with just enough food to eat and drive a Volkswagen and be a minister. »
The other thing had to do with something I remembered from a cold, grey morning while he was training to fight Zora Folley in New York. We had taken a taxi to the Central Park reservoir where he did his roadwork. Then, coming back to the hotel, his steamy bulk filling the front of the cab, he turned around suddenly. I was sitting in the back with James Ellis, his sparring partner, and Drew Brown, who had the unofficial title of assistant trainer. « They let you read the papers in jail? » he asked. It was then I knew for certain, although he had not yet announced it, that he would not accept induction, that he had made up his mind. And now I wanted to ask him how he felt, what he thought, now that he was faced with the reality of prison again, as he must have been, suddenly, on that cold morning.
« Who wants to go to jail? » he said. « I’m used to running around free like a little bird. In jail you got no wife, no freedom. You can’t eat what you want. I know I’ll get sick. Because I’m used to eating a certain way every day for six years. And now, being in prison every day, looking out of the cell, not seeing nobody. After getting so used to traveling around the country, different countries, eating good every day and sleeping good. » A slight pause. « And going off by yourself if you want. A man’s got to be serious in his beliefs to do that. »
We arrived at the motel where I was staying and I asked him if he would like to stop at the restaurant for something to eat. « No, » he said. « I think I’ll go home and talk to my little wife. »
I got out of the palomino Eldorado and watched him drive away. The red taillights blinked as he applied the brakes at the next corner. I blinked back at them and felt overwhelmingly sad.
This article originally appeared in the April 1968 issue.
Voir par ailleurs:
Muhammad Ali’s abhorrent views on race
Jeff Jacoby
The Boston Globe
June 07, 2016
LONG BEFORE he died, Muhammad Ali had been extolled by many as the greatest boxer in history. Some called him the greatest athlete of the 20th century. Still others, like George W. Bush, when he bestowed the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2005, endorsed Ali’s description of himself as “the greatest of all time.” Ali’s death Friday night sent the paeans and panegyrics to even more exalted heights. Fox Sports went so far as to proclaim Muhammad Ali nothing less than “the greatest athlete the world will ever see.”
As a champion in the ring, Ali may have been without equal. But when his idolizers go beyond boxing and sports, exalting him as a champion of civil rights and tolerance, they spout pernicious nonsense.
There have been spouters aplenty in the last few days — everyone from the NBA commissioner (“Ali transcended sports with his outsized personality and dedication to civil rights”) to the British prime minister (“a champion of civil rights”) to the junior senator from Massachusetts (“Muhammad Ali fought for civil rights . . . for human rights . . . for peace”).
Time for a reality check.
It is true that in his later years, Ali lent his name and prestige to altruistic activities and worthy public appeals. By then he was suffering from Parkinson’s disease, a cruel affliction that robbed him of his mental and physical keenness and increasingly forced him to rely on aides to make decisions on his behalf.
But when Ali was in his prime, the uninhibited “king of the world,” he was no expounder of brotherhood and racial broad-mindedness. On the contrary, he was an unabashed bigot and racial separatist and wasn’t shy about saying so.
In a wide-ranging 1968 interview with Bud Collins, the storied Boston Globe sports reporter, Ali insisted that it was as unnatural to expect blacks and whites to live together as it would be to expect humans to live with wild animals. “I don’t hate rattlesnakes, I don’t hate tigers — I just know I can’t get along with them,” he said. “I don’t want to try to eat with them or sleep with them.”
Collins asked: “You don’t think that we can ever get along?”
“I know whites and blacks cannot get along; this is nature,” Ali replied. That was why he liked George Wallace, the segregationist Alabama governor who was then running for president.
Collins wasn’t sure he’d heard right. “You like George Wallace?”
“Yes, sir,” said Ali. “I like what he says. He says Negroes shouldn’t force themselves in white neighborhoods, and white people shouldn’t have to move out of the neighborhood just because one Negro comes. Now that makes sense.”
This was not some inexplicable aberration. It reflected a hateful worldview that Ali, as a devotee of Elijah Muhammad and the segregationist Nation of Islam, espoused for years. At one point, he even appeared before a Ku Klux Klan rally. It was “a hell of a scene,” he later boasted — Klansmen with hoods, a burning cross, “and me on the platform,” preaching strict racial separation. “Black people should marry their own women,” Ali declaimed. “Bluebirds with bluebirds, red birds with red birds, pigeons with pigeons, eagles with eagles. God didn’t make no mistake!”
In 1975, amid the frenzy over the impending “Thrilla in Manila,” his third title fight with Joe Frazier, Ali argued vehemently in a Playboy interview that interracial couples ought to be lynched. “A black man should be killed if he’s messing with a white woman,” he said. And it was the same for a white man making a pass at a black woman. “We’ll kill anybody who tries to mess around with our women.” But suppose the black woman wanted to be with the white man, the interviewer asked. “Then she dies,” Ali answered. “Kill her too.”
Voir aussi:
‘The white man is the devil’ – what the Nation of Islam taught Muhammad Ali
In 1974, Muhammad Ali told Michael Parkinson and a stunned chat show audience that the white man of America was « the blue-eyed, blond-headed Devil »
Adam Lusher
The Independent
5 June 2016
In 1974, in the middle of a Michael Parkinson interview, Muhammad Ali decided to dispense with all the safe conventions of chat show etiquette.
“You say I got white friends,” he declared, “I say they are associates.”
When his host dared to suggest that the boxer’s trainer of 14 years standing, Angelo Dundee, might be a friend, Ali insisted, gruffly: “He is an associate.”
Within seconds, with Parkinson failing to get a word in edgeways, Ali had provided a detailed account of his reasoning.
“Elijah Muhammad,” he told the TV viewers of 1970s Middle England, “Is the one who preached that the white man of America, number one, is the Devil!”
The whites of America, said Ali, had “lynched us, raped us, castrated us, tarred and feathered us … Elijah Muhammad has been preaching that the white man of America – God taught him – is the blue-eyed, blond-headed Devil! No good in him, no justice, he’s gonna be destroyed!
“The white man is the Devil. We do believe that. We know it!”
In one explosive, virtuoso performance, Ali had turned “this little TV show” into an exposition of his beliefs, and the beliefs of “two million five hundred” other followers of the radically – to some white minds, dangerously – black separatist religious movement, the Nation of Islam.
At the height of his tirade, Ali drew slightly nervous laughter from the studio when he told Parkinson “You are too small mentally to tackle me on anything I represent.”
Maybe, though, it was just a judicious sense of self-preservation that prevented Parky from asking arguably the greatest boxer the world has seen to explain how “God” had taught Elijah Muhammad about white Americans being blue-eyed devils.
To explain that, Ali would have had to go back to the 1930s and an obscure door-to-door salesman in Detroit. Wallace D Fard, the founder of the Nation of Islam, appears to have arrived in Detroit in 1930 and began by selling silks to poor black families in the city. His wares, he told his customers, came from “their home country”.
Enough of them were intrigued for Fard to get a following and to be able to switch from the Bible to the Koran as the basis for his preaching.
“My name is W.D. Fard and I came from the Holy City of Mecca,” he supposedly told one early gathering. “More about myself I will not tell you yet, for the time has not yet come. »
It seems that time had still not come when in 1934, Fard mysteriously disappeared. The FBI took the opportunity to creatively fill in the gaps. It told one newspaper that Fard had in fact been a white man from New Zealand, and another that he had been a Turkish-born Nazi agent who had worked for the Germans during World War Two.
Not surprisingly the Nation of Islam has developed a different narrative. Elijah Muhammad, the man who emerged as leader of the Nation of Islam after the “departure” of its founder, came to identify Fard with Allah.
In this scheme of things, Elijah Muhammad, born Elijah Poole, the son of former slaves in Georgia, became the « Last Messenger of Allah. »
In a 1996 article that is now on the Nation of Islam’s website, Elijah Muhammad’s wife Tynetta wrote that her husband was chosen as the “Divine Representative” who would preach that the “Master’s” mission had been: “to resurrect His lost and found people, who were identified as the original members of the Tribe of Shabazz from the Lost Nation of Asia. The lost people of the original nation of African descent, were captured, exploited, and dehumanized to serve as servitude slaves of America for over three centuries. “
Elijah Muhammad told the faithful that “the Blackman, the Original Man, [from whom] came all brown, yellow, red and white people,” was to overcome the oppression of whites – the “blue-eyed devils” – and form his own nation.
To some, including the black liberal Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, the Nation of Islam was “run by a bunch of thugs organised from prisons and jails.”
Others, like the black Conservative commentator George Shuyler may have dismissed Elijah Muhammad as “a rogue and a charlatan” but conceded, in the ugly language of 1950s America, “When anybody can get tens of thousands of Negroes to practice economic solidarity, respect their women, alter their atrocious diet, give up liquor, stop crime, juvenile delinquency and adultery, he is doing more for Negroes’ welfare than any current Negro leader I know.”
In 1959, the same year that Shuyler was writing, a teenage boxer called Cassisus Clay first heard of the Nation of Islam. He tentatively attended his first meeting in 1961.
And in 1964, the morning after the 22-year-old 7-1 underdog stunned the world by defeating Sonny Liston to become heavyweight champion of the world, he announced that he had renounced his “slave name” Cassius Clay and joined the Nation of Islam.
Beside him as he made his announcement was the man who had become his mentor – Malcolm X.
Malcolm Little had entered a Charlestown jail in 1946 as a hustler convicted of burglary. He had been paroled in 1952 as Malcolm X, a self-educated convert who had ditched his slave name and was burning to go to the Nation of Islam’s Chicago headquarters and meet Elijah Muhammad.
By the time he met Ali in 1962, Malcolm X was Elijah Muhammad’s chief spokesman and most prominent apostle.
His belief that violence was sometimes necessary, and the Nation of Islam’s insistence that followers remain separate from and avoid participation in American politics meant that not every civil rights leader welcomed Muhammad Ali joining the movement.
“When Cassius Clay joined the Black Muslims [The Nation of Islam],” said Martin Luther King, “he became a champion of racial segregation, and that is what we are fighting against.”
The bitter irony is that soon after providing the Nation of Islam with its most famous convert, Malcolm X became disillusioned with the movement. A trip to Mecca exposed him to white Muslims, shattering his belief that whites were inherently evil. He broke from the Nation of Islam and toned down his speeches.
Ali, though, remained faithful to Elijah Muhammad. “Turning my back on Malcolm,” he admitted years later, “Was one of the mistakes that I regret most in my life.”
He was never able to put it right. On February 21 1965 Malcolm X was assassinated as he gave a speech at the Audubon Ballroom in Harlem.
Three members of the Nation of Islam were convicted of the killing. Prosecutors alleged that they had wanted to send a message to Malcolm X’s supporters, but the extent to which they did or did not take orders from above has not been conclusively proved.
Rumours, however, have continued to swirl. In 1993, Louis Farrakhan, by then the Nation of Islam’s new leader, was seen by some to acknowledge the possibility that the movement might somehow have been linked to Malcolm X’s murder when he told a crowd of supporters: “We don’t give a damn about no white man law if you attack what we love. And frankly, it ain’t none of your business.
“Did you teach Malcolm? Did you put Malcolm out before the world? Was Malcolm your traitor or ours? And if we dealt with him like a nation deals with a traitor, what the hell business is it of yours?”
By then, though, Ali’s own attitudes to the « blue-eyed devils” had long since mellowed. In 1975 he converted to the far more conventional Sunni Islam – possibly prompted by the fact that Elijah Muhammad had died of congestive heart failure in the same year, and his son Warith Deen Mohammad had moved the Nation of Islam towards inclusion in the mainstream Islamic community.
He rebranded the movement the “World Community of Islam in the West”, only for Farrakhan to break away in 1978 and create a new Nation of Islam, which he claimed remained true to the teachings of “the Master” [Fard].
“The Nation of Islam taught that white people were devils,” he wrote in 2004. “I don’t believe that now; in fact, I never really believed that. But when I was young, I had seen and heard so many horrible stories about the white man that this made me stop and listen. »
The attentive listener to the 1974 interview, might, in fact, have sensed that even then Ali wasn’t entirely convinced about white men being blue-eyed devils.
He had, after all, set the bar pretty high for “associates” like Angelo Dundee to become friends.
“I don’t have one black friend hardly,” he had said. “A friend is one who will not even consider [before] giving his life for you.”
And, despite calling Parky “the biggest hypocrite in the world” and “a joke”, he could also get a laugh by reassuring the chat show host: “I know you [are] all right.”
Voir également:
Muhammad Ali dead: How Cassius Clay became one of the most famous and infamous figures in modern history
In the end it felt like the whole world was watching his back
Steve Bunce
The Independent
4 June 2016
Muhammad Ali was the most controversial boxer in the history of the sport, arguably the most gifted and certainly the best known. His ring glories and his life on the political and racial frontline combine to make him one of the most famous, infamous and discussed figures in modern history.
During his life he stood next to Malcolm X at a fiery pulpit, dined with tyrants, kings, crooks, vagabonds, billionaires and from the shell of his awful stumbling silence during the last decade his deification was complete as he struggled with his troubled smile at each rich compliment.
In the ring he shocked the world to win the heavyweight world title in 1964, retained the belt in sweet win after sweet win, predicting the rounds and beating every man with ease. However, other heavyweights have won as underdogs and kept their title, but no fighter had ever delivered the glitz, the brilliance and the words like Ali. He was a one-man revolution and that means he made enemies faster than any boy-fighter – which is what he was when he first became world heavyweight champion – could handle. His hands and lips were quick, but in the end the government’s relentless machine caught up with the dancing and punching master and mowed down the boxer in his prime. His fans watched helplessly as their idol was stripped of his title and cast out.
His best years as a prize-fighter were denied him and denied us by his refusal to be drafted into the American military system in 1967. At that time he was boxing’s finest fighter, a man so gifted with skills that he knew very little about what his body did in the ring; his instincts, his speed and his developing power at that point of his exile would have ended all arguments over his greatness forever had he been allowed to continue fighting. Ali was out of the ring for three years and seven months and the forced exile took away enough of his skills to deny us the Greatest at his greatest, but it made him the icon he became. “We never saw the best of my guy,” Angelo Dundee told me in Mexico City in 1993. Dundee should know. He had been collecting the fighter’s sweat as the chief trainer from 1960 and would until the ring end in 1981.
The ban, which is what it was, lasted from 1967 to 1970 and when he returned he was, in many ways, far more entertaining to watch and a lot less elusive. He had gained universal respect during the break because of his refusal to endorse the bloody conflict in Vietnam, but he often walked a thin line in the 70s with the very people that had been happy to back his cause. He was not as loved then as he is now, and there are some obvious reasons for that. In 1970 there were still papers in Britain that called him Cassius Clay, the birth name he had started to shred the day after beating Sonny Liston for the world title in 1964. In America he still divided the boxing press and the people.
In the 70s he attended a Ku Klux Klan meeting, accepted their awards and talked openly and disturbingly about mixed race marriages and a stance he shared with the extremists. His harshest opinions are always overlooked, discarded like his excessive cruelty in the ring, and explained by a misguided concept that everything he said and did, that was either uncomfortable or just wrong, was justifiable under some type of Ali law that insisted there was a twinkle in his eye. There probably was a twinkle in his eye but he had some misguided racist ideas back then and celebrated them.
In the ring he had hurt and made people suffer during one-sided fights and spat at the feet of one opponent. He was mean and there is nothing wrong with that in boxing, but he was also cruel to honest fighters, men that had very little of his talent and certainly none of his wealth. The way he treated Joe Frazier before and after their three fights remains a shameful blot on Ali’s legacy. I sat once in dwindling light with Frazier in Philadelphia at the end of three days of talking and listened to his words and watched his tears of hate and utter frustration as he outlined the harm Ali’s words had caused him and his family. Big soft Joe had no problem with the damage Ali’s fists had caused him, that was a fair fight but the verbal slaughter had been a mismatch and recordings of that still make me feel sick. I don’t laugh at that type of abuse.
The memory of that night talking to Frazier does not alter the heroics of the fights and the sacrifice of the third and final encounter in 1975 in Manila; it put an end in many ways to both of their fighting careers and undoubtedly brought forward their terrible endings when the pair were mirror-images of shakes and pitiful stares. It remains the greatest fight I have ever watched, the most brutal and tragic and magical, which only the finest prize fights can possibly be. If I watch the Thrilla in Manila I don’t hate Ali for what he said to Frazier, but I love him, like any true boxing fan, for what he is doing to Frazier in the ring.
Away from the ring excellence he went to cities in the Middle East to negotiate for the release of hostages and smiled easily when men in masks, carrying AK47s, put blindfolds on him and drove like the lunatics they were through bombed streets. “Hey man, you sure you know where you’re going?” he asked one driver. “I hope you do, coz I can’t see a thing.” He went on too many missions to too many countries for too long, his drive draining his life as he handed out Islamic leaflets. He was often exploited on his many trips, pulled every way and never refusing a request. On a trip to Britain in 2009 he was bussed all over the country for a series of bad-taste dinners that ended with people squatting down next to his wheelchair; Ali’s gaze was off in another realm, but the punters, who had paid hundreds for the sickening pleasure, stuck up their thumbs or made fists for the picture. The great twist in the abhorrent venture was that Ali’s face looked so bad that his head was photo-shopped for a more acceptable Ali face. Who could have possibly sanctioned that atrocity?
During his fighting days he had men to protect him, men like Gene Kilroy, the man with the perm, that loved him and helped form a protective guard at his feet to keep the jackals from the meat. When he left the sport and was alone for the first time in the real world, there were people that fought each other to get close, close enough to insert their invisible transfusion tubes deep into his open heart. His daughters started to resurrect their own wall of protection the older they got, switching duties from sitting on Daddy’s lap to watching his back like the devoted sentinels they became.
In the end it felt like the whole world was watching his back, watching the last moments under the neon of the King of the World.
Voir encore:
Muhammad Ali’s meetings with Ku Klux Klan leaders revealed by documentary
Shortly before he fought Joe Frazier in the Philippines in 1975, Muhammad Ali met with the leaders of the Ku Klux Klan.
Far from being embarrassed about sharing jaw-time with the Grand Chief Bigot or whatever the loon in the sheet called himself, Ali boasted about it.
The revelation of his cosy chats with white supremacists comes in a television documentary screened on More4. As Ali finds himself overtaken as the most celebrated black American in history, True Stories: Thrilla In Manila provides a timely re-assessment of his politics.
« I think Ali is being done a disservice by the way in which he’s these days cast as benign, » says John Dower, the film’s director. « He was always a lot more complicated than that. »
Before his third fight with Frazier, Ali was at his most elevated, symbolically as well as in the ring. Hard to imagine when these days he elicits universal reverence, back then he was a figure who divided America, as loathed as he was admired. At the time he was taking his lead from the Nation of Islam, which, in its espousal of a black separatism, found its politics dovetailing with the cross-burning lynch mob out on the political boondocks. Ali was by far the organisation’s most prominent cipher.
The film reminds us why. Back then, black sporting prowess reinforced many a prejudiced theory about the black man being good for nothing beyond physical activity. But here was Ali, as quick with his mind as with his fists. When he held court the world listened. Intriguingly, the film reveals, many of his better lines were scripted for him by his Nation of Islam minders.
Ferdie Pacheco, the man who converted Ali to the bizarre cause which insisted that a spaceship would imminently arrive in the United States to take the black man to a better place, tells Dower’s cameras that it was he who came up with the line, « No Viet Cong ever called me nigger ». There was never a more succinct summary of America’s hypocrisy in forcing its beleaguered black citizenry to fight in Vietnam.
« Ali has been post-rationalised as a champion of the civil rights movement, » says Dower. « But far from promoting the idea of black and white together, his was a much more tricky, divisive politics. »
The film suggests it was his opponent who got the blunt end of Ali’s political bludgeon. The pair were once friends and Frazier had supported Ali’s stance on refusing the draft. But leading up to the fight Ali turned on his old mate with a ferocity which makes uncomfortable viewing even 30 years on. Viciously disparaging of Frazier, he calls him an Uncle Tom, a white man’s puppet.
Ali riled Frazier to the point where he entered the ring so infuriated that he abandoned his game plan and blindly struck out. So distracted was he by Ali’s politically motivated jibes, he lost. Indeed, what we might be watching in Dower’s film is not so much the apex of Ali’s political potency as the birth of sporting mind games.
Voir enfin:
Ali and Ashe brought different messages to a country, and a black community, that had been upended by civil rights. Ali’s experience as an African-American in the South led him to believe that the U.S. would never live up to its professed ideals of equality when it came to blacks; Ashe’s experience led him to try to prove that the nation could. Their lives can be read as a conversation about what it means to be an African-American and, by extension, what it means to be American.
* * *
In 1955, Ali—then known as Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr.—turned 13 in Louisville and Ashe turned 12 in Richmond. That summer, both boys were deeply affected by the story of another African-American their age, from Chicago. While visiting relatives in Mississippi, it is believed 14-year-old Emmett Till had made the fatal mistake of calling a white cashier at a grocery store “baby.” Four days later, the woman’s husband and half brother dragged Till out of his great-uncle’s house, beat him, gouged out his eye, shot him in the head, and dumped his body in the Tallahatchie River.
When Till’s mother chose to have an open casket at his funeral, Jet magazine published photos of his virtually unrecognizable corpse. The murderers’ acquittal by an all-white jury, in 67 minutes, was taken by African-American families as a warning. When Cassius Clay Sr., a sign painter, saw the photos of Till, he showed them to his two sons. “This is what they do to us!” he told them.
“[I] felt a deep kinship to him,” Ali would say of Till. “My father talked about it at night and dramatized the crime. I couldn’t get Emmett out of my mind.”
“The horror that Cassius experienced looking at the pictures of Till’s brutalized face in the pages of the black press,” wrote Ali biographer David Remnick in the New Yorker, “helped convince him of the limits of his possibilities as a black kid in the South.”
At the same time that Till’s death was confirming Cassius Clay Sr.’s sense of injustice in Louisville, it was also confirming the long-held fears of Arthur Ashe Sr. in Richmond. Ashe, a single father whose wife, Mattie, had died five years earlier, was a stern, responsible maintenance man who watched over his two sons, Arthur Jr. and Johnnie, closely. Now his efforts were given a new sense of urgency.
“My father tried hard to keep us out of harm’s way, and the possibility of harm was real,” Ashe would later say. “We all knew what had happened to Emmett Till, whose death in 1955 cast a shadow over my youth and that of virtually all black kids in Richmond.”
Ashe Sr. believed that trouble lurked in all directions for young African-Americans in Richmond, and did his best to help his elder son navigate the all-powerful white world that surrounded him. Each day, Arthur Jr. was expected to return home 10 minutes after the final bell at school rang, and he was never to argue with whites or blame them for his problems. Young Arthur, naturally deferential, did as he was told.
Clay Sr. remained unbowed. “There was nothing modest about Cassius, Sr.,” wrote Ali’s friend Howard Bingham in his book Cassius Clay vs. the United States of America (written with Max Wallace). “I am the greatest!” the father would announce to anyone within earshot—including, presumably, his oldest son. The young Cassius would appropriate his father’s catchphrase; more important, the father’s racial grievances inspired a self-reliant ambition in the son. After Till’s death, Cassius Jr. knew that the only way he was going to beat the system was by doing it himself.
Ashe, a straight-A student, became famous for his thoughtful reserve and his ability to move easily between white and black worlds. But he would also be accused of not being militant enough in the African-American cause. Billie Jean King, tennis’s resident revolutionary, once claimed that “a lot of blacks have told me that in many ways they can relate to me better than they can to Arthur.”
The self-effacing patience and prudence Ashe learned in Richmond were just as much a product of the black experience in the South as the self-dramatizing rebelliousness that Ali learned from his own father in Louisville.
* * *
By the time Ali and Ashe entered their teens, each had found a refuge from their highly circumscribed surroundings. The boxing ring and the tennis court became places where they could remake their worlds the way they wanted.
Ali claimed that he started fighting as a way “to make it in this country,” but he took his first boxing lesson at age 12 for a more practical reason: His bike had been stolen. “The usually easygoing youngster erupted in fury,” Bingham and Wallace wrote, “and started to yell for a policeman.” It turned out there was one in the basement of a nearby building. Clay ran there in tears and found Joe Martin, an off-duty Louisville cop who trained young boxers.
Clay was hooked from day one. At first Martin thought the skinny kid’s talents were “just ordinary,” but he was easily the hardest worker he had ever trained. “It was almost impossible to discourage him,” Martin told Thomas Hauser, author of Muhammad Ali: His Life and Times. Soon after meeting Martin, Clay beat a fellow novice fighter and promptly shouted, “I’m gonna be the greatest in the world!”
By 1960, the 18-year-old Clay was accomplished enough to win a gold medal at the Olympics in Rome. The ring wasn’t a place of violence for Clay; it was a stage where he could express the showmanship and artistry that he had inherited from his father. Clay won with speed rather than power.
Ashe discovered tennis at age 7, when his father took a job as a policeman at one of Richmond’s segregated recreational facilities, Brookfield Park. The younger Ashe may not have seemed a likely future tennis champion; in the 1950s, the sport was still the province of exclusive all-white clubs. But with daily access to the courts at Brookfield, he quickly caught the eye of local teaching pro Ron Charity. Like Cassius Clay, Ashe’s playing style belied his personality. Cautious off court, he was a slashing, risk-taking attacker on it.
By the time he was 10, Ashe’s reputation had spread as far as Lynchburg, Va., and the home of Dr. Robert Walter Johnson. In between his medical rounds, Johnson had pioneered the idea of the junior tennis academy on a court in his backyard. His goal was to develop the Jackie Robinson of tennis, a player good enough to break the sport’s color barrier and beat whites at their own game. In 1950, he succeeded when his star student, Althea Gibson, became the first African-American to compete in the U.S. Nationals (now the U.S. Open).
As the ’50s continued, Johnson found a new goal: mentoring a black player who could win the National Interscholastic Championships, an annual all-white tournament held at the University of Virginia. It was one thing to integrate an international event in New York, another to do it in the South. Johnson was adamant; he didn’t just want a black player to enter the Interscholastics, he wanted one to win it.
“What made me maddest,” Johnson told Time magazine two years before his death in 1971, “was this idea that colored athletes were only good as sprinters or strong boys, who couldn’t learn…finesse.”
To break tennis’ color barrier, Johnson believed he needed not just a standout athlete, but one who also possessed manners that were beyond reproach. “Never question a line call, never confront anyone on a court,” is how one student of Johnson’s described his philosophy. “If one of us was to challenge a player, they [officials at white tournaments] might say, ‘See, this is why we don’t let them in.’”
Ashe, it was soon apparent, was the perfect vessel for Johnson’s ideas about decorum, as well as his regimented training program. “I always did exactly what Dr. Johnson told me to do,” Ashe said. “Usually, his strategy was right.”
In 1961, eight years after joining Johnson’s program, Ashe fulfilled the older man’s dream by winning the Interscholastics. Ashe would not only be the first black winner of the tournament, he would also be its last winner in the South. That same year, after hosting the tournament for 14 years, the University of Virginia asked to have it moved elsewhere. The college cited the financial burden, but, as Ashe biographer Eric Allen Hall has pointed pointed out, a Sports Illustrated editorial at the time asserted that people in the area were “unhappy at the university’s role as a tournament host since Negroes began to appear regularly.” In 1962, the event left Charlottesville for Williamstown, Mass. Ashe would move on to bigger stages and bigger victories as well, but this one was as significant as any.
* * *
Clay and Ashe entered the 1960s as two of the most promising young African-American athletes. What each of them would mean to this revolutionary era was summed up in a pair of magazine covers that appeared in 1968, the year when that decade reached its unruly nadir.
In April, Esquire portrayed the boxer—now with a new name—as St. Sebastian, pierced by arrows, above the headline “The Passion of Muhammad Ali.” Esquire was the bible of the counterculture, and Ali one of its icons. Three months later, Ashe appeared on the cover of Life. He was photographed playing tennis, in all-white clothes, under the headline “The Icy Elegance of Arthur Ashe.” While Esquire was the hip chronicler of ‘60s youth, Life was the graying photo album of the establishment. Ashe was celebrated in its pages for his calm under pressure, and held up as an antiradical black athlete—an anti-Ali.
How had Ali gone from smiling gold medalist in 1960 to being shot through with metaphorical arrows eight years later?
The transition began in 1964 when, as a 7–1 underdog, Clay upset heavyweight champion Sonny Liston in Miami. Liston was a glowering ex-con, while the other heavyweight contender of that era, Floyd Patterson, was his opposite: polite, nonthreatening, a favorite of liberals. Ali didn’t fit either mold. He was youthful, charismatic, funny, and he didn’t defer to anyone. It was only a matter of time before he would test the limits of white America’s tolerance for a confident black athlete.
That tolerance began to crack soon after the Liston fight, when Clay revealed that he had joined Elijah Muhammad’s Nation of Islam, and that the group’s leader had chosen a new name for him, Muhammad Ali. Ali never shared Muhammad’s belief that whites were “blue-eyed devils,” but he respected the fact that he “made people feel it was good to be black.” Many viewed the Nation as a criminal organization, and longtime boxing writers viewed Clay’s—they refused to call him Ali—association with it as an act of treason.
Ali’s revelation in ’64 that he was a Muslim made him unpopular with many Americans; his announcement three years later that he wouldn’t fight for his country turned him into public enemy No. 1. The day after Ali announced his conversion, FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, who feared the destabilizing influence of the Black Muslims, instructed his agents to look into the young troublemaker’s draft status.
It turned out that, six weeks earlier, Ali had failed an Army intelligence test. “I said I was the greatest, not the smartest,” Ali joked. Unable to force Ali to pass its aptitude tests, the Pentagon decided to lower its standards. Ali had scored between the 16th and 18th percentile; in November 1965, the passing grade was conveniently dropped from the 30th to the 15th, and Ali was made eligible for the draft.
According to reporter Robert Lipsyte, who was with Ali in Miami when he got the news, “Somebody asked, ‘What do you think about the Vietcong?’ By this time, [Ali] was angry, tired, pissed off, and he gave his quote, which is, ‘I ain’t got nothing against them Vietcong.’”
“With that one sentence about the Vietcong,” columnist Jerry Izenberg told Bingham and Wallace, “Ali became the patron saint of the anti-war movement. Before that, none of the protesters could really articulate why they were against the war. He gave them the reason.”
In April 1967, Ali, claiming that his role as a minister of Islam should make him exempt, refused to step forward to be drafted. For that he was stripped of his heavyweight title, banned from boxing for three years, and sentenced to five years in prison; it took a jury about 20 minutes to find him guilty. Yet Ali’s antiwar commitment only deepened.
From 1967 to ’70, as his case made its circuitous way through the courts, Ali traveled the country giving antiwar speeches. Through his fiery words, he helped change mainstream America’s attitude toward the war, and toward himself. Nowhere was Ali’s impact on the country more obvious than in the verdict that the Supreme Court handed down in 1971. Four years earlier, Ali had been quickly and decisively found guilty of draft evasion; now the country’s highest court unanimously upheld his status as a conscientious objector.
* * *
While Ali was telling the world that he didn’t have anything against those Vietcong in early 1966, Arthur Ashe was flying to Fort Lewis, Wash., to begin six weeks of basic training with the Army.
Ali saw segregation as fundamental to the United States. Ashe saw it as a regional derangement to be cured, a way of life that was ultimately antithetical to the nation’s character. Ashe’s attitude can be summed up in his feelings about Davis Cup, tennis’s international team event. Nothing would give him more satisfaction than becoming the first black man to be chosen for the U.S. team.
“Segregation and racism had made me loathe aspects of the white South, but had scarcely left me less of a patriot,” Ashe wrote. “In fact, to me and my family, winning a place on our national team would mark my ultimate triumph over all those people who had opposed my career in the South in the name of segregation.”
“Despite segregation, I loved the United States. It thrilled me beyond measure to hear the umpire announce not my name but that of my country: ‘Game, United States,’ ‘Set, United States,’ ‘Game, Set, and Match, United States.’”
Ashe began the ’60s by joining the Reserve Officers Training Corps (ROTC) at UCLA. Ashe’s uncles had fought in the Marines and the Navy, and his younger brother, Johnnie, would join the Marines and fight in Vietnam. In college, Ashe was a study in moderation when it came to political and racial issues. He thought deeply about the problems, but took no part in the demonstrations after the Watts riots in L.A. in 1965, and didn’t travel back to the South for the protests against segregation there.
“There were times,” Ashe said, “when I felt a burning sense of shame that I was not with blacks—and whites—standing up to the fire hoses and police dogs.”
When Ashe listened to the speeches of African-American activists at UCLA, he heard echoes of the white segregationists he had happily left behind in the South. Unlike Ali, Ashe believed that civil rights had made a difference, and that racial progress in the U.S. was possible.
“I never went along with the pronouncements of Elijah Muhammad,” Ashe told Hauser, “that the white man was the devil and that blacks should be striving for separate development—a sort of American apartheid. That never made sense to me.”
For the war effort, Ashe played exhibitions, met with troops, and worked as a tennis coach at West Point. He got to hit balls rather than dodge bullets, while the Army got to show off an African-American officer and star athlete in its ranks. It was the type of arrangement that Ali, who was offered the chance to put on boxing exhibitions for the Army instead of fighting, had risked jail time to reject.
By 1968, Ashe could no longer resist the pull of politics or the example of Ali. This was the year of the Revolt of the Black Athlete, illustrated most vividly by U.S. sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos, who raised gloved fists on the medal stand at the Mexico City Olympics. At a meeting of black athletes that year, Jesse Jackson challenged Ashe to use his fame to greater effect. “Jesse, I’m just not arrogant, and I ain’t never going to be arrogant,” Ashe said. “I’m just going to do it my way.”
In March 1968, Ashe accepted an invitation to speak at the Church of the Redeemer in Washington, D.C., from the same pulpit where Stokely Carmichael, the man who coined the term “black power” two years earlier, had recently given an impassioned oration. Ashe’s speech was modest by comparison. He emphasized personal responsibility—“poverty is half laziness,” he asserted—and echoed the words of King. According to Ashe, African-Americans needed militants like Carmichael to lead, but they also needed moderates like himself to back them up. The mostly black congregation gave him a standing ovation.
Ashe now knew that his words mattered, and his self-assurance grew accordingly. Six months later, he would become the first black man to win the U.S. Open. As he stood on the trophy stand at Forest Hills with his arm around his father, Ashe’s win was hailed as a victory for race relations in America.
But it hadn’t come without controversy. In the quarterfinals, Ashe had faced his friend, Cliff Drysdale of South Africa. There was talk that Ashe, a child of segregation, should withdraw to protest apartheid; earlier that year, he had told a reporter that he would consider such a boycott. But Ashe, who knew that Drysdale was against segregation, decided to play.
When he won the match, Ashe was saluted by New York sportswriter Arthur Daley. “He proved his own superiority,” Daley wrote. “If he had withdrawn in protest, he would have proved nothing.” To Daley, “direct confrontation” was the best way for this black athlete to deal with the situation in South Africa. Over the next five years, Ashe would put that theory to the test.
* * *
“Yes, master.”
When Ashe heard a maid at a Johannesburg mansion address him with those words, he stopped in his tracks: “For the love of God,” he thought.
It was November 1973, and Ashe was fulfilling a long-held but still controversial dream: becoming the first black man to play in the South African Open.
In 1970, Ashe had applied for a visa into the country. Instead, he had been banned by the South African government. Saying, as he had, that “I just want to take an H-bomb and drop it right on Johannesburg” probably hadn’t helped his cause.
Ashe’s 1969 ban only made him more determined to isolate South Africa from the international community. The following year, he succeeded in having the nation suspended from the Davis Cup, and he began to travel in other parts of Africa. In 1971, on a visit to Cameroon, Ashe singled out a talented 11-year-old named Yannick Noah for further attention. Seven years later, they would play doubles together at Wimbledon.
Finally, in 1973, talks began between Ashe, the South African government, and the promoters of the South African Open about bringing him to Johannesburg. Many people, believing that the regime would only use Ashe to make itself look humane and reasonable, tried to persuade him not to make the trip. But Ashe thought that the sight of a free black man competing with whites, and beating them, would offer hope.
Ashe spent the week of the South African Open in a state of wonder, and sometimes fear, at the subtly sinister quality of apartheid. He visited the slums of Soweto, met with high-ranking officials, and debated his trip with activists. One day Ashe was followed by a young boy as he walked through the city; when he asked him what he was doing, the boy said that he had never seen a free black man before. And at the home where he stayed in Johannesburg, Ashe had the surreal experience of being addressed as “master” by the domestic help.
“See, here is little Artie Ashe,” he joked in his journal, “the skinny black kid from the capital of the old Confederacy, all set up in a mansion carrying on jes’ like the white folks, and gettin’ hisself called Master.”
Cliff Drysdale agreed with Ashe’s stance and welcomed his trip; another South African player, Bob Hewitt, said he thought Ashe should mind his own business because the blacks of South Africa were “happy.” Ashe would play and beat Drysdale and Hewitt on his way to the tournament’s final; both times the American was the crowd favorite. The black fans were so enthusiastic that Ashe had to remind them not to cheer for his opponents’ errors. He also demanded that the normally segregated seating at the tournament be integrated while he played, but that was beyond his star power. Whites watched from up close, blacks from afar.
Yet four decades later, many people, including Drysdale, now view the trip as a starting point in the eventual demise of apartheid. Ashe had used sports to crack open a door; over the next two decades, he would use his powers as an anti-apartheid activist—he was arrested during a protest in Washington, D.C., in 1985—to help push that door wide open.
* * *
Eleven months after Ashe departed Johannesburg, Muhammad Ali began his own journey to Africa. The boxer’s excursion, not surprisingly, wasn’t quite as sober-minded as the tennis player’s. Ali went to Zaire to fight George Foreman, the fear-inspiring Texas slugger, in what became known as the Rumble in the Jungle.
“From the Slave Ship to the Championship” was how the bout was originally billed, until the Zaireans took (understandable) offense. But nobody could dampen Ali’s spirits. He had been back in the ring for three years, and was still looking to reclaim his belt; now he had a chance to take it back from Foreman. Ali spent two months in Africa regaling the press with tales of how “I done wrestled with an alligator, I done tussled with a whale; handcuffed lightning, thrown thunder in jail.”
Ali also injected political drama into the proceedings. He cast Foreman as a symbol of colonialism and U.S. hegemony to the Zaireans, and cast himself as the native African. “He’s in my country to start with!” Ali bellowed when asked about Foreman.
It worked; the Zaireans rallied around Ali. The global respect he had earned by refusing to fight in Vietnam preceded him even here. Ali had no trouble whipping 60,000 people into a deafening chant of “Ali, bomaye!”— “Ali, kill him!”
In truth, while Ali and Ashe had been successful as activists, by 1974 it had been some time since either had won anything significant as athletes. Ali had been stripped of his belt seven years earlier, and had yet to win it back. Ashe hadn’t won a major title since the U.S. Open in 1968. A new generation of pros, led by Jimmy Connors and Bjorn Borg, had leaped in while he wasn’t looking.
But in 1974 and ’75 Ali and Ashe were rewarded for their good works with three career-capping triumphs. Each man would, in the words of Ali, rope a dope.
Ali invented the tactic in the second round of his fight with Foreman. After spending two months telling the world that he was going to dance Foreman to death, Ali retreated to the ropes and made himself an easy target for his opponent’s roundhouse blows. By the sixth round, Foreman had done what Ali thought he would do: punched himself out.
Ali asked, “That’s all you got, George?” and then, when the eighth round started, told him, “Now it’s my turn.” In the closing seconds of that round, Ali climbed off the ropes, popped Foreman with a right hand to the face, and sent the giant tumbling. Ali was champion again.
* * *
In the 1975 Wimbledon final, Ashe would use his own version of the rope-a-dope to beat tennis’ version of George Foreman, Jimmy Connors.
As with Foreman, it was widely believed that the 22-year-old Connors was unbeatable. The Brash Basher from Belleville had won the tournament the previous year and was No. 1 in the world. In 1974 he had gone 99–4, and there was talk in the locker room about how he would “go on winning everything for years.”
But there was one person in that room at Wimbledon who had to believe he could beat Connors. After winning his semifinal in five sets, Ashe walked into the player lounge and watched Connors shred their countryman Roscoe Tanner. Tanner was the game’s hardest server, but every ball he hit came back even harder from Connors. Now Ashe knew that his usual hammer-and-tongs aggressiveness wasn’t going to work. Could he do something different, just once?
A year before, Ali’s friends had been frightened to see him walk into a ring with Foreman; now Ashe’s friends felt the same way. Bud Collins said he was “scared to death that Arthur was going to be terribly embarrassed” by Connors. Ashe would answer their fears the same way that Ali had.
Before the final, Ashe huddled with his agent, Donald Dell, and fellow player Dennis Ralston, and came up with a plan based on the rope-a-dope. Instead of feeding Connors, a born counterpuncher, the pace he craved, Ashe would slice and dice. Instead of cracking the flat serve he loved, and which Connors loved to crack back, Ashe would bend it away from him.
But not all of Ashe’s tactics were ripped from the Ali playbook. Where he cast Foreman as the American in their fight, Ashe claimed that status for himself at Wimbledon. He walked onto Centre Court wearing his red-and-blue Davis Cup team jacket, with “USA” emblazoned across the back. It was a not-so-subtle message to Connors, a self-styled maverick who had refused to play for his country that year.
Ashe’s strategy worked perfectly. He rolled the ball gently, swung Connors from side to side, and gave him no punches to counter. Ashe won the first two sets 6–1, 6–1. In the end, like Ali, he let rip two knockout backhands to break serve in the fourth set. When tennis historians speak of strategic masterpieces, this is the match they point to first.
After his final winner, Ashe turned to his player box and raised his fist, briefly, in celebration. He had become the first black man to win Wimbledon, and many believed he was making a black-power salute. Ashe said it was merely a gesture of triumph toward his friend Dell. But he also said he was happy, later, to hear that “Among blacks, I’ve had quite a few say [the win] was up there with Joe Louis in his prime and Jackie Robinson breaking in with the Dodgers in 1947.”
Ashe, hewing as always to the middle path, began the afternoon wearing his USA Davis Cup jacket, and finished it by holding up a clenched fist.
* * *
Ashe and Ali were born at the same time, became politically aware at the same time, and reached the summits of their sports at the same time. They would also suffer physical decline at the same time.
In 1975, Ali beat Joe Frazier in 14 rounds in the Thrilla in Manila. The fight took place in an estimated 120-degree heat, and both men felt like they had been lucky to live through it. “We went to Manila as champions, Joe and me,” Ali said, “and we came back as old men.
Ali, as usual, was prescient. Three years later, he lost his belt to an unknown named Leon Spinks. In 1980, at age 38, he was knocked out by Larry Holmes. By then, Ali had begun to show the symptoms—slurred speech, slowed reactions—that would be diagnosed as Parkinson’s disease in 1984.
Four years after winning Wimbledon, in July 1979, Ashe suffered a heart attack while teaching a tennis clinic in New York. After two rounds of heart surgery, it was discovered in 1988 that he had contracted HIV from a blood transfusion. He died of pneumonia, a complication of AIDS, on February 6, 1993.
Ashe and Ali ended their lives as they had lived them, with courage and a flair for the dramatic. In 1992, Ashe stood bravely before TV cameras to confirm that the stories circulating that he had AIDS were true. Four years later in Atlanta, Ali delighted the world when he appeared, seemingly from nowhere, to light the Olympic torch.
On June 3, 2016, Ali died of Parkinson’s disease at age 74, but not before he could register one last protest, against the wave of anti-Islamic feeling that was being stirred up in the U.S. “Islam is a religion of peace,” Ali said after the 9/11 attacks. In many ways, it had been his message all along.
Ashe and Ali often expressed a desire to meet each other, but it happened just once during their athletic careers. After his trip to South Africa in 1973, the tennis player made a pilgrimage to the boxer’s training camp in rural Pennsylvania. Here was the man who had helped Ashe gain the courage to be more than an athlete, to live for more than himself.
“Ali spoke in his usual folksy way, with the bad grammar and the colorful idioms,” Ashe said—he had his standards, even with the immortals. “But there certainly is no doubt in my mind that a very natively clever man lurks behind this façade. We had a most forthright and intelligent conversation.”
Their long-distance dialogue—about what athletes owe to the world, and what Americans owe to their country—is over now. But Ali’s passion and fearlessness have been inherited by a new generation of African-American activists and athletes, while Ashe’s cerebral moderation can be seen in the governing style of Barack Obama.
That conversation also lives on in their words, which are quoted ceaselessly on the internet by people too young to have seen them in their primes. Here the two legends will talk to each other, and to future generations, forever:
“I know where I’m going, and I know the truth, and I don’t have to be what you want me to be.” — Muhammad Ali
“From what we get, we can make a living; what we give, however, makes a life.” — Arthur Ashe
* * *
Stephen Tignor is a senior writer at Tennis Magazine and Tennis.com, and author of High Strung: Bjorn Borg, John McEnroe, and the Last Days of Tennis’ Golden Age.