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There he was, the dancing master, shuffling up the steps as though battling through an invisible blizzard, his clasp on the flickering torch heartbreakingly compromised by hands that shook uncontrollably. For over two decades, from his professional debut in 1960 as a scrawny teenager to that profoundly sad wintry night in 1981 when he made his ill-fated comeback against Trevor Berbick, Muhammad Ali lit up the sporting world’s colourless landscape like a metropolis of scorching stars. [details]
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The young ones who are put off by Ali may consider taking Ali (as Clay) in the context of the times that he was coming up: It was the 60's...America and much of the rest of the western world lost its innocence with the assasination of JFK... a State governor ordered that dogs be unleashed on black demonstrators...iconoclasm was in full swing... The Beatles (John Lennon) proclaimed themselves more famous than Jesus Christ....
Against that backdrop, Ali's self-annointing as, "The Greatest" was seemingly demanded by the times, if not merely in step with the times. Ali was comparing himself, after all, with mere mortals (boxing immortals, as they may be) such as Joe Louis, Rocky, etc., while those lads from Liverpool....
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