On the night in 1964 that Muhammad Ali (then known as Cassius Clay) stepped into the ring with Sonny Liston, he was widely regarded as an irritating freak who danced and talked way too much.
To Remnick it seems clear that Ali's greatest accomplishment is to prove beyond a doubt that not only is it possible to challenge the implacable forces of the establishment (the noir-ish, gangster-ridden fight game and the ethos of a whole country) but, with the right combination of conviction and talent, to triumph over these forces. In extraordinary detail, Remnick depicts Ali as a creation of his own imagination as we follow the willful and mercurial young Cassius Clay from his boyhood and watch him hone and shape himself to a figure who would eventually command center stage in one of the most volatile decades in our history. But mostly Remnick's portrait is of a man who could not be confined to any existing stereotypes, inside the ring or out. Beginning with the pre-Ali days of boxing and its two archetypes, Floyd Patterson (the good black heavyweight) and Sonny Liston (the bad black heavyweight), Remnick deftly sets the stage for the emergence of a heavyweight champion the likes of which the world had never seen: a three-dimensional, Technicolor showman, fighter and minister of Islam, a man who talked almost as well as he fought. You'd think there wouldn't be much left to say about a living icon like Muhammad Ali, yet David Remnick imbues King of the World with all the freshness and vitality this legendary fighter displayed in his prime.
"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title. A master storyteller at the height of his powers, David Remnick has written a book worthy of America's most dynamic moden hero. KING OF THE WORLD takes us back to the days when his life was a series of battles, inside the ring and out. It is a study of the rise of the black voice in the American consciousness and a look at how the media creates its heroes - Cassius Clay began as a 'light-hitting loudmouth' before becoming gradually canonized by the American press and public as Muhammad Ali. Remnick then describes Clay's 1964 fight with Liston, which even his own people thought Clay couldn't win, and takes us through to 1967 when Ali refused the military draft to Vietnam. The book begins in September 1962 with the fight between Floyd Patteson and Sonny Liston, providing a remarkable sociological backdrop to Ali's entrance on the boxing scene. David Remnick concentrates on Ali's early career, when he was still fighting as Cassius Clay. This unforgettable account of Muhammad Ali's rise and self-creation, told by a Pullitzer Prize-winning writer, places Ali in a heritage of great American originals.
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