• About Stephen Roth

A Place for My Stuff

~ The hopes, dreams and random projects of author Stephen Roth

A Place for My Stuff

Tag Archives: 1960s

Ali, The Poet

12 Sunday Jun 2016

Posted by ghosteye3 in author, observations, sports, stephen roth, Uncategorized

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

1960s, boxing, muhammad ali, peyton manning, poetry, sports, the greatest, tom brady, writing

ali
I’m not old enough to remember when Muhammad Ali was in his fighting prime, but I’ve always enjoyed watching old film clips and documentaries about him in those days. I especially love the poems he would write and share with the press before big fights. In addition to being the greatest boxer in the world, he was a genius with words and phrases. Ali coined “Rumble in the Jungle,” and “Thrilla In Manila,” the phrases we use to recall two of his most pivotal bouts. Grantland Rice would have been hard-pressed to come up with better catch-phrases than those.

Ali wrote the following poem, “I am the Greatest,” when his name was still Cassius Clay. He was 21 at the time. National Public Radio featured the original audio recording of the poem earlier this week.

Do you know any 21-year-olds who have the self-assurance to read a piece of verse they wrote to a large gathering of strangers? Do they also possess the skill to make the piece boastful, but humorous and playful at the same time? And do they have the charisma to read a poem called “I am the Greatest” without coming across as an arrogant jackass? Finally, how many 21-year-olds do you know who could back up that performance by actually being the greatest at what they do?

It has been written many times that Ali was a one-of-a-kind, and that is true for many reasons. For me, his charisma stands out as something totally unique in the dull, calculated, humorless world of sports. Can you imagine Tom Brady or Peyton Manning sharing poems they wrote before an upcoming Super Bowl?

Here’s the poem. Hope you enjoy it as much as I did:

This is the legend of Cassius Clay,
The most beautiful fighter in the world today.
He talks a great deal, and brags indeed-y,
of a muscular punch that’s incredibly speed-y.
The fistic world was dull and weary,
But with a champ like Liston, things had to be dreary.
Then someone with color and someone with dash,
Brought fight fans a-runnin’ with cash.
This brash young boxer is something to see
And the heavyweight championship is his des-tin-y.
This kid fights great; he’s got speed and endurance,
But if you sign to fight him, increase your insurance.
This kid’s got a left; this kid’s got a right,
If he hit you once, you’re asleep for the night.
And as you lie on the floor while the ref counts ten,
You’ll pray that you won’t have to fight me again.
For I am the man this poem’s about,
The next champ of the world, there isn’t a doubt.
This I predict and I know the score,
I’ll be champ of the world in ’64.
When I say three, they’ll go in the third.

So don’t bet against me, I’m a man of my word.
He is the greatest! Yes!
I am the man this poem’s about,
I’ll be champ of the world, there isn’t a doubt.
Here I predict Mr. Liston’s dismemberment,
I’ll hit him so hard; he’ll wonder where October and November went.
When I say two, there’s never a third,
Standin’ against me is completely absurd.
When Cassius says a mouse can outrun a horse,
Don’t ask how; put your money where your mouse is!
I AM THE GREATEST!”

Book Review: The Night Train

09 Thursday Jan 2014

Posted by ghosteye3 in book review, fiction

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

1960s, back bay books, book review, civil rights, clyde edgerton, dunn, family, fiction, little brown, north carolina, novel, segregation, southern fiction, Stephen Roth, the night train

Some of my fondest childhood memories were the trips we made to Dunn, North Carolina, to visit my mother’s family. I would sit in the kitchen of Grandma’s house or in front of her massive RCA color television in the back room, listening to my aunts and uncles reminisce about life growing up in a small tobacco town in the 1950s and 60s. There was a lot of laughter and the occasional heightened pitch of my mother or one of her sisters recounting a particularly juicy part of a story. Everyone on my mother’s side of my family was a good storyteller, so I guess I come by that honestly.
untitled (4)
Reading The Night Train, Clyde Edgerton’s 2011 novel about a small town in the early 1960s, reminded me of Dunn and some of those raucous tales at Grandma’s house. Fictional Starke, North Carolina, is like countless other Southern hamlets before and after Segregation – railroad tracks splitting it into the white part and the black part of town, with little overlap between the two other than in the tobacco fields and at a few businesses. Despite the separation and the history, Edgerton notes, folks on both sides of the tracks seem to share more in common than they would care to admit:

We could accurately say that the railroad divided a community of cornbread, vegetable and chicken eaters; or a community of pet lovers; or a community of rural dialects; of families of men who hunted quail and rabbits; people who owned chickens; women who cooked and sewed; or people who had, in their lifetimes, “worked in tobacco” – picked it, carted it behind mule or tractor, tied it to sticks, hung it in barns to cure, took it to market, complained about suckering and sand lugging.

Sunday mornings, however, encapsulate just how far apart the two sides of town are:

The truths of their pasts gave each group a different God (one of deliverance, the other of dominion), a different mode of worship service (one with energy and joy trumping solemnity and fear, the other almost reversing that). And their histories brought hardships to the people of West Starke not understood by the people of East Starke, and guilt to the East not understood by anybody.

Somehow, despite their upbringings and social pressures of their town, two teen-aged boys – one black and one white – slowly become friends. As with a lot of kids suddenly old enough to form their own tastes, it is music that brings them together. Dwayne Hallston has discovered James Brown and instructs his all-white band to memorize every song on the Live at the Apollo album. Larry Lime paces Dwayne through James Brown’s dance moves, but Larry Lime’s real passion is piano jazz, which he’s learning from a hemophiliac musician called the Bleeder who plays a club on the outskirts of town.

Both Larry Lime and Dwayne love The Bobby Lee Reese Show, a local TV variety show featuring the latest country and rock acts every Saturday night, hosted by a transplanted Yankee with a strange knack for connecting with both white and black audiences. Dwayne wants to audition on Bobby Lee’s show, and what could possibly go wrong with white boys playing soul music on TV at a time when the South is about to erupt over Civil Rights?

At little more than 200 pages, The Night Train is a fast-moving, often hilarious trip along both sides of the railroad tracks in tiny Starke. Edgerton’s skill at developing characters is such that even the most vilely racist ones come off as strangely sympathetic. They’re not bad people, they are just products of a tightly wound caste system that still exists in pockets of small towns and big cities all across the country.

You know from the very beginning of the book that the blooming friendship between Larry Lime and Dwayne is bound to be tested. Along the way, however, there are wonderful boyhood adventures and vivid characters of all ages. And, as with all of Edgerton’s books, there’s some great storytelling. You can almost taste the fried chicken, green beans and buttered biscuits on Grandma’s kitchen table, no matter what part of town you’re from.

The Episode in Which “Madmen” Jumps the Shark

21 Sunday Apr 2013

Posted by ghosteye3 in current events, entertainment, humor, Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

1960s, advertising, amc, don draper, madmen, new york, peace corps, television

SCENE: It is a Sunday morning at the Drapers’ spacious Manhattan apartment. MEGAN DRAPER lounges on the couch in a silk nightie, flipping through the pages of Look Magazine and smoking a Virginia Slim. DON DRAPER enters the apartment and drops his keys on a nearby table. He wears a ruffled charcoal grey suit and a loosened burgundy tie.

DON: Good morning.

MEGAN: Where were you all night? You look like hell.

DON: (Staring into the hallway mirror and smiling slightly.) I do, don’t I?

MEGAN: Are you drunk?

DON: As a matter of fact, I’ve never been more sober.

(DON drags a trash bin from the kitchen and places it next to the living room liquor cabinet. He stoically pulls one bottle after another from the cabinet and tosses each one into the trash. MEGAN rushes to him and grabs him by the arm.)

MEGAN: Don! What are you doing?

DON: (Not looking at her) Something I should have done a long time ago.

MEGAN: This is crazy. What’s gotten into you?

(DON ignores her, continuing to pile bottle after bottle into the bin. There are a lot of bottles, so it takes a while. When he finishes, DON turns to his wife and puts his hands on her shoulders. He looks at her dreamily, as if he is seeing her for the first time. He takes the skinny cigarette from her mouth and tosses into the trash with all the bottles.)

DON: Honey, this guy walked into my office yesterday. We spent the whole night talking.

MEGAN: What kind of guy?

DON: I’ve never met him before. He said he was with the Gideons and he gave me this (He pulls out a pocket-sized New Testament and places it on top of the liquor cabinet). Megan, have you ever heard of being born again?

MEGAN: What are you talking about?

DON: (Getting down on one knee and looking up at his wife with a pleading expression. There are tears in his eyes.) Look, I’ve done a lot of bad things in my life. Drinking, carousing, deceiving. There’ve been women. A lot more than you know about it. So many, even I’ve lost count. In a way, you could say my whole life has been a lie. When I came back from the war in Korea… Well, maybe that’s a story for another time.

MEGAN: Don, I–

DON: –But I think I’ve got a chance to set things straight. Tomorrow morning, I’m walking into Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce and I’m handing them my resignation. I’m giving up my partnership. The agency’s no good for me. Not for what I’ve got planned. Besides, advertising has bored me for years. I think it’s the Heinz account that finally put me over the edge.

MEGAN: But you’ve spent your whole career building up that company. What on earth are you going to do?

DON: (Smiling slyly.) Well, there’s this little thing call the Peace Corps.

MEGAN: Oh, Don, no!

DON: Listen. All my life, I’ve taken from people. I’ve been a crappy husband, a crappy father. I’ve made up ads that testify that true happiness can only be found through the purchase of the right brand of deodorant. I’ve worshiped false idols, and I’ve created false idols. But now I think I can give something back. I think I can get my hands dirty in a different way. Megan, do you know where Sierra Leone is?

(MEGAN says nothing, but starts tearing up).

DON: Hey. Hey! I know it sounds crazy. But listen to me! Listen to me! Listen to me! (He is shaking her by the shoulders.) Everything we know, everything in this apartment… It’s all phony. It’s nothing. Out there is the real world. The Third World. Look, it’s only for a couple of years. After that, you can go back to your acting. You hate working on that soap opera, anyway.

(He kisses her tenderly on the forehead, puts a hand under her chin and nudges it up so that MEGAN is eye-to-eye with him.)

DON: What do you say? Just you and me? We can start over.

MEGAN: (Looking at him hopefully). Yes. YES!

DON: You’ll never regret this. I swear. We go in for our immunization shots tomorrow.

MEGAN: Uhm, okay.

(The two hold hands and look out the massive window as the sun peaks above the New York City skyline. It is a new day for DON and MEGAN DRAPER).

Follow My Stuff!

RSS Feed RSS - Posts

RSS Feed RSS - Comments

Blog Archive

  • May 2022 (1)
  • March 2022 (1)
  • February 2022 (2)
  • March 2021 (1)
  • December 2020 (1)
  • June 2020 (1)
  • May 2020 (1)
  • April 2019 (1)
  • March 2019 (1)
  • March 2018 (3)
  • February 2018 (3)
  • February 2017 (3)
  • January 2017 (3)
  • December 2016 (2)
  • November 2016 (4)
  • September 2016 (2)
  • August 2016 (6)
  • July 2016 (1)
  • June 2016 (4)
  • May 2016 (3)
  • April 2016 (5)
  • March 2016 (4)
  • February 2016 (5)
  • September 2015 (1)
  • August 2015 (1)
  • July 2015 (4)
  • June 2015 (2)
  • May 2015 (1)
  • April 2015 (1)
  • March 2015 (3)
  • February 2015 (3)
  • January 2015 (4)
  • December 2014 (2)
  • November 2014 (1)
  • October 2014 (5)
  • September 2014 (6)
  • August 2014 (5)
  • July 2014 (6)
  • June 2014 (6)
  • May 2014 (4)
  • April 2014 (6)
  • March 2014 (5)
  • February 2014 (6)
  • January 2014 (7)
  • December 2013 (7)
  • November 2013 (7)
  • October 2013 (6)
  • September 2013 (5)
  • August 2013 (7)
  • July 2013 (7)
  • June 2013 (4)
  • May 2013 (5)
  • April 2013 (6)
  • March 2013 (6)
  • February 2013 (7)

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 335 other followers

Blogs I Follow

  • So Many Miles
  • Jolie and Piper's Writing
  • Deidra Alexander's Blog
  • Five More Minutes.....
  • Daily Inspiration Blog
  • The Shameful Sheep
  • LITERARY TITAN
  • Grateful and Authentic
  • Stuff White People Like
  • Storyshucker
  • 8 Hamilton Ave.
  • SO... THAT HAPPENED
  • TruckerDesiree
  • Mercer University Press News
  • BookPeople
  • A Place for My Stuff
  • "Write!" she says.
  • TwistedSifter
  • André Bakes His Way Through Martha Stewart's Cookie Book
  • The Dimwit Diary

Posts Categories

advertising A Plot for Pridemore author book review current events entertainment fiction growing up humor media movie reviews music my life observations parenthood photo fiction president satire social media sports stephen roth Uncategorized

My Facebook Fan Page

My Facebook Fan Page

Goodreads

Blogroll

  • Discuss
Follow A Place for My Stuff on WordPress.com

Categories

  • A Plot for Pridemore
  • advertising
  • author
  • book review
  • current events
  • entertainment
  • fiction
  • growing up
  • humor
  • media
  • movie reviews
  • music
  • my life
  • observations
  • parenthood
  • photo fiction
  • president
  • satire
  • social media
  • sports
  • stephen roth
  • Uncategorized

Blog at WordPress.com.

So Many Miles

Thru-hiking. Truck-driving. Miles.

Jolie and Piper's Writing

Deidra Alexander's Blog

I have people to kill, lives to ruin, plagues to bring, and worlds to destroy. I am not the Angel of Death. I'm a fiction writer.

Five More Minutes.....

I am a mother of five active, sometimes aggravating children that drive me crazy, provide me with lots of entertainment and remind me constantly about the value of love and family. I am married to my best friend. He makes me laugh every day (usually at myself). I love to eat, run, write, read and then eat again, run again…you get it. I am a children's author, having published four books with MeeGenuis (The Halloween Costume, When Santa Was Small, The Baseball Game, and The Great Adventure Brothers). I have had several pieces of writing published on Adoptive Families, Adoption Today, Brain Child, Scary Mommy, and Ten To Twenty Parenting. I am also a child psychologist, however I honestly think that I may have learned more from my parents and my children than I ever did in any book I read in graduate school. This blog is a place where I can gather my thoughts and my stories and share them with others. My writing is usually about kids and trying to see the world through their eyes, a few about parenting, adoption (one of my children is adopted) and some other random thoughts thrown in… I hope you enjoy them! So grab a cup of coffee, or a glass of wine, depending on what time of day it is (or what kind of day it is) and take a few minutes to sit back, relax and read. Please add your comments or opinions, I know you must have something to say, and I would love to hear it. Thanks for stopping by. Anne Cavanaugh-Sawan

Daily Inspiration Blog

The Shameful Sheep

LITERARY TITAN

Connecting Authors and Readers

Grateful and Authentic

Shift Your Perspective, Change Your Life

Stuff White People Like

This blog is devoted to stuff that white people like

Storyshucker

A blog full of humorous and poignant observations.

8 Hamilton Ave.

Reading, writing & other mysteries

SO... THAT HAPPENED

TruckerDesiree

Offering Opinions and Insights

Mercer University Press News

Our Mission: Mercer University Press supports the work of the University in achieving excellence and scholarly discipline in the fields of liberal learning, professional knowledge, and regional investigation by making the results of scholarly investigation and literary excellence available to the worldwide community.

BookPeople

Howdy! We're the largest independent bookstore in Texas. This is our blog.

A Place for My Stuff

The hopes, dreams and random projects of author Stephen Roth

"Write!" she says.

Tales from the car rider line and other stories

TwistedSifter

The Best of the visual Web, sifted, sorted and summarized

André Bakes His Way Through Martha Stewart's Cookie Book

175 cookie recipes - 175 stories to tell

The Dimwit Diary

A humorous website of assorted madness

Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use.
To find out more, including how to control cookies, see here: Cookie Policy
  • Follow Following
    • A Place for My Stuff
    • Join 335 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • A Place for My Stuff
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Report this content
    • View site in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar
 

Loading Comments...