A Tragic Hero Lives in Michigan
Cassius Clay, later named Muhammad Ali, was a tragic hero of modern times. He was widely renowned and acclaimed as the greatest boxer in the history of the sport. Ali's success led his career further and further. He began to believe that he truly was the greatest. His pride caused him to continue to fight; not only for himself, but for the crowd that revered him so greatly. Muhammad Ali won 56 of his 61 fights. He was able to do it because of the sheer confidence given to him from his previous wins and the attention of the entire world. Ali's greatness did not last him a lifetime by any means, however. He suffered defeat at the hands of pugilistic Parkinson's syndrome. From then on, Ali was nothing like his former self.
Muhammad Ali was clearly of very high stature. He earned this through his own work.
Ali started out, put simply by Bill Reynolds, as "a poor black kid who got on a magic carpet at the 1960 Olympics in Rome and took off." He was not born into high social standing. Ali was nothing more than a poverty-stricken boy for 18 years. Beginning with his gold medal in heavyweight boxing, Muhammad Ali was a professional. Also in the article is the statement that: "he became the most recognizable figure in the world." Even today, Muhammad Ali is very widely known by all sizes, shapes, races, and ages. He was and is nothing less than a legend. Muhammad Ali worked his way to the top of the social ladder through his boxing career. It was what he was good at; and it was what people loved to see.
Muhammad Ali possessed a tragic flaw, his Aristotelian hamartia, that identified him as a...