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andy's avatar

“Rumble, young man, rumble.”

Muhammad Ali was something. As a boxer, for sure. Even more so as an entertainer.

I read, collected, every LL “western” novel when I was a boy. I bought the paperbacks a few at a time until there were no more to buy.

Ultimately my mother gave them away, boxes of them, as I’d left home - well, the place the LL’s were living - & didn’t have spare pack animal space to carry them up & down the trails.

Whoever she gave them to questioned my commitment to gifting them, as the large collection was complete &, but for one I’d loaned out, mistakenly (Flint was the title), in pristine, as new, condition. That guy won the LL Lottery.

Later, I read LL’s biography, too.

You’ve asked about books to read. Here’s one, particularly illuminating if you have some boxing knowledge, & especially knowledge of Ali (if not, then maybe your grand/father can fill you in).

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/723774.Sucker_Punch

Entertainers. And those they entertain. Some are legit, character-wise. Rule proving exceptions those, I’d say, tho, since entertaining may well be character defect #1.

Entertainers/entertained intertwined entrainment … well, that’s just the old “bread & circuses” story serial murderers of people, of truth, of progress, etc. routine, isn’t it?

“We who are about to die salute you,” & “Are you not entertained?!” (Sword thrown into the adoring audience is the exclamation point.)

At some point in your LL reads you began to notice how formulaic the stories were, didn’t you? Faces, names, locales “changed” as the trotline plot that seemed plural hooked young boys & their overgrown counterparts too in a robust commercial fishing operation.

Speaking of overfishing, here’s another suggestion to read:

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/64895.Cod

Entertainers entertaining the entertained is what Ali & LL had in common.

Think on that as you compare in a weight-bearing exercise effort to contrast the entertainment industrial complex’s machinations in the recent presidential election … because, again, entertainers have far more in common than rare distinctions among them.

Be wary, I’d say, is the gist.

One last, while we’re at it. Just saw it recently. There’s a Martha Stewart documentary on Netflix. She’s called “the original influencer.” Which is more trotline “distinction." She was & is an entertainer. And entertainers, like pawns, are disposable. See how she was disposed of … on the way up, & then (pre-FBI Comey) down.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6blC6bsgZmc

Oops, final last entertainment. Shakespeare. “All the world’s a stage” (entertainers everywhere). And the null void of the lawyers (“First thing we do is …”) voir dire’ing “the blank slate” that ain’t:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CDVD3YTRAV8

“I’m ready for my close up, Mr. DeMille,” but “What’s my motivation?”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Wgn0KlSHl4

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Ken Waski's avatar

good one. thanks....

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