Muhammad Ali: The People's Champion (review)

From the soaring hagiography of Jonah Winter's Muhammad Ali: Champion of the World (BCCB 3/08) to Jim Haskins' plainspoken Champion: The Story of Muhammad Ali (BCCB 6/02), there's no shortage of picture-book biographies about the boxing icon. The challenge then is to break fresh ground or provide a novel take on the legend, and although Myers offers an able portrait, there's no new information on offer. Furthermore, the somewhat flat prose seems poorly matched to its flamboyant subject: "On March 8, 1971, Ali fought against Frazier and lost a tough fight. His fans were crushed, but Ali was determined to keep fighting." The focus is on the active years of Ali's career, including, of course, his conversion to Islam and his refusal to serve in the military. Wrapping up the main text with Ali's lighting of the Olympic torch at the Atlanta games means that readers miss the details of his continuing battle with Parkinson's disease (recent achievements and awards are relegated to an appended timeline), a struggle that for many raises the stature of the mature Ali above that of his younger pugilist persona. Delinois' vibrant mixed-media illustrations, which fairly sculpt the figures in planes of paint textured in coarse swirls and doodles, shimmer with the heat of exertion in the ring. That eye-catching presentation will draw an audience, and readers will at least come away with the essentials.