The Power Of One

by Bryce Courtenay

‘In the matter of white man’s punishment, the black people already understand that the body can be broken by a sjambok but never the spirit. We are the earth, that is why we are the colour of earth. In the end it is the earth who will win, every African knows this.’

the beginning of the power of one, where I would learn that in each of us there is a flame that must never be allowed to go out. That as long as it burns within us, we cannot be destroyed.

One thing is certain in life. Just when things are going well, soon after they are certain to go wrong.

I have found in life that everything, no matter how bad, comes to an end.

the person on the outside was only a shell, a presence to be seen and provoked. Inside was the real me,

All children are flotsam driven by the ebb and flow of adult lives.

You’ve got to be quick on your feet in this world if you want to survive. Though, once you know the rules, it is not too hard to play the game.

Sometimes the slightest things change the directions of our lives, the merest breath of a circumstance, a random moment that connects like a meteorite striking the earth. Lives have swivelled and changed direction on the strength of a chance remark.

‘It’s good to be a little frightened. It’s good to respect your opponent. It keeps you sharp. In the fight game, the head rules the heart. But in the end the heart is the boss,’

‘Never forget, Peekay, sometimes, very occasionally, you do your best boxing with your mouth.’

(null)

I had learned the most important rule in winning. . . keep thinking.

Remember always, first with the head and then with the heart. Without both, I’m telling you, plans are useless!

First with the head and then with the heart, that’s how a man stays ahead from the start.

when you’re small and on your own, you’ve got to gather all the information you can, as fast as you can. Good camouflage depends on this.

concentrate on love, there is already too much hate in this land of ours. This country has been starved of love too long.’

‘Pride is holding your head up when everyone around you has theirs bowed. Courage is what makes you do it.’

when you stood out in the crowd, trouble was sure to follow.

‘Sadness has a season and will pass.’ Then she would laugh and hug me and say, ‘But it isn’t the season for sadness yet.’

listening is a good camouflage. I soon discovered that it is also an art. You learn not simply to listen to what people say. It’s what people don’t say that is important. If you listen hard enough you can hear the most amazing things going on behind the speaker’s voice.

When pressed by my mother to have a second helping, my granpa used to say: ‘A cow has eight stomachs but I, alas, have one. A cow must keep on chewing but I, my dear, am done.’

Country people know the sweat that goes into an ear of corn, a pail of milk, a churn of butter, bread warm from the oven and the eggs and bacon which sizzle in the breakfast frying pan. Food is hard earned and requires the proper degree of respect.

‘Life is all beginnings and ends. Nothing stays the same,

“No matter what has happened bad, today I’m finished from being sad. Absoloodle!”’

always in life an idea starts small, it is only a sapling idea, but the vines will come and they will try to choke your idea so it cannot grow and it will die and you will never know you had a big idea, an idea so big it could have grown thirty metres through the dark canopy of leaves and touched the face of the sky.’ He looked at me and continued, ‘The vines are people who are afraid of originality, of new thinking; most people you encounter will be vines, when you are a young plant they are very dangerous.’

Your brain, Peekay, has two functions; it is a place for original thought, but also it is a reference library, use it to tell you where to look and then you will have for yourself all the brains that have ever been.’

Doc also taught me Latin roots so I was no longer forced to resort to memory alone and the botanical names of plants began to make sense to me.

the greatest camouflage of all is consistency. If you do something often enough and at the same time in the same way, you become invisible. One of the shadows.

‘In music you must first do the exercises, always first the exercises. If you do the exercises goot then you have the foundations. You cannot build a good musician on a bad foundation.

‘More fights are lost by underestimating your opponent than by any other way. Always remember, small baas, surprise is everything.’

Doc was a perfectionist and it gave him great pain not to meet the standards he demanded for himself.

‘in this world are very few things made from logic alone. It is illogical for a man to be too logical. Some things we must just let stand. The mystery is more important than any possible explanation.’ He paused for a moment and tapped his fingers on the edge of the keyboard. ‘The searcher after truth must search with humanity. Ruthless logic is the sign of a limited mind. The truth can only add to the sum of what you know, while a harmless mystery left unexplored often adds to the meaning of life. When a truth is not so important, it is better left as a mystery.’

The photograph captured the exact moment when I understood with conviction that racism is a primary force of evil designed to destroy good men.

‘Cleverness is a false presumption,’ Doc had explained. ‘It is like being a natural skater, you are so busy doing tricks to impress that you do not see where the thin ice is and before you know, poof! You are in deep, ice-cold water frozen like a dead herring. Intelligence is a harder gift, for this you must work, you must practise it, challenge it and maybe towards the end of your life you will master it.

Cleverness is the shadow whereas intelligence is the substance.’

From the moment Captain Smit had stepped into the ring he had remained silent, and I could sense this was beginning to unnerve Borman.

‘Sometimes, when there is enough hate, this thinking can kill. The people will think some person to death. Such a death is always long and hard, because the thinking takes place over a long time. It is the hate; when it boils up there is no stopping it, the person will die because there is no muti you can take to stop this hating thing.’

above all things I had been taught to read for pleasure and for meaning,

In teaching me independence of thought they had given me the greatest gift an adult can give to a child, besides love, and they had given me that also.

my theory is that to beat any system you have to know it intimately. Rebellion is senseless and being pointedly different only leads to persecution, the only way to control any system is from inside it the way the Jews have always done.’

‘Every system tends to be mutually exclusive, they’re all about keeping someone or something out, by keeping the Jews out of the Nazi party Hitler was acting typically. No system wants to be undermined or abused and therefore it is constantly on guard to exclude those who would destroy it.

For me money is like boxing is for you, it’s my way of getting even with the world. For a rich Jew money is a weapon, unless I know how to make it on my own I will be defenceless.’

When men can be made to hope, then they can be made to win.’

first the facts and then the trust.’

As is so often the case with a legend, every incident has two possible interpretations, the plausible and the one which is moulded to suit the making of the myth. Man is a romantic at heart and will always put aside dull, plodding reason for the excitement of an enigma. As Doc had pointed out, mystery, not logic, is what gives us hope and keeps us believing in a force greater than our own insignificance.

I had learned early that silence is better than sycophancy, that silence breeds guilt in other people. That it is fun to persecute a pig because it squeals, no fun at all to beat an animal which does not cry out.

The power of one was the courage to remain separate, to think through to the truth and not to be beguiled by convention or the plausible arguments of those who expect to maintain power, whatever the cost.

in my experience the glittering prizes in life come more to those who persevere despite setback and disappointment than they do to the exceptionally gifted who, with the confidence of the talents bestowed upon them, often pursue the tasks leading to success with less determination.’

good conversational debate was an end in itself and talking for the love of conversation is what makes us human.

‘Winners make their own luck but winners are also lucky,’

The power of one is above all things the power to believe in yourself, often well beyond any latent ability you may have previously demonstrated. The mind is the athlete; the body is simply the means it uses to run faster or longer, jump higher, shoot straighter, kick better, swim harder, hit further or box better. Hoppie’s dictum to me: ‘First with the head and then with heart’ was more than simply mixing brains with guts. It meant thinking well beyond the powers of normal concentration and then daring your courage to follow your thoughts.