The Fight

by Norman Mailer

There is a threshold to the knockout. When it comes close but is not crossed, then a man can stagger around the ring forever. He has received his terrible message and he is still standing. No more of the same woe can destroy him. He is like the victim in a dreadful marriage which no one knows how to end.

Foreman was becoming reminiscent of the computer Hal in 2001 as his units were removed one by one, malfunctions were showing and spastic lapses.