Marirose Vernalee

“WHEN IT’S ALL OVER, there’s one final talk I want to make—to the press. When they gather in front of me, it’s hard to forget that nearly all of them had considered me a hoax. They start to shoot questions at me, but I cut them off: “Hold it! Hold it!” I say. “You’ve all had a chance to say what you thought before the fight. Now it’s my turn. You all said Sonny Liston would kill me. You said he was better than Jack Johnson or Jack Dempsey, even Joe Louis, and you ranked them the best heavyweights of all time. You kept writing how Liston whipped Floyd Patterson twice, and when I told you I would get Liston in eight, you wouldn’t believe it. Now I want all of you to tell the whole world while all the cameras are on us, tell the world that I’m The Greatest.” There’s a silence. “Who’s The Greatest?” I ask them. Nobody answers. They look down at their pads and microphones. “Who’s The Greatest?” I say again. They look up with solemn faces, but the room is still silent. “For the LAST TIME!” I shout. “All the eyes of the world on us. You just a bunch of hypocrites. I told you I was gonna get Liston and I got him. All the gamblers had me booked eight-to-one underdog. I proved all of you wrong. I shook up the world! Tell me who’s The Greatest! WHO IS THE GREATEST?” They hesitate for a minute, and finally in a dull tone they all answer, “You are.” •”
― Muhammad Ali, The Greatest: My Own Story

“Which I suppose it should be; if you're going to kill someone, you shouldn't be insulating yourself from the process. That was always my objection to the use of drones: warfare ought to be immediate; it ought to be bloody, to be close combat. You should be forced to witness, to feel, each and every impact. You shouldn't be allowed to put it at arm's length.”
― Lexie Elliott, How to Kill Your Best Friend

“Platitudes, both his words and mine, and we both know it --- the reckoning is yet to come. But in the meantime we're operating on a surface level of civility that's nothing short of excruciating.”
― Lexie Elliott, How to Kill Your Best Friend

“Two missed calls and you think your father is dead again. The conversation is rushed. Nuances of your new life are pushed into a speaker. They meet alien ears. At home; you are an old stranger. Away; you are a new one.
All you have of your family is in a phone. And it is why you can never lose it.”
― Ezinne Orjiako, Nkem.