My Humanity, In Common With All Of

I Have Become Convinced That We Blacks Spend Too Much Time On The Playing Field And Too Little Time In Libraries.

I Don't Want To Be Remembered For My Tennis Accomplishments.

I Don't Want To Be Remembered For My Tennis Accomplishments. That's No Contribution To Society. [tennis] Was Purely Selfish; That Was For Me.

There Were Times When I Asked Myself Whether I Was Being Principled Or Simply A Coward.... I Was Wrapped In The Cocoon Of Tennis Early In Life, Mainly By Blacks Like My Most Powerful Mentor, Dr. Robert Walter Johnson Of Lynchburg, Virginia. They Insisted That I Be Unfailingly Polite On The Court, Unfalteringly Calm And Detached, So That Whites Could Never Accuse Me Of Meanness. I Learned Well. I Look At Photographs Of The Skinny, Frail, Little Black Boy That I Was In The Early 1950s, And I See That I Was My Tennis Racquet And My Tennis Racquet Was Me. It Was My Rod And My Staff.

When We Were Together, I Loved You Deeply And You Gave Me So Much Happiness I Can Never Repay You.