BUNDINI

“FLOAT LIKE A BUTTERFLY, STING LIKE A BEE… RUMBLE, YOUNG MAN, RUMBLE… AAAAAHHH!”

IF Drew Brown Jnr (better known as “Bundini”) had never done anything else, his place in history would be assured by his origination and choreography of the phrase: “Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee… Rumble, young man, rumble… Aaaaahhh!”

Those words and the exclamation that followed captured the essence of Cassius Clay – and later, Muhammad Ali – both in the ring and out of it. They shaped the perception of one of the most important athletes of all time. Bundini by Todd D. Snyder (Hamilcar Publications) is the story of this complex enigmatic man who spent the most noteworthy years of his life in Ali’s orbit.

Bundini was born on March 21, 1928. His father was a violent uneducated man, black and poor in the rural south. Unable to stand the abuse, Bundini’s mother left the marital home when Bundini was seven, taking his younger brother with her. Bundini was left alone with his father. He quit school in the third grade and was functionally illiterate throughout his life.

Many of the details of Bundini’s life are shrouded in mystery. He joined the U.S. Navy (he said) at age 13. His duties were those of a ship’s porter. The moniker “Bundini” (he said) was bestowed on him after some girls called out “Bundini! Bundini! Bundini” (which he said meant “lover”) as his ship pulled out of a port in India. He was discharged from the Navy at age 15 after throwing a white officer overboard for slapping him and calling him a “nigger” or (alternative version) threatening the officer with a meat cleaver. He spent the next 12 years with the Merchant Marines (civilian mariners