“Race is for me a more onerous burden than AIDS. My disease is the result of biological factors over which we, thus far, have no control. Racism, however, is entirely made by people, and therefore it hurts and inconveniences infinitely more.”
~Arthur Ashe, American tennis champion & activist
Days of Grace: A Memoir (1993) with Arnold Rampersad, Thorndike, Maine: G.K. Hall & Co., 1994 large-print edition, p. 205
Extended excerpt [Memoir. Ashe is referring to the public interpretation of comments he made during an interview for People magazine in June 1992, and the fact that he had acquired the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and the illness related to it, acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS).]:
“However, I stand by my remark. Race is for me a more onerous burden than AIDS. My disease is the result of biological factors over which we, thus far, have no control. Racism, however, is entirely made by people, and therefore it hurts and inconveniences infinitely more.” (p. 205)
Source note: Ashe died from AIDS-related pneumonia in 1993 after contracting the virus that causes the disease during heart bypass surgery in the early 1980s.
Source: Library – Days of Grace: A Memoir (1993|1994 G.K. Hall ed.) International Standard Book Number (ISBN) 0-8161-5883-5
Arthur Ashe – Misattributed
“Clothes and manners do not make the man; but when he is made they greatly improve his appearance.”
~Henry Ward Beecher, American author
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit (1887) ed. William Drysdale, New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1887, p. 20; online via Princeton University & Google Books, books.google.com
Misattribution note:
Some contemporary sources have incorrectly cited American tennis player & philanthropist Arthur Ashe as being the source of the “clothes and manners do not make the man” quote. It’s possible that Ashe quoted Beecher at some point, but the quote was in print before Ashe was born.
Extended excerpt [None. Verse appears as a single proverb in Beecher’s collection.]:
“Clothes and manners do not make the man; but, when he is made, they greatly improve his appearance.” (p. 20)
Source note: According to editor William Drysdale’s introduction, Henry Beecher’s Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit were selected from his “sermons, speeches, and writings,” after which Beecher revised about one-third of the work before his death, “making many alterations, additions, and erasures….The remaining proverbs stand in the words in which Mr. Beecher originally clothed them.” (Introduction, Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit, 1887)
Source link: Henry Ward Beecher, Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit (1887) online via Google Books: https://books.google.com/books?id=i447AAAAYAAJ&pg=PA20&dq=Henry+Ward+Beecher+%2B+Clothes+and+manners+do+not+make+the+man,+but+when+he+is+made+they+greatly+improve+his+appearance
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