Iron Ambition

Starred review from May 15, 2017
In this tender and disturbing hybrid of memoir and biography, former heavyweight boxing champion Tyson examines one of the most unusual characters in boxing history. The story begins in 1979 with boxing trainer Cus D’Amato watching Tyson, then a 13-year-old gangster, batter a former pro in a sparring session. At the time, it had been over 20 years since D’Amato guided Floyd Patterson to a title and almost as long since his exile to pugilistic Siberia (aka upstate New York). The resentful street kid’s rage and power reinvigorated D’Amato, and seven years later he helped Tyson become the youngest heavyweight champion in boxing history. Tyson’s narrative alternates between recollections of his discipleship with D’Amato and narration of the manager’s earlier years, including his upbringing in the Bronx and his battles with the Mafia, which controlled boxing in the decades after WWII. D’Amato, a brilliant autodidact whose training methods incorporated Zen, hypnotism, and the psychoanalytic practices of Wilhelm Reich, had forged other champions before Tyson, only to lose them through an odd mixture of paranoia and principle. This book is no hagiography, and descriptions of D’Amato’s brutal psychological manipulation of damaged teenagers like Tyson makes for unpleasant reading. As hypercritical and manipulative as D’Amato could be, he nevertheless drew remarkable accomplishments from boys others had forgotten. Tyson’s love for D’Amato is more than apparent, but it doesn’t lead him to downplay his teacher’s myriad faults.