“In America you’re conditioned to regard everything as a contest. You have to make the Ten Best Dressed List, win this, win that. It drives me nuts sometimes. Who cares, for Christ’s sake?”

If you’re paid before you walk on the court, what’s the point in playing as if your life depended on it?

If I don’t ask “Why me?” after my victories, I cannot ask “Why me?” after my setbacks and disasters.

I don’t want to be remembered for my tennis accomplishments.

I guess I started too early because I just thought it was something fun to do.

You come to realize that life is short, and you have to step up. Don’t feel sorry for me. Much is expected of those who are strong.

Drummed into me, above all, by my dad, by the whole family, was that without your good name, you would be nothing.

Trust has to be earned, and should come only after the passage of time.

You’ve got to get to the stage in life where going for it is more important than winning or losing.

I keep sailing on in this middle passage. I am sailing into the wind and the dark. But I am doing my best to keep my boat steady and my sails full.

I guess I started too early because I just thought it was something fun to do.

I keep sailing on in this middle passage. I am sailing into the wind and the dark. But I am doing my best to keep my boat steady and my sails full.

The ideal attitude is to be physically loose and mentally tight.

If I don’t ask “Why me?” after my victories, I cannot ask “Why me?” after my setbacks and disasters.

I spent many, many hours in libraries. Libraries became courts of last resort, as it were.

Having grown up in a segregated environment in the south I know what it’s like to be stepped on, I know what it’s like also to see some black hero do well in the face of adversity.

There is a syndrome in sports called ‘paralysis by analysis.’