Morgan Freeman plays South African President Nelson Mandela. The movie shows the story behind the country’s rugby union team (the Springboks) and how they went from a failing team to winning the 1995 Rugby World Cup in less than one year. Nelson Mandela saw that racial hatred was tearing his country apart, and through the greatest act of forgiveness imaginable led his country toward reconcilliation. His support of the team inspired them to change who they were and how they thought.
One of Nelson Mandela’s inspirations was the poem “Invictus”.
The English poet William Ernest Henley wrote this poem in 1875. It was first published in 1888 in Henley's Book of Verses. It was one of a series of poems entitled Life and Death (Echoes).
Interstingly enough, the poem was not titled untill Artur Quillen-Couch included the poem in The Oxford Book Of English Verse (1900).
Invictus
Out of the night that covers me,
black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
for my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
my head is bloody, but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
looms but the Horror of the shade,
and yet the menace of the years
finds and shall find me unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
how charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.
I hope you find the inspiration you need to change your life.
"The mind is not a vessel to be filled, but a fire to be ignited"-Plutarch (46-120 AD)
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