Exposing the lies of one of sports' greatest frauds.
The poet Mary Oliver died on Thursday. I almost hate to admit how much I like her work — not because she isn’t all morose and difficult like poets are supposed to be, but because some people (well, one in particular) misappropriate and befoul her words.
Continue reading “The Journey: Diana Nyad, Mary Oliver, and Me”
Nyad says that she “relinquished my position as screenwriter of my life story.” Of her Manhattan swim, she once said, “I hereby relinquish my title as the first woman.” But you can’t relinquish something you never had.
I was so diverted by Nyad’s cinematic machinations in the last post that I missed something important. When Diana finally tells us that she’s not writing the screenplay for Nyad: The Motion Picture, she declares:
I relinquished my position as screenwriter of my life story. (Sung, “Diana Nyad…” )
When she got caught in her Manhattan lie back in 2011, she used the same verb:
I hereby relinquish my title as the first woman. (Nyad via the Wayback Machine)
Continue reading “Diana’s GREAT Surprise, part 2: The Relinquisher”
For over forty years, Diana Nyad has longed for a biopic devoted to her favorite subject, Diana Nyad.*
Below is a lightly and snarkily annotated chronological list of all of Nyad’s biopic-related pronouncements that I know of.
Continue reading “Nyad: The Motion Picture”
The first pattern that emerged from the “110 Miles . . .” discussion on the Marathon Swimmers Forum was Diana Nyad’s policy of active un-engagement.
Diana and/or her handlers must have calculated that their boat already rode so low in the water that any movement might swamp it. So Diana either does not engage with skeptics; or, when she momentarily forgets herself and does engage, she quickly erases the evidence, pretends nothing happened, and hopes that the boat stops rocking.
Giving Aris Nyad the benefit of the doubt leads to Herald Tribune treasures.
“Diana Nyad’s Unspeakable Lie, part 2” included a link to a 1942 Montreal Gazette article, “Young Greek Flier Held in New York Jail.” That flier, Aristotle Nyad, was “a handsome, aristocratic-looking young fellow” who, according to the article,
…had with him a clipping from the New York Tribune giving an interview as one of the many young Greeks who had stormed their consulate in New York when Greece was invaded, hoping they could get back so they could fight for their country.
Continue reading “New York Herald Tribune Archive Holds Nyad-related Gems”
A rereading of “110 miles, 53 hours: Questions for Diana Nyad” sends the Annex swimming off in a new direction.
¡Feliz año nuevo!
I love the sound of Spanish, the music of it, the way so many words end by flowing out of vowels rather than by crashing into consonants: gato vs. cat, for instance, or perro vs. dog, calle vs. street, etc.
I don’t know enough Spanish, though, to converse in it beyond the level of un niño who has just turned three.
I do know a thing or two about Diana Nyad. She is a con artist and a fraud, and she will lie about anything. The last two Annex posts leave no doubt about that.
So just one task remains: proving that Nyad did not swim all the way from Cuba to Florida under her own power.
Continue reading “¡Adelante!”
