Youssef Daoudi – författare

By twenty-three, Welles had founded his own theatre company and revolutionised radio with his infamous broadcast of The War of the Worlds. By twenty-five, he had secured his place in history with his debut film, Citizen Kane. Yet four films and less than a decade later, his career suffered a spectacular collapse. Welles, once the most promising director in America, was written off as a “would-be genius” - a bad bet in an increasingly money-conscious industry. It would be many years before his later works such as Touch of Evil and The Other Side of the Wind received widespread acclaim.So how did the boy wonder from Kenosha, Wisconsin, amount to so much, and yet so little? And if his artistic ambitions were thwarted, where does the blame truly lie? In The Giant, Youssef Daoudi weaves together reality and mythology to create a radical new look at one of Hollywood’s most legendary figures. He poses a question as timeless as Orson Welles himself: What happens when a true artist comes up against the rest of the world?

On the morning of 4 July 1910, thousands of boxing fans stormed a newly built stadium in Reno, Nevada, to witness an epic showdown. Jack Johnson, the world’s first Black heavyweight champion—and most infamous athlete in the world because of his race—was paired against Jim Jeffries, a former heavyweight champion then heralded as the “great white hope”. It was the height of the Jim Crow era and spectators were eager for Jeffries to restore the racial hierarchy that Johnson had pummelled with his quick fists.Transporting readers directly into the ring, artist Youssef Daoudi and poet Adrian Matejka intersperse dramatic boxing action with vivid flashbacks to reveal how Johnson, the self-educated son of formerly enslaved parents, reached the pinnacle of sport—all while facing down a racist justice system. Through a combination of breathtaking illustrations and striking verse, Last on His Feet honours a contentious civil rights figure who has for more than a century been denied his proper due.