Routledge Handbook of Tennis: History, Culture and Politics [1 ed.] 1138691933, 9781138691933

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Routledge Handbook of Tennis

Tennis is one of the world’s most popular sports, as levels of participation and spectatorship demonstrate. Moreover, tennis has always been one of the world’s most significant sports, expressing crucial fractures of social class, gender, sexuality, race and ethnicity – both on and off court. This is the first book to undertake a survey of the historical and socio-cultural sweep of tennis, exploring key themes from governance, development and social inclusion to national identity and the role of the media. It is presented in three parts: historical developments; culture and representations; and politics and social issues, and features contributions by leading tennis scholars from North America, Europe, Asia and Australia. The most authoritative book published to date on the history, culture and politics of tennis, this is an essential reference for any course or program examining the history, sociology, politics or culture of sport. Robert J. Lake (Editor) is Instructor in the Department of Sport Science at Douglas College, Canada. He has written on numerous socio-historical aspects of tennis including social class, gender, national identity, media, coaching and talent development policy. His first book A Social History of Tennis in Britain (Routledge, 2015) won the Lord Aberdare Literary Prize in 2016 awarded by the British Society of Sports History. Carol A. Osborne (Assistant Editor) is Senior Lecturer in Sport and Social Sciences at Leeds Beckett University, UK. Her research focuses on women in sports history and gender relations in sport. She sat on the executive committee of the British Society of Sports History (BSSH) 2007–17 and has worked as an independent History Consultant with the UK-based Sporting Heritage CIC.

Routledge Handbook of Tennis History, Culture and Politics

Edited by Robert J. Lake

ASSISTANT EDITOR CAROL A. OSBORNE

First published 2019 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2019 selection and editorial matter, Robert J. Lake; individual chapters, the contributors The right of Robert J. Lake to be identified as the author of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalog record has been requested for this book ISBN: 978-1-138-69193-3 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-315-53357-5 (ebk) Typeset in Bembo by Deanta Global Publishing Services, Chennai, India

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Contents

List of illustrations x List of contributors xi Acknowledgements xix 1 Introduction to the history and historiography of tennis Robert J. Lake

1

PART I

Historical developments (commercialization, professionalization and the creation of tennis celebrities, globalization and internationalization of tennis)

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2 From folk game to elite pastime: Tennis and Its patrons Brad Hummel and Mark Dyreson

19

3 Grass roots: The development of tennis in Great Britain, 1918–78 Joyce Kay

29

4 Coaching and training in British tennis: A history of competing ideals Robert J. Lake, Dave Day and Simon J. Eaves

39

5 Golden years and golden stars: International women’s tennis between the wars Elizabeth Wilson

50

6 A transcendent game plan: Bill Tilden’s rhetorical strategy in defying the USLTA John Carvalho and Michael Milford

58

7 Fred Perry and the amateur-Professional divide in British tennis between the wars Kevin Jefferys

67

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Contents

8 Boris Becker and Steffi Graf: German tennis, media images and national identity 76 Kristian Naglo 9 The female hero through the cultural lens: Comparing framing of Li Na in Chinese and Western media Steve Bien-Aimé, Haiyan Jia and Chun Yang 10 The world’s game? Globalisation and the cultural economy of tennis Barry Smart 11 Jeu de Paume, lawn tennis and France’s national identity from the 1870s to the Musketeers era Patrick Clastres

86 96

108

12 Lawn tennis in Ireland: The untold history, 1870–1914 Simon J. Eaves and Tom Higgins

119

13 Socio-cultural transformations of tennis in the Czech Republic Arnošt Svoboda and Dino Numerato

130

14 A brief historical, political and social analysis of Argentine tennis Robert G. Rodriguez

141

15 Indian tennis: Past perfect, present continuous, future tense Suvam Pal

151

16 Tennis in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region Mahfoud Amara

162

PART II

Culture and representations (gender, race, class, the arts and media)

171

17 Fashioning competitive lawn tennis: Object, image and reality in women’s tennis dress 1884–1919 Suzanne Rowland

173

18 Wimbledon women: Elite amateur tennis players in the mid-twentieth century Janine van Someren and Stephen Wagg

183

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Contents

19 Beyond the “Kournikova phenomenon”: Race and beauty in a “colorblind” culture Helen Ditouras 20 Making work out of play: The troubling gender performances of Bill Tilden Nathan Titman

193 203

21 Your racquet should do the talking: Masculinity and top-class tennis, 1930s to the early twenty-first century Stephen Wagg

212

22 “You’ve come a long way baby” but when will you get to deuce?: The media (re)presentation of women‘s tennis in the post Open Era John Vincent

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23 Veiled hyper-sexualization: Deciphering Strong is Beautiful as collective identity in the WTA’s global ad campaign Travis R. Bell and Janelle Applequist

234

24 Warriors of the court: Richard “Pancho” González, Rosie Casals and the history of US Latino/as in tennis José M. Alamillo

245

25 Historical changes in playing styles and behavioural etiquette in tennis: Reflecting broader shifts in social class and gender relations Robert J. Lake

255

26 The seductions of modern tennis: Technical invention, social practice, literary discourse Alexis Tadie

266

27 Understanding competitive tennis through literature and the visual arts: Society, celebrity and aesthetics Alexis Tadie

276

28 The literature of tennis Jeffrey O. Segrave

286

29 International tennis art Ann Sumner

296

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30 Tennis and the media: A history of shifting attitudes toward tennis journalism and broadcasting Robert J. Lake and Simon J. Eaves

308

31 Exploring an online tennis community Nadina Ayer and Ron McCarville

319

32 Tennis and social media Katie Lebel and Karen Danylchuk

329

PART III

Politics and social issues (governance, nationalism and identity: race, gender, class and disability) 33 Tennis governance: A history of political power struggles Robert J. Lake

339 341

34 Defending the grand slam: Government intervention, urban renewal and keeping the Australian Open Alistair John and Brent McDonald

351

35 Tennis and the Olympics: An historical examination of their on-off relationship since 1896 Matthew P. Llewellyn and Robert J. Lake

362

36 The Wimbledon effect: The tennis championships as changing national symbol 372 Stephen Wagg 37 Andy Murray and the borders of national identities: (Re)claiming a tennis champion John Harris

383

38 Racial politics in the history of American tennis Sundiata Djata

392

39 Arthur Ashe: Politics, racism and tennis Eric Allen Hall

402

40 The Original 9: The social movement that created women’s professional tennis, 1968–73 Kristi Tredway

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Contents

41 Giving all women the chance: The battle of the sexes in popular culture Jessica Luther

422

42 Break point: Renée Richards and the significance of sex and gender in women’s tennis Lindsay Parks Pieper

432

43 Venus and Serena are “doing it” for themselves: Theorizing sporting celebrity, Marxism and Black feminism for the Hip-Hop generation Jayne O. Ifekwunigwe

440

44 Wheelchair tennis: Historical development and narratives of play Linda K. Fuller 45 A history of social exclusion in British tennis: From grass roots to the elite level Robert J. Lake

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460

Index470

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Illustrations

Figures 10.1 BNP Paribas partnerships with tennis tournaments and competitions around the world

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Images Photographer unknown, Mrs. Lambert Chambers in action on grass at The Championships at Worple Road181 29.1 John Lavery, The Tennis Party (1885), Aberdeen Art Gallery & Museums 297 29.2 Theodoor Toorop, Garden Party, Lawn Tennis (1890-91), Gemeente Museum, The Hague 298 29.3 Percy Shakespeare, The Tennis Player (c.1929), Dudley Museum Service collection 300 29.4 Hurvin Anderson, Country Club and Chicken Wire (2008), Private collection 305 29.5 Vicente do Rêgo Monteiro, Tennis (1928), Swindon Museum and Art Gallery 306 17.1

Tables 1.1

10.1 16.1 16.2 32.1 32.2 32.3 32.4 44.1 44.2

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Articles published in twenty leading journals across various subjects in the social sciences of sport mentioning ‘tennis’ in its abstract by decade, 1960s–2010s 2018 Grand Slams: Sponsoring Partners and Official Suppliers Arab Tennis men in the Top 1000 ATP Ranking Arab Tennis women in the top 500 WTP ranking Tennis player rankings on social media Description of Self-Presentation Strategy Frames Number of followers on Grand Slam Social Media Platforms Sponsor exposure on social media International Tennis Federation male and female wheelchair tennis champions Wheelchair Tennis Results from Paralympic Games, 1992–2016

11 102 164 165 330 332 335 335 453 454

Contributors

José M. Alamillo is Professor of Chicana/o Studies at California State University, Channel

Islands, USA. He is author of Making Lemonade out of Lemons: Mexican American Labor and Leisure in a California Town, 1880–1960, co-author of Latinos in U.S. Sport: A History of Isolation, Cultural Identity, and Acceptance. He has completed a book manuscript, Deportes: The Making of a Sporting Mexican Diaspora for Rutgers University Press. He is an avid tennis player and captain of the Mission Oaks Warriors. Mahfoud Amara is Director of the Sport Science Program and Assistant Professor in Sport Management and Policy at the College of Arts and Sciences Qatar University, Qatar. He has a number of publications on the topics of sport, business, politics and society in the Arab region. His other research interests are sport and social inclusion and cultural diversity. In 2012 he published a book with Palgrave Macmillan on Sport Politics and Society in the Arab World. He is co-editor with Alberto Testa of Sport in Islam and in Muslim Communities (Routledge, 2015); and with John Nauright, Sport in the African World (Routledge, 2018). Janelle Applequist is Assistant Professor of Advertising in the Zimmerman School of Advertising & Mass Communications at the University of South Florida, USA. Her research interests include qualitative research methods, pharmaceutical advertising, advertising, health communication and patient and healthcare representations via advertising. Nadina Ayer teaches in the Department of Kinesiology and Physical Education at the Wilfrid

Laurier University, Ontario, Canada. She holds a Ph.D. in Recreation and Leisure Studies from the University of Waterloo, Canada. Her research interests include online communities, interpersonal and group dynamics, participation and leadership in sport and marketing and management of outdoor recreation. Travis R. Bell is Multimedia Journalism Instructor in the Zimmerman School of Advertising & Mass Communications at the University of South Florida, USA. His research interests include mixed methods media analysis, media framing and sport communication that situates at the intersection of media, race and sport. Steve Bien-Aimé is Assistant Professor in the College of Informatics at Northern Kentucky University, USA. Prior to receiving his doctorate from the College of Communications at Penn State, Bien-Aimé worked as a copy editor at both The News Journal in Delaware and The Baltimore Sun and served in a variety of functions at FOXSports.com in Los Angeles, departing as deputy NFL editor. His research interests include race and gender portrayals in news and sports media. xi

Contributors

John Carvalho is Professor of Journalism in the School of Communication and Journalism at

Auburn University, USA. A sports media historian, his research focuses on sports celebrities who also had connections to the journalism profession. He has published Frick*: Baseball’s Third Commissioner (McFarland, 2016) – the first comprehensive biography of Ford Frick, who started as a Jazz Age sports journalist in New York City, but finished his career as baseball commissioner for 14 years. Carvalho has also published articles on Bill Tilden’s writing pursuits in Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly, Sport in History, and Journal of Sport History. Patrick Clastres is Professor of Sport History at the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences at Lausanne University (UNIL), Switzerland where he coordinates the Global Sport & Olympic Studies Center. He has published nine books and more than 50 articles about cultural and political contemporary history through sport and Olympics. He co-edited in 2009 the first ever history book on real and lawn tennis in France from the Renaissance up to the 20th century, and, in 2018, Global Sport Leaders at Palgrave. Karen Danylchuk is Professor of Sport Management, School of Kinesiology, and Associate

Dean (Academic), Faculty of Health Sciences, at Western University in London, Canada. She is a former Intercollegiate Athletics Coordinator and tennis, squash and golf coach; and former nationally and provincially ranked tennis player. Dr. Danylchuk is the current President of the World Association for Sport Management (WASM), a former President of the North American Society for Sport Management (NASSM), NASSM Research Fellow and recipient of the NASSM Distinguished Service and Earle F. Zeigler Lecture Awards. Her research focuses on internationalization and increasing participation in sport. Dave Day is Professor of Sports History at Manchester Metropolitan University, UK, where his research interests focus on the historical and cultural development of coaching and training practices and the uncovering of the hidden histories of sports coaches and performers. His publications include Professionals, Amateurs and Performance: Sports Coaching in England, 1789–1914 and A History of Sports Coaching in Britain. Helen Ditouras is Professor of English at Schoolcraft College in Michigan, USA, where she

teaches English, Media and Film Studies. Her academic areas of interest include Film studies, Ethnic studies, Critical Race Theory, and International Education pedagogy. Her chapter ‘The Kournikova Phenomenon’ was published in David Baggett’s anthology Tennis and Philosophy: What is the Racket All About? in 2010 by the University of Kentucky Press. Sundiata Djata teaches and researches the histories of Africa,African America, Latin America, the

Caribbean, sports and music. His publications include: The Bamana Empire by the Niger: Kingdom, Jihad and Colonialism, and Blacks at the Net: A History of Blacks in Tennis (two volumes), and chapters in The Columbia Guide to African American History since 1939, and Separate Games: African American Sport behind the Walls of Segregation. Also, he has published in the Journal of Caribbean Studies and Business and Society Revie. He holds degrees from the University of Massachusetts, Morgan State University, Oklahoma City University and the University of Illinois. Mark Dyreson is Professor of Kinesiology, Affiliate Professor of History, Director of Educational

Programs and Research at Penn State’s Center for the Study of Sports in Society, USA, and a Fellow of the US National Academy of Kinesiology. He has written extensively on modern

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Contributors

sport history, particularly on the intersections of sport and consumer culture. He is Managing Editor of The International Journal of the History of Sport and co-editor of the Sport and Global Society: Historical Perspectives book series for Routledge Press. He began playing tennis with a wooden racquet but has not improved as the technology has upgraded. Simon J. Eaves is Reader in the Department of Sport and Exercise Science at Manchester

Metropolitan University, UK. His research interests include sports performance analysis, sports coaching and sports history. He has recently focused his work on lawn tennis history, co-authoring several articles examining early coaching professionals and the internationalisation of the game in the nineteenth century. Linda K. Fuller is Professor Emerita of Communications at Worcester State University, USA. She has authored over 30 books, the most recent being Female Olympian and Paralympian Events: Analyses, Backgrounds and Timelines published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2018. Linda earned Fulbrights to teach in Singapore in 1996 and to do HIV/AIDS work in Senegal in 2002. Eric Allen Hall is Associate Professor of History at Northern Illinois University, USA. His

research examines the relationship between race, politics, and popular culture (particularly sports) in twentieth-century US history. He is the author of Arthur Ashe: Tennis and Justice in the Civil Rights Era and essays that have appeared in the Journal of African American History and Washington Post among other outlets. He is currently working on a book about the 1973 “Battle of the Sexes” match through the lens of the culture wars. John Harris is Associate Dean Research in the Glasgow School for Business and Society at Glasgow Caledonian University, UK. He has published widely on various aspects of international sport including work on celebrity, mega-events, labour migration and national identities. Harris is the author of Rugby Union and Globalization (Palgrave Macmillan) and serves on the editorial boards of the Journal of Sport & Tourism, International Journal of Sport Communication, Managing Sport and Leisure and Journal of Hospitality, Leisure, Sport and Tourism Education. Tom Higgins is an Independent Scholar. He qualified as a civil engineer in 1969, and from 1977

until his retirement, lectured at the Institute of Technology, in Sligo, Ireland. He has been widely involved in sporting administration. He was a founding member of one badminton, one rugby and three tennis clubs and is a qualified coach in all three sports. He is honorary life president of Sligo Tennis Club. His publications vary across different sports. The History of Irish Tennis, a three-volume book, was self-published in 2006. Brad William Hummel is Graduate Student in the Department of Kinesiology at Penn State

University, USA. Enthralled from an early age with the interaction of sport and culture manifested in the Olympic Games, he pursues studies which seek to reveal the essential and meaningful role that sport and game-play serves in the lives of individuals and communities. His primary research centers on the intertwined history of tennis and the Olympics. A follower of the professional game, he considers tennis his favorite sport. Jayne O. Ifekwunigwe is Faculty at the Center on Genomics, Race, Identity, Difference (GRID) at Duke University, USA. She was formerly a Reader in Anthropology at the University of East London (UK). She received a Joint Ph.D. in Medical Anthropology from the University of

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Contributors

California, Berkeley/San Francisco. Her broad scholarly and teaching interests include global youth cultures; intersectional and transnational black feminist theories and sport; comparative and global ‘mixed race’ identities; the gendered and generational politics of global African diasporic formations; as well as visualizing cultural and heritage tourism in urban spaces. She has published and presented her work widely. Kevin Jefferys, formerly Professor in Contemporary History at Plymouth University, UK, is

the author of a dozen books including Anthony Crosland, Finest and Darkest Hours and Politics and the People. His work Sport and Politics in Modern Britain: The Road to 2012 was winner of the 2013 Lord Aberdare Literary Prize. In recent years he has published widely on aspects of sports history, including articles on British and world tennis in journals such as the International Journal of the History of Sport and Sport in History. His biography Fred Perry: British Tennis Legend was published in 2017. Haiyan Jia is Assistant Professor in the Department of Journalism and Communication at Lehigh University, USA. Jia earned her doctorate in mass communications at the Pennsylvania State University. Her primary research interest focuses on the psychological and social effects of communication technology, ranging from the Internet and social media to robots and the Internet of Things. Jia also investigates the social and collective aspects of privacy in an increasingly technology-rich world. Jia has published her work in Communication Research, Human-Computer Interaction and in prestigious conference proceedings in the fields of computer-mediated communication, human-computer interaction and data search. Alistair John is Lecturer in Sports Development in the College of Health and Life Sciences at

Brunel University London, UK. His principle research focuses on neoliberal ‘spaces’ of sport – examining the sportscape and how these sites reflect/reproduce neoliberal ideologies; including the urban entrepreneurial strategy of funding elite sports events/infrastructure. He has also explored corporate nationalism through sports advertising and the role of sport in the wellbeing of young people. Joyce Kay is Research Fellow in the School of Sport at Stirling University, UK; she also worked for several years at the Open University. She has a wide range of research interests in sport history, particularly in areas related to gender and social class. She has written on golf, tennis, football and equestrian sports and has had work published in the International Journal of the History of Sport, the International Review for the Sociology of Sport, Women’s History Review, and Sport in History. Katie Lebel is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Marketing in the Ted Rogers School of Management at Ryerson University in Toronto, Canada. Her research is focused in the area of sport marketing, with a particular interest in digital brand management and social media engagement strategies.This work has resulted in several publications, as well as consulting opportunities with both athletes and sport organizations across North America. Matthew P. Llewellyn is Associate Professor in the Department of Kinesiology at California

State University, Fullerton, USA. He has successfully published over 30 papers in refereed journals and is co-author of The Decline and Fall of Olympic Amateurism (University of Illinois Press, 2012). He is currently the co-director for the Center for Sociocultural Sport and Olympic Research.

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Contributors

Jessica Luther is a freelance Investigative Journalist and Writer whose work focuses on the intersection of sports and culture. She is author of Unsportsmanlike Conduct: College Football and the Politics of Rape (Akashic, 2016) and a featured columnist at Huffington Post. Her by-lines include Sports Illustrated, ESPN the Magazine, the New York Times, Teen Vogue, the Texas Observer, and Texas Monthly. Ron McCarville is Professor in the Department of Recreation and Leisure Studies at the

University of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. His research interests include marketing, management, consumer behavior, persuasion and customer service. He publishes in journals like the Journal of Park and Recreation Administration, Leisure Sciences and Managing Leisure: An International Journal. He is the author of the textbook Improving Leisure Services Through Marketing Action and is coeditor of the textbook Leisure for Canadians. Brent McDonald is Lecturer in the Sociology of Sport in the College of Sport and Exercise Science at Victoria University Melbourne Australia. His research is focused on sport and its potential for social change and involves a critical engagement with the intersecting themes of race and ethnicity, migration and multiculturalism. He is particularly interested in how sport in Australia acts to include and exclude and acts as a vehicle for a certain type of national identity. Mike Milford is Associate Professor in the School of Communication and Journalism at

Auburn University, USA. His research in rhetorical theory and criticism explores the ways in which popular culture, sports and politics share ideological messages, with particular interests in collective identity, wartime public address and national myths. Dr. Milford’s research has appeared in journals such as Rhetoric & Public Affairs, Mass Communication and Society, Rhetorica, Sport in History, Western Journal of Communication, Southern Communication Journal, Communication Quarterly, Communication Studies, Journal of Sports Media, Sport in Society and the International Journal of Sport Communication. Kristian Naglo is Lecturer in Sociology at Philipps at the University of Marburg, Germany. He has taught in Sociology and German Studies (Intercultural Communication Studies) at the Universities of Innsbruck (Austria), Lancaster, Leicester (both UK), Potchefstroom (South Africa) Göttingen, Siegen, and the German Sports University in Cologne (all Germany). His research and teaching interests encompass themes in the field of sociology of culture, language and sport, in combination with German studies and conceptions of multilingualism. Dino Numerato is Assistant Professor and Head of Department of Sociology at the Faculty

of Social Sciences, Charles University, Czech Republic. His research interests include football fandom, social theory, sport governance and policy, mass media and sport, corruption in sport and match-fixing and the sociology of health-care. He is the author of Football Fans, Activism and Social Change (2018, Routledge). His work has also been published in Sociology, Current Sociology, Qualitative Research, Journal of Consumer Culture, Sociology of Health and Illness, Journal of Sport and Social Issues and the International Review for the Sociology of Sport. Suvam Pal is an International Media Professional based in Beijing with the unique journalistic

experience of working in three BRICS countries, namely India, South Africa and China. He is currently working as an International News Editor with CGTN, a part of China’s national

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Contributors

broadcaster, China Central Television (CCTV). He has also written a slew of books on cricket and the Olympics and has also been the head of research for a 26-episode television series on the history of Indian cricket and a 13-episode series on future Indian Olympic & Paralympic medal prospects. He has also copyedited a book on grassroots football. Lindsay Parks Pieper is Associate Professor of Sport Management at the University of

Lynchburg, USA. Her research interests include gender and sport, sport law and women’s sport history. Her book, Sex Testing: Gender Policing in Women’s Sport (University of Illinois Press, 2016), explores the history of gender verification in the Olympics and was named the North American Society of Sport Sociology’s 2016 Outstanding Book. Robert G. Rodriguez is Associate Professor of Political Science and Coordinator of the Latin American & U.S. Latino Studies minor at Texas A&M University-Commerce, USA where he teaches courses on Politics and Sports. He earned a Ph.D. in political science from the University of Kansas in 2005 and is the author of The Regulation of Boxing: A History and Comparative Analysis of Policies Among American States. Dr. Rodriguez is of Argentine heritage and was a sports journalist before entering academia, mostly covering boxing and soccer. In August 1993, he reported on Gabriela Sabatini’s win over Tracy Austin at the Virginia Slims tournament. Suzanne Rowland is a Ph.D. candidate based in the School of Humanities at the University of

Brighton, UK where she also lectures in Design History. Her thesis is titled: ‘The role of design, technology and business networks in the rise of the fashionable, lightweight, ready-made blouse in Britain, 1909–1919’. This interdisciplinary project aims to investigate the development of the lightweight ready-made fashion industry through its first successful commodity, the blouse. She is the author of Making Vintage 1920s Costumes for Women (2017) and Making Edwardian Costumes for Women (2016) for The Crowood Press. Jeffrey O. Segrave is Professor of Health and Human Physiological Sciences at Skidmore

College, Saratoga Springs, USA. He was awarded the David H. Porter Endowed Chair in 2015. His main area of scholarly interest lies in the socio-cultural analysis of sport; hence, he embraces an interdisciplinary approach that seeks to study sport at the intersections of history, sociology, philosophy and literature. He has published three anthologies, 16 book chapters and more than 60 articles in a wide variety of scholarly journals. Barry Smart is Professor of Sociology at the University of Portsmouth, UK, and has worked at universities in Australia, England, Japan and New Zealand. Publications include Foucault, Marxism and Critique (Routledge, 1983: republished 2009); Michel Foucault, Key Sociologists series (Ellis Horwood 1985: revised edition Routledge, 2002); Facing Modernity: Ambivalence, Reflexivity and Morality (Sage 1999); Resisting McDonaldization (Sage, 1999); Economy, Culture and Society: A Sociological Critique of Neo-Liberalism (Open University Press, 2003); The Sport Star: Modern Sport and the Cultural Economy of Sporting Celebrity (Sage, 2005); and Consumer Society: Critical Issues and Environmental Consequences (Sage, 2010). Ann Sumner is an art historian, curator and museum manager. She is a former Head of Fine Art

at the National Museum of Wales in Cardiff, UK, and Director of the Barber Institute of Fine Arts at the University of Birmingham, UK, where she was Professor of Fine Art and Curatorial Practice and Head of Cultural Engagement at the University of Leeds, UK. She curated the

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Contributors

exhibition Court on Canvas: Tennis in Art at the Barber in 2011 and is currently Historic Collections Adviser at Harewood Trust. She is Chair of the Methodist Collection of Modern Art and a Fellow of Aberystwyth University. Arnošt Svoboda is Assistant Professor at the Department of Social Sciences in Kinanthropology,

Faculty of Physical Culture, Palacký University Olomouc, Czech Republic. He teaches courses in general sociology, sociology of leisure and sociology of sport together with the methodology of social research. His current research focuses on relations and differences between mainstream and lifestyle sports and sporting subcultures. Alexis Tadie is Professor of English Literature at Sorbonne Université, France. He specialises in eighteenth-century literature as well as in the cultures of sport. He is the author of monographs on Sterne, on Locke and on Bacon. He has edited numerous volumes, including Sport, Literature, and Society: Cultural Historical Perspectives with J.A. Mangan and Supriya Chaudhuri (Routledge, 2014), and Sporting Cultures 1650–1850 with Daniel O’Quinn (Toronto, 2018). Nathan Titman holds a Ph.D. in American Studies from the University of Iowa, USA spe-

cializing in the history of sexuality, queer theory and American cultural history. His previous article on Bill Tilden, ‘Taking Punishment Gladly: Bill Tilden’s Performances of the Unruly Male Body’, appeared in the Journal of Sport History in 2014. He is currently a Visiting Assistant Professor of American Studies at Macalester College. Kristi Tredway is a feminist Cultural Theorist of Sport whose work centers on intersectionality, social activism and women’s professional sports, especially women’s tennis. Her book, Social Activism in Women’s Tennis: Generations of Politics and Cultural Change, will be published by Routledge. She is currently a Visiting Assistant Professor at St. Mary’s College of Maryland where she has taught in the Women, Gender, & Sexuality Studies Program, the African and African Diaspora Studies Program, the DeSousa-Brent Scholars Program and the CORE Curriculum. Janine van Someren was awarded her Ph.D. by the University of Southampton, UK, in 2011. Her research focused on amateur women’s tennis at Wimbledon, via an analysis of oral testimonies, published biographies and archival and media sources.The research shed light on a range of issues, including the impact of family and gender role expectations on the women’s amateur circuit. John Vincent is Professor and Coordinator of the Graduate Sport Management Program in the Kinesiology Department at The University of Alabama, USA. His main research line focuses on how newspaper narratives portray elite athletes competing in major international sporting events, particularly in relation to their gender, race and national identity. Stephen Wagg has been Professor in the Carnegie School of Sport at Leeds Beckett University in the UK since 2008. He writes regularly on the politics of sport, of leisure, of childhood and of comedy. His recent books include An Introduction to Leisure Studies: Principles and Practice (written with Peter Bramham, Sage, 2014), The London Olympics of 2012: Politics, Promises and Legacy (Palgrave, 2015), Sport, Protest and Globalisation (edited with Jon Dart, Palgrave, 2016) and Cricket: A Political History of the Global Game 1945–2017 (Routledge, 2018).

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Contributors

Elizabeth Wilson is an Independent Scholar who formerly taught at London Metropolitan University, Goldsmiths College, Stanford University and the University of the Arts London. She is currently a school governor and was a trustee of the London Library from 2012–16. Her publications include: Fashion and Modernity (1985, 2003), The Sphinx in the City: Urban Life, the Control of Disorder and Women (1993), Bohemians:The Glamorous Outcasts (2000) and Love Game: A Cultural History of Tennis from Victorian Pastime to Global Phenomenon (2014). She has also written the period crime novels: The Twilight Hour (2006), War Damage (2009), The Girl in Berlin (2011) and She Died Young (2015). Chun Yang is Assistant Professor in the Manship School of Mass Communication at Louisiana

State University, USA. His research focuses on the emotional and cognitive impact of media messages.

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Acknowledgements

Robert J. Lake and Carol A. Osborne would like to acknowledge the diligent work and effort put into the early stages of this project, particularly in its conception, by Stephen Wagg, from Leeds Beckett University.

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1 Introduction to the history and historiography of tennis Robert J. Lake

Few sports have undergone the marked developments that have characterized tennis over the past century and a half. While a handful of the world’s most popular team and individual sports have experienced comparable international growth and the commercialization and professionalization of their players, competitions and governing associations, few have seen also such marked changes to how and by whom the game is played, in the technologies, tactics and playing styles employed, and in the broad and various demographics of participating players. In this regard, contemporary 21st century tennis, while not entirely unrecognizable from its earlier antecedents, has nevertheless undergone a remarkable and extensive transformation. Adopting a broad perspective incorporating various methodologies and different theoretical and subject lenses, this edited collection aims to examine and comprehensively cover key aspects of the developing history of tennis, focusing in particular on the many connections with wider societal culture and politics. This present introductory chapter aims to provide a brief overview of key developments in the sport’s history, effectively laying the foundations for the more nuanced and detailed analyses provided in the chapters that follow. It also provides a brief discussion of the sport’s developing historiography, thereby locating this present edited collection within the expanding field of tennis research.

From garden game to global sport: a brief history of tennis Throughout the sport’s historical development, from when it emerged as a genteel garden-party pastime exclusive to the English upper and upper-middle classes in the early 1870s until now, in its highly professionalized, commercialized and internationalized form, important aspects of its culture have undergone rampant change. This has helped shift it from an exclusive, niche pastime to a popular, mainstream sport played in almost every corner of the world, and by all genders, classes and races. Of course, historically inveterate ideologies related to gender, class and race remain entrenched in the sport, continuing to color much of how and by whom the sport is played, watched, reported and assessed. This makes the sport’s history highly nuanced, blending old traditions and deep-rooted ideologies with new value systems and contemporary social movements. The sport’s initial exclusivity partly stemmed from the fact of its connections to earlier racket games, particularly Real Tennis, which was played extensively among the European nobility and 1

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royalty at its heyday in the 16th century (Gillmeister 1997; Lake 2009).1 In Britain, numerous versions of what came to be known as “lawn tennis” were created and tested by members of the landed gentry throughout the 18th and 19th centuries in their attempts, amidst the burgeoning rational recreation movement, to recreate “tennis” in an outdoor setting (Lake 2015; Walker 1989). Available records suggest that almost all were short-lived – possibly because play was not particularly dynamic and the short rallies tiresome – and so it took the new mid-19th-century inventions of vulcanized rubber, the lawn mower and the garden roller to ensure more consistent and good bounces on grass, and therefore longer rallies and more interesting play between players (Todd 1979). When Major Harry Gem and J.B. Perera in 1859 and Major Walter Clopton Wingfield in 1873 first played their own versions of lawn tennis, in Edgbaston and Nantclwyd respectively, exclusivity or at least respectability remained an important concern. While Gem publicly protested against Wingfield’s claims to have invented lawn tennis (see The Field 21 November 1874), as he claimed that he and his Spanish friend Perera had been playing their own version of the game over a decade earlier and had formed the world’s first lawn tennis club in Leamington Spa, they did not make attempts to extend its popularity beyond their small group of playing acquaintances (Holland 2011). Wingfield did, however, though his advertisements in The Field and Vanity Fair suggest that he was pitching it as a form of conspicuous consumption, to wealthy ladies and gentlemen players with a suitably sized patch of land upon which to lay their own court, and not, presumably, to the masses.That as a rule all players should be amateurs was widely assumed and, at this stage, unsaid. While lawn tennis most closely resembled Real Tennis when it was first played, it is certainly the case that the new sport borrowed important structural and social aspects from numerous games preceding it, including also rackets, badminton, croquet and cricket. From Real Tennis was lent the sport’s exclusive clientele, the scoring system (15, 30, 40, game; six games to win a set) and the initial rackets, with long handles and bent heads; from rackets was lent an alternative scoring system (games up to 15 points) that Wingfield recommended before the Real Tennis method became standard, alongside some of the sport’s first players; from badminton was lent the high drooping net, which was lowered in 1882 to its standard 3.5 foot at the sides and 3 foot in the center;2 from croquet was lent the sport’s social (garden-party) settings, smooth manicured lawns and mixed-sex play; and from cricket was lent the all-whites clothing and club aspects (Alexander 1986). Interestingly, as golf emerged in Scotland and rapidly spread southward into England and beyond the British Isles, the two sports came to share more social aspects and, particularly in the US, both enjoyed popular presence within the country clubs springing up throughout the late 19th and early 20th centuries (Baltzell 1996; Rader 1999). Early play remained conditioned by prevailing norms in relation to social class and gender, as etiquette demanded restrained play and sportsmanship and in the case of men playing with/ against women, also chivalry (Lake 2011; 2012). In time, playing styles became more dynamic as the edifice of amateurism slowly crumbled amidst the increasing competitiveness of players across all levels of competition. The social enterprise of earlier lawn tennis gatherings, especially in garden-parties, was soon replicated in exclusive, members-only clubs, which had the same purpose: to provide opportunities to spatially separate from the masses and mingle only with status equals. The mixed-gender component of the sport – a fairly staple feature in many settings from early on – also offered opportunities for romance, alongside more formalized efforts of parents to marry off sons and daughters with suitable partners from families of comparable social status (McCrone 1988). The club aspects of British lawn tennis were replicated internationally and with impressive consistency. Spa towns and seaside resorts throughout Europe, especially in Germany, the 2

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Netherlands and Italy, became popular tennis destinations for the British stationed or travelling abroad, and in particular the French Riviera rapidly became the most fashionable location for lawn tennis play among wealthy British tourists, including the famous Renshaw brothers who made Cannes their winter training hub (Little 2014). The sport soon became a favourite for European elites, including, among others, the eminent King Gustav of Sweden, who constructed tennis courts and, as early patrons, hosted tournaments to satisfy increasing demand. When the sport initially arrived in the US some months after Wingfield’s first boxed sets for Sphairistike went on sale – though debate remains as to exactly where and when lawn tennis was first played across the Atlantic (see Alexander 1974; Baltzell 1996; Gillmeister 1997) – the exclusive following remained as the game was adopted among the affluent, Eastern-seaboard elites and made its way into Harvard among other Ivy-League universities. The sport had evidently remained a form of conspicuous consumption, and America’s private country clubs served similar function to their British equivalents, but often dwarfed them in size and opulence (Baltzell 1996). That early US National Championship matches were played at the opulent Casino in Newport, RI hints at the socio-economic status of the clientele who immersed themselves in lawn tennis culture. In Australia and New Zealand, despite the rhetoric of more democratic, free and less status-hierarchical societies, tennis clubs here also retained their social exclusivity and staunchly middle-class following (Falcous & McLeod 2012; Kinross-Smith 1987; O’Farrell 1985). The effects of European colonization in particular helped spread the game rapidly throughout the world, as it became, much like cricket, a force for globalization. Lawn tennis established itself comfortably in many of Britain’s overseas territories and dominions, but, unlike cricket, it often initially failed to galvanize the local indigenous populations so that it remained for some time a preserve of the white upper-middle classes. In fact, many new lawn tennis courts were laid in cricket clubs in South America and the West Indies (Reay 1951). Similarly, in India and South Africa, lawn tennis clubs were locations for white settlers to separate themselves from the locals, though in time the indigenous populations began forming clubs and holding tournaments of their own (Odendaal 2003; Pal 2004). By the end of the 19th century, lawn tennis clubs, tournaments and associations had become established in six continents, but the tennis nations that were considered to wield the most power in international governance and host the most prestigious tournaments, namely Great Britain and the US, continued to set the tone for how the sport developed throughout the rest of the world. Their players and officials helped to characterize where, by whom and how the sport should be played, and largely determined the social character of clubs and tournaments. The gradual development of inter-club play began as friendly social occasions rather than competitive affairs, and clubs proved just as enthusiastic about outdoing their neighbours in the opulence of their facilities and surroundings, and in attracting the highest-status patrons and members, as they were about actually winning (Lake 2015). The growth of local and national tournaments in Britain and elsewhere facilitated changes to the prevailing norms of how players should approach the game. This had a trickle-down effect, as elite-level players like brothers Reggie and Laurie Doherty from England and then later Norman Brookes and Tony Wilding from Australia and New Zealand respectively set the standards of more competitive play, while still retaining their flawless “gentleman amateur” personas. The rising status and international media coverage of Wimbledon and the US National Championships, along with the emergence of the Davis Cup competition, in which American players immediately set out with a more ruthless will-to-win mentality, brought international players increasingly into the spotlight in the early 20th century (Eaves & Lake 2017). As international sporting competitions took on heightened, quasi-political relevance after the Great War, due in part to rising nationalist sentiments attached to sporting competitions 3

Robert J. Lake

generally, the number of overseas competitors at Wimbledon, particularly in the men’s draw, and the number of nations entering the Davis Cup increased rapidly (Smart 2007). In the last Wimbledon Championships before the Great War, in 1914, 102 players from eight different nations (88 from Britain) entered the men’s draw and 51 from just three nations (47 from Britain) in the women’s, but growth and expansion throughout the inter-war period saw a huge rise in the number of players from overseas. Thus, by 1939, 128 men from 24 different nations (56 from Britain) and 96 women from 15 nations (68 from Britain) competed in the Singles Championships. The largest number of nations to compete in the Davis Cup before the war was eight in 1913, but in the 1920s the number grew steadily from six at the start of the decade to 29 at the end. Indeed, before the inaugural football World Cup in 1930, tennis was arguably the most international of sports, and the Davis Cup was competed for by more nations than any other sporting event, outside of the Olympic Games (Smart 2007). Indeed, as Lake and Llewellyn (2015) have argued, one of the key reasons the International Lawn Tennis Federation (ILTF) were unwilling to compromise with the International Olympic Committee on matters related to the inclusion of tennis in the Olympics, which ceased after the 1924 Games, was because tennis had the Davis Cup and was in such a healthy state generally that it did not need the Olympics as a key platform to showcase its star players. By the end of the 1930s, the Davis Cup in particular took on greater political significance, adjudged perhaps most famously by Adolf Hitler’s attempts to use the possibility of German success against the US in the 1937 Inter-zone final for political expedience (Fisher 2009). The inter-war period also witnessed the marked encroachment of national cultures upon the sport. In the 1920s, French cultural representations, in particular, expressed through fashion and the joie de vivre exuded by many of their players – notably Suzanne Lenglen, the sport’s first true global superstar, and the “Four Musketeers”: Jean Borotra, Rene Lacoste, Henri Cochet and Jacques Brugnon – influenced tennis culture in profound ways. Artistic representations proliferated as aspects of the sport stretched into other areas of social life in many nations (Holland 2011). The quasi-political stand-off between Bill Tilden and the US Lawn Tennis Association (USLTA) over his alleged journalistic endeavours made front-page news (Carvalho 2009), and when the US was due to compete against France in Paris in the 1928 Davis Cup final with a threat of a Tilden ban hanging over their heads, political ambassadors and even, possibly, the US President Calvin Coolidge intervened to smooth out the kinks of international diplomacy (Deford 2004). By this stage, the sport had its first true professionals, as Lenglen and the American numberone-ranked male player Vincent Richards, alongside a handful of lesser-known American and French players, signed contracts with promoter C.C. Pyle to tour major cities in the US and Canada in late 1926. Before this momentous move, many of the most sought-after amateur players lived fairly comfortably off their tennis talents; they asked for and duly received firstclass travel and accommodations and claimed inflated “expenses” from tournament organizers who were desperate to fill their stands, but this was all done “under the table” (Jefferys 2009; Wilson 2014). Lenglen kick-started a trend of the top amateur players – as typically judged by Wimbledon or US National Championship success – leaving the high-status but less lucrative amateur circuit to cash in on their talents for a few years of professional touring. Alongside Tilden in the 1930s were Henri Cochet, Fred Perry and Don Budge, all of whom made their mark as amateurs before deciding to forgo the associated perks and prestige. So began a trend that, except for a brief period during the Second World War, would not cease until the late 1960s, when tennis officials internationally were forced to adapt and come to terms with the shifting realities of tennis players. No longer were players drawn exclusively from the wealthy upper-middle class, who approached tennis as a carefree pastime and could, therefore, support 4

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themselves. Players were increasingly drawn from lower down the social scale; they approached tennis as a full-time vocation and sought fair reimbursement for their efforts, especially given that they were attracting fee-paying spectators in their thousands to tournaments internationally (Baltzell 1996; Jefferys 2009). The commercialization of tennis continued after the Second World War, and by the late 1940s the “sham-amateur” or “shamateur” player collecting “under-the-table” appearance fees became an increasingly normalized, and even rationalized, figure within elite-level tennis (Jefferys 2009; Lake 2015). Also expanding were opportunities for the top amateurs to sign professional contracts. Most were from the US and Australia. The American player Jack Kramer, winner of six doubles and three singles championships, including Wimbledon in 1947 and the US National Championships in 1946 and 1947, followed his compatriots Don Budge and Bobby Riggs and left amateur tennis to pursue a professional career. By 1951, he had taken charge of the main professional circuit and begun recruiting heavily from the amateur ranks, often signing new talent before they had reached their playing peaks. This pitched Kramer’s pro tour diametrically against the main amateur circuit, which led Kramer to be regarded as an antagonist and threat to amateur tennis (Kramer 1979). Indeed, a Wimbledon or US Nationals championship remained the ticket to a professional contract, and the majority of male players, and a handful of female players, achieving this objective left the amateur circuit shortly thereafter. Between 1946 and 1967, ten of the 15 world-number-one male players signed professional contracts. In time, the repeated defection of top talent diluted the amateur pool and, inevitably, lowered the relative competitive standards of the leading amateur tournaments, including the four “grand slams” and the Davis Cup, which turned these tournaments into, essentially, qualifying competitions for the pro tour (Lake 2015). This was undoubtedly one of the main reasons why the Wimbledon Championships committee began to press for open tennis from the early 1960s, as a way of ensuring their tournament remained not only the most prestigious but also inclusive of the world’s best players. In the two decades prior to the eventual turn toward open tennis in 1968, the key sites on the men’s professional tour, mostly ramshackle indoor arenas in American cities, became the prime location to witness the world’s best male players. There was often stern resistance to professional tennis among amateur associations and their affiliated clubs. In Britain, upon joining the pro tour, former amateur champions typically lost all perks associated with the clubs and tournaments where they previously were successful, including honorary memberships, and in many places they became, in effect, personae non gratae (Jefferys 2009). At the request of the Lawn Tennis Association (LTA), many amateur clubs declined to host professional tour events, despite the potentially lucrative payouts from gate receipts and sponsorship. Even more dogmatic were the Lawn Tennis Association of Australia (LTAA), which issued various bans on professional players, including a rule that forbade their affiliated clubs from allowing professionals to play within them (Fewster 1985). Mainstream media and the dominant tennis press at the time typically ignored their performances, as Kramer (1979, p.53) reflected: ‘Pro tournaments were never part of the records. … We played and we kept score, but somehow it wasn’t considered worth remembering’. According to the dominant narratives produced by those who played in it, the pro tour system itself was a physically exacting test of mental strength and stamina. Kramer (1979, p.192) spoke of the exhausting and repetitive match schedule, the tiresome travelling and incessant pressures to fill arenas and avoid getting ripped off by local promoters. Such was the fragility of his own mental health that, toward the end of his 123-match tour with Pancho Gonzales in 1949–50, he ‘cracked’ during a match, started ‘belting balls over the fence’ and repeatedly screamed, ‘I’m losing my mind!’. The Australian sensation Lew Hoad (1959) also wrote of how the repetitive 5

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grind had made him a ‘worried, hurt, moody figure, entirely lacking in confidence’. At times, when balancing multiple responsibilities – to endorse products, promote the tour, write articles for the press and conduct radio and television interviews – the uncomplicated amateur circuit must have seemed a far cry from his new life on the road. Spurred by the prospects of riches, nevertheless, numerous other Australians were to follow in his footsteps, in what became a long production line of amateur champions. After decades of development in a system seemingly more egalitarian and inclusive than in Britain, or even America, Australian tennis realized its destiny in the 1950s and 1960s as the top-ranked tennis nation. In every Davis Cup competition staged between 1938 and 1968, Australia reached the final and, from 1950 to 1967, won it 15 times from 18 attempts. In the four major national championships from 1946 to 1969, Australian men and women posted a phenomenal record of winning 85 of the total 192 singles events contested; this represents an Australian victory in over 44% of all major championships during this time. Margaret Court, winner of 24 major titles during her career, remains, as of early 2019, the most successful player in history of either sex – if not also one of the most controversial, given her newly adopted role as an outspoken anti-gay-rights campaigner – but given the nationalist sentiments expressed through the Davis Cup, it was Australian male players who generated the greatest public interest. When teenaged Davis Cup newcomers Lew Hoad and Ken Rosewall defeated the experienced Americans in 1953, for example, Fewster (1985, p.52) reported: ‘the Kooyong crowd erupted, throwing thousands of seat cushions into the air in a most un-Australian display of emotion’. Not only were Davis Cup matches typically ‘played in a strongly nationalistic climate, with national flags, uniforms, anthems and civic receptions’, but ‘success in the Davis Cup was taken by many Australians as representative of much more than a mere sporting achievement.The victories seemed to symbolize Australia’s recent shift away from Britain and outward to the world in general’ (Fewster 1985, p.62).Therefore, alongside cricket, naturally, and the 1956 Melbourne Olympics in which the Australians achieved an impressive medal haul, Davis Cup tennis during this period was a key political platform to satisfy Australia’s desire for international recognition and social, cultural and political independence from their colonial masters. As the spotlight was shone on Australian sporting practices and coaching methods, explanations proliferated among players and officials for their remarkable success, which ranged from their favourable climate and relatively low casualty numbers in the war, to the general standard of their facilities and more flexible amateur rules (Fewster 1985; Kramer 1979). Success seemed to breed success for the LTAA, as playing in the Davis Cup Challenge Round constituted a ‘financial bonanza’ with profits soaring to over £30,000 in the late 1950s (Fewster 1985, p.55), which allowed them to send their most promising players on international tours to America and Europe, and pay generous expenses for a full-time coach, Harry Hopman. Aside from the indomitable Margaret Court and the majestic and graceful Brazilian Maria Bueno, a swathe of American women dominated the game during the 1950s and 1960s, achieving great success at Wimbledon and the US and French National Championships.3 The Wightman Cup, inaugurated in 1923 to pitch the best British and American female players against each other in an annual seven-match team competition, highlighted the two nations’ relative ranks fairly accurately. In the 17 competitions held during the inter-war period, the British won four. However, from 1946 the Americans did not lose a single cup over the next twelve years, winning seven of them by a clean-sweep. American women also dominated at Wimbledon, winning the first thirteen successive post-war singles championships. Severely hampered by the effects of war, it is certain the British were unable to divert or generate the resources necessary to develop talent at a comparable pace, but once the government’s austerity measures had been entirely dropped in the early 1950s and British economic growth recovered, it was clear that broader 6

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societal issues were only part of the problem; central was the fact that the LTA, and many of the clubs and schools affiliated to it, seemed unwilling to shed their amateur emphasis and commit wholeheartedly to the pursuit of developing talent (Lake 2016a). This had long-lasting consequences deep into the 20th century, if not beyond. Despite their apparent backward and conservative approach to developing talent during the post-war period, leading British administrators – within both the LTA and All England Lawn Tennis Club (AELTC) – showed themselves to be remarkably progressive when they led the global movement toward open tennis in the 1960s. Pressed by the need to reverse the decline of their own Championships and regain administrative control over the sport, officials from the LTA and AELTC campaigned internationally throughout the 1960s to remove the amateur/professional distinction and hold “open” tournaments (Lake 2015). After several failed attempts to gain the necessary two-thirds majority needed in ILTF meetings to alter the rules, the AELTC risked expulsion from the ILTF and decided to hold an “open”Wimbledon in 1968 without official backing; they were supported by their own LTA, alongside the USLTA and other national associations, and many of the world’s top players.Their efforts were buoyed by the growing profits accrued through television broadcasting, upon which they were to increasingly rely, and the public’s apparent acceptance of professionalism in tennis, which was demonstrated the previous year when the British Broadcasting Corporation sponsored an end-of-season professional tournament at Wimbledon, featuring Rod Laver, alongside Hoad, Rosewall and Gonzales, which showcased a higher-quality standard of play than that seen at Wimbledon a few weeks earlier and drew large and receptive crowds (Barrett 1986). Despite the risk of becoming ostracized from the international tennis community, an emergency meeting just three months before the Championships in 1968 finally gave official sanction to the Wimbledon committee, thus ushering in what became known as “open tennis”. The first few years of the “open era” were tumultuous. In 1970, leading female players brought the politics of gender into tennis by boycotting ILTF/USLTA tournaments, because of the comparatively paltry share of prize-winnings directed toward the women. They established their own separate tournament circuit, led by Billie Jean King’s efforts to recruit corporate backing from Gladys Heldman (editor of World Tennis magazine) and Joseph Cullman (from Philip Morris tobacco) to create the Virginia Slims tour. By 1974, they had grown to such an extent that the ILTF was forced into a merger that precipitated the marked increase in prize-money for women (equal at the US Open from 1973 onwards) and the emergence of the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) to act as a player’s union (Spencer 1997). The men’s game was progressing through an equally turbulent period. Arguably, the ILTF’s sanctioning of open tennis did not go far enough in removing the amateur-professional distinction, which allowed professional tour operators to retain control over their contracted players and demand appearance fees for their participation in amateur tournaments (Evans 1993). This led to several boycotts of the major championships in the early 1970s, and the creation of the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) as a player’s union. The ATP was immediately called into action when, in 1973, the Yugoslav player Nikki Pilic was ordered by his national association to play in a Davis Cup match despite him being contractually obliged to compete in another tournament. Pilic was suspended by the ILTF due to his absence from the Davis Cup. Matters came to a head when the ILTF refused to drop its ban on Pilic competing at Wimbledon, and so the ATP ordered a mass walk-out. In all, 79 male players declined to participate in the 1973 Championships (including 13 of the top 16 seeds), and the ATP survived its first major political power struggle against an increasingly undermined ILTF. The 1970s also brought racial politics to the forefront of attention with the efforts of Arthur Ashe – 1968 US Open champion and 1975 Wimbledon champion – who worked to shed 7

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a spotlight on South Africa’s apartheid regime (Hall 2014). Despite him suffering what he described as “the black man’s burden” – essentially, being expected to represent all AfricanAmericans and use his privileged status as a public figure to campaign for social justice – he nevertheless worked tirelessly to raise awareness of racial issues in sport and wider society (Thomas 2010). Certainly, the performances of black tennis players in the US had a long history, but players were undermined by overt racial discrimination and the fact their tournaments and successes were not reported by the mainstream (i.e. white-owned and controlled) press. Since the early 1890s, tennis had been played in historically black colleges and universities in the US, but African-Americans were excluded from obtaining membership in many white clubs and competing in amateur tournaments sanctioned by the USNLTA. It was not until 1916 that black leaders therein helped form the American Tennis Association, which had as its remit to promote the sport among African-Americans through tournaments and increased media exposure (Harris & Kyle-DeBose 2007). Despite marked growth in participation numbers and tournaments, however, it was not until Althea Gibson showed potential to defeat the best white players were she and others of her color afforded opportunities to compete at the US Open, alongside Wimbledon and other ILTF/USLTA-sanctioned tournaments. Inevitably, it took Alice Marble, four-time US Nationals champion in the late 1930s/early 1940s, among other white players and officials, to collectively utilize their white privilege by publicly supporting Gibson’s inclusion and sway the USLTA on the matter. These pioneers, to which you can also add the Australian aborigine Evonne Goolagong and Frenchman Yannick Noah, blazed the trail for the likes of Venus and Serena Williams, James Blake, Gael Monfils and Jo Wilfrid Tsonga from the turn of the 21st century. In the US, as of early 2019, black players now occupy a position at the forefront of women’s tennis. Indeed, in the 2017 US Open, three of the four semi-finalists (and both finalists) were of African-American descent, none of whom had the first name Serena. By the late 1970s, the image of a millionaire superstar tennis player had become an accepted thing, as endorsements for the top players not only supplemented their prize-money but became their chief form of income. This has been the case for the top male and female players, but the greater publicity and media attention that women’s tennis enjoyed from the 1970s onwards, alongside their successes in achieving guarantees for equal prize money at the major championships, did not necessarily align female players equally with their male counterparts across all aspects of tennis. Into the 21st century, the most lucrative product endorsement deals remain the preserve of the female players most able to match their on-court successes with “traditional” (i.e. white, heterosexual) ideals of femininity in tennis, which has also, over time, become increasingly hyper-sexualized (Schultz 2014). Anna Kournikova and Maria Sharapova are the two most obvious examples, but only the latter matched her success in obtaining endorsements off the court with tournament wins on the court. As an aside, their successes are also indicative of the ascendancy of female players from former Eastern-Bloc nations, especially the Soviet Union/ Russia and Czechoslovakia/Czech Republic. The production-line of talent developing out of Eastern Europe has been enhanced by the willingness of many owners of tennis academies in the US, such as the IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida (formerly owned and operated by Nick Bollettieri), to house and develop these players. Other than the ways in which both male and female players are represented in the media, advances in the strength, stamina and agility shown by players, the speed of play itself and changes in the dominant playing styles, are possibly the most glaring visual differences between early and modern versions of tennis. Alongside developments in talent identification, coaching and training that have had the cumulative effect of increasing the average size (height and weight) of the top male and female players, racket technology has also advanced to such an extent that new tactics and styles of play have evolved as players have learned to hit the ball 8

History and historiography of tennis

harder, more cleanly and with more top-spin, and to utilize an increasing variety of strokes and shots to deceive or overpower their opponents. The standards and precision applied to the perfection of balls and court surfaces have also become reduced to matters of science, and hawk-eye and other forms of 21st-century on-court technology allow play to be measured and calculated to the greatest extent (Wilson 2014).Yet despite these advances and the encroachment of science into the sport, the aesthetic of human movement has remained integral to spectator enjoyment of the game.Though such views are highly subjective, it has been argued that players like Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal are as enchanting to watch as those of the inter-war “Golden Age” (Wilson 2014), and the rivalries of top female players like Serena Williams, Maria Sharapova and Angelique Kerber arguably come close to matching the excitement of the classic matchups involving Suzanne Lenglen after the Great War.

From ace to academia: a brief historiography of tennis Just as tennis has developed and grown, so too has its recognition and appeal as a subject of academic interest and value. Scholars internationally have come to appreciate the sport as an interesting site to examine wider society and the politics of identity in areas such as gender, social class, race and nationalism. Given the marked developments witnessed within the sport, scholars have also recognized its value as a subject to examine shifts in the amateur/professional status and ethos of its players and officials, alongside its globalization, commercialization, commodification and politicization that have collectively altered much of how tennis is played, watched, organized, funded and reported. Such marked changes have also brought interesting developments in terms of how the sport is represented in the arts and media, and few sports have enjoyed as much attention, collectively, in literature, poetry and artwork. This is particularly so in England where the sport occupies a unique and deep, historically-rooted cultural position. This book is an edited collection of chapters authored by many of the leading, contemporary scholarly writers on tennis in the social sciences. The breadth of contributing authors comprehensively represents the scope of how the sport has developed in these ways, though it is imperative to note that tennis has historically not enjoyed the immense and long-standing popularity as a scholarly subject compared to the team sports of soccer, baseball, cricket, rugby, American football, ice hockey and basketball, which have tended to occupy hegemonic positions as far as scholarly writing on “Western” sport cultures is concerned.This is possibly due to the inveterate cultural position that these team sports occupy in our modern societies, due in no small part to the processes of colonization, globalization and Americanization that, have over the last two centuries helped spread these North American/European cultural representations internationally, to the exclusion of other, perhaps more regionalized sport forms. The rampant and unremitting commercialization, professionalization, politicization and mediatization of these well-known team sports has brought them into popular consciousness in ways that more locally organized and niche sports have been unable to do. As individual sports go, however – and tennis is principally an individual sport except when played in the Olympics and Davis Cup/Fed Cup (even doubles players are ranked as individuals) – tennis now compares well as a scholarly subject against other leading, predominantly individual sports such as golf, track-and-field/athletics, skiing, martial arts/combat sports, swimming and gymnastics. Part of the reason for this is that, like golf but unlike many other individual sports, the key foci for competition – and also, therefore, media attention – are its four annual major (grand slam) events and annual team competitions (Davis/Fed Cup, and Ryder Cup for golf); this is instead of relying on the quadrennial Olympic Games as its principal showcase, 9

Robert J. Lake

which is not only less frequent but also saturated by coverage from dozens of other sports competing for attention. The international spread of tennis is further boosted, when compared to golf in particular, by the fact that each of the four majors is played in a different country (Wimbledon, French Open, US Open, Australian Open), rather than three of the four played in the US (USPGA Tour, Masters, US Open) as in golf, and its highest profile and revenue-generating international men’s team competition limited to players from just the US and Europe, as is the Ryder Cup. Moreover, what tennis offers above all other individual and, indeed, team sports, is the (near) equal representation of women in the upper echelons of wealth/income-generation, international fame and recognizability. Tennis sits proudly and inarguably atop the list of global, professionalized sports offering the smallest gap between male and female players in terms of salary/ prize money and media attention, and it has done since the early 1970s, if not the inter-war period when Suzanne Lenglen and Helen Wills achieved comparable, indeed if not even greater, fame than Bill Tilden and Fred Perry. In the 2010s, Serena Williams and Maria Sharapova enjoy comparable recognizability and wealth as Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal, much as Steffi Graf compared to the equally dominant Pete Sampras in the 1990s, and Billie Jean King, Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova compared to Arthur Ashe, Jimmy Connors and John McEnroe in the 1970s and 1980s. Tennis was brought further into the limelight as a consequence of its role, and that of its star players like Billie Jean King, in the broader second-wave feminist movement. This coincided with the “tennis boom” of the 1960s and 1970s that witnessed the escalating popularity of the sport, as clubs and school/university campuses constructed courts and held tournaments as an outcome of its democratization. These combined elements helped develop tennis into arguably the highest profile, most comprehensively international, and most genderequitable individual sport – i.e. rather than team sport – in the 21st century. These facts alone can account to a great extent for the growing attention paid to the sport by writers and journalists over the last forty or so years, as the 1970s and 80s witnessed a marked increase in the number of tennis-related books, including coaching guides, biographies/autobiographies and first-person journalist narratives being published (Lake 2016b). However, the historiography of tennis has revealed that a similar boom in scholarly writing on tennis has not followed the same path or trajectory. Alternatively, it could be said that the scholarly boom has occurred but is 20–30 years behind the participation boom, which perhaps is accounted for by the fact that historians do not tend to touch events until they have lost some of their immediacy. Aside from a spattering of scholarly books and journal articles from a small handful of writers, it is only since the mid/late 2000s that the sport has enjoyed increasing popularity as a subject matter of serious scholarly interest across the social sciences. Indeed, one aim of this book is to highlight the breadth of different types of scholars – those in the subjects of history, sociology, media studies & communications, leisure studies, sport management, philosophy, economics & business, politics, and gender studies – who have made important contributions to the subject matter in the last decade, as many of them are featured as authors/contributors in this book. That we are currently witnessing a “boom” in scholarly works in tennis within the social sciences is supported by statistical evidence. Taking into account the fact that the number of English language scholarly journals – and therefore also the number of journal articles being published – in the social sciences of sport has at least doubled since 2000, a very rough calculation of articles in the twenty of the most relevant scholarly journals in the areas of sport sociology, sport history, sport philosophy, sport media/communications, leisure studies, sport management, and sport and politics that mentioned the word “tennis” in their titles or abstracts has still shown a remarkable increase. Grouped by decade, the 1960s saw not a single article on tennis, but there were three published in the 1970s, 13 in the 1980s, and 14 in the 1990s. 10

History and historiography of tennis

Thirty-seven peer-reviewed journal articles mentioning tennis in their titles/abstracts were published across the top twenty journals in these fields in the 2000s, and in the 2010s, as of December 2018, an impressive 89 articles have so far been published. This marked growth in the scholarly interest in tennis can be observed in Table 1.1. Clear trends and themes are recurring in this burgeoning field of research. British and American tennis stands at the forefront of scholarly attention, and possibly for good reason, but to the neglect of tennis scholarship related to other geographical areas. At least in Englishspeaking academic journals, the wonderfully compelling history of tennis in France is largely neglected, bar a handful of articles on Lenglen and the Four Musketeers. Australian tennis enjoyed a noticeable increase in scholarly attention in the 1980s, but the leading researchers in this area have either retired or moved away from tennis, leaving this story of its early features, and the fascinating rise to prominence of Australia in the early post-war period in need of attention. African and Asian tennis history, alongside aspects of its culture and politics, are conspicuous in their absence from scholarly attention, as is work on Canada, Mexico and much of Central and South America. While Heiner Gillmeister has done excellent work on German tennis, other parts of Europe have been overlooked, particularly in the East. Beyond geographical imbalances, the subject matters of class, gender and race have been given greater attention – though the latter much more recently developed than the former two – and also increasingly national identity, but there are noticeable gaps in other areas.The structures of religion, disability and sexuality (broadly) remain woefully under-researched in tennis scholarship, and the appreciation of the need for “intersectional” analyses across all of these outputs is only just beginning to burgeon. Tennis within the realm of “sport for development” also needs attention, as do numerous other political or quasi-political aspects. Critical analyses of deviance, doping, corruption, match-fixing and other scandalous events and acts are needed, particularly to provide a more balanced exposé to complement, if not challenge, the work of tennis reporters and journalists who are always the first to cover these stories and thus shape the dominant narratives. While tennis media, both traditional and contemporary, has enjoyed considerable attention, particularly in relation to gendered representations, the arts has only recently been embraced as an area deemed worthy of critical examination. There is still much to do, and while commercial aspects have featured in analyses of sponsorships and various management matters, we are arguably only scratching the surface of interesting, relevant and impactful tennis-related research here. These areas highlighted are just a few of the many gaps in the literature, and as a consequence, this book must, inevitably, be considered more a point of departure for new research rather than a comprehensive synopsis of existing work in the field. Relative to other sports, and likely Table 1.1 Articles published in twenty leading journals across various subjects in the social sciences of sport mentioning ‘tennis’ in its abstract by decade, 1960s–2010s

Articles published mentioning ‘tennis’ in its abstract

1960s 1970s 1980s

1990s 2000s

2010s

0

14

89

3

13

37

Sources: International Review for the Sociology of Sport, Sport in Society (Sport, Culture and Society), Sociology of Sport Journal, Journal of Sport and Social Issues, European Journal of Sport and Society, Sport in History (The Sports Historian), International Journal of the History of Sport, Sporting Traditions, Sport History Review (Canadian Journal of Sport History), Journal of Sport History, Journal of the Philosophy of Sport, Sport, Ethics and Philosophy, Communication and Sport, International Journal of Sport Communication, Journal of Sports Media, Leisure Studies, Journal of Sport Economics, Journal of Sport Management, Case Studies in Sport Management, and International Journal of Sport Policy and Politics (International Journal of Sport Politics).

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because of its late blossoming as a field of critical analysis generally, the field of social-scientific research on tennis is still in a fairly rudimentary, rather than advanced, stage. However, I argue that this fact, proudly and excitingly, represents a call-to-arms for researchers to fill these gaps and expose the sport – its players, officials, institutions, practices, ideologies and cultures – to the academic community and public as the fascinating and research-worthy subject matter it truly is.

How this book is organized The remainder of this book comprises 44 chapters, which are loosely divided into three main parts, attending to various aspects of tennis history, culture and politics. The authors chosen were afforded considerable flexibility in terms of their approach and focus, and so the content of the chapters provides insights into how the various subjects intersect and overlap. Some chapters adopt a broad view, outlining major developments over time and space, while others offer a case study approach that is contextualized within broader themes and developments.This mix of approaches reflects the inherent complexities of the subject matter and highlights the different lenses to understand and analyse the processes through which a garden game became a global sport. Part I examines historical developments in tennis, related chiefly to its commercialization, professionalization and globalization, and the emergence of tennis celebrities as an outcome. Brad Hummel and Mark Dyreson adopt a broad view and examine the important role of tennis patrons, commencing in the Middle Ages with Real Tennis before going on to examine the sport’s contemporary financial backers. Contextualizing their work within the broader commercialization of the sport, their chapter sets the tone for one of the key developments that influenced the sport’s trajectory particularly over the last century. Joyce Kay also examines leadership, in her discussion of grassroots tennis in the late 19th and 20th centuries and the important role of clubs and works’ associations in fostering the game at a recreational level. Robert J. Lake, Dave Day and Simon J. Eaves then discuss developments for coaching-professionals during this same time period in Britain, particularly in terms of the practice of coaching itself alongside the improving status of coaches as individuals in traditional amateur club and tournament environments. Their achievements and struggles are set in the broader context of the sport’s gradual professionalization and ongoing resistance to it from governing bodies like the LTA. The inter-war period remains a key era, when noticeable aspects and features of what might be termed “modern” tennis began to emerge, and Elizabeth Wilson examines the rise of female players as celebrities, especially Suzanne Lenglen who was arguably the first tennis “superstar” that transcended the sport. John Carvalho and Mike Milford build on this narrative of the interwar tennis celebrity in their analysis of Bill Tilden, focusing in particular on his struggles with the USLTA over his off-court journalistic activities. Kevin Jefferys examines the first major British tennis celebrity of this period, Fred Perry, and contextualizes his difficulties experienced merely in fitting into the British tennis establishment within wider class struggles of the time. The professionalization of tennis, and the concomitant decline of amateurism, continued to be a key feature of the sport’s historical development throughout the post-war period, and Kristian Naglo’s detailed analysis of the great German tennis celebrities, Steffi Graf and Boris Becker, provides interesting insights into their marked differences and similarities as they became global superstars in the 1980s and helped shape a new German national identity.The subsequent analysis of Li Na, by Steve Bien-Aimé, Haiyan Jia and Chun Yang is also particularly revealing of the dual challenges of representing both a sport and an entire nation, and highlights, generally speaking, some of the continued struggles for female athletes in Asia. The focus of the part then moves beyond some of the traditional hotbeds of tennis to examine, firstly, the sport’s globalization. Barry Smart weaves us through the sport’s spread 12

History and historiography of tennis

internationally to expose the developing global tennis landscape in the context of its professionalization and commercialization. The spread of tennis to France – discussed in the chapter by Patrick Clastres – examines early clubs and associations before locating the insurgence of French tennis in the interwar period, internationally, within the broader contexts of French culture more broadly. Lenglen, again, is a key focus as are the “Four Musketeers”. Irish tennis has a rich history, but one punctuated with extreme highs and lows. Simon J. Eaves and Tom Higgins explain how Irish players in the 1890s were some of the world’s best, and the Irish Lawn Tennis Championships second only to Wimbledon in international prestige, yet the decline of this tournament amidst broader socio-political developments precipitated the general decline of Irish standards internationally before the Great War. Arnošt Svoboda and Dino Numerato then discuss the impressive rise of tennis in Czechoslovakia and, more contemporarily, in the Czech Republic. Set in a Cold War context – before and after the “Velvet Revolution" in 1989 – the story reminds us how pivotal broader politics can be, and indeed has been, in efforts to develop talent and expose nationalistic regimes. Robert G. Rodriguez then examines the spread of tennis to Latin America, and his focus on Argentina provides rich insights on the politics of identity for, especially, their star players Guillermo Vilas and Gabriela Sabatini. Suvam Pal investigates the spread of tennis to India and focuses on the rise of India in the Open era as a powerhouse in the doubles game and the impact of colonization on key aspects of tennis culture in the Indian subcontinent. Mahfoud Amara’s chapter exploring the social, political and business significance of tennis in the Middle East serves as another reminder of how great the need is to expand our analyses of tennis history outside of North America and Europe, especially given the notable recent rise of this region in global sport development and mega-event hosting. Part II builds on the broader contexts introduced in the first section, especially the commercialization, professionalization and politicization of tennis to examine key aspects of culture and representation, covering gender, race, class, the arts and media. Suzanne Rowland commences the section with an examination of changes in tennis dress, dealing with primarily the shifting boundaries of class and gender throughout the interesting pre-First World War period. These were, especially for females, so vividly contrasted through the appearances (and play) of Dorothea Lambert Chambers and Suzanne Lenglen. Janine van Someren and Stephen Wagg then expand this discussion of gendered aspects of tennis culture in their biographical analyses of four leading post-war female British players. Helen Ditouras then provides a more contemporary view of how the feminine tennis body is celebrated and commodified but also sexually objectified in her examination of the phenomenon that is (or was) Anna Kournikova. The masculinity of Bill Tilden – as close to a true enigma in interwar tennis as you could find – is then given specific treatment by Nathan Titman, who examines the interesting and various ways that the media represented him throughout his career. This is compelling reading in the context of Tilden’s homosexuality and infamous incidents with younger male players that subsequently tarnished his image. Stephen Wagg then takes this discussion of masculinity in tennis forward from the 1930s to the early 21st century by examining challenges and contradictions related to the sustained “gentlemanly ethic” according to which male players are expected to behave. John Vincent’s chapter provides an overall analysis of gendered media representations of female tennis players – focused, primarily on the last two decades – and highlights their sustained marginalization. Travis R. Bell and Janelle Applequist then go into the specific ways in which the WTA, which formed in the early 1970s, works to sexualize female players as a means of enhancing the apparent commercial value of women’s tennis as a commodity. Their focus on a 2012 ad campaign entitled “Strong is Beautiful” highlights the contradictory representation of female players as both sexualized commodities and empowering athletes. 13

Robert J. Lake

Race and social class then feature as key factors in the next two chapters. José M. Alamillo’s analysis of how Latino/a players, in particular Pancho Gonzales and Rosie Casals, have been racialized in the post-war period. Robert J. Lake then discusses developing playing styles in the broader contexts of class and gender, and within a set of parameters that worked to marginalize playing strokes and tactics which, before the Second World War, were deemed to exist outside the behaviour ideals of the hegemonic white, upper-middle class authorities. The section moves on to examine historical representations of tennis across numerous different mediums. Alexis Tadie provides two chapters here: the first is an examination of literary discourse, positioning tennis as an interesting focal point for mainstream writing; and the second continues in this vein and positions tennis within the history of literature and the visual arts more broadly. Jeffrey O. Segrave also analyzes tennis in mainstream literature to uncover cultural meanings of the sport, focusing in particular on the interesting interplay of tennis depicted as both “a game of love” and a highly professionalized and corporatized sport. Ann Sumner provides a rich analysis of how tennis has been depicted and portrayed in art throughout Europe and North America since the Victorian era, highlighting developments in cultural and social approaches to the sport. Robert J. Lake and Simon J. Eaves then examine the history of journalism in tennis, commencing on the early role of journalists in the game’s incipient development in Britain, before examining some of the challenges experienced by key figures reporting during the inter-war and post-war periods. Nadina Ayer and Ron McCarville provide an interesting analysis of tennis culture as seen through an online tennis community, and explore the day-to-day uses and representations of tennis in the online forum. Katie Lebel and Karen Danylchuk take a broader look at the role of social media in the representation of top male and female players in the 21st century, and examine the interesting role of Twitter in particular as a creative marketing and public relations tool for contemporary players. Part III focuses on politics and various social issues that have featured in critical discussions of tennis, particularly related to governance, nationalism and identity, and to race, gender, class and disability. Robert J. Lake commences by providing an historical overview of tennis governance as it developed, focusing particularly on the roles of the most powerful associations, namely the USLTA/USTA and LTA, alongside the ILTF/ITF. Alistair John and Brent McDonald conduct a case study analysis of the Australian Open and the inherent challenges related to the role of government in selecting the site and developing the infrastructure of Flinders Park in Melbourne. Matthew P. Llewellyn and Robert J. Lake then examine the politics related to the inclusion of tennis in the Olympic Games, focusing on its first 28 years as part of the Olympic movement, its subsequent separation, and eventual return in the Open Era. Stephen Wagg pushes us to understand issues related to nationalism in tennis, with an analysis of how tennis in Britain promotes and reinforces ideals and values of English national identity, especially through the media representations of its players and the flagship event, the Wimbledon Championships. John Harris takes this a step further to examine the interesting, varied and sometimes conflicting representations of Andy Murray as both a Scotsman and a Briton, focusing on key challenges faced and his, eventual, emergence as a more mainstream figure in British sport following his first Wimbledon victory in 2013. The politics of race are then examined by Sundiata Djata through the history of AfricanAmerican involvement in tennis, commencing with an analysis of the American Tennis Association, before going on to discuss important figures like Althea Gibson and the Williams sisters among others. Eric Allen Hall focuses specifically on Arthur Ashe and his efforts and struggles as a civil rights activist in the 1960s and 1970s. The “black man’s burden” he stated experiencing is particularly interesting, and his role in the anti-apartheid movement in South 14

History and historiography of tennis

Africa positions him as a pivotal figure in what was very much a global, rather than purely American, struggle. Kristi Tredway’s analysis then follows, of how gender and the politics of feminism featured within the formation of the rebel Virginia Slims tour in the early 1970s, focusing on the “Original 9” women who defied convention and challenged male hegemony by signing their famous $1 contracts. Jessica Luther continues in this rich vein and focuses on Billie Jean King’s specific efforts to bring about change for women in tennis, and her famous “Battle of the Sexes” tennis match in 1973 – a story recently retold in a Hollywood movie – against the outspoken chauvinist Bobby Riggs. Lindsay Parks Pieper examines another important figure in the 1970s, the transgender player Renee Richards, whose battles with tennis officials in the US to enable her to compete on the women’s tour were uniquely contextualized in the broader struggles for gender equity at the time. Jayne O. Ifekwunigwe’s analysis of the Williams sisters brings together discussions of race, class and gender into this insightful chapter that highlights the need for intersectional analyses, and Linda K. Fuller’s chapter on the politics of identity for people with disabilities also pushes us to acknowledge multiple systems of oppression in what is a highly nuanced field and subject matter. The final chapter by Robert J. Lake discusses the manifestation of exclusion in tennis, specifically examining tennis clubs as sites where age and class if not also (implicitly) race and religious barriers intersect to create a unique matrix of domination that has, historically, seemed to pervade many clubs.

Notes 1 Real Tennis emerged simply as “tennis”, but when its offspring “lawn tennis” became known popularly as tennis, thereby superseding its antecedent, the prefix real was added to the original version of tennis to differentiate the two games (Shneerson 2014). 2 Wingfield suggested the net should be six feet at the sides, but the committee for the inaugural Wimbledon Championships in 1877 opted for five feet. 3 Until the late 1970s/early 1980s, the Australian National Championships/Open was often avoided by the top overseas players due in part to its geographical isolation and its lower status among the four major championships (Feinstein 1991).

References Alexander, G.E. (1974) Lawn Tennis: Its Founders & Its Early Days. Lynn, Massachusetts: H.O. Zimman Inc. Alexander, G.E. (1986) Wingfield: Edwardian Gentleman. Portsmouth: Peter E. Randall. Baltzell, E.D. (1995) Sporting Gentlemen: Men’s Tennis from the Age of Honor to the Cult of the Superstar. New York: Free Press. Barrett, J. (1986) 100 Wimbledon Championships: A Celebration. London: Collins. Carvalho, J. (2009) “An Honorable and Recognized Vocation”: Bill Tilden Makes the USLTA Back Down. Journal of Sport History, 36(1), 83–98. Deford, F. (2004) Big Bill Tilden:The Triumphs and the Tragedy. Toronto: Sportclassic Books. Eaves, S.J. & Lake, R.J. (2016) The ‘Ubiquitous Apostle of International Play’, Wilberforce Vaughan Eaves: The Forgotten Internationalist of Lawn Tennis. International Journal of the History of Sport, 33(16), 1963–1981. Evans, R. (1993) Open Tennis: 25 Years of Seriously Defiant Success On and Off the Court. London: Bloomsbury. Falcous, M., & McLeod, C. (2012) Anyone for Tennis? Sport, Class and Status in New Zealand. New Zealand Sociology, 27(1), 13–30. Feinstein, J. (1991) Hard Courts: Real Life on the Professional Tennis Tours. New York:Villard Books. Fewster, K. (1985) Advantage Australia: Davis Cup Tennis 1950–1959. Sporting Traditions, 2(1), 47–68. Fisher, J.M. (2009) A Terrible Splendor. New York: Crown Publishers. Gillmeister, H. (1997) Tennis: A Cultural History. Leicester: Leicester University Press. Hall, E.A. (2014) Arthur Ashe:Tennis and Justice in the Civil Rights Era. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. 15

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Harris, C. & Kyle-Debose, L. (2007) Charging the Net: The History of Blacks in Tennis from Althea Gibson and Arthur Ashe to the Williams Sisters. Chicago: Ivan R. Dee. Hoad, L. (1959) My Story. London: Sportsmans Book Club. Holland, R. (2011) Edgbaston’s Gem of a Game: The Origins of Lawn Tennis. In A. Sumner, Court on Canvas:Tennis in Art (pp. 35–46). London: Philip Wilson. Jefferys, K. (2009) The Triumph of Professionalism: The Road to 1968. International Journal of the History of Sport, 26(15), 2253–2269. Kinross-Smith, G. (1987) Privilege in Tennis and Lawn Tennis: The Geelong and Royal South Yarra Examples but Not Forgetting the Story of the Farmer’s Wrist. Sporting Traditions, 3(2), 189–216. Kramer, J. (1979) The Game: My 40 Years in Tennis. London: Andre Deutsch. Lake, R.J. (2009) Real Tennis and the Civilising Process. Sport in History, 29(4), 553–576. Lake, R.J. (2011) Social Class, Etiquette and Behavioural Restraint in British Lawn Tennis: 1870-1939. International Journal of the History of Sport, 28(6), 876–894. Lake, R.J. (2012) Gender and Etiquette in ‘Mixed Doubles’ Lawn Tennis 1870-1939. International Journal of the History of Sport, 29(5), 691–710. Lake, R.J. (2015) A Social History of Tennis in Britain. London/New York: Routledge. Lake, R.J. (2016a) ‘That Excellent Sample of a Professional’: Dan Maskell and the Contradictions of British Amateurism in Twentieth-Century Lawn Tennis. Sport in History, 36(1), 1–25. Lake, R.J. (2016b) ‘Guys Don’t Whale Away at the Women’: Etiquette and Gender Relations in Contemporary Mixed-Doubles Tennis. Sport in Society, 19(8–9), 1214–1233. Lake, R.J. & Llewellyn, M. (2015) The Demise of Olympic Lawn Tennis in the 1920s: A Case Study of Shifting Relations between the IOC and International Sports Federations. Olympika, XXIV, 94–119. Little, A. (2014) The Golden Days of Tennis on the French Riviera 1874–1939. London: Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Museum. McCrone, K. (1988) Sport and the Physical Emancipation of English Women 1870–1914. London: Routledge. Odendaal, A. (2003) The Story of an African Game. Claremont, South Africa: David Philip Publishers. O’Farrell,V. (1985) The Unasked Questions in Australian Tennis. Sporting Traditions, 1(2), 67–86. Pal, S. (2004) ‘Legacies, Halcyon Days and Thereafter’: A Brief History of Indian Tennis. International Journal of the History of Sport, 21(3/4), 452–466. Rader, B. (1999) American Sports: From the Age of Folk Games to the Age of Televised Sports (4th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. Reay, B. (1951, May–September) Lawn Tennis – The Game Britain Gave to the World. Lawn Tennis & Badminton, (pp. 294–298). Schultz, J. (2014) Qualifying Times: Points of Change in US Women’s Sport. Champagne, IL: University of Illinois Press. Shneerson, J. (2015) Real Tennis Today and Yesterday. London: Ronaldson Publications. Smart, B. (2007) Not Playing Around: Global Capitalism, Modern Sport and Consumer Culture. Global Networks, 7(2), 113–134. Spencer, N.E. (1997) Once Upon a Subculture: Professional Women’s Tennis and the Meaning of Style, 1970–1974. Journal of Sport and Social Issues, 21(4), 363–378. Thomas, D.L. (2010) ‘Don’t Tell Me How to Think’: Arthur Ashe and the Burden of ‘Being Black’. International Journal of the History of Sport, 27(8), 1313–1329. Todd, T. (1979) The Tennis Players: From Pagan Rites to Strawberries and Cream. Guernsey:Vallencey. Walker, H. (1989) Lawn Tennis. In T. Mason, Sport in Britain: A Social History (pp. 245–275). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Wilson, E. (2014) Love Game: A History of Tennis, from Victorian Pastime to Global Phenomenon. London: Serpent’s Tail.

16

Part I

Historical developments (commercialization, professionalization and the creation of tennis celebrities, globalization and internationalization of tennis)

2 From folk game to elite pastime Tennis and Its patrons Brad Hummel and Mark Dyreson

Tennis emerged out of the medieval soup of European folk ball games that also produced varieties of football and bat-and-ball games such as cricket. Europe’s commoners indulged in these ball games during folk festivals, holidays (in the traditional sense of holy days) and other popular gatherings. Serving as diversions from the grinding toils of everyday life, ball sports were especially popular among peasant boys and young men. The upper classes of the feudal system, the nobility and the clergy, served as patrons for these folk games in order to bolster the cement that bound the medieval social foundation (Carter 1992; Gillmeister 1997). The folk traditions that spawned games such as the French jeu de la paume in which the common folk used their hands to hit balls off the walls of village churches, evolved into tennis as clerics adapted the games to the stone confines of their monasteries. Two versions of the game developed.While the peasants continued to enjoy their folk versions of the sport, the move from outside to the inside of monastic courtyards led the clergy to patronize a refined version that became popular among the upper classes. By the sixteenth century, the monastic patrons of the game added another innovation as they developed racquets for the game’s elite version (Gillmeister 1997; Morgan 1995), which had a different pattern of patronage to earlier versions of the game. Increasingly, the monastic orders served as both patrons and players of their version of tennis, while still on occasion supporting the peasant version to fulfil their feudal obligations to the masses. During the late medieval period and the early Renaissance, the upper-class version of the game spread from the clergy to the nobility. “Court” or “Real” tennis blossomed as royal endorsements made it an essential emblem of monarchical dominion. Patronage duties passed from the clergy to the nobility as tennis spread among the ruling classes, especially in France, England, Spain, the Italian states, the Netherlands and the Habsburg Empire. No longer a casual game contested by commoners banging balls against outdoor walls of buildings or clerics competing within monastery walls, tennis became part of the ornamentation of royal courts. The civil and genteel aesthetic cultivated by tennis persuaded the European elite that the game should be a staple of royal court life (Gillmeister 1997). In the Book of the Courtier, a 1528 manual by the Italian Renaissance scholar Baldassarre Castiglione (2012; orig. 1528), tennis served as the most important physical activity that the ruling classes and their retinues needed to master.The physical and mental dexterity the game required along with the conviviality it produced justified the attention and support that 19

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noble patrons lavished on tennis. References to the game abounded in Renaissance literature and theatre (Hiller 2009). As the Renaissance revolutionized European educational practices, tennis emerged as an indispensable element of curricula designed to train ruling classes for the new monarchies that were building the foundations for the emergence of modern nation-states (Gillmeister 1997). Court tennis shaped not only the sentiments and habits of its patrons but added new elements to the physical spaces they inhabited. The new patrons of tennis built “ballhouses” that reflected the vast pecuniary resources and the cultural tastes of tennis patrons. Between 1526 and 1529, Henry VIII constructed a ballhouse to honour his favourite advisor, the Lord Chancellor Cardinal Wolsey, at the monarch’s famed Hampton Court Palace, setting a standard that other monarchs would soon emulate. Dubbed the Royal Tennis Court, with its burnished-wood interior surrounded by viewing galleries and clerestory, the building became the model for ballhouses that sprang up throughout Europe (Morgan 1995). With royal support guaranteed and ballhouses proliferating, court tennis flourished in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. As a sport identified with the power and interests of monarchies, tennis declined as the ancient regimes of the nobility shuddered and cracked under the strains of modernity. When Parliament and the Puritans triumphed over the crown in the English Civil War (1642–51) and temporarily replaced the monarchy (1649–60), tennis came under assault as a symbol of the royal order. Thereafter, as the restored monarchy’s power continued to erode, tennis declined in Great Britain.The same patterns held also in other European nations (Gillmeister 1997). Indeed, the death knell for the age of the tennis patron and for court tennis, as well as for the traditions of monarchical pre-eminence in Western civilization, took place in 1789 during the French Revolution. At that moment, the triumphant forces of the masses who had overthrown the hegemony of the monarchy and aristocracy invaded the tennis court at the royal headquarters in Versailles to write a new and modern constitution for France. They chose the “ballhouse” to amplify their rejection of the old order by symbolically commandeering a space that had long signified royal dominion and issuing a “Tennis Court Oath” pledging allegiance to the new revolutionary sentiments of “liberty, equality, fraternity”. The prestige of tennis patrons had reached its nadir, and court tennis became a quaint symbol of the past, an antiquarianism kept alive by a handful of modern patrons (Baker 1988).

Modern tennis emerges: the transition from patrons to sponsors Eighty-five years after the “Tennis Court Oath”, a Victorian gentleman and impresario, Major Walter Clopton Wingfield, invented a game called “Sphairistiké” (Greek for “playing ball”), which blended earlier racquet games into an outdoor version of tennis to be played on a manicured lawn. This new variant of the old game was soon renamed by the press and public “lawn tennis”, and would launch a modern revival of the sport. In certain ways, Wingfield resembled the traditional patrons of sport. Born into a family with an ancient lineage and a place in Britain’s landed gentry, Wingfield was a public schoolboy who via the Royal Military College went on to a sterling career in the Empire’s army; he inhabited the upper echelons of British society, rubbing elbows with lords and ladies, socializing with movers and shakers in Parliament, and earning employment in Queen Victoria’s court. The moribund game of “court tennis” inspired the major’s invention. He moved outdoors, onto the estate lawns that served as the social centres for summertime frolics of Victorian elites. Wingfield pitched his lawn tennis parties as a beneficent venue for courtship among the well-to-do, a critical aim of elite society, and of the English social “season” in particular. In Wingfield’s vision, lawn tennis would become an essential habit for the Victorian ladies and gentlemen who ruled the British Empire—the most 20

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powerful global force in the late nineteenth/early twentieth century (Alexander 1974; Lake 2015; Wilson 2014). Wingfield thus served as a neo-patron of tennis, a benefactor who sought to use his personal influence to promote the game among his class. Wingfield sought not only to serve as a patron but also to make a tidy profit from his invention. Outdoor variants of court tennis enjoyed popularity during the 1870s, particularly among the upper-middle classes who sought to emulate the social graces of the nobility and their traditional racquet sports. Wingfield sought to ensure that “Sphairistiké” triumphed over other versions of lawn tennis. He also wanted not only to reinforce his social position through the game but also to make money by marketing tennis to the emerging middle-class consumers in industrial Britain. In 1874, he filed for a patent that outlined basic rules for his version of lawn tennis. He then launched a manufacturing venture to produce boxed sets for garden parties, selling them not only to aristocrats but also to the aspiring middle classes who could afford the princely sum of five guineas – roughly the weekly salary of a skilled working-class artisan in 1874 (Alexander 1974;Wilson 2014). In his commitment to making tennis not only an emblem of social prestige but a commodity that could be bought and sold in the marketplace, Wingfield linked the game to an emerging consumer culture in which commercial sponsors would eventually replace elite patrons as the leading promoters of the sport. Lawn tennis quickly dominated the British market for genteel “lawn” games, surpassing Victorian crazes for croquet, badminton, shuffleboard and various updates of bowling games. Wingfield’s invention found numerous patrons in publications that catered to the British ruling classes, such as The Field. One contemporary commentator called it ‘pleasant to play at, and pleasant to see played’ (Alexander 1974, p.23). The Army and Navy Gazette, a magazine embedded in Wingfield’s world, predicted that lawn tennis ‘will become a national pastime’ (Alexander 1974, p.23). Wingfield and his fellow enthusiasts realized that lawn tennis was not only an enjoyable athletic activity, but one that could carry class distinction by exuding elegance and exclusivity historically associated with the elite. The middle-class and upper-class supporters of Wingfield’s invention and other variants of lawn tennis intended the game as a “national pastime” of the ruling classes and not the labouring masses. The amateur sporting clubs of the British quickly absorbed it into their assemblage of games designed to mark the boundaries between social classes. Indeed, no sooner did Wingfield publish his first rulebook and manufacture his first boxed set than a lengthy debate ensued in the pages of the upper-class journal The Field concerning how lawn tennis should best be played in a manner amenable to the social purposes of the game. One of the leading patrons of British amateurism, the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC), then stepped in to organize a special meeting. The MCC tried to standardize its rules and become the game’s de jure arbiter. However, the MCC’s efforts failed to satisfy all of the middle-class enthusiasts of the various strains of lawn tennis, and the role of standardizing the product fell to the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club (AELTCC). In 1877, the AELTCC established the Wimbledon Championships at its Worple Road grounds in southwest London, an event to showcase the amateur version of lawn tennis. By 1883, the MCC ceded dominion over the rules and culture of lawn tennis to the AELTCC. By the end of the nineteenth century, lawn tennis had been established as a marquee attraction in British high society (Lake 2015; Wilson 2014). During the late Victorian era, British entrepreneurs exported lawn tennis throughout the world. These tennis promoters ensured that the sport’s success was sustained into the twentieth century, but, more significantly, they articulated a strict amateur sporting structure to govern the game and restrict participation to persons of the upper and upper-middle classes. Beginning with the All England Club and expanding to clubs throughout Europe and North America, elite 21

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social clubs such as those in Bad Homburg and Baden Baden in Germany and the Newport Casino in the United States, which hosted the US Lawn Tennis Championships from 1881, sponsored tennis tournaments for their national elites. These organizations acted as new patrons for tennis – self-sustaining vessels perpetuating the game as a social institution rather than as an amusement for the masses (Gillmeister 1997; Lake 2015). Club patronage obligated participants to adhere to a class-centric code of amateurism that, on the surface, included the refusal to accept money for tennis-related activities. In the first two decades of the twentieth century, some players sought to evade amateur strictures by trading the prizes they won at tournaments for cash. By the 1920s, clever players figured out additional mechanisms for cashing in on their tennis skills by garnering travel stipends, earning royalties for writing about tennis, and, sometimes, receiving under-the-table payments that guaranteed the appearance of top players at tournaments.This “shamateur” system, as the press of the era labelled it, privileged the uppermiddle-class players who began their careers in the bosoms of clubs and maintained sterling amateur credentials when they started competing, but who also possessed the skills and education to take advantage of loopholes and earn their livings from tennis as they rose through the ranks. In fact, many of the early champions came from the upper-middle classes who inhabited the elite clubs, including the dominant doubles duos the Renshaw and Doherty brothers and Wimbledon and Olympic champion Charlotte Cooper (Baltzell 1995; Lake 2015). The neo-patrons of lawn tennis formed governing bodies that represented the values of the clubs and their wealthy members, including the United States National Lawn Tennis Association (USNLTA) in 1881, Britain’s Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) in 1888, and an International Lawn Tennis Federation (ILTF) in 1913. Collectively, these bureaucracies became stakeholders in preserving tennis as an amateur game. These federations organized and staged tournaments including the prestigious Davis Cup, but also acted as gatekeepers regarding who qualified as an amateur and under what circumstances, though the policies often lacked consistency and clarity and led to bitter wrangles between themselves and with other amateur sports bodies (Lake 2015). In the 1920s, these agencies kept the elites in control of tennis. Still, the second prong of Wingfield’s lawn tennis invention, embodied in his boxed sets designed to market the game to the middle classes, began to shift power into the hands of sponsors. These sponsors – individual entrepreneurs and corporate empires – sought to reap profits by selling the game to the masses or using it to market other consumer items – from men’s dress shirts to cigarettes – many of them having nothing to do with tennis. As the global industrial revolution entered a new phase of production for consumption, factories around the world turned out mass-produced racquets and balls that made the game available to the masses. Tennis haberdashery invaded popular fashion. Governments and social organizations, from municipal parks and recreation departments to the Young Men’s Christian Association, built tennis courts that did not require exclusive memberships. A growing plebeian appetite for tennis burgeoned alongside the elite game. Indeed, the elitist history of tennis with its upper-crust patrons served to make the game and its accoutrements popular to a broad audience. If they could not join an exclusive club or expect an invitation to a society gala, the common folk could at least purchase a racquet just like the ones used by the leisure classes so that they could play on public courts. They could even smoke the same cigarettes as tennis aristocrats in mass-market advertisements. They also were interested in buying tickets to watch the best players in the world compete (Dyreson 1989; Mrozek 1983). By the 1920s and 1930s, a growing professional counterculture had developed to challenge both the market share and the cultural hegemony of the amateur circuit. Players who achieved an exceptional degree of success in Davis Cup and at the four “grand slam” amateur 22

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tournaments, especially Wimbledon, received offers from promoters to endorse consumer products and to join professional tennis troupes. Abandoning amateur glamour – and “shamateur” inducements –some of the leading players of the interwar period including Suzanne Lenglen, Bill Tilden, Vincent Richards, Ellsworth Vines, Don Budge and Fred Perry toured arenas and makeshift stadiums in North America and Europe in a series of one-night stands designed to generate large profits. While exhibition tours lasted many months and often included the same handful of professionals each night, they offered an opportunity to make an income without bothering with the pretences surrounding amateurism and earn rewards that were, at least in theory, greater than that of the amateurs (Baltzell 1995; Wilson 2014). The first major tennis star to break away from the amateur system and become openly professional was the French stylist Suzanne Lenglen, who signed in 1926 with American promoter C. C. Pyle. The cunning agent capitalized on Lenglen’s international stardom by creating a barnstorming tour centred on her and a handful of other professionals (Englemann 1988). Pyle’s innovation initiated a perpetual cycle of professional tours that waxed and waned for the next four decades (Lake 2015; Wilson 2014) His new design signalled the transition from patronage to sponsorship as the agent sold the sport to the masses (Kastner 2007). Although early professional tennis players gave up their opportunities to play at Wimbledon and the US Open, they entered into a network of sponsorship opportunities unavailable under the amateur code. Among the first male stars to pursue a professional career was American great William “Bill” Tilden. Throughout much of the 1920s, Tilden waged an ongoing struggle with the patrons of amateurism. He insisted on his right to earn money from the media for writing about tennis while the neo-patrons of the elite game tried to strip him of his amateur standing for that sin.The feud raged for years, until Tilden ultimately joined the professional ranks where he could make a living from his prize winnings, undertake journalistic endeavours, and endorse Lucky Strike cigarettes (Carvalho 2009; Deford 2012). Tilden’s defection opened the floodgates for tennis players to migrate from patronage to sponsorship. Beginning in the 1930s, many of the top international stars who began their careers by winning the prestigious amateur crowns at Wimbledon, and the US and French National Championships, later abandoned the amateur circuit in order to cash in on their prowess on professional tours. They became the vanguard of a more egalitarian class of tennis players, less entrenched in upper-middle-class amateurism and willing to accept sponsorship offers when opportunities arose. Still, between the 1930s and 1960s the elite amateur organizations battled against the professionals, banning even the greatest stars of the game such as Lew Hoad, Jack Kramer and Pancho Gonzalez from their tournaments as soon as they accepted offers from the professional tours (Wilson 2014). The amateur-professional rift plagued tennis during these years, as an older generation of tennis leaders, who wanted to maintain the elitist class dynamics of the amateur game, increasingly came into conflict with a newer generation who wanted to create a democratized mass market. Increasingly, the top talent began to desert the traditional club tournaments for riches offered by professional promoters. In response, even the most robust defenders of amateurism such as Britain’s hallowed LTA had to enlist the aid of corporate sponsors – though the LTA sought only “discreet” partnerships with corporations and government agencies to try the secure the funding necessary for acquiring top players. By the early 1960s, the Nestlé Corporation and British Petroleum had become corporate partners of tournaments sanctioned by the LTA (Lake 2015). Still, in spite of their embrace of “discrete” partnerships with sponsors, the doyens of amateurism refused to allow sponsors to pay the players directly – an increasingly unsustainable position in a thoroughly commodified tennis world. In April 1968, the four grand slam tournaments, led by Wimbledon, agreed to make their tournaments open to all comers, bringing to a close the 23

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amateur club era in tennis and ushering in a period of unbridled commercial patronage. As tennis increasingly became a commodity, sponsors began to dominate the game.

The golden age of sponsorship The arrival of the “Open Era” unshackled tennis from more than a century of hidebound codes designed to make the sport a preserve of exclusivity and ushered in a new ethos in which the levelling forces of mass-market consumerism increasingly dictated its evolution. Ironically, corporate sponsors were attracted to tennis precisely because its exclusive reputation made it attractive to consumer products seeking to brand themselves as luxury goods. The decision reached by the ILTF and interested parties opened new avenues for tennis stars – chief among them the Australian Rod Laver – to return to the most prestigious historic tournaments without maintaining any façade of amateurism (Lake 2015). The dawn of the Open Era signalled the final triumph of sponsorship over patronage—one of the most significant developments in the sport’s history. By the 1990s, amateurism would be dead not only in tennis but also in every other bastion in which it had once flourished, including at the Olympics (Llewellyn & Gleaves 2016). No sooner had tennis authorities admitted professionals to their tournaments, than a ready stream of financiers appeared, eager to capitalize on the opportunity to market tennis as a glamorous, mainstream sporting enterprise. Men’s and women’s professional tennis tours quickly developed. Corporate sponsors began to support individual athletes and the tournaments. A lucrative industry emerged to sell tennis equipment through the endorsement of professionals. The rules and structure of the events adapted to expand television exposure – a key element in peddling tennis to the masses (Lake 2015). In this new climate, sports entrepreneurs sought to establish themselves by signing elite players to long-term contracts, which tied them to organized troupes that were managed by agents who negotiated the tournaments they would play in, their salary guarantees and travel arrangements. The two most successful early tennis tycoons were George MacCall and Lamar Hunt. MacCall, a former United States Davis Cup captain and accomplished insurance salesman, created the National Tennis League (NTL) in 1967. By the end of the following year, he had signed eight of the best men and women in the sport, including Rod Laver, Ken Rosewall, Richard “Pancho” Gonzales and Rosie Casals (MacCall 1968). He also became the first person to sign Billie Jean King to a professional contract in 1968, a deal guaranteeing the rising American star $70,000 for one year (‘Billie Jean, Roy Emerson Turn Pro’ 1968). Alongside MacCall’s NTL was a rival ensemble organized by sports mogul Lamar Hunt, a leading figure in American professional football. In 1967, Hunt and David Dixon founded World Championship Tennis (WCT). Their early signees included such talent as John Newcombe and Cliff Drysdale – who became part of the “Handsome Eight” as the press dubbed them (Wilson 2014). In what a New York Times sportswriter called ‘a clandestine struggle for power,’ the NTL and WCT competed directly for tournaments during the first few months of the open era, using exclusivity arrangements to prohibit players from the other “league” from playing in the same tournaments (Amdur 1968). As a result, the representatives of the NTL played at the French Open in 1969, while the Handsome Eight were absent (Wilson 2014). Discovering quickly that maintaining two competing tours was financially damaging to all parties, MacCall and Hunt searched for an equitable solution and resolved to merge their companies into a single entity (MacCall 1968). Under a 1968 proposal, the two impresarios would each share 50 percent of the new company. Hunt quickly bought out MacCall’s share and developed the World Championship Tennis (WCT) brand.The WCT dominated men’s professional tennis until 1990, when the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) Tour took over. 24

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The concurrent organization of the women’s elite tennis tour likewise owed its success to a few astute individuals, and perhaps more than any other entity in professional sports, a single sponsor. Not long after she had signed with MacCall, Billie Jean King spearheaded the creation of the most successful league in the history of women’s sports, the Virginia Slims tour. Upset with the grossly unequal compensation for female players at the dawn of the Open Era, King, Rosie Casals and World Tennis magazine founder Gladys Heldman negotiated a $2,500 contribution from Philip Morris in 1970 to fund the first event in what would become a twodecade long relationship between tennis and tobacco (Bodo 1995). Benefiting from a personal relationship with CEO Joseph Cullman, Heldman convinced the Philip Morris director that women’s tennis was a viable marketing opportunity for his company. In 1971, the Philip Morris’ sponsorship expanded to the 24 stop Virginia Slims circuit, the definitive women’s professional tennis tour which would ultimately become the WTA Tour (Bodo 1995). The slogan for the tour, ‘You’ve come a long way, baby’, sold both tennis and cigarettes, and the partnership proved critical in establishing professional tennis as an athletic vocation for women (Wilson 2014). As a marketing device, the association of cigarettes marketed to fashionable, independent women with the newly developed women’s professional circuit was successful beyond comparison. As the sportswriter John Feinstein has argued: ‘Only four names had really mattered in the women’s game. … Billie Jean King, Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova and Virginia Slims’ (Feinstein 1991, p. 16). In a social climate in which tobacco use was increasingly discouraged and regulated, however, the connection between cigarettes and women’s tennis was bound to change. In the early 1990s the WTA divorced itself from the Virginia Slims brand, but not before twenty years of sponsorship had built a sustainable tour capable of attracting eager corporate patrons (Feinstein 1991). By the time the WTA emerged as a professional sports brand separate from its famous sponsor, numerous corporations had already seized the chance to place their names on tournaments, computer rankings and on the athletes themselves.Title sponsorship proved particularly attractive. After years of lagging viewership, the ITF sought to revive the Davis Cup by awarding title sponsor rights to the Japanese technology company NEC (Lake 2015). Tea giant Lipton signed a deal with a Miami tournament that was intended to last for thirty years (Feinstein 1991). Even the grand slam tournaments succumbed to sponsors with deep pockets. During the 1970s the French tennis federation was forced, due to declining viewership and attendances, to negotiate a title sponsor for the French Open (Feinstein 1991). Perhaps the most prevalent sponsor in tennis today is BNP Paribas. In 2017, the French multinational bank sponsored not only its home country’s grand slam, as it had done since 1973, but also lent its name to no fewer than eight other elite-level tournaments including the Davis Cup, the Federation Cup and WTA Tour Finals (Association of Tennis Professionals 2017a; BNP Paribas 2017; Women’s Tennis Association, 2017b). The new methods of sponsorship revolutionized not only the tournaments but also the players. The traditional white uniforms of lawn tennis clubs became a metaphorical canvas on which to stitch sponsor logos and paint outlandish designs. In hopes of selling any conceivable product or service, sponsors offered promising players large sums of money to sport corporate logos. During the 1980s, sponsor labels proliferated on women’s tennis attire and new corporate interests sought to associate their products with the game (Bodo 1995). On the men’s side, players such as John McEnroe and Andre Agassi became key figures in a concerted effort to promote an “anti-establishment image”, wearing Nike clothes with garish patterns destined for popularity among the young and rebellious. As historian Elizabeth Wilson (2014, p. 209) observes, apparel, shoe and racquet endorsements created ‘corporate tennis’, forging an extricable link between the contemporary tennis professional and the sale of consumer products, sport-related or otherwise. 25

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While the potential to reap a bounty from endorsement deals exploded, not all of the world’s top players shared equally in the spoils. Especially in the US, non-white tennis players did not have opportunities for sponsorship comparable to those afforded their white peers. Despite their success at the sport’s highest level, as late as the 1990s black tennis players such as Zina Garrison often could not find a single corporate sponsor (Ashe and Rampersad 1993). Ranked as the number four woman in the world in 1990, Garrison played without a contract for shoes or clothing. Tennis officials also regularly passed over Garrison for show court assignments that would give her television exposure during major tournaments (Feinstein 1991). Such racial discrepancies continue. In 2015, Serena Williams, a twenty-three-time major champion, made $10 million less than her far less accomplished rival, Maria Sharapova (Bain 2015). Sharapova’s earning power has much to do with perceptions of her femininity, which underscores the racial discrepancies that appear in the tennis world. Sponsors flock to the privileged version of “white” femininity that Sharapova sells as opposed to the less effusive mass reactions to the “black” femininity that Williams embodies. In tennis, as elsewhere, American (and global) notions of femininity are filtered by racial lenses (Schultz 2005). Sponsorship has not only transformed tournaments and players’ careers but also the fundamental rules and common culture of the game itself. The old summer swing of players through Europe and the East Coast of North America that developed in the age of neo-patrons, as Baltzell (1995) described, has given way to a laborious globe-spanning, year-round grind that takes players to nearly every continent. Increasingly, global management agencies, including Mark McCormack’s International Management Group (IMG) and Donald Dell’s ProServ, supervised players’ careers and provided the talent for the international circuit (Feinstein 1991). Collectively, these firms brokered most of the players’ public lives including negotiating media interviews and sponsor agreements, and determined in which tournaments they would appear. Often, they were tournaments owned or managed by the agencies themselves. In the 1980s and 1990s, Dell was so deeply entrenched in promoting the players he represented at tournaments he both owned and covered for the media that tennis critic Peter Bodo deemed him ‘the grand master of conflicting interests’ (Bodo 1995, p.135). The marketing of tennis on television, a crucial element in the corporatization of the game, has since the 1960s changed rules to make the game more palatable to viewers. In 1965, the American James Van Alen II invented the tie-break to shorten the length of sets to no more than thirteen games (Fein 2002). Since then a myriad of other rules changes, both minor and significant, have redesigned tennis to the taste of its corporate sponsors and its television audience. Recently, the ATP World Tour replaced the deciding third set in doubles with the first-toten-points “super” tiebreaker, remedying a television ratings problem and allowing more time for scheduling lucrative singles matches (Association of Tennis Professionals, 2017b). However, the most significant recent change to tennis score-keeping is the introduction of the Hawk-Eye electronic line-calling system, first used officially in 2006. The Hawk-Eye system increased the marketability of tennis by reducing the number of erroneous line calls and providing television audiences with a dramatic replay of contested points. Corporate tennis also sparked changes in on- and off-court decorum. In contrast to the largely assumed “manners and sportsmanship values” of the amateur era, the new ATP and WTA rulebooks laid out precise procedures for governing players and penalizing offenders (Baltzell 1995; Lake 2015). The rulebooks also require players to make themselves available for television and the media at the direction of the tournaments (Association of Tennis Professionals 2017b; Women’s Tennis Association 2017a). Since the 1960s, sponsors have become what, in earlier centuries, patrons once were – the leading forces in shaping most aspects of tennis. No longer does tennis conform to the needs 26

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of monastic orders, royal benefactors, or the social elites. Increasingly, the game obeys ­corporate partners and television broadcasters who seek mass appeal. The sponsors have replaced the patrons as the arbiters of tennis culture and fashion. Global capitalism now dominates tennis the way monastic orders governed medieval tennis. Ultimately, the future trajectory of tennis – and its place in the sporting landscape – resides with the interests of its sponsors. If the last halfcentury of Open Era tennis serves as any indication, tennis will continue to find sponsors among the corporate interests who use the sport to enhance their own images and sell their products. Indeed, twenty-first-century tennis has become a product of its sponsors – a professionalized, televised and commercialized spectacle and a marketable product for an entertainment-consuming world.

References Alexander, G. (1974) Lawn Tennis: Its Founders and Its Early Days. Lynn, MA: H. O. Zimman. Amdur, N. (1968) Pro Tennis Crossfire: Merger Seen as Only Way to Save 2 Rival Groups in Power Struggle. New York Times. George MacCall Papers; PSUA 6188; box 2, folder 4; Eberly Special Collections Library, Penn State University Libraries. Ashe, A. and Rampersad, A. (1993) Days of Grace: A Memoir. New York: Knopf. Association of Tennis Professionals. (2017a) ‘2017/2018 Calendar.’ Available at http:​//www​.atpw​orldt​our.c​ om/en​/tour​namen​ts;Women’s Tennis Association, ‘WTA Calendar 2017,’ 2017, http://www.wtatennis. com/calendar-2017. (Accessed 5 May 2017) Association of Tennis Professionals. (2017b) The 2017 ATP Official Rulebook. 2017. Available at http:​//www​ .atpw​orldt​our.c​om/en​/corp​orate​/rule​book. (Accessed 4 June 2017) Bain, M. (2015) Why Doesn’t Serena Williams Have More Sponsor Deals? Atlantic Monthly, 31 August. Available at https​://ww​w.the​atlan​tic.c​om/en​terta​inmen​t/arc​hive/​2015/​08/se​rena-​willi​ams-s​ponso​ rship​-nike​-us-o​pen/4​02985​/. (Accessed 15 May 2017) Baker, W. (1988) Sport in the Western World, rev ed. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. Baltzell, E.D. (1995) Sporting Gentlemen: Men’s Tennis from the Age of Honor to the Cult of the Superstar. New York: The Free Press. ‘Billie Jean, Roy Emerson Turn Pro.’ (1968) News Clippings. George MacCall Papers; PSUA 6188; Box 2, Folder 4. Eberly Special Collections Library, Penn State University Libraries. BNP Paribas. (2017) ‘Roland-Garros 2017: Le plus prestigieux tournoi sur terre battue,’ available at https​:// gr​oup.b​nppar​ibas/​temps​forts​/rola​nd-ga​r ros-​2017/​pitch​. (Accessed 23 May 2017) Bodo, P. (1995) The Courts of Babylon: Tales of Greed and Glory in a Harsh New World of Professional Tennis. New York: Scribner. Carter, J. (1992) Medieval Games: Sports and Recreation in Feudal Society. New York: Greenwood. Carvalho, John. (2009) “An Honorable and Recognized Vocation”: Bill Tilden Makes the USLTA BackDown. Journal of Sport History, 36(1), 83–98. Castiglione, B. (2012; orig. 1528). The Book of the Courtier. Oxford: Benediction Classics. Deford, F. (2012) Big Bill Tilden:The Triumphs and the Tragedy. New York: Open Road Integrated Media. Dyreson, M. (1989) The Rise of Consumer Culture and the Transformation of Physical Culture: American Sport in the 1920s. Journal of Sport History, 16(3), 261–81. Englemann, L. (1988) The Goddess and the American Girl:The Story of Suzanne Lenglen and Helen Wills. New York: Oxford University Press. Fein, P. (2002) Tennis Confidential:Today’s Greatest Players, Matches and Controversies. Dulles,VA: Brassey’s. Feinstein, J. (1991) Hard Courts: Real Life on Professional Tennis Tours. New York:Villard Books. Gillmeister, H. (1997) Tennis: A Cultural History. London: University of Leicester Press. Hiller, G. (2009) The Bandies of Fortune. Perceptions of Real Tennis from Medieval to Modern Times. Oxford: Ronaldson Publications. Kastner, C. (2007) Bunion Derby:The 1928 Footrace across America. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press. Lake, R.J. (2015) A Social History of Tennis in Britain. London: Routledge. Llewellyn, M. and Gleaves, J. (2016) The Rise and Fall of Olympic Amateurism. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. MacCall, G. (1968) ‘Professional Tennis Proposal - Prepared June 26, 1968.’; George MacCall Papers; PSUA 6188; box 1, folder 4; Eberly Special Collections Library, Penn State University Libraries. 27

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Miller, Greg. (1968) ‘George MacCall Proud He Played Part in Bringing Acceptance to Pro Tennis.’ Las Vegas Sun, 4 July 1987, 6D; George MacCall Papers; PSUA 6188; box 1, folder 13; Eberly Special Collections Library, Penn State University Libraries’ Morgan, R. (1995) Tennis:The Development of the European Ball Game. Oxford: Ronaldson. Mrozek, D. (1983) Sport and American Mentality, 1880–1910. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press. Schultz, J. (2005) Reading the Catsuit: Serena Williams and the Production of Blackness at the 2002 U.S. Open. Journal of Sport and Social Issues, 29(3), 338–57. Wilson, E. (2014) Love Game: A History of Tennis, From Victorian Pastime to Global Phenomenon. London: Serpent’s Tail. Women’s Tennis Association. (2017a) WTA Official Rulebook. Available at http:​//www​.wtat​ennis​.com/​sites​ /defa​ult/f​i les/​rules​2017.​pdf. (Accessed 10 May 2017) Women’s Tennis Association. (2017b) ‘2017 WTA Calendar.’ Available at http://www.wtatennis.com/ calendar-2017. (Accessed 23 May 2017)

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3 Grass roots The development of tennis in Great Britain, 1918–78 Joyce Kay1

Lawn tennis can be played and enjoyed by boys and girls, men and women, of all degrees of excellence and of all ages. … [It] flourishes in the clubs, the schools and the public parks and… can be played and enjoyed almost literally from the cradle to the grave. It is a recreational amusement played not too seriously but with just sufficient competitive interest to make it attractive. The great beauty of the game of lawn tennis is that, like cricket, it’s a game for everyone. This was the opinion of J.C. Smyth (1953), tennis correspondent of the Sunday Times from 1946 to 1951. Perhaps these sentiments help to explain why historical research in tennis has focused on the professional, competitive and elite aspects of the sport. Well-respected general histories of British sport in the twentieth century have continued to emphasise the upper-middle- or middle-class roots of tennis, harking back to the days when it was played on suburban and vicarage lawns (Hargreaves 1994; Hill 2002; Polley 1998). Even when opportunities for mass participation have been acknowledged, the image of posh tennis has lingered on, together with the suggestion that snobbishness within private clubs and the Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) have contributed in no small way to Britain’s failure to find “stars” (see: Lake 2008; Walker 1989). However, tennis is essentially for amateurs; like golf, there are very few opportunities for individuals to make a living on a limited professional circuit. More attention is needed on the grass-roots game developed in the mid-twentieth century and the role played by a variety of clubs. As far as tennis is concerned, we are still unclear ‘about the organizations of sport at levels below national bodies’ (Maclean 2008, p.49). A brief history of grass-roots tennis in the 60 years after 1918 illustrates its fluctuating fortunes. Recovering rapidly from wartime privations, it reached out into new communities during the inter-war years. This was the heyday of two under-researched sports spaces, public parks and workplaces, and ‘tennis for the millions’ was said to be the cry in Britain (Sheffield and District LTA, 1989, p.17). Some clubs suffered during the depression years of the early 1930s, and war ensured that others closed their gates for good. Although the immediate post-war period saw the formation of new clubs, particularly in schools, the sport was undermined from

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the mid-1950s by alternative leisure opportunities and increasingly poor facilities, and was overwhelmed by indifference, escalating costs and vandalism in the 1960s. Some clubs fought to balance the books by attracting more – and younger – members, and improving both the playing and the social environment; others were not equal to the task. Local authorities failed to maintain their courts, and pleas to increase the development of public parks tennis went unheeded, while workplace sport, in general, began to decline in a changing industrial landscape. By the early 1970s there was a danger that the “everyone for tennis” optimism of the inter-war years would revert to the “anyone for tennis” model of the pre-1914 era (see Lusis 1998). This chapter aims in part to demonstrate the scale of grass-roots involvement in tennis, but several challenges exist. These include determining accurate numbers for the membership size of clubs, given the poor records of these in any official documentation, and the number of clubs specific to a particular county as well as nationally. This includes clubs that were unaffiliated to the LTA, which in counties like Nottinghamshire in the 1920s may have been as high as 80% (Lusis 1998). Estimates suggest, nationally, that affiliated clubs numbered between 2,500 and 4,500 during the period under investigation, but these figures may have included clubs connected with schools (see: Walker 1989). It is clearly impossible to determine the how many people were playing tennis at any given point or the size of the “average” tennis club but, taking account of the substantial networks of informal organisations throughout Britain, it would seem that far more tennis was being played than we have been led to believe. The key sources for this chapter include a combination of official and “amateur” sources, notably annual LTA handbooks and county LTA histories. Local historians, club secretaries and long-standing members have used minutes and other documents, personal recollection, interviews and newspapers to produce written accounts of their own associations, often to celebrate a centenary or important milestone. Using all of these sources together with material from company archives, this chapter demonstrates that tennis in Britain was not only for the privileged, and opportunities existed for lower-income families to play in public parks and company sports grounds in the middle decades of the last century. As these facilities were lost, low-cost options narrowed. Although the maintenance of social exclusivity may have been of paramount concern to some private clubs, it is suggested that the struggle for survival was likely to be uppermost in the thoughts of many more. Given the predominance of work that has focused on tennis in the South, this chapter will give added attention to the Midlands, the North and Scotland. An overview of grass-roots tennis in Britain from 1918 to 1978 will outline the development of the sport and attempt to quantify its changing fortunes.

Overview of grass-roots tennis 1918–78 Evidence suggests that tennis was booming throughout Britain in the 1920s. According to Lusis (1998), existing clubs in Nottinghamshire were ‘bursting at the seams’, and new clubs opened every year. Of the 270 for which formation dates are known, one-third were started in the 1920s. Of 51 West of Scotland clubs still in existence in 2004, 14 (27%) were founded in the 1920s, a higher number than any previous decade (Hunter 2004). Tennis “took off ” in the Colwyn Bay area of North Wales in the early 1920s and the North Wales LTA was founded in 1925 (Jones 2000, p.10). The number of clubs affiliated to Surrey County LTA rose from 114 in 1923 to ‘well over 200’ by 1937 (Paish 1996, p.4–5), and in Durham and Cleveland, affiliated clubs increased from 23 to 71 between 1922 and 1930 (Durham & Cleveland LTA 1999). The economic problems of the early 1930s temporarily stalled this expansion. One-off entry fees at some of the more prestigious clubs were waived, and subscriptions were widely reduced; 30

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groundsmen had their hours and wages cut and coaches were let go. A variety of solutions were proposed at different clubs to boost numbers including Sunday opening, cheaper rates for combined husband/wife or family membership or a broadening of the tennis club to include other sports. Squash courts were built at prestigious venues such as the Priory and Edgbaston clubs in Birmingham and Surbiton in Greater London, while the Hazelwood club in Enfield settled for a putting green and “ping pong” (Edgbaston Priory Club 1975; Hazelwood LTC 2009; Surbiton LT&SC 1981). The war years brought a host of difficulties. Many clubs suffered financial problems as members were called up to service; some were only kept going by private loans, and others were forced to close. The Hollies club in Nottinghamshire never recovered after a Lancaster bomber came down on its courts (Lusis 1998). Tennis balls were in short supply, many courts became derelict or were ploughed up for use as allotments, and county activities were suspended. Despite these problems, it was not a tale of unmitigated gloom. Land girls helped with ground maintenance at the Radyr LTC near Cardiff (Clark 1989). Clarkston Bowling and Tennis Club in Glasgow kept up morale by hosting dances for servicemen and women on leave, as did Putney LTC in London (Clarkston B&TC 1959; Putney LTC 1979). For others the war brought new members. Padgate Tennis and Bowling Club in Cheshire benefited from overseas military personnel stationed nearby, and the relocation of several government departments to the Colwyn Bay–Llandudno area of North Wales during the war was said to have raised standards in the area clubs (Cheshire LTA 1995; Jones 2000). A more controversial item was recorded in the history of the Winchester club. Although US service personnel supported fundraising bazaars and dances, the club committee ‘sadly agreed that black officers should not be admitted in order to conform with American custom’ (Mussell, 1994). The dislocation caused by war left tennis in a run-down state in the 1940s. In Durham and Cleveland, a number of well-known clubs disappeared and it was some time before others could restore their courts to playing condition (Durham & Cleveland LTA 1999). The historian of Surrey LTA, though acknowledging that many clubs had been forced to let their courts become overgrown in wartime, found it ‘amazing’ how quickly they were brought back into use (Paish 1996, p.13). In Essex, 66 clubs affiliated to the county LTA in 1947 had risen to 144 in 1950; in rural Shropshire, the number of clubs doubled between 1946 and 1948 (Essex LTA 1995). Although some struggled – and some failed – to replace members and repair grounds, new clubs sprung up, mergers were undertaken, and new coaching initiatives were introduced by county LTAs. Those with adequate funds relayed courts instead of trying to repair them, as at Honor Oak in south London and Chapel Allerton in Leeds (Alexander 1965; Chapel Allerton LT&SC 1980). Others, perhaps foreseeing the difficulty of hiring groundsmen in an increasingly competitive job market, replaced their grass with a variety of hard courts requiring less maintenance. Cullercoats LTC was not alone in having to fight with its local authority to get land released from agricultural use back to sport (Angus 1993). In general, however, hopes were high; leagues re-formed and tennis regained its inter-war popularity. The 1950s saw the sport reach its peak in terms of adult participation and for some clubs this was the ‘golden decade’ (Costelloe 1998, p.10). But problems were already on the horizon. The number of affiliated clubs in Britain fell by almost one-fifth in the 10 years 1956–66, and club and county LTA histories also reflect the downturn in grass-roots tennis throughout the country. In North Wales, tennis was said to be ‘in a parlous state’ by 1964 with ten clubs closing in the previous year (Jones 2000, p.28). The East Gloucestershire LTC in Cheltenham suffered a ‘drastic fall in members’ in 1957 and reduced its annual subscriptions in an effort to attract new 31

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recruits. Presumably this failed to improve matters as it was forced to advertise for members in the local papers in 1964, a fate that had befallen the Winchester club as early as 1952 (Rockett 1985, p.13). Bellahouston LTC, a founder club of the West of Scotland LTA, was forced to close in the late 1960s at the time of the M8 roadworks. Hillhead LTC, swallowed up by extensions to the BBC headquarters in Glasgow, and Liberton LTC in Edinburgh, formed in 1883, were driven to extinction after repeated acts of vandalism (Hunter 2004). Throughout Britain, tennis courts disappeared under blocks of flats, car parks and playgrounds. Small private clubs were squeezed out of existence by the rising costs, increases in local authority rating assessment, compulsory land purchase orders and anti-social behaviour. Worse was to follow in the 1970s with competition from leisure centres and large multi-sport facilities but the decline in public park courts was even more significant for the concept of “everyone for tennis”.

Tennis in public parks Although there are scattered references to tennis in public parks and open spaces, insufficient is known about this aspect of the sport. Dorothea Chambers, seven-time winner of the Wimbledon singles, referred to opportunities for playing in public parks as early as 1910. In larger urban areas, some tennis courts had been constructed under park improvements schemes before the war – Manchester was said to have 46 courts in one venue alone (Walker 1989). Seaside resorts often boasted a range of leisure facilities before 1914; an advertisement for Scarborough in 1913 listed three golf courses, five bowling greens and 20 tennis courts as well as sailing and fishing. After the war, town councils were encouraged to promote themselves as tourist destinations as a result of the Health Resorts and Watering Places Act of 1921, and ‘any place with a foothold in the tourist business’ embarked on improvements to their amenities which often included tennis courts, putting and bowling greens, bandstands and paddling pools (Anderson & Swinglehurst 1978, p.16). While these were aimed at visitors, they were obviously available to locals as well, and numerous private clubs were formed to take advantage of these public facilities. For those who could afford it, many larger hotels catered for tennis holidays, some boasting their own professional coach in the summer season. Lowe’s Lawn Tennis Annual for 1935 contains 39 pages of advertisements for ‘the large number of fine hotels with facilities for tennis scattered about Britain, both round the coast and inland’ (Lowe 1935, p.iii). Much like in the US and Australia, municipal provision continued to grow in the inter-war period in Britain. The Sheffield Parks Association, set up in 1921, was responsible for building ‘hundreds of “parks” courts’ and The Star newspaper sponsored a cup competition (Sheffield & District LTA 1989). The Scottish Public Parks LTA was formed in 1932 by delegates from Edinburgh, Dundee and Glasgow, and moves were underway before 1939 to affiliate to the Scottish LTA. In Edinburgh, the local Evening Dispatch trophy was competed for in the Meadows, a large open space near the centre of Edinburgh; hundreds came to watch the finals. Tennis courts in public parks were said to be packed: ‘you had to book well ahead’ (Robertson 1995, p. 173). Costs were also reasonable: an hour’s bowls or tennis was available for 2d an hour at a time when the average wage was around £3 15s. Converted to current prices, a tennis court could be hired for less than 50p (Jones 1986). The case of Glasgow is particularly interesting. Glasgow Public Parks LTA, established in 1926, provided ‘a huge amount’ of tennis and had many more courts than the private clubs (Hunter 2004, p.190). It affiliated to the West of Scotland LTA and entered teams in men’s and women’s leagues; it organised six divisions within the parks and played home and away matches. It was said that dozens lined the park courts to watch ordinary folk playing a match and possibly pick up tips, and that youngsters, in particular, learned to play the game this way, by watching. 32

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With no clubhouse/hospitality facilities, there was no ‘garden party image’ here although the Association did celebrate its silver jubilee in 1951 with a dance at Glasgow City Chambers. But by the early 1970s it had ceased to exist. One reason suggested was that, from the early 1960s, many park players ‘went private’, ‘perhaps because it was cheaper’ (Hunter 2004, 191-2). This was certainly a period in which some local authorities were raising their charges. An article from The Scotsman (23 November 1960) calculated that costs for municipal bowls and golf were now comparable with private clubs ‘where facilities were infinitely superior’. There is no reason to believe that tennis was any different. In 1972 (20 July), the Edinburgh Evening News claimed that the number of players on public bowling greens had more than halved in ten years and that ‘the drift from public greens to private clubs has been going on for years’. For whatever reason, public tennis also became less popular and descriptions of people queuing to play on a park court became distant memories. The Leeds Parks Association, in which ‘many people had their introduction to tennis’, folded in the 1960s during a general decline in tennis, and the courts fell into poor condition (Chapel Allerton LT&SC 1980). Holt and Mason (2000) found that the numbers playing municipal tennis in Birmingham fell by 55% from 1956 to 1964 and although they thought this primarily reflected a lack of coaching facilities it is possible that cost was another factor. An important link in the above examples is that they all refer to northern areas of Britain. Although the south-east of England is supposed to be the natural heartland of tennis, no references to public parks tennis have been discovered in county histories for Bedfordshire, Surrey and Essex. Lusis (1998) found that Nottingham had no public courts until 1922 when over 60 were built, with many sub-let to small clubs. After the war the sports ground became an industrial estate. The Nottingham Parks LTA was formed at an alternative site in 1950, decades later than those further north, but appears to have closed at a later date in the 1950s. Lake and Lusis (2017) uncovered only a handful of well-supported park associations further south, including the Birmingham Parks LTA, London Parks & Clubs LTA and Brighton & Hove Parks LTA, but there is little evidence of any more. With evidence from the public parks, thus, it is increasingly difficult to reconcile statements such as Holt’s (1996, p.160), that ‘tennis was a suburban, Southern sport not much followed in the North outside of the leafy suburbs of the big cities’.

Tennis in the workplace Interestingly, detailed research drawn from LTA Official Handbooks during the post-war period, when LTA affiliation was at its highest, shows that approximately 30% of private clubs, nearly 1000 in 1956, operated within the workplace. In one area – Derbyshire – this reached 58%; half of all 36 English counties recorded above average numbers of works tennis clubs in that year. Ten years later, at a time when municipal tennis was in decline, figures for workplace clubs remained steady. Given that affiliation necessitated at least 20 members, a bare minimum of 20,000 were playing tennis on company courts during this period. This figure could be considerably higher when smaller tennis sections of works sports clubs and other non-unaffiliated groups are included. The great boom in company tennis probably occurred during the inter-war period but a few firms had introduced it earlier. Munting (2003) identified several firms in the Norwich area that offered tennis before 1914, and, according to company archives, Lever Bros. Port Sunlight works in Cheshire as well as Cadburys Bournville factory had constructed tennis courts as early as 1897 and 1904, respectively. At Bournville, in 1926, 36 all-male and all-female tennis teams played 233 competitive matches, not counting the numerous casual tennis games. By the 1930s, Bournville was affiliated to the Warwickshire LTA and, boasting 60 tennis courts, also took part 33

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in the Birmingham Tennis League. Far from the preserve of the rich, the Bournville archive also suggested a fairly even spread of tennis interest among the various ranks of employees. Other examples of employers providing opportunities to play tennis, both for leisure and competition, included Clark’s Thread Mills in Linwood, near Glasgow. It ran the Anchor Recreation Club for employees from 1923 until the firm closed in 1983, and in the 1920s two female employees won the Scottish Welfare Tennis Association open tournament (Hunter 2004). The John Lewis Partnership took part in the West End LTA leagues, battling opponents from firms such as Harrods, Lyons and Nestlé. According to the John Lewis Partnership Gazette (1 July 2000), Miss F. Haldane, a clerical worker at their Peter Jones department store in London, competed at Wimbledon in 1923, having won the retailers’ ladies’ singles for the fourth successive year. In Hull, an association of 52 firms representing 30,000 employees organised sections for tennis, angling, billiards, ladies’ golf and cricket (Jones 1986). From Lusis’s (1998) research, works clubs of every description can be found in Nottinghamshire: at hospitals and colleges of education, police forces and RAF stations, co-operative societies and political organisations and a wide range of factories including everything from heavy engineering and machine tool plants to rope works and hosiery companies. Figures calculated from LTA handbooks show that Nottinghamshire averaged 46 affiliated clubs over the period 1936-76, nearly 40% of which were works clubs. Many more operated outside the official system, organising their own leagues and tournaments, and foremost amongst these were the regional colliery and miners’ welfare clubs. The Mining Industry Act of 1920 had created a Welfare Fund ‘to be applied for purposes connected with the social wellbeing, recreation and conditions of living of workers in and about coal mines’ and many areas chose to support sports facilities (Jones 1986, p.73). The Collieries Alliance League in Nottinghamshire ran mixed-sex and men-only tennis leagues and knock-out tournaments from the early 1920s to 1969. Twelve different colliery or welfare clubs won these competitions over 45 years, but a further 24 were known to exist. Most had two or three courts and closed in the 1960s; a few lasted into the 1980s. (Lusis 1998). It is unlikely that Nottinghamshire was alone among the mining counties in organising colliery leagues but further research in areas such as Durham, Yorkshire or Central Scotland would be useful for comparison.The LTA handbook for 1956 indicates that there were at least 75 affiliated working men’s club and miner’s welfare tennis groups throughout the North but 30 years later, with large-scale colliery closures and alternative leisure options, there were only seven. Workplace tennis was also a feature of the South. There may have been more clubs in banking, retail and public service and a smaller percentage of company sports clubs overall, but in only a handful of areas did the figure fall below 20% of the total. While the Midlands were strongly represented with works clubs, as befits the industrial heartland of England, even in the leafy Home Counties – Berkshire, Hertfordshire and Middlesex – nearly a quarter of tennis clubs were workplace-based. The multiple motivations behind company provision of sports facilities – the improvement of health and physical fitness to increase productivity, the attraction and retention of staff, or, in the opinion of one Sheffield steel magnate, ‘the best antidote to revolution and revolutionary ideas’, have been discussed elsewhere (see: Long 2011; Munting 2003). Government and employers in the inter-war years were certainly of the opinion that the provision of sports facilities promoted class collaboration rather than confrontation and, by this period, classic Victorian notions of rational recreation, middle-class philanthropy and paternalism had faded. Company sports clubs were, in any case, a mixture of white- and blue-collar personnel, as seen at Bournville. As in the public parks, the costs of playing works sport were often ridiculously cheap with equipment usually provided free or for a nominal sum. Annual membership of the Bournville Athletic Club remained at 6s, or £5 in current prices, from 1926 34

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to the post-war era. A 1938 survey in Industrial Welfare noted that, for about 3d a week usually deducted from the wage packet at source, many employees had access to a wealth of facilities, including tennis courts (Jones 1986). The John Lewis Partnership, employing around 30,000 staff by 1970, had its own ‘country clubs’ offering a wide range of outdoor activities such as cricket, football, hockey and tennis. According to its Chronicle from 23 February 1962, full annual membership cost one day’s pay up to a limit of 8 guineas (c.£115), and 12 guineas for a family membership. Other firms negotiated playing facilities for their staff at local clubs. IBM arranged for 70 of its employees to receive a 25% discount on fees at the Winchester Tennis and Squash Club in 1965; this was reduced to 20% in 1974 (Mussell 1994). Access to works clubs was sometimes open to non-employees as well, opening up opportunities for the wider community. Weir Recreation, the sports club of Weir Pumps Limited in the West of Scotland, offered associate membership for 12s 6d in 1948 (less than £15) (Hunter 2004). It is important not to overlook how important company sport provision could have been for a sizeable section of the population, and how many opportunities it offered lower-income households to take part in activities perhaps previously beyond their means. Not all employers, however, were as enthusiastic as John Spedan Lewis, son of the original founder John Lewis, who was intimately connected with the business from the first decade of the twentieth century until his retirement in 1955. Strongly influenced by the Cadbury family, he was motivated by ‘a desire to give his father’s employees the chance to do things their station in life and lack of money wouldn’t ordinarily allow them’. Fifty years after his death, the John Lewis Partnership ‘is now alone in the scale and range of subsidised facilities for its employees’ (Cox 2010, p.278).

Tennis in the clubs Grass-roots tennis is most closely associated with the private neighbourhood club, with its “garden party” ambience, its ‘important function in the marriage market’ and its afternoon teas (Hill 2002, p.144). Indeed, in their published histories, both Hazelwood LTC and Bromley Wendover LTC mentioned numerous marriages between club members, and at Finchley Manor (north London), summer teas with the Vicar halted play for half an hour in the 1950s (Finchley Manor LTC, 1981). At Bramhall Lane (Cheshire) the importance of teas only tailed off in the late 1960s to be replaced by cocktail parties at which the ladies committee, as was typical, provided the food (Gare 2000). Others abandoned their ‘duties’ much earlier. At Braid Tennis Club in Edinburgh, outside caterers were appointed in 1938 as it had been such a struggle to find volunteers (Borthwick 1990); but at Radyr the question of ‘should the ladies make the cakes for Saturday tea or should the club buy them’ was still being debated in the 1980s (Clark 1989, p.6). Catering was an ever-present problem for many clubs. Clubs could be, and usually were, affected by general economic conditions: a tennis club subscription is likely to have been an early casualty in any period of financial stringency. Improvements, deterioration or other physical changes to facilities could result in growth or decline in members. Poor grass maintenance at Hale LTC in the early 1960s led to a fall in adult membership, ‘a similar decline in bar takings and social events’ and a consequent rise in subscription rates (Nelson 2004). The changing demographics of local communities sometimes had an impact: Aughton LTC benefited from its rise as a dormitory suburb of Liverpool and St Helens after 1945 (Hargreaves 1992), but in the early 1970s, Birkenhead LTC was ‘being run on a shoestring’ and only a fear of resignations prevented a rise in subscriptions ‘in a district that was declining in affluence’ (Cook 1992, p.27). Mergers with other local clubs raised numbers rapidly 35

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and ensured survival, as experienced by both Chapel Allerton (Leeds) and Busby (Glasgow) in the 1940s (Chapel Allerton LTC 1980; Hunter 2004). The age profile of a club was also an important consideration. When Bearsden LTC introduced a waiting list for seniors in the early 1920s with no automatic transfer rights for juniors, a new local club poached many of its younger members (Bearsden LTC 1987). There are some examples of junior players saving clubs from extinction in the 1930s, but there is also evidence suggesting that under-18s were disadvantaged and discriminated against in their access to court time, and were tolerated rather than encouraged by adults (Lake 2008; Lusis 1998). By the 1960s, some clubs had well over 40% of their membership as juniors. Bearsden LTC had 116 juniors in 1964 from a total of 286 (40%); 102 members at Cullercoats LTC in Whitley Bay included 40 juniors in 1962; Blundellsands LTC in the Liverpool suburb of Crosby had 88 juniors in 1945 but only 48 seniors which suggests that the youngsters were playing an important role in keeping the club afloat during the war (Angus 1993; Bearsden LTC 1987; Blundellsands LTC 1980; Cullercoats LTC 1993). However, the Cardonald club, in Glasgow, had a thriving junior membership at this time but closed because it had too few seniors, and conversely, Rutherglen, in another suburb of Glasgow, went into decline in the early 1970s when many team members retired or took up golf – there was no veterans’ tennis then. (Hunter 2004). Three distinct types of private tennis club deserve a brief mention. Village clubs played an important part in the growth of tennis during the inter-war years; church clubs and leagues also popularised the sport in the mid-twentieth century; and school tennis clubs became increasingly visible from the 1950s. In Nottinghamshire, it was said that all but the smallest villages boasted a tennis club (Lusis 1998). Bridge of Weir in Scotland started out in 1930 with one court on the terrace of the local hotel and even at its height had only 40 adult members; nearby Elderslie, formed in 1926 with assistance from a local landowner, was ‘very much a community club’ that gave residents priority membership; Stepps ran into financial difficulty in 1913 but was re-constituted with a membership of 50 after the war when representatives of the other village clubs – cricket, golf and bowls – gathered to celebrate the opening (Hunter 2004). The popularity of village clubs at this time probably reflects the lack of leisure opportunities; not all survived the war and the advent of mass car ownership and alternative attractions in the 1950s. Church tennis clubs were also prominent, but many remained small, unaffiliated and underrecorded. In Nottinghamshire, a churches league operated in Retford from 1926–40. The small community of Hucknall, seven miles from Nottingham, boasted five church clubs: Baptist, Methodist, Congregational and two of indeterminate faith; overall, 12% of Nottinghamshire’s clubs were attached to churches (Lusis 1998). Jack Williams’ (1996) study of church-based sport in north of England towns, relying heavily on local newspapers, found that only one of his sample, Bolton, had a tennis league specifically for church clubs. He thought it likely that many church clubs were too small or informal to play in competitions and were therefore overlooked by the press. Nevertheless, over 100 were large enough to be mentioned in the 1956 LTA handbook. By 1966, that number had halved. Some may have followed the route taken by the Alderley LTC, founded at Hoylake (Cheshire) in 1922 by a few members of the Presbyterian Church of Wales, for the exclusive use of church members. Before the war, friends were allowed to play occasionally as guests but after 1945 the non-church contingent grew to the point at which they were in the majority; the club finally severed any link with its founding body (Cheshire LTA 1995). The church’s role in supporting tennis and other sports across Britain, particularly in the mid-twentieth century, deserves to be studied more fully. The part played by school tennis clubs in introducing the game to youngsters is another aspect that has been virtually ignored, perhaps because it has been assumed that only the private sector offered this opportunity. It is certainly true that the cups presented by Lord Aberdare 36

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and C.R. Glanvill in the mid-1940s ‘to promote team spirit and improve the standard of play’ in girls’ and boys’ schools were won on numerous occasions by Millfield and a raft of grammar schools and girls’ colleges until 1982, when the first comprehensive school winner was recorded. However, the LTA handbooks show that affiliations rose from only 93 schools in 1936 to 734 in 1956 and 1836 in 1976, and that in the post-war period the number of girls’ schools has remained constant while boys’ schools and especially co-educational schools have increased dramatically.

Conclusion Although evidence from club histories has been used to trace the development of tennis in the mid-twentieth century, this chapter has been more concerned with aspects that have been largely overlooked. It has also concentrated on areas of Britain outside of London and the South-east: what is typical there may not be replicated further north. This may be illustrated with reference to Suzanne Lenglen’s famous bandeau, which was ‘de rigeur for chic women on and off the court’ in the 1920s Wimbledon and other wealthy southern suburbs (Brasher 1986, p.202), but in Scotland, it is singularly absent from photographs of cup-winning ladies’ teams in the mid-1920s (although the lady herself played an exhibition at Hampden Park in 1927 in front of 8000 spectators), nor amongst the female members of the colliery leagues (Robertson 1995). We need more visual evidence of tennis for the masses from the inter-war period.

Note 1 Various sections of this chapter have been reproduced previously, in: Kay J. (2012). Grass Roots: The Development of Tennis in Britain, 1918–1978. International Journal of the History of Sport, 29(18), 2532– 50. The author would like to thank the Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland for financial help towards research costs and Cadburys Bournville, the John Lewis Partnership and Lever Bros Port Sunlight for archival access and assistance.

References Alexander, M.B. (1965) A History of Honor Oak Cricket and Lawn Tennis Club – Centenary 1866–1965. Dulwich: Honor Oak Cricket and Lawn Tennis Club. Anderson, J. and Swinglehurst, E. (1978) The Victorian and Edwardian Seaside. London: Hamlyn. Angus, E. (1993) Cullercoats Lawn Tennis Club, 1893–1993. Cullercoats: Cullercoats Lawn Tennis Club. Bearsden LTC (1987) Bearsden Lawn Tennis Club 1887–1987. Glasgow: Bearsden Lawn Tennis Club. Blundellsands LTC (1980) Blundellsands Lawn Tennis Club Centenary 1880–1980. Crosby, Lancashire: Blundellsands Lawn Tennis Club. Borthwick, A. (1990) Braid Tennis Club: A Centenary History 1890–1990. Edinburgh: Braid Tennis Club. Brasher, K. (1986) “Traditional Versus Commercial Values in Sport: The Case of Tennis”. In The Politics of Sport, Edited by: Allison, Lincoln. 198–215. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Chapel Allerton LT&SC (1980) Chapel Allerton Lawn Tennis and Squash Club 1880–1980. Leeds: Chapel Allerton Lawn Tennis and Squash Club. Cheshire LTA (1995) Cheshire County Lawn Tennis Association Centenary 1895–1995. Cheshire LTA. Clark, G. (1989) Radyr Lawn Tennis Club, 1914 to 1989. Cardiff, Wales: Radyr Lawn Tennis Club. Clarkson B&TC (1959) Clarkston Bowling and Tennis Club Jubilee History 1909–1959. Glasgow: Clarkston Bowling and Tennis Club. Cook, K.C. (1992) Birkenhead Lawn Tennis Club Limited 1892–1992. Birkenhead: Birkenhead Lawn Tennis Club. Costelloe, D. (1998) A History of Catford Wanderers Lawn Tennis Club 1914–1998. London: Catford Wanderers Lawn Tennis Club. Cox, P. (2010) Spedan's Partnership:The Story of John Lewis and Waitrose. London: Labatie Books. 37

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Durham & Cleveland LTA. (1999) History of Durham & Cleveland Lawn Tennis Association 1895–1999. Durham & Cleveland LTA. Edgbaston Priory Club (1975) Edgbaston Priory Club: Centenary Year 1875–1975. Birmingham: Edgbaston Priory Club. Essex LTA. (1995) Tennis in Essex:The First 100 Years, 1895–1995. Essex LTA Finchley Manor LTC. (1981) A Centennial History of Finchley Manor Lawn Tennis and Squash Rackets Club 1881–1981. London: Finchley Manor Lawn Tennis and Squash Rackets Club. Gare, T. (2000) Bramhall Lane Lawn Tennis Club: A Story of More Than 90 Years of Tennis. Stockport: Bramhall Lane Lawn Tennis Club. Hargreaves, I. (1992) Aughton Lawn Tennis Club Centenary 1892–1992. Ormskirk, Lancashire: Aughton Lawn Tennis Club. Hargreaves, J. (1994) Sporting Females: Critical Issues in the History and Sociology of Women's Sport. London: Routledge. Hazelwood LT&SC (2009) Hazelwood Lawn Tennis and Squash Club 1909–2009. Enfield, London: Hazelwood Lawn Tennis and Squash Club. Hill, J. (2002) Sport, Leisure & Culture in Twentieth-Century Britain. Basingstoke: Palgrave. Holt, R. (1996) Heroes of the North: Sport and the Shaping of Regional Identity. In Sport and Identity in the North of England, Edited by: Hill, Jeff and Williams, Jack. 137–64. Keele: Keele University Press. Holt, R. and Mason, T. (2000) Sport in Britain 1945–2000. Oxford: Blackwell. Hunter, M. (2004) 100 Years of Tennis in the West of Scotland, 1904–2004. Glasgow: West of Scotland Lawn Tennis Association. Jones, E.S. (2000) Tennis in North Wales. Ruthin: Elwyn Jones. Jones, S.G. (1986) Workers at Play: A Social and Economic History of Leisure 1918–1939. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Lake, R.J. (2008) Social Exclusion in British Tennis: A History of Privilege and Prejudice. PhD diss., Brunel University. Lake, R.J. & Lusis, A. (2017) ‘Sandwich-men parade the streets’: Conceptualizing Regionalism and the North-South Divide in British Lawn Tennis. International Journal of the History of Sport, 34(7/8), 578–98. LTA (1956) Lawn Tennis Association Official Handbook, 1956. London: Lawn Tennis Association. Long, V. (2011) The Rise and Fall of the Healthy Factory: The Politics of Industrial Health in Britain, 1914–60. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Lowe, F.G., ed. (1935) Lowe's Lawn Tennis Annual 1935. London: Eyre & Spottiswoode. Lusis, A. (1998) Tennis in Robin Hood's County: The Story of Tennis Clubs in Nottinghamshire. Nottingham: Andy Lusis. Maclean, M. (2008) Evolving Modern Sport. Journal of Sport History, 35(1), 49–55. Munting, R. (2003) The Games Ethic and Industrial Capitalism before 1914: The Provision of Company Sports. Sport in History, 23(1), 45–63. Mussell, B. (1994) Winchester Tennis and Squash Club: A Historical Record 1906–1992.Winchester:Winchester Tennis and Squash Club. Nelson, J.V. (2004) A History of Hale Lawn Tennis Club. Altrincham: Hale Lawn Tennis Club. Paish, G.L. (1996) Surrey County Lawn Tennis Association – the first 100 Years 1896–1996. Brockham: Paish. Polley, M. (1998) Moving the Goalposts: A History of Sport and Society Since 1945. London: Routledge. Putney LTC (1979) Putney Lawn Tennis Club Centenary Special 1879–1979. London: Putney Lawn Tennis Club. Robertson, G. (1995) Tennis in Scotland: 100 Years of the Scottish Lawn Tennis Association 1895–1995. Edinburgh: Scottish Lawn Tennis Association. Rockett, D.E. (1985) East GloucestershireTennis Club Centenary 1885–1985. Cheltenham: East Gloucestershire Tennis Club. Sheffield & District Lawn Tennis Association. (1989) Sheffield and District Lawn Tennis Association: The First Hundred Years, 1889–1989. Sheffield: Sheffield & District Lawn Tennis Association. Smyth, J.G. (1953) Lawn Tennis. London: B.T. Batsford. Surbiton LT&SRC (1981) Surbiton Lawn Tennis and Squash Rackets Club Centenary 1881–1981. London: Surbiton Lawn Tennis and Squash Rackets Club. Walker, H. (1989) Lawn Tennis. In Sport in Britain: A Social History, Edited by: Mason,T. 245–75. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Williams, J. (1996) Churches, sport and identities in the North, 1900–1939. Sport and Identity in the North of England, Edited by: Hill, Jeff and Williams, Jack. 113–36. Keele: Keele University Press.

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4 Coaching and training in British tennis A history of competing ideals Robert J. Lake, Dave Day and Simon J. Eaves

Attitudes toward training and coaching in British sport generally in the late 19th century tended to reflect dominant amateur ideals that stressed the exhibition of behavioural self-restraint and fair play, and generally rejected “professional” impulses.The emphases on effortless success, exercise moderation and physical/body symmetry, combined with an almost institutional abhorrence of specialization and the notion of taking sport “too seriously”, impacted the development of British training/coaching practices in profound ways (Carter 2010; Day 2012). It brought into question how players should approach their sport, how complex skills should be learnt, and how often and in what ways they should train. As an almost exclusively amateur and middle-class sport, lawn tennis in Britain was subject to these impediments, which profoundly impacted the role, influence, professional standards and social status of coaches and their craft. Hitherto, the status of the professional trainer/coach across most sports ‘differed little from that of a servant or labourer’ (Tranter 1998, p.71), but while amateur administrators in boxing and athletics often acknowledged their influence (see Day & Carpenter 2015), lawn tennis officials were less supportive. Recently gathered evidence has shown that coaching-professionals began to be employed, often as “groundsmen”, from the 1880s in a small number of British clubs (Eaves, Lake & Cowdrey 2016). Their duties gradually expanded from court and clubhouse maintenance to instructing club members in basic stroke production, training ball-boys and stringing rackets. Reflecting their typically workingclass backgrounds, they tended to be referred to by their surnames, as were their counterparts in cricket, and were expected to behave toward club members with deference (Lake 2015). George Kerr was the first known club “pro”, based in Dublin’s Fitzwilliam LTC, and was much admired, acknowledged for bringing ‘the Irish amateurs to their present high standard’ (Pastime 20 August 1890, p.146). Gradually, other coaching-professionals emerged – including, most notably, Charles Read,Tom Fleming, Harry Cowdrey and Charles Hierons at London’s Queen’s Club, Tom Burke at Dublin’s Lansdowne Club and W. Marshall at Craigside Hydro Hotel in Llandudno, North Wales – but until the turn of the century their numbers were still relatively small, and all received their initial training at one of these small number of clubs. Accounts suggest these men were well-liked and considered ‘quiet, respectful and keen opponents’

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(Lawn Tennis 8 August 1900, p.278), similar to middle-class opinions of working-class professionals in cricket and golf, which reflected the more generic notion of the “respectable artisan” (see Holt 1989; Light 2010; Williams 2006). American periodicals also heaped praise on the British professionals employed there, and the New Zealander, Anthony Wilding (1912, p.41), considered a coaching-professional ‘an excellent type of man, capable, intelligent and courteous’, before expressing hope that ‘every club [can] afford to place one on its staff ’. Despite the gradual introduction of coaching-professionals into British lawn tennis, the instruction manuals/books for budding young players to learn from were almost exclusively authored by middle-class, amateur players or officials. The player-coach liaison closely mirrored the master-servant relationship characteristic of English upper-middle-class life, and, as with cricket and athletics coaches, class snobbery limited opportunities for lawn tennis coachingprofessionals to author coaching books/manuals until the inter-war period (Lake 2010a). Tinged with the class values of their authors, many of these British publications promoted various forms of self-learning ahead of coaching (see Baddeley 1895; Beldam & Vaile 1905; Wilberforce 1889). Heathcote (1890, p.216) urged beginners to watch good players at first, in order to see how they stand, how they hold the racket and hit the ball; afterwards, in order to ascertain their position in the court; and to learn as much as possible of their tactics in play. Dorothea Lambert Chambers (1910) recommended specifically for young women to play against a brick wall, discuss the game with friends and purchase books about tennis, so actionphotographs could be studied. One author who defied convention by recommending ‘proper coaching’ was the American writer Jahial Parmly Paret (1904, p.v), though he still suggested: ‘the game can be taught and learned by written instruction nearly as well as by personal direction’. In terms of stroke practice, most authors recommended play in moderation. Both Dwight (1886) and Wilberforce (1889) advised no more than the modest regime of five sets, three times a week. It was widely believed that excessive coaching through repetitive stroke practice and over-strenuous play led to ‘staleness’ or ‘slackness’ (Dod 1890; Dwight 1886;Vaile 1906), and that excessive muscular development was unnecessary ‘for skilful play at tennis’ (Paret 1904, p.237). Indeed, this was always an issue for the gentleman amateur sportsman concerned with symmetry and elegance (Day & Oldfield 2015). In a cultural environment where players were not supposed to take games too seriously, it is unsurprising that coaching-professionals were largely considered superfluous in Britain (Lake 2010a). Leading American, Australasian and continental European players from the mid-Edwardian period, however, thought differently; they used coaches, and also advocated physical training (Eaves 2016). Underpinned by imperialist ideals of innate class and racial supremacy, it was widely believed that “gentlemen amateurs” had natural ability in abundance, and did not need coaching (Day & Carpenter 2015). Baker (2004, p.1) remarked: ‘The amateur played the game vigorously and intensely but never took the outcome too seriously … [and] did not engage in unduly elaborate preparation’. The Renshaw brothers, William and Ernest, epitomized these values. Schooled at Cheltenham College, they dominated Wimbledon in the 1880s – winning 18 Wimbledon singles, doubles and mixed-doubles titles between them – and helped to revolutionize play by successfully cultivating the half-volley and overhead smash, but with little obvious training. It was apparently ‘well known’, stated Brownlee (1889, p.96) that William ‘does not trouble about training’, limiting it to ‘a couple of weeks’ (Doherty & Doherty 1903, p.46). Similarly, Ernest ‘is supposed to do rather less [strict training and preparation], yet no one has exhibited more 40

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wonderful proofs of endurance’ (Heathcote 1890, p.254).Their legendary status as quintessential British “gentlemen amateurs” was enhanced through public perceptions of their effortless success, and underpinned by a belief that excessive coaching would detract from natural style, flair, elegance and creativity (Lake 2015). Talk of their relaxed approach was certainly exaggerated, however. The Renshaw brothers established a winter training facility at the Beau Site Hotel in Cannes, from 1883, and enticed top American and British players over for practice matches and pre-season tournaments (Little 2014). The New York Times (25 April 1886) commented that the Renshaw’s were ‘at all times, hard at work’ at the Beau Site Hotel, and the Sydney Post (30 May 1891) stated the twins had ‘nothing else to do’ but ‘practice’. Perhaps due to the more relaxed approach to amateurism on the Continent, coaching-professionals were typically offered higher wages in the French Riviera, and enjoyed better working conditions than in Britain. Burke, for example, relocated to Paris and Nice, alternating seasons, in the late 1880s/1890s, followed by other British coaching-professionals, Kerr, Tom Fleming and Charles Haggett, who were stationed in Berlin,Vienna and Sweden respectively. Certainly, they would have helped train and/or coach elite players. Dozens of other British players, male and female, made the French Riviera their winter home and training hub, most notably the Doherty brothers, Reginald and Laurence.1 Educated at Westminster and Cambridge, and winners of 17 Wimbledon singles and doubles titles between them from 1897 to 1906, the Dohertys ‘completely dominated the sport, at home and abroad, with their graceful and outstanding stroke play’ (Little 2014, p.342). Passionate advocates of year-round training, they regularly attended Riviera clubs and tournaments between 1894 and 1909 (Little 2014).They were immensely talented but hard-working, championing “professional” training-methods and engaging the services of coaching-professional Tom Fleming, who was, himself, an exceptionally good player. Despite approaching the sport with a fierce will to win, the Dohertys were held in the highest possible esteem by fellow players, spectators and amateur officials (Lake 2015; Little 2014). However much the leading British players trained or engaged the services of coaching-professionals, or even received expenses and gratis travel, accommodation and equipment, it seems neither the press nor fellow players nor officials ever insinuated they were anything other than quintessential amateurs. The amateur definition was at once both precarious and malleable and, as Wagg (2006, p.534) suggested, was ‘pre-defined by their social position’, meaning ‘these values were only amateur when expressed by them’ (emphasis in the original). Thus, an appropriate “amateur spirit” was often assumed based on their class. Amateurs could train vigorously and receive coaching without any questioning of their “approach”, as they set and constantly reset the parameters of appropriate gentlemanly behaviour. The pre-war situation in Britain was qualitatively different from the United States, Australasia and continental Europe, where the professional sports trainer/coach was more highly regarded (Day & Carpenter 2015). Because of their more meritocratic approach to competitive sport in which systematic preparation was expected, Americans in particular placed greater value on professional expertise (Day 2013), so the notion of a professional coach/trainer plying his trade and instructing club members from wealthier backgrounds was more widely accepted. In fact, they were ‘respected and remunerated in a way that professionals never would be under a British system that emphasized amateur values’ (Day & Carpenter 2015, p.35). Indeed, lawn tennis coaching-professionals, from just before the First World War when Britons Charles Haggett and George Agutter were hired at the West Side Tennis Club in New York, earned comparatively better salaries and enjoyed greater respect and better working conditions there. 41

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In comparison, British clubhouses in the middle-class sports of golf and cricket resembled country houses, with clear hierarchies, established codes of etiquette, and segregated spaces for amateurs and professionals (see McKibbin 1998; Williams 2006). In lawn tennis, and even at more progressive clubs like London’s Queen’s Club, coaching-professionals and other ancillary staff used a separate entrance and were denied access to members’ lounges and other privileges deep into the inter-war period (Maskell 1988). However, Stephen Cowdrey, great-greatnephew of the former Queen’s Club professional Harry Cowdrey, recalled a conversation with his great-aunt in 1990, in which she claimed that club members and staff before the Great War mixed socially on occasion, at their local pub, the Pear Tree. The situation for coaches only really changed as an outcome of declining British performances from the mid-Edwardian era, which was also witnessed in rowing, cycling, swimming and athletics, and seemed to reflect Britain’s weakening global position more generally.The heavy death toll in the Second Boer War signalled deficiencies in military organization and national fitness, and America and Germany overtook Britain in economic development and industrial production (Bédarida 1979). Collectively, fears of British decline were rooted, and expressed as such, in growing discontent regarding the effectiveness and saliency of traditional British amateur methods and philosophy. Heavy defeats of the British athletic team at the 1908 and 1912 Olympic Games were particularly influential, considered a consequence of Americans employing coaches/trainers and adopting a more specialized and professional approach (Llewellyn 2011a, 2011b). This went against British amateur ideals that continued to value the all-rounder and sporting competition “for its own sake”. While the rhetoric behind these ideals was already being routinely flouted, as even Oxbridge rowing crews trained vigorously, it nevertheless led to a shift in public perceptions of the efficacy of traditional British sporting philosophies and methods (Day & Carpenter 2015). In lawn tennis, British success at Wimbledon was no longer guaranteed. During the interwar period, improving standards abroad occurred within an environment in which international sporting success increasingly mattered.This made talent development a greater priority, whereby the services of coaching-professionals were increasingly engaged (Huggins & Williams 2005).

Inter-war developments By the mid-1920s, the excuses of war had worn thin among a British public expectant of success in lawn tennis, and commentators recommended organizational reform. As early as 1902, the more progressive training methods and physical fitness of American players had been acknowledged by Wilberforce Eaves, who wrote that Americans ‘adopt more forcing tactics’, and contrary to British players are ‘trained to the hour’ (Sydney Herald 24 December 1902, p.1). The following year, Myers (1903, p.132) observed: In England there is, with a few notable exceptions, a sad absence of really advancing talent. … It is not the case on the Continent, it is not the case in America, nor is it the case in the Colonies. He attributed this situation to the ‘lack of proper instruction’ in the public schools and poor support by ‘the authorities’, and he drew particular attention to ‘the reluctance of wealthy clubs to employ a professional instructor’. The leading universities were also criticized for their unwillingness to hire lawn tennis coaching-professionals (Payn 1906). Broad debate still ensued about how the British should approach sport, and how much the more specialized, coach-centered, “professional” American methods constituted a departure 42

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from British amateur values (Huggins & Williams 2005; Wrynn 2010). Developments in lawn tennis certainly featured as part of this wider debate. Lowe (1924, p.126) predicted: We shall never produce champions capable of holding their own against foreign competition … until general interest is more widely stimulated in junior lawn tennis … The fact remains that for every promising youngster we turn out, there are at least a dozen in America, Australia and France. In an age when working-class concerns came increasingly to the forefront of public attention, partly through the collective war effort and the rise of the British Labour Party, coachingprofessionals also found a new platform to voice their grievances. Queen’s Club professional Charles Hierons (1924, p.103) wrote of America: ‘No nation takes lawn tennis so seriously. … Not only has she a greater number of young players to draw upon, but she takes hold of them at school, [and] trains them with professional teachers’. Indeed, American and continental European juniors typically began learning lawn tennis much earlier in life, while in Britain the recommendation in the 1920s was to avoid training until the age of fourteen (Hierons 1924; McKane 1925). The inter-war period did see a marked change, however, in the role and influence of coaching-professionals, as they played a more central role within an overall strategy for talent development. British schoolchildren were encouraged to utilize the expertise of coaches (Aitken 1924; Beamish & Beamish 1924; Hillyard 1924); children were advised to join clubs with the best coaches (see Blackmore 1921;Tuckey 1937 Wills 1928); and the LTA began employing coaching-professionals to instruct children in schools and clubs (Fry & Doust 1926; Millen 1927; Patterson 1939). While this was encouraging, information about coaching remained vague and uncritical, and Dorothy Round’s (1934, p.99) assertion that ‘it is possible now for a promising novice to obtain professional coaching quite cheaply’ ignored the structural exclusion that many children faced. Indeed, only public schools – essentially, private, fee-paying, boarding schools – and elite clubs were visited by LTA coaching-professionals (Lake 2010a). Coaching-professionals still struggled for acceptance, however, as seen in key areas: the growing scepticism about coaching and criticism of coaching practices; the denial of opportunities for coaches to attain match practice; the stigmatization of coaches as “professionals”; and their “second-class” treatment in many clubs (Lake 2010a). Despite efforts from leading coaches, schemes to develop the coaching craft had received little formal encouragement from the LTA (Lake & Eaves 2017). Coaches were hampered by claims that they, collectively, suppressed originality and discouraged individuality. For Fry and Doust (1926, p.57–8), coaching-professionals tended to demonstrate a particular stroke then ‘[deem] it expedient that his pupil should slavishly copy his methods’, which ‘has little or no real value’. Such methods were considered ‘utterly worthless for beginners’ (Miles 1925, p.21–2) and can ‘flatten out individualism’ (Patterson 1939, p.12). Frenchman and winner of seven major singles titles in the mid-1920s, René Lacoste (cited in Pollock 1926, p.38,40), suggested that coaches ‘will cramp, instead of develop, individual talent’, given they have so few opportunities to compete, themselves, ‘under match conditions’. Indeed, in 1922, the LTA passed a ruling allowing coaching-professionals to become club members, but forbidding them to represent their club, county or country in anything other than friendly competitions. Allowing the club “pro” to compete for their club, argued one LTA Councillor, ‘is not amateur in theory or in practice, and is only a short way removed from the action of getting a professional team to play for the club’ (LT&B 13 December 1924, p.894). 43

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LTA support for the institution of match-play for coaching-professionals did not commence until 1924, when they sanctioned amateurs-versus-professionals doubles competitions at Queen’s Club in 1924 and, later, in Eastbourne, Manchester, Leeds, Paignton and Teddington (Maskell 1988, p.50). Results from these and other friendly encounters tended to favour the amateurs, whose greater experience competing against first-rate opposition meant they fared better, but coaching-professionals were occasionally applauded for their emerging abilities. Given the small entries, of often less than a half-dozen, and the low number of such events, however, they did little to satisfy the professionals’ desire for more competition. At this stage, the term “professional” referred to a coach or instructor, usually based at a club. While other sports had “professional players” who were paid a salary or fee, most lawn tennis players and officials rejected this approach. However, the emergence of professional tours, beginning with Suzanne Lenglen’s successful endeavour in 1926, represented an important development that significantly altered prevailing attitudes toward both amateurism and professionalism. In Britain, amateurism was held up as the most virtuous quality in a player, while professionalism was considered a taint on the amateur game that should be firmly opposed. Thus, a “professional” was stigmatized as money-grabbing and dishonorable, sentiments that coaching-professionals were naturally keen to reject, especially after claims were made in LT&B (15 January 1927, p.989) that some coaching-professionals were a ‘wholly incompetent class of self-styled instructors whose only concern in life is to take money from beginners while giving an entirely inadequate return’. Queen’s Club professional Dan Maskell challenged this attitude. Around the time of Lenglen’s famous tour, he was beginning to make a name for himself as a talented player and coach. He won his first of sixteen British Professional Championships in 1927, and the following year he was invited to become the All England Lawn Tennis Club’s first ever professional, a job that also afforded opportunities to coach the nation’s best players through Davis Cup preparations. Maskell helped the British team reach the 1931 Challenge Round, but was not invited to travel with them to France, where they were beaten. Two years later, with Maskell’s on-site assistance, the team triumphed 3-2 and returned the Davis Cup to Great Britain after 21 years of failure. Maskell’s input was noted as a key ingredient to their success; for Fred Perry (1935, p.49, 85), the LTA’s decision to take him: repaid us over and over again. … He was of immense service to our team, for, apart from his great merits as a coach, he is a fine player—able to play serious sets, on equal terms, or to serve up the stuff one wants for stroke practice. After their fourth successive victory, the Davis Cup captain H. Roper Barrett – who before the war voiced his objection to the development of coaching-professionals through their own championship (see LT&B 7 January 1909, p.50) – awarded Maskell the ultimate acknowledgement, describing him as ‘that excellent sample of a professional who… learns to impart his knowledge to the team rather than fill his own pockets’ (LT&B 8 August 1936, p.463). His unfaltering respect for amateur authority and unmatched coaching talents earned Maskell admiration from the amateur establishment, and he helped drive a wedge between what were increasingly understood to be two distinct types of “professional”, as outlined by the editor of LT&B (1 December 1934, p.837): The genuine professional player [i.e. coach] is accorded full recognition in his own sphere of livelihood. It is the other class of professional, the exhibitionist, usually an ex-amateur, who is causing dissension in the game. He tours the world seeking to put into his own 44

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pocket as much as he can in the least possible time. … He is commercialising the talent which has very often cost amateur associations thousands of pounds to mature. This symbolic segregation of coaching- and ex-amateur touring-professionals was also witnessed in “professional” competitions, which tended increasingly to be targeted towards either one group or the other, and inadvertently helped Maskell and other coaching-professionals remain in favour with the LTA (Lake 2015, 2016). Consequently, he was able to influence their views and lobby them for funds and resources. In 1925, Maskell and Hierons formed an autonomous professional coaches’ association to work alongside the LTA to improve coaching standards, but its impact was limited by the exclusion of coaches from LTA boardrooms. After prolonged pressure on the LTA to formally acknowledge the important role of coaching-professionals, the organization relented in 1931 and formed a “Contact Committee”. It was headed not by Maskell but by an LTA member, leaving coaching-professionals still denied representation or voting powers. It seems the LTA struggled to see beyond the traditional master-servant relationship they had long established with coaches. Dissatisfied with ‘the manner in which the LTA controlled their side of the game’, Maskell convened a secret meeting with other coaching-professionals, at which they agreed to sever relations with the Contact Committee and form their own independent organization (LT&B 12 December 1931, p.987). At the time, LTA employment opportunities for coaches remained scarce and modestly remunerated,2 but public support for them and appreciation of the coaching role was evidently growing. One LT&B correspondent, for instance, condemned as ‘behind the times’ the LTA’s prevailing view of a coach’s “proper place” being ‘in the basement’ (LT&B 23 July 1932, p.377). Reflecting their growing confidence, coaching-professionals successfully lobbied the LTA for more financial support, which came in 1934 in the form of a £3,000 grant to regenerate several floundering county coaching schemes that had either failed to target enough children, especially those outside of public schools, or failed to make a significant impact on those who had received coaching. Many LTA Councillors mistakenly retained the belief that their talent development schemes encompassed children of all class backgrounds, although dissenting voices were now being heard. One LT&B correspondent (4 February 1933, p.1087) urged that: Boys and girls in elementary schools should be given the same opportunity as the children whose parents can afford to send them to public schools, if the governing body are sincere in their wish to make lawn tennis really democratic. Unconvincingly, officials tried to utilize Fred Perry – three-time Wimbledon singles champion, 1934–6 – as a model of lower-middle-class success, despite his being the first, and to date only, member of his social class to reach the front rank.3 ‘It is obvious that you cannot keep a good man down’, H.A. Sabelli, Davis Cup captain, remarked of Perry, adding: ‘Any boy or girl, no matter what their social standing, has a chance to climb to the top of the tree if they are keen enough’ (LT&B 4 February 1933, p.1087). Such claims reflected the LTA’s enduring blindness to class-based inequities. Connecting the social exclusion found in British lawn tennis with coaching opportunities, unsurprisingly the LTA were forced to admit in 1937 that: ‘three quarters of the amount allocated by the LTA for coaching is practically wasted’ (LT&B 25 December 1937, p.947). Their reluctance to heed Maskell’s advice and create a qualification system to differentiate experienced instructors from novices suggested they were themselves responsible for the slow advancement. The LTA’s unwillingness to institute a comprehensive coach development programme reflected 45

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their paternalistic relationship with coaches throughout the inter-war period, although progress came after the war when social changes in Britain brought more approving attitudes towards coaching in a number of individual sports (Day & Carpenter, 2015).

Early post-war developments In the early post-war period, Britain became a welfare state characterized by more egalitarian socio-political ideals. Reflecting this new mood, the country’s sports governing bodies made concerted efforts to remove participation barriers, opening doors for children from poorer backgrounds to play sport and develop their talents (Houlihan & White 2002; Smith & Porter 2000). By 1950, the LTA had: initiated Focus on Tennis, a nationwide talent identification programme for children, led by Perry and Maskell; commenced a training school for promising juniors; and, with Ministry of Education and Central Council for Physical Recreation funding, devised a comprehensive tennis training scheme for school teachers (Lake 2015).4 They were supported by numerous correspondents who stressed the need to provide more comprehensive public tennis-playing opportunities, both to improve general standards and develop elite-level players (see LT&B 15 December 1950, p.719). Preparatory and public schools for boys and girls also initiated inter-school competitions and leagues, and increasingly utilized the services of coaching-professionals. Ostensibly, the LTA seemed to encourage coach development. They agreed to help reconstitute the Professional Contact Committee (PCC) within the LTA, this time headed by Maskell, and offered the coaches a group insurance package and a regular allocation of Wimbledon tickets. Maskell was honoured as the first ever professional to be granted AELTC honorary membership in 1953, before moving on to work with the BBC’s Wimbledon commentary team (Lake 2016). This all suggests a heightened respect for coaches, yet the class-based “professional” and “money-grabbing” stigmas remained: coaches were denied opportunities to compete in local tournaments; heard their pleas to reinstitute amateur-versus-professional competitions rejected; and were routinely subjected to discrimination in clubs. Former Wimbledon referee Alan Mills (2005, p.72) recalled an incident from the early 1970s at St. George’s Club in the wealthy London suburb of Weybridge, when the club “pro” was invited for a drink in the bar, but ‘was asked to leave and finish his drink outside in the hallway’. Coaches also suffered from poor job security, which was only partially resolved through their unionization in 1954 with the formation of the independent British Professionals’ Association. They maintained links with the LTA’s PCC, considering official recognition from them important for adding credibility to their endeavours. These early post-war developments complemented changes in the coaching craft, as it gradually became a more scientific, rationalized and theory-based endeavour (Day 2011). In the 1950s, Australian coaches experimented with more “scientific” training tools that understood the body as ‘an object to be mechanically conditioned, tuned and managed to improve performance’ (Phillips & Hicks 2000, p.215). This approach contrasted with traditional British coaching philosophies that prioritized experience over science and tacit knowledge over explicit knowledge but, given Australia’s phenomenal success in tennis throughout the 1950s and 60s, the LTA were forced to look “down under” for guidance.5 Even so, it was several decades before the LTA granted British coaches a degree of institutional recognition. This was at a point when, during the 1980s and early 1990s, the association embarked on large-scale organizational restructuring (Lake 2008). Into the 21st century, many clubs continue to deny coaches a committee position despite their pivotal role in the day-to-day operations of many tennis clubs (Lake 2013). 46

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Conclusion It was clear that shifting attitudes toward amateurism and professionalism were inextricably related to developments for coaches and the coaching craft throughout the late 19th and 20th centuries. As amateurism gradually loosened its hold on the direction of sport, and as national governing bodies placed ever greater value on elite-level performances, so too did coaches figure more centrally in the planning and delivery phases of sports development. During the inter-war period, coaching-professionals like Dan Maskell became more important for the LTA, as they considered the restoration of British prowess more of an imperative. To be successful, however, Maskell was forced to carefully balance two roles, as a kind of tradeunion advocate and a servant of the LTA.While pressing for better opportunities and conditions for coaches, he had to position requests for LTA support as a matter in the establishments’ best interests; through his own actions and successes, he convinced the LTA of the need to support coaches (Lake 2016). Despite attitudes toward coaching-professionals inevitably progressing in the “open era” toward the adoption of more scientific approaches and systematic training, this interesting juxtaposition in some ways still reflects the constant challenges for coaching-professionals, as they have been forced to temper their own personal ambitions for those of the organizations they serve (Lake 2010b). For a full understanding, these developments must be located in the contexts of broader social processes, especially shifting class relations and the decline of amateurism as a guiding philosophy in British sport.

Notes 1 Other British players who were known to frequent the French Riviera include Dorothea Lambert Chambers, Blanche Hillyard, Major Ritchie, A. Wallis Myers, George Hillyard, Frank Riseley, Gordon Lowe and Wilberforce Eaves. 2 Only thirty coaches were contracted within their County Coaching Scheme, which earned them just 10 guineas a week for less than six months of the year. This represented a paltry investment from the LTA when considering their revenue for the year totalled £13,500. 3 Perry was born into an upwardly mobile working-class family. His father, Samuel, worked as a cotton spinner in the North-west of England and later became a Labour MP for Kettering. 4 The connection with the CCPR was championed by Emlyn Hughes, who worked closely alongside Maskell. 5 In every Davis Cup competition between 1938 and 1968, Australia either won or was runner-up. In the majors, Australian men and women won 85 of the total 192 singles events contested from 1946–69, representing a 44% Australian success rate.

References Aitken, A. (1924) Lawn Tennis for Public Courts Players. London: Methuen. Baddeley, W. (1895) Lawn Tennis. London: George Routledge & Sons. Baker, N. (2004) Whose Hegemony: The Origins of the Amateur Ethos in Nineteenth Century English Society. Sport in History, 24(1), 1–6. Beamish, A.E., & Beamish, W.G. (1924) Lawn Tennis for Ladies. London: Mills & Boon. Bédarida, F. (1979) A Social History of England 1851–1975. London: Methuen. Beldam, G., & Vaile, P.A. (1905) Great Lawn Tennis Players:Their Methods Illustrated. London: Macmillan. Blackmore, S.P. (1921) Lawn Tennis Up-To-Date. London: Methuen. Brownlee, W.M. (1889) Lawn Tennis. Bristol: J.W. Arrowsmith. Carter, N. (2010) Introduction: Coaching Cultures. Sport in History, 30(1), 1–7. Chambers, D.L. (1910) Lawn Tennis for Ladies. London: Metheun & Co. Ltd. Day, D. (2011) Craft Coaching and the ‘Discerning Eye’ of the Coach. International Journal of Sport Science and Coaching, 6(1), 179–96. 47

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Day, D. (2012) Massaging the Amateur Ethos: British Professional Trainers at the 1912 Olympic Games. Sport in History, 32(2), 157–82. Day, D. (2013) America’s ‘Mysterious “Training Tables”’: British Reactions and Amateur Hypocrisy. Sport in History, 34(1), 90–112. Day, D. & Carpenter, T. (2015) A History of Sports Coaching in Britain: Overcoming Amateurism. London: Routledge. Day, D. & Oldfield, S.J. (2015) Delineating Professional and Amateur Bodies in Victorian England. Sport in History, 35(1), 19–45. Dod, L. (1890) Chapter by Lottie Dod. In K. Duke of Beaufort, & A. Watson, Tennis: Lawn Tennis: Rackets: Fives. London: Longmans, Green & Co. Doherty, R., & Doherty, H. (1903) R.F. & H.L. Doherty on Lawn Tennis. London: Lawn Tennis. Dwight, J. (1886) Lawn Tennis. London: Pastime. Eaves, S. (2016) Coaching, Physical Training and the Changing Landscape of Lawn Tennis: Australia’s Ascendancy to Dominance in the Pre-Great War era. In D. Day, Sport and Leisure on the Eve of the First World War (pp.72-97). Manchester: Manchester Metropolitan University Sport and Leisure History. Eaves, S.J., Lake, R.J. & Cowdrey, S. (2016) The ‘Ghosts’ of Lawn Tennis Past: Exploring the Forgotten Lives of Early Working-Class Coaching-Professionals. Sport in History, 36(4), 498–521. Fry, J., & Doust, S. (1926) Lawn Tennis: How to Master the Strokes. London: W. Foulsham and Co. Ltd. Heathcote, C. (1890) Sports and Pastimes:Tennis. London: Longmans, Green and Co. Hierons, C. (1924) How to Learn Lawn Tennis: A Simple Instructive Treatise (2nd ed.). London: Ward, Lock & Co, Ltd. Hillyard, G. (1924) Forty Years of First-Class Lawn Tennis. London: Williams & Norgate. Holt, R. (1989) Sport and the British. Oxford: Clarendon. Houlihan, B., & White, A. (2002) The Politics of Sports Development. London: Routledge. Huggins, J., & Williams, J. (2005) Sport and the English: 1918–1939. London: Routledge. Lake, R.J. (2008) Social Exclusion in British Tennis: A History of Privilege and Prejudice. London: Unpublished PhD Dissertation, Brunel University. Lake, R.J. (2010a) Stigmatised, Marginalised, Celebrated: Developments in Lawn Tennis Coaching 18701939. Sport in History, 30(1), 82–103. Lake, R.J. (2010b) ‘Managing Change’ in British Tennis 1990–2006: Unintended Outcomes of LTA Talent Development Policies. International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 45(4), 474–90. Lake, R.J. (2013) ‘They Treat Me like I’m Scum’: Social Exclusion and Established-Outsider Relations in a British Tennis Club. International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 48(1), 112–28. Lake, R.J. (2015) A Social History of Tennis in Britain. London: Routledge. Lake, R.J. (2016) ‘That Excellent Sample of a Professional’: Dan Maskell and the Contradictions of British Amateurism in Twentieth-Century Lawn Tennis. Sport in History, 36(1), 1–25. Lake, R.J. & Eaves, S.J. (2017) Defeat, Decline and Disconnect: A Critical Analysis of Attempted Reform in British Tennis during the Inter-war Period. Sport in History, 37(1), 1–24. Lawford, H. (1890) Lawn Tennis by Herbert Lawford. In C. G. Heathcote, Tennis, Lawn Tennis, Rackets, Fives (pp.274–81). London: Longmans, Green & Co. Light, R. (2010) A ‘Strange … Absurd … and Somewhat Injurious Influence’? Cricket, Professional Coaching in the Public Schools and the ‘Gentleman Amateur’ Ethos. Sport in History, 30(1), 8–31. Little, A. (2014) The Golden Days of Tennis on the French Riviera 1874–1939. London: Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Museum. Llewellyn, M.P. (2011a) The Battle of Shepherd’s Bush. International Journal of the History of Sport, 28(5), 688–710. Llewellyn, M.P. (2011b) ‘A Tale of National Disaster’. International Journal of the History of Sport, 28(5), 711–29. Lowe, G. (1924) Gordon Lowe on Lawn Tennis. London: Hutchinson & Co. Maskell, D. (1988) From Where I Sit. London: Willow. McKane, K. (1925) Lawn Tennis: How to Improve Your Game. London: Ward, Lock and Co. Ltd. McKibbin, R. (1998) Classes and Cultures: England 1918–1951. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Miles, E. (1925) Lawn Tennis Lessons for Beginners and Others. Norwich: The London and Norwich Press. Millen, H.E. (1927) Lawn Tennis and its Coaching in School for Girls. London: Macaire Mould and Co. Ltd. Mills, A. (2005) Lifting the Covers: Alan Mills, the Autobiography. London: Headline. Myers, A.W. (1903) Lawn Tennis at Home and Abroad. London: George Newnes Ltd. Paret, J.P. (1904) Lawn Tennis: Its Past Present and Future. London: Macmillan. 48

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Patterson, N.H. (1939) Lawn Tennis at School and After. London: Methuen. Payn, F.W. (1906) Secrets of Lawn Tennis. London: L. Upcott Gill. Perry, F. (1935) Perry Wins! Expert Advice for All on Lawn Tennis. London: Hutchinson & Co. Ltd. Phillips, M.G., & Hicks, F. (2000) Conflict, Tensions and Complexities: Athletic Training in Australia in the 1950s. International Journal of the History of Sport, 17(2–3), 206–24. Pollock, J. (1926) Listening to Lacoste. London: Mills and Boon. Porter, D., & Smith, A. (2000) Introduction. In A. Smith, & D. Porter, Amateurs and Professionals in Post-War British Sport (pp.vii–xvi). London: Frank Cass. Round, D. (1934) Modern Lawn Tennis. London: George Newnes Ltd. Smith, A., & Porter, D. (Eds.). (2000) Amateurs and Professionals in Post-War British Sport. London: Frank Cass. Tilden, W.T. (1921) The Art of Lawn Tennis (2nd ed.). London: Methuen. Tranter, N.L. (1998) Sport, Economy and Society in Britain 1750–1914. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Tuckey, C.R. (1937) Lawn Tennis for Men. London: Blackie & Son Ltd. Vaile, P. (1906) Lawn Tennis Guide or the Strokes and Science of Lawn Tennis. London: British Sports Publishing Co. Ltd. Wagg, S. (2006) Base Mechanic Arms? British Rowing, Some Ducks and the Shifting Politics of Amateurism. Sport in History, 26(3), 520–39. Wilberforce, H. (1889) Lawn Tennis. London: George Bell & Sons. Wilding, A.F. (1912) On the Court and Off. London: Methuen & Co., Ltd. Williams, J. (2006) ‘The Really Good Professional Captain Has Never Been Seen!’: Perceptions of the Amateur/Professional Divide in County Cricket, 1900–39. Sport in History, 26(3), 429–49. Wills, H. (1928) Tennis. London: Charles Scribner’s Sons. Wrynn, A.M. (2010) The Athlete in the Making: The Scientific Study of American Athletic Performance, 1920–1932. Sport in History, 30(1), 121–37.

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5 Golden years and golden stars International women’s tennis between the wars Elizabeth Wilson

John Betjeman’s poem, The Subaltern’s Sweetheart, celebrates the beauty of the female tennis player as she covers the court with ‘the speed of a swallow, the grace of a boy!’The poem hymns an ideal of the English summer with tennis as central to it and the idyll of green grass, white clothes and pretty girls, accompanied by the rhythmic, regular “thwok” of the ball hit back and forth. This ideal has persisted into the twenty-first century, enshrined above all at Wimbledon: utterly English, serenely middle-class and sweetly carefree. It is so innocent – and so remote from contemporary tennis. This was the home-grown version of an international sport that reached an apotheosis between the First and Second World Wars, a period often recalled as the “golden years” of tennis, along (not entirely coincidentally) with the “golden years” of crime fiction (much of it written by women). Each purveyed an upper-middle-class version of social life and leisure and in each case the surface glamour cast dark shadows. The Victorians invented lawn tennis as a social pastime in which the sexes mingled and the game was eagerly taken up and became extremely popular with the prosperous and expanding late Victorian and Edwardian middle and upper-middle classes, where it became a chic and slightly racy dimension of social life. Some considered it shocking that women should disport themselves so actively (by contrast with the more static croquet, which it displaced), yet paradoxically the association of tennis with the female sex meant that it was considered effeminate and by many as unworthy of the attention of sporting heroes. Although by 1914 some of its more dedicated male players had recognised that it was actually a demanding sport, requiring considerable skill and strength, it continued to be considered a “sissy” game, not to be taken seriously and little played at men’s public schools, then the heartland of British sport.Thus, it was early established as something more than, or other than, merely a sport: an encounter between individuals that over the years has repeatedly been described as balletic, pugilistic and operatic. It rapidly became a popular spectator sport and public spectacle. In Britain, Wimbledon was an important occasion in the social calendar and the presence of women on court was an undoubted draw. Lottie Dod, a multiple Wimbledon winner in the 1880s and 1890s, was a household name, and in the first decade of the twentieth century Mrs Dorothea Lambert Chambers ruled the Centre Court, a seven times Wimbledon winner as well as the mother of a large family. 50

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The 1918 Armistice found Europe devastated by the horrors of war and the febrile, pleasureseeking social culture of the 1920s seemed like a psychological reaction to the appalling loss of life.Women had played a vital role in the war, as nurses, ambulance drivers and in replacing men in the workforce. After the end of hostilities British women over thirty were granted the vote. A less confrontational generation of feminists continued to campaign for the right to work and equal pay, but the popular focus on women, all over Europe and in the United States, took a different direction. Morals and manners, fashions and eroticism took centre stage in a culture of developing consumerism and entertainment. Tennis tournaments in the UK, at country clubs in America and at venues on the Riviera, to mention only the most prestigious, were events on a par with Ascot. As Hercule Poirot in Agatha Christie’s The Mystery of the Blue Train (1928) expressed it, ‘At the tennis one meets everyone’. Indeed, if the period between the two world wars is seen as a “golden age” of tennis, this may be because it was during these decades that the balance between glamour and technical excellence, social élan and sporting prowess was most equally poised. This reached its highest pitch on the Riviera.

Star of modernity: the Lenglen melodrama The Côte d’Azur provided fine weather, spectacular surroundings and all sorts of ancillary entertainments to increase the enjoyment of its prestigious tournaments, especially those at Cannes and Monte Carlo. The latter, of course, offered gambling; everywhere there were good restaurants, boat racing, fashion and thé-dansants (transl. tea dances) as well as the tennis itself.The whole littoral was a pleasure destination, indeed one in which it has been suggested that the very concept of leisure was invented for the wealthier classes, who came to be entertained and – less often – to participate in the many spectacles on offer. Tennis was foremost among these spectacles and one in which women played a central role. Already at the turn of the century progressive commentators had recognised their importance. One, a tennis player herself, commented that: ‘I am sure that the tournaments would not possess half their present attractions if men alone competed’, and added that ladies must ensure they looked their best when on court, as ‘all eyes are upon them’ (Todd 1979, p.38). Another, male, conceded that ‘most meetings only flourish by virtue of their social charms and that ladies are as essential to the well-being of a large open tournament as the committee or the much-abused umpires’ (Myers 1908, p.53). A dramatic example of the popularity of women’s tennis came on Wimbledon’s Centre Court in 1919. A sell-out crowd of 8,000 had queued for hours to witness the contest between Dorothea Lambert Chambers, the seven times champion, and a new star: the French sensation Suzanne Lenglen. Mrs Lambert Chambers was the daughter of a progressive vicar who encouraged his daughters to play. In her manual, Lawn Tennis for Ladies, she advised players to move around the court and develop confidence and variety of play. She herself played against men in order to improve her game and David Gilbert (2011) has insightfully demonstrated how she represented the “modern” woman of the Edwardian period. Yet when the two players walked onto the Centre Court on 5 July 1919, it was Suzanne Lenglen who was cast in the role of representative of modernity. To understand the intense interest and excitement the star players of the period generated, we need to remember that fashionable women now presented themselves in a style far different from that of the Edwardian period. This difference was dramatically embodied in the encounter between Mrs Dorothea Lambert Chambers and Suzanne Lenglen. 51

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Chambers, almost twice her opponent’s age, wore an ankle-length Edwardian skirt, a shirt fastened at the neck and wrists, and stockings. Invisible beneath the outfit was the corset still commonly worn in polite society. Lenglen wore a startlingly brief dress, reaching barely beyond mid-calf, with short sleeves and an open neck. Modest as this would certainly seem to today’s spectators, it was described as “indecent” by parts of the press, which only added to the excitement generated by the French star as representative of the new age. Gilbert points out that although Chambers was twice her opponent’s age, the contest was an epic struggle. The Englishwoman twice had a match point, but in the end Lenglen won the third set 9-7. The difference between them was not that of age or ability, rather it was that the British sportswoman was just that, but Lenglen was about to become an international celebrity. The decade before 1914 had brought advances for women, with the bicycle craze, the growing popularity of sport for women and, of course, the struggle (in the UK at least) for the vote. It was, in fact, not Lenglen, but another Frenchwoman, Marguerite Broquedis, who had already modernised tennis. Better looking than the heavy featured, sallow Suzanne, she had paved the way for her fellow countrywoman. ‘The first published tennis fashion columns … the first … special hairstyles for tennis, the first Olympic gold medal won for France by a woman, even the first suggestion that women’s tennis should be beautiful, all derived from her’, wrote Teddy Tinling (1983, p.21–22). It was Lenglen, however, who, emerging after the break caused by the War, appeared as an entirely new phenomenon. Coached by her overbearing father (a scenario repeated many times since then), her appearance and off-court social life filled the gossip columns. She participated in an early version of what would later be termed the international jet set, where royalty, film stars, entertainers of all kinds and, sometimes, adventurers mingled. The Riviera provided the ideal sophisticated setting for this parade of glamour. Teddy Tinling grew up on the Riviera. Mad about tennis, he became a schoolboy member of the Nice Lawn Tennis Club, where he met Lenglen and soon became a member of her entourage. In his autobiography he described the place of tennis, dancing and gambling as the catalysts of the high-fashion Côte d’Azur social time-table. Suzanne Lenglen was, he said, ‘the unquestioned Queen of Art Deco’. Her tennis matches were scheduled at ‘prime time’, between the cocktail hour and the thé-dansants. Suzanne returned to Wimbledon in 1920 and won the title for a second time. Friends noticed that her character appeared to change.Tennis, which she had previously described as a “pastime”, became a compulsion and with this came a sense of her own invincibility and a determination to dominate the game.This she did, not simply – or even perhaps primarily – by her style of play, but by the publicity she generated. For one thing she dramatically boosted her country’s sense of pride after all the inconclusive bloodshed of the war. She could match Hollywood’s most glamorous and even outshine royalty. She was a “goddess” in France, a national heroine, but she became an international goddess as well. The publicity generated by the worship of the French press was as exportable as she was, a publicity machine fed by her personality and appearance. Aided by her couturier, Jean Patou, Lenglen exploited the fashions of the early 1920s to create a style that was copied everywhere. It helped that the minimalist aesthetic then coming on stream differed little on and off court. Loose, knee-length frocks, open necks and short sleeves could be simply adapted and copied by manufacturers for the mass market and by the local and home dressmakers who were still important. Lenglen made the style her own by introducing a chiffon scarf wound round her short hair as a headband. This was always coloured – lemon, heliotrope, old rose, flaming orange – and matched the cardigan she wore over her invariably white dress.Thus, she turned herself into what we should today term a “brand”. 52

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It may seem perverse to start with the star’s appearance rather than with what made her fame possible in the first place – her tennis. Yet appearance and play were intimately linked. She did not simply play tennis, she performed it (Engelmann 1988). René Lacoste first saw her play when he was himself a budding French tennis star and was mesmerised. He had expected that it would be something elaborate and extraordinary – and it was extraordinary, but by dint of being, he said, so simple. Père Lenglen had trained his daughter to hit the ball with pinpoint accuracy. Placing a handkerchief and later a small coin at the opposite end of the court, he made her practise until she could unfailingly hit any spot at will.This accuracy was the basis of her game, but what made her tennis so riveting to spectators was Lenglen’s ravishing balletic style. Her grace and the swiftness of her movement were astounding. She seemed to float in the air, to be unconstrained by the normal rules of gravity. She was compared to the French music hall star, Mistinguette – a singer – and when she hit a smash it was as if she were dancing a can-can. The public adulation, bordering on hysteria, that accompanied Lenglen wherever she went, took its toll. She succumbed often to illnesses and nervous crises. On her first visit to the US, in 1921, she faced a potential rival, Molla Mallory and a hostile crowd. Once the match began it was soon clear that Mrs Mallory was defeating the French woman. Lenglen began coughing and retired from the match in tears, leaving the court to the sound of hissing. (The following year she demolished Mallory at Wimbledon.) In 1924, she suffered from jaundice in the weeks before Wimbledon and although she got through the first week of the tournament with no trouble, she chose to retire. Over time what Tinling called her “temperamental flare-ups” worsened. She had transformed herself, he said, from an ugly duckling into a bird of paradise, but there was a cost to being so famous. He pointed out that it was world headline news when she lost two games in a row and she would react with bouts of hysteria and vomiting. Such, however, was the glittering and artificial popular culture which created her and in which she flourished.

The rivalry of the two Helens In 1926 the bubble burst. A new rival appeared on the scene: the all-American girl, Helen Wills. Following a string of wins in the US, Wills was due to play the Riviera circuit and this set in train the most feverish expectations yet. Reporters gathered like locusts to await the first encounter between the two, but they were continually thwarted as several tournaments passed in which one or other did not play.The rivals only finally met at the Carlton Hotel tournament in Cannes in April. Their epic final, in the presence of international royalty and celebrities in the audience and the seething mass of spectators desperate to get a toehold inside the arena, has been described many times. Lenglen won the match 6-3, 8-6 after what was in fact a very close encounter in the second set, but – astonishingly – this was her penultimate triumph. She won in Paris, but Helen Wills was absent from that tournament with appendicitis. The year 1926 was the 50th anniversary of Wimbledon and everyone expected a further triumph for Suzanne. Instead, illness and a series of misunderstandings culminating in a massive disagreement over scheduling, nd led to the sight of Queen Mary waiting in the royal box to watch the French star play, while the star herself was sobbing hysterically in her dressing room, refusing to go on court. She retired precipitously from the tournament. Later that year she turned professional and thus excluded herself forever from the limelight she so craved. More than any other player of her era – perhaps of any era – Suzanne Lenglen personified a mass-market dream-world constructed from forms of popular culture: sport, fashion and the 53

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movies. She transcended the sport, entering a realm of operatic drama. Helen Wills Moody was a classical, statuesque beauty, but while she dominated women’s tennis for the next decade her fame never matched the celebrity achieved by Lenglen. By contrast with the Frenchwoman, she was an “ice queen”, nicknamed “Miss Poker Face”. Reticent and relentless, she dominated with the power of her serve and her ground strokes. Surprisingly, she was described as being slow and flat footed, but her pace was effective as it enabled her to achieve the most results for the least possible expenditure of energy.Teddy Tinling likened her style to that of Chrissie Evert in the 1970s; both moved superbly side to side, less well up and down the court, so neither became a willing volleyer. In personality they were surely far different, for whereas Evert was friendly and fun, Helen Wills Moody was glacially aloof. Her autobiography gives the impression of a self-involved, very serious, slightly tunnel-visioned individual, but tunnel vision can be the downside – or the necessary quality – of those who excel at some calling that demands dedication and practice. In fact, Wills Moody was dedicated to art as well as tennis, for she was an accomplished painter; and, indeed, the two were related in that, as she wrote: tennis is ‘in its way an art. Tennis encourages the player to express himself and his personality. … Into his game he puts something of his personality, so that his play becomes a unique expression’ (Wills 1937, p.194). Unfortunately, her queenly chill and lengthy domination of the game eventually bored the tennis audience. She put relentless pressure on her opponents, always imposing her game. Her expression never changed during a match; she was a living marble statue. She was monotonous, ‘powerful, repressed and imperturbable’, as the sports correspondent of the Herald Tribune expressed it in 1929. He felt that she never seemed to enjoy playing, her features remaining serenely mask-like and austere. She never smiled. Perhaps, like many performers, she wanted to achieve the status of a work of art herself, for she said: ‘Perfection and beauty fascinate me in any field, but most of all in art’ (Wills 1935, p.192). It may be that the search for perfection in a sport carries with it an inevitable risk of monotony and boredom.The closer to perfection is a work of art, the greater its impact will be; but sport is a contest and the search for perfection is the search for invincibility, no matter how that is achieved. Paradoxically, the player who always wins merely deprives the audience of the excitement of a vivid contest; insofar as tennis, in particular, is a spectacle, the ruthlessly successful machine player, who wins with maximum economy and ruthlessness, may disappoint more than they excite.1 Helen Wills Moody’s ruthlessness was underlined in her rivalry with her namesake, Helen Jacobs, who came to the conclusion that her stony demeanour was a form of psychological bullying. Jacobs was the very opposite of the woman who so often defeated her in the finals of major tournaments. She appeared to care little about her appearance, smoked continually and, it was hinted, preferred her own sex, but of course, such matters were never discussed openly in the 1930s. It was not simply spectators but also the press that had wearied of the endless perfection of Helen Wills Moody.W.O. McGeehan of the New York Herald Tribune stated that ‘the tennis world is yearning impatiently for some new heroine to come forward and overpower the imperial Helen’ (cited in: Engelmann 1988, p.315). Helen Jacobs was chosen to be this opponent and the press did all they could to turn the contests of the two Helens into a true rivalry. Tales of their mutual hatred – always denied by the players themselves – circulated.Their rivalry was symbolised by the shorts that Helen Jacobs introduced and always wore on court, whereas the ultra-feminine Helen Wills Moody stuck to the knee-length skirt. They had close finals both at Wimbledon and at the US national championships, but the only time Jacobs won Wimbledon was in 1936, when Helen Wills did not play. Jacobs also won the US title four times. At Forest Hills she did score a victory against her rival in 1933. She won the first set 8-6 and lost the second 3-6. In the third set she was leading 3-0 when Helen Wills defaulted, with the excuse that she had a bad leg and could not continue. 54

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Thus, Helen Jacobs gained her victory by default. Wills Moody’s withdrawal was widely condemned as unsporting for it robbed Jacobs of a complete victory. The thirst for rivalries in tennis must be in part due to the individuality of the game, but although a few outstanding players have tended to dominate in every epoch, rivalries and individual stars could not exist without the surrounding culture of tournaments and many other outstanding players.Yet despite its popularity, women’s tennis generally seldom got a good press. Those who really understood the game were sensitive to its attractions, but there was always criticism of the women who played tennis, and that women’s tennis was boring and limited. This was in the context of a sporting community that, particularly in the US, continued to despise men’s tennis as irredeemably “sissy” and in such an unmanly sport, women were further denigrated. A.L. Laney, a leading American sportswriter between the wars, summed up the typical view, stating that very few women’s matches were worth remembering. ‘The dears’, he wrote patronisingly, were dull performers and it was ‘clashing personalities rather than skill or outstanding performance’ that made the occasion memorable (Laney 1968, p.49). He recalled interminable matches of purposeless hitting, with neither woman ‘able to win when the chance comes, both forced to go on and on until one or other finally loses’. Helen Jacobs herself described one such match in the South of France, which she herself eventually lost through the sheer boredom of getting drawn into rallies of a hundred strokes and more. It was held against Helen Wills, by the American press at least, that a sweet American girl was gradually transformed into a cold and hostile member of the upper-class tennis elite.There is no question that tennis, always a social game in which the sexes mixed and flirted, was the preserve of the elite, particularly so long as it retained amateur status. Few working-class men or women were able to penetrate the exclusive clubs of Europe and America. Tennis clubs were found all over the British Empire, but Asians and Indians did not disport themselves on their courts. In Europe, Jewish players had a hard time of it too, even before 1933. The situation in the US was even more marked. Until after the Second World War, a second, shadow American tennis association existed mirroring the United States Tennis Association; the American Tennis Association (ATA), the association of African American players. In the US, the exclusion of non-white players was completely explicit, yet the ATA did enable black players at least to play; and during Helen Wills’ years of dominance, a black American woman, Ora Washington, won seven straight titles in the ATA national tournament. Her achievements were barely recognised publicly and she was reportedly bitter – understandably – that she was never in a position to face either of the two Helens. Moreover, while the white elite moved in high society, Ora Washington worked as a domestic servant.

How much has changed? Looking back on the twentieth century In the twenty-first century, the Williams sisters,Venus and Serena, provide a striking contrast to the thwarted ambitions of Ora Washington, but it may be worth considering how much, or how little, women’s tennis has changed since the 1930s. The game itself, of course, has changed and within sport, not just tennis, change is mostly unquestioningly interpreted as meaning better. The narrative of progress has always been central to sport, as A.L. Laney pointed out: However unrealistic it may be there have always been those who accept the view that once you name a player great at any period, he must be greater than all who preceded him and to have carried the game to new heights. (Laney 1968, p.269) 55

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Laney did not subscribe to this view, but it remains the default position in sport, and certainly in tennis commentary 50 years later. A more nuanced view might be that things don’t get better or worse, but rather just get different.Yet they also often stay the same. Conditions for women in tennis have changed dramatically for the better since the 1930s, most obviously in that women now receive equal pay, for example at all four of the “majors”. Following complaints after the 2015 Wimbledon, in 2016 the BBC gave more coverage to women’s matches. Yet as recently as 2012, two top French male stars voiced the continuing view that women shouldn’t be paid as much as men, either because they play shorter matches at the majors (best-of-three instead of, as for the men, best-of-five sets) or because women can’t play at the same level as men due to their “biology”, meaning menstruation – a perverse argument in view of their obvious stamina, since they are not noticeably less consistent than men. Presumably the temperamental ups and downs in form from which the brilliant Stan Wawrinka, winner of three majors, suffers, cannot be due to his “biology”. Since 2012 there have been further derogatory remarks about women’s tennis by individual male players. Maybe these should be disregarded as crude examples of loutish behaviour, but there is a sense in which the development of the power and endurance game, favoured by the technological developments of racquets and strings, has not enhanced women’s tennis in the way that it is held to have enhanced that of men’s. Tennis seems now to be to some extent emerging from a period in which baseline play was almost totally dominant – with new, younger players, the Frenchman Lucas Pouille and Canadian Denis Shapovalov, for example, not afraid to surge to the net – and established stars in some cases favouring the all court game – Roger Federer’s re-adoption of volleying a case in point. The baseline defensive game suited women less well than men, since it foregrounded strength and hard hitting and gave less opportunity for the all-court play that, it might be argued, makes possible the ‘balletic’ kind of tennis for which women were once famed. So were the reporters of the 1930s to return today they might still complain of endless baseline rallies, although volleying has begun to make a come-back in the women’s game too. Suzanne Lenglen and Helen Wills Moody traded on their appearance as well as on their tennis brilliance and the emphasis on beauty today seems as insistent as ever. In the 1930s, Helen Jacobs’ shorts were considered immodest, yet won over many women players and continued to be worn into the 1950s, despite a renewed demand for female glamour on court after the Second World War. By the Millennium, modesty was no longer an issue and women’s tennis gear has become ever more exiguous, with women players wearing what are little more than skirted bathing costumes. The emphasis on a feminine appearance has increased as the glamorous players have been tempted by all sorts of ancillary offers in endorsements and fashion modelling. Virginia Wade commented that this may have caused problems for some women players – she cited Ana Ivanovic and Eugenie Bouchard – whose very lucrative fashion commitments may have damaged their tennis, because it has been a distraction or has led them to, for example, losing too much weight. It is also rather shocking that Maria Sharapova’s blonde style of beauty resulted (until her recent ban) in endorsements that far outran those of African-American Serena Williams, the more successful player. Shorts and short hair are almost never seen and conventional ideas of what constitutes female “beauty” dominate the sport. When Marion Bartoli won Wimbledon in 2013 the veteran sports commentator, John Inverdale, somewhat crassly remarked that her father must have encouraged her to play tennis because ‘she was never going to be a looker’; and although he ascribed this “lapse” as due to fatigue, that does not explain why such a remark should have slipped up out of his unconscious. 56

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Billie Jean King observed that tennis is an erotic sport and that one of its main attractions is the display of beautiful, lightly clad bodies. That is indeed one reason to watch it, but, with exceptions, there is a banality about the bathing dresses. In mainstream fashion, however, there appears to be a move away from the near nude (bikini sales have dropped dramatically), due in part of fears of skin cancer and also to the influence of ideas about modest dress, and it will be interesting to see if women’s tennis outfits follow suit. All we can safely deduce from this is that women’s tennis is an arena in which a perennial ambiguity plays itself out. Rather like the classical ballet – or modern dance, for that matter – tennis exists in that region in which erotic display interacts with grace and skill to create an “art” in which the two are inseparable. Similarly, women’s tennis, in the “golden years” between the wars and still today, is both enhanced and hampered by its feminine nature: diminished by the sexism of the surrounding culture and perhaps prevented from expanding its potential by the power tennis that now dominates, yet still able to thrill and enthuse.

Note 1 Novak Djokovic exemplifies this in contemporary men’s tennis. Commentators have repeatedly commented that despite his outstanding achievements between 2013 and 2016, he appears to have failed to attract the kind of adulation enjoyed by Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal and instead has been described as robotic and automaton like. In one 2016 interview he even described himself as a machine! His invincibility has been based on a simple and monotonous form of perfection, lacking either the warrior intensity of Nadal or the balletic beauty of Federer. This may be unfair, but illustrates the contradictory appeal of sport, or perhaps of tennis in particular: that spectators relish the contest, don’t want it to be a foregone conclusion, and crave theatricality and artistry as well. The most ruthlessly efficient way of playing tennis may not be much fun to watch.

References Christie, A. (1928) The Mystery of the Blue Train. Glasgow: William Collins and Sons. Engelman, L. (1988) The Goddess and the American Girl:The Story of Suzanne Lenglen and Helen Wills, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Gilbert, D. (2011) The Vicar’s Daughter and the Goddess of Tennis: Cultural Geographies of Sporting Femininity and Bodily Practice in Edwardian Suburbia, Cultural Geographies, 18(2), 187–207. Laney, A.L. (1968) Covering the Court: A Fifty Year Love Affair with the Game of Tennis, New York: Simon and Schuster. Myers, A.W. (1908) Lawn Tennis at Home and Abroad, London: George Newnes. Tinling, T. (1983) Sixty Years in Tennis, London: Sidgwick and Jackson. Todd, T. (1979) The Tennis Players: From Pagan Rites to Strawberries and Cream, Guernsey:Vallancey Press. Wills, H. (1937) Fifteen Thirty, New York: Scribner.

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6 A transcendent game plan Bill Tilden’s rhetorical strategy in defying the USLTA John Carvalho and Michael Milford

On the 21st April 1924, tennis champion Bill Tilden shocked the world of tennis by announcing that he would resign from the United States Davis Cup team (Tilden Quits Place on US Tennis Teams 1924). His announcement was the latest move in an ongoing battle between the world’s top-ranked player and the United States Lawn Tennis Association (USLTA). Over previous years, a new generation of financiers and industrialists had seized control of the USLTA from its first leaders, drawn from the upper crust of Newport, Rhode Island, society. These newer leaders, particularly long-time Executive Committee member Julian Myrick, were just as authoritarian as their Newport society predecessors, and they found Tilden to be a constant source of criticism – much of it expressed through the articles he wrote for newspapers and magazines (Tunis 1928). They insisted that he confine his actions to the tennis court, but Tilden proved to be a consistently difficult opponent (Deford 1975). The defining issue in 1924 was a rule, passed by the USLTA, which sought to curb Tilden’s writing career, much of which focused on criticizing USLTA leaders. The broader issue involved the growing power of high-profile athletes, within a sports culture that was transitioning from a traditional amateur mindset to a modern professional philosophy. In that context, Tilden was doing more than merely preserving his right to earn money on the side as a journalist for pay. He was also helping athletes recognize and exploit their status, which originated not in traditional values related to social rank or economic position, but in athletic talent and public image. This chapter will trace the conflict between Tilden and the USLTA, which culminated in the rules change that ultimately led to Tilden’s actions. While other research has looked at the battle itself (Carvalho 2007; 2009), this chapter will look at Tilden’s return to his self-touted roots as a writer and examine his statements to the media about the rule and its effect on his amateur status and writing career.The first statement was actually his immediate response to the USLTA’s vote and represents his extemporaneous media skills. In the second statement, soon after and during a prepared speech, Tilden stressed his determination to maintain his writing career. The third statement, referenced previously, included his resignation from the US Davis Cup team after criticism from a USLTA leader. These statements, considered together and in the context of their subsequent tactical success, reflect Tilden’s media communication skills and indicate

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why he represented such a threat to the USLTA. Tilden’s message focused on transcendence, a strategy that minimizes and even reverses the charges by broadening the context in which they are viewed. More than mere rhetorical strategy, Tilden’s battle with the USLTA also provides an early look at a familiar phenomenon today: a successful athlete effectively applying his public profile to plead his case in the media.

Bill Tilden Bill Tilden was considered the top-ranked male tennis player in the world during the 1920s. When he was in the middle of winning six US tennis championships in a row (1920–1925), legendary columnist Grantland Rice labeled him the leading sports champion of the era, exceeding Jack Dempsey, Babe Ruth and Walter Hagen: ‘William T. Tilden, reigning monarch in the world of tennis, comes extremely close to being our dominant crown wearer, the one champion who outclasses his field by a wider margin than anyone else’ (Rice 1924). As he frequently stressed, Tilden was a journalist before he reached the peak of his tennis career. He worked for the Philadelphia Evening Ledger beginning in 1915 at the age of 22, serving as an assistant to the famed cultural critic Gilbert Seldes, in the early part of Seldes’ career as a correspondent for the Ledger (Deford 1975; Tilden 1948). As essayist and cultural critic John Tunis put it, ‘Soon after his rise to fame [Tilden] became disgusted with the politics and chicanery which he found in tennis. And he said so’. Although Tilden’s preferred style of writing was drama or literary fiction, ‘His best writing was as a journalist or as a technical tennis authority’, wrote sportswriter Frank Deford in his biography of Tilden. Deford added, such writing gave Tilden ‘a platform. … [T]here was always some publishing syndicate ready to pay to print his views’ (Deford 1975, p.113, 125). One of Tilden’s steady assignments was a column for American Lawn Tennis magazine. A September 1923 column, following the US team’s victory in that year’s Davis Cup, intensified the Tilden-USLTA conflict. In particular, Tilden was angry at Harold Hackett, a four-time US doubles champion (1907–1910) who had been appointed team captain by the USLTA. ‘Suggestions on methods of play [in a doubles match] would come better at any other time than between the third and fourth sets. It is too late to change’, he wrote, in a thinly veiled criticism of Hackett’s intrusion during that match (Tilden 1923). The USLTA escalated the verbal war by pre-releasing Hackett’s response, a letter to the editor, to newspaper sports departments. After criticizing Tilden’s doubles play the year before, Hackett stated, ‘The fact that he chose to park his intelligence outside the stadium during the [1923] match was naturally entirely unexpected’. Hackett asserted his right and privilege to pass along coaching advice, then claimed, After refusing verbally the advice or instruction of the committee during the intermission he went out on the court and proceeded to follow the advice or instruction to the letter, and the result was he played tennis of the highest caliber, and the match was won. (Davis Cup official replies to Tilden 1923, 4 December, p.18) An incensed Tilden responded the next day, mainly criticizing the USLTA’s ‘star chamber methods’ in announcing the doubles team only 36 hours before the match and teaming him with a partner – Richard N. Williams – with whom he had never played before. Tilden attributed the team’s turnabout success to his growing comfort in playing the right court (‘I changed because Williams, too, is a left court player and we felt he could handle the play there better than he could in the right court’) and to a change of shoes. Tilden threatened to quit the Davis Cup 59

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team if his complaints were not sufficiently addressed by the USLTA (Tilden threatens to quit Cup play 1923, 5 December, p.15). The debate, it seemed, ended there; the USLTA offered no official response. The association, in fact, had been crafting a response, in the form of a resolution that was approved by the USLTA executive committee at its December 1923 meeting, to be presented at the February 1924 annual convention. The resolution called for an interpretation of the USLTA rules, under which, a player who writes on tennis for newspapers, magazines, periodicals or pamphlets and who receives therefore substantial compensation, pecuniary gain, or emolument contemporaneously with his engaging in tennis competitions, violates the said provisions of the Amateur Rule and shall be declared ineligible to compete in tournaments under the auspices of the USLTA. (United States Lawn Tennis Association 1923) The Executive Committee believed that if they could change the rule, Tilden would submit to their definition of an amateur and step away from his writing to preserve his tennis career. Perhaps indignant at Tilden’s tone and behavior in the media, the members adopted the resolution by a vote of 47,196 to 6,250. Despite the seemingly overwhelming vote (the result of massive proxy voting by representatives of tennis clubs with high memberships), the resolution provoked serious debate. Among the opponents was S. Wallace Merrihew, editor/publisher of American Lawn Tennis. He complained that ‘the resolution strikes directly at one vocation: journalism’ (United States Lawn Tennis Association 1924, p.41).

Tilden’s initial response: transcendence When people are publicly accused of wrongdoing, they are compelled to offer up apologia, a statement of self-defense. Benoit (1997, p.178) asserts that apologia is appropriate when someone is accused of an act ‘considered offensive’. In response to charges, the accused has a number of responses available, from outright denial, to acceptance, to exception and others, each with its own strategic benefits (Ware & Linkugel 1973). In such cases, the accused often turns to transcendence as a response.Transcendence is a strategy that places the act in a ‘broad, positive context’ to encourage the audience to see the act in a larger and more abstract sense (Benoit & McHale 1999, p.268; Ward & Linkugel 1973, p.280). In adopting transcendence as a rhetorical strategy, the ‘accused’ is able to center attention on the ‘perceived moral dimensions’ of the ‘alleged wrongdoing’ instead of answering the minutiae of the accusations (Rowland & Jerome 2004, p.197). What makes Tilden’s responses interesting is the different ways in which he applied transcendence as a means to turn the accusation against the USLTA. Tilden’s initial response, though reserved, reflected that transcendence as he predicted the ruling would hinder the game’s development. ‘It will work a hardship on many districts where the leading players are never, or rarely, seen in action’, he said. ‘In such districts the players have to depend on what these players write’ (Tilden hits at ruling 4 February 1924, p.24). Tilden cast the USLTA’s implied accusations against him into the broader context of the ‘good of the game’. He began by turning the tables on the USLTA, asserting that the USLTA will ‘greatly regret their action’. He enhanced this position by broadening the charge, suggesting that instead of punishing him, it would harm the sport at large. Tilden argued that strong players outside of the East Coast media’s reach, where ‘leading players are never, or rarely, seen 60

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in action’, would lose the ability to promote their skills and status. He went on to say that the ‘players have to depend on what these players write’, suggesting that without the benefit of their own media coverage, a prescient picture of today’s brand-conscious athlete, these deserving players would be left out of the greater tennis conversation. Tilden framed his argument geographically, pointing out that outside the ‘metropolitan districts and those along the coast’, the players in the ‘Middle West, the Southwest, and the South’, those who needed the coverage the most, would bear the brunt of the policy. For Tilden, players in the latter regions were too far removed from the East Coast media that dominated tennis coverage. Players lacking attention would be unlikely to garner invitations to larger events where they could showcase their skills and move up in the rankings. In essence Tilden’s first statement countered the USLTA’s proclamation, contending that it would damage the national scope of the game by hamstringing players from sea to shining sea. His careful reframing of the issue made it less a question of a conflict of interest in the player/ journalist dynamic, and more a concern for the national well-being of the game. Repositioning the charge against the larger backdrop allowed Tilden to reverse the charges and suggest that their short-sighted actions would have real and lasting negative effects on tennis and its developing players. Tilden’s second response, and his first prepared statement, came in a speech at the New England Tennis Association’s annual dinner on March 1st. In his most newsworthy announcement, he said, Concerning my own status under the rule, I believe that it will not apply to me. I began my newspaper work in the winter of 1913–14 and have been engaged in it to date. I did not play for the national championship until 1916 and yet had been writing tennis articles, as well as dramatic and musical criticisms, for three years. He added: My future, so far as one can prophesy, will continue along my present line of activities. Should I be forced in 1925 to make my choice between my profession and amateur tennis, I will give up tennis with deep regret and with the feeling that I am better for having played it. (Tilden threatens to abandon game 1924, 2 March, p.23) Earlier in this second statement, Tilden cast his argument wider, centering it on the philosophy of amateurism. At first glance, Tilden’s speech seems to have little to do with his earlier statement to the media. Tilden’s first assertion in the New York Times emphasized the benefits player/journalists provided to the game, while the second stressed the idea of amateurism and its importance to sports at large. While these two positions may be topically different, they are united by a common strategy. Here Tilden made use of transcendence in a different manner by using the broader setting of amateurism as a frame for the USLTA’s decision. He began by acknowledging the USLTA’s leadership’s concern, recognizing that they ‘honestly fear an abuse creeping into the game’. After that nod to their apprehension, Tilden again reversed the charges. He made a few passing shots with rhetorical questions about who was ‘better fitted to analyze or explain the game’: a ‘man who is engaged in playing it at the time’, meaning player/journalists, or a common reporter, which Tilden derisively labeled ‘a spectator’.

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However, the bulk of his argument lay in the way he reframed amateurism. Casting amateurism not as a status but as a motive, Tilden implied that the USLTA’s decision effectively tarnished the purity of the sport they claimed to be protecting. He began by contrasting amateurism and professionalism. For Tilden an amateur was someone who ‘plays a game solely for the game’s sake’ and was ‘not influenced where he plays by any business relations whatsoever’. Professionalism, on the other hand, was characterized by the ‘deliberate intention of capitalizing any reputation he may gain’. Reducing amateurism to a motive justified Tilden’s engagement in money-making activities such as sports journalism without risking his status; it was not the action that defined an amateur but the purpose. Tilden asserted that he had ‘never allowed material consideration to influence [his] decision as to where [he] played or when’, which would be a violation of the essence of amateurism. However, through clever play, an amateur may, as Tilden told his Connecticut audience, ‘gain a return through his fame’, and that was precisely what he did. Tilden, through his reframing of the situation, was able to maintain his ‘amateur spirit’ regardless of the USLTA’s decision. If the end result was that through one’s play a player may capitalize on his/her successes, then that should not be held against the player. After all, the player played for the love of the game, a noble virtue of the amateur’s heart. Tilden’s comments also reflected the early 20th century evolution in the concept of amateurism that allowed him to benefit so directly and generously from his athletic success. Great Britain had maintained the concept of the “gentleman amateur”, playing the game for its own sake – a policy that excluded the middle and lower classes from competition, which was handled by private clubs with expensive dues (Holt 1990). In the US, not surprisingly, concepts of democracy and opportunity overrode the British traditions, and in pursuits like tennis as well as college sports, notions of professionalism had begun to intrude (Smith 1990). As much as Tilden preached playing the game for its own sake, his practice profited him, and he knew it.

Round two: Ward's statement The USLTA executive committee met with Tilden later that month to address his request for a ruling on his amateur status.The committee did not issue a final ruling, but determined that Tilden likely would be found in violation of the rule.The committee delegated its report on the decision to member Holcombe Ward, chairman of the Amateur Rule Committee (Carvalho 2009). Ward’s report was released a month later, and it threw the process off the rails. In his letter, Holcombe acknowledged Tilden’s perception of how his writing promoted the sport, but refuted his argument: If these evils which we are attempting to curb really are evils, then the man who holds the position of champion of the United States (whoever he may be) should be the one to take the leadership in maintaining our amateur standards; because of the prestige which his position and title of champion give him, he should be more scrupulous than any lesser light in tennis to observe both the letter and the spirit of the amateur rule. For, if he infringes on the letter or spirit of our amateur rule, he can do more danger to our amateur standards than any other player, on account of his preeminence as a player and as a writer. If the standards of the champion are high, the boy and girl tennis players will be affected by his influence and are pretty certain to follow his example; but if his standards are otherwise, then he will have a bad influence on the standards of our boys and girls. (Tilden arraigned as a bad example 1924, 20 April, p.S1+S4)

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Ward’s statement drew a strong, outraged response from Tilden. In a letter to the USLTA – also released to sports journalists, of course – Tilden wrote: I learn with astonishment that the player-writer in general, and I in particular, am regarded by the committee as not only no longer an amateur, but as an “evil influence” in the game. … Since it is inconceivable that the association would desire the presence on the Olympic or Davis Cup squads for 1924 of such an “evil influence” I, although I do not for a moment concede either the fairness or correctness of the committee’s interpretation of the amateur rule or of my standing thereunder, tender to you my resignation as a member of both squads. I do this to relieve the association of the embarrassment and to save them from the criticism which will be theirs if they take the initiative in the matter. I do not regard myself as violating either the spirit or letter of the amateur rule, and I certainly do not consider myself an “evil influence” in the game, but your report clearly states that in the eyes of the committee, I am. … I resign with regret, but self-respect compels me to do so. I wish you and the committee to know that my services are at your disposal when my amateur status is clearly recognized. (Tilden quits place on US tennis teams 1924, 22 April, p.15)

Tilden’s ultimate response: transcendence plus vindication Tilden’s resignation statement takes a different tack. Using the transcendent foundation of his earlier comments, Tilden builds what Ware and Linkugel (1973, p.283) call a “vindicative case”, which seeks ‘not only the preservation of the accused’s reputation, but also the recognition of his greater worth as a human being relative to the worth of his accusers’. This approach denies the event and turns the tables on one’s accusers in an attempt to cast aspersions on their character, morals or motives. Tilden makes use of this strategy by offering himself up as a faux martyr in an effort to expose the absurdity of the committee’s decision. One of his more effective strategies is the juxtaposition of labels associated with him. He admits to being astonished that the ‘player-writer in general’, and himself in particular, is ‘regarded by the committee as not only no longer an amateur, but as an “evil influence” on the game’. The reference to the ‘player-writer’ is a holdover from the last statement, and he opposes that with the ‘evil influence’ quote from the committee. The obvious incongruence of the two, one innocuous and the other superlative, work to stress the committee’s overreaction to ban player-writers like Tilden from amateur play. At the same time, he also refuses to concede any sort of guilt. Tilden’s position is that the USLTA committee is over-exaggerating the issue and punishing him unjustly. He refuses to ‘concede either the fairness or correctness of the committee’s interpretation of the amateur rule’ or his position. He writes, ‘I do not regard myself as violating either the spirit or letter of the amateur rule’. He goes on to place the onus for the decision on the committee; despite his insistence that he is innocent of rule violations, ‘in the eyes of the committee’ he has broken the statutes. The combination of these two elements strategically places the blame for the whole ordeal on the committee’s back, asserting Tilden’s relative worth above theirs and giving him the moral high ground. The implicit argument is that the committee lacks the moral fiber to make the right choice, so Tilden sacrifices himself to expose their hypocrisy. He resigns but admits that he does so ‘with regret’, compelled by ‘self-respect’. He volunteers to remove himself from the team to ‘relieve the association of the embarrassment and to save them from the criticism’ that 63

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will come if they follow through on their position. In doing so Tilden makes himself a martyr to expose the committee’s nonsensical position. Tilden’s statements take different tacks to the same horizon. Through them Tilden argued that while the USLTA’s rulings may apply in some contexts, they are detrimental to the broader notions of the good of the game and amateurism. In both cases the details of the situation were used to foreground issues of larger importance. Tilden’s reliance on the ambiguities provided by his transcendent strategies empowered him to eschew the charges against him by subordinating them to the larger values of the USLTA. By turning the ruling into an attack on the pillars of the USLTA’s philosophical framework, Tilden managed to extricate himself from a difficult situation. It is important to note that such strategies wouldn’t have worked for everyone. Kruse (1981) notes that winners in sports are considered to embody the values of the community, or, in other words, winning covers a multitude of sins. One could speculate that if Tilden’s record were closer to average his statements would not have had the impact they did. In making such arguments, Tilden found quick agreement within the press. To critics of the era like Tunis (1928), the USLTA leadership had no moral grounds to criticize Tilden for his tennis-related gains. He estimated that Julian Myrick (who served as association president during the Tilden controversy), earned $50,000/year in publicity. ‘May I, therefore, be forgiven for presuming that, despite [Myrick’s] devotion to the cause of amateur sport, of which unquestionably he has been one of the foremost upholders, his bread cast upon the water of tennis has come rolling generously back?’ (p.292–3). From a media relations perspective, Tilden’s strategy worked. Sportswriters nationwide blamed the USLTA, not Tilden, and speculated that Tilden’s absence promised inevitable defeat for the US Davis Cup team (Tilden has lost only once in matches for Davis Cup 1924; Tilden quits US Davis Cup defense 1924). The association passed a substitute rule at its next meeting that allowed Tilden and others to write, as long as it was not during a tournament in which they were competing. Once the USLTA announced in June 1924 its willingness to compromise, announcing the formation of a committee to revise the rule (USLTA names four on rules committee 1924), things resolved themselves quickly. Tilden accepted the invitation to play for his country in the Davis Cup, and the United States team easily defeated its Australian rivals, 5-0 (US makes sweep in Davis Cup play 1924). This did not mark the end of Tilden’s battle with the USLTA over his writing career. Four years later, Tilden broke the rule he had helped to write, reporting on the Wimbledon tournament while he was competing in it. The USLTA executive committee suspended him immediately (Warren 1928), but that drew a protest from France, where the federation had completed an expensive renovation of its tennis stadium in anticipation of the Davis Cup match with the United States team, featuring Tilden (Deford 1975). As Tilden noted, it took intervention from the US ambassador to France to get the USLTA to yield and allow Tilden to play (Tilden 1948). It was not until Tilden turned professional two years later that the conflict would end.

Conclusion On the court, Tilden was known as a showman: a player who could exploit a match’s narrative to increase the entertainment value to spectators. Off the court, he showed the same prowess, particularly in crafting media messages that promised him victory over opponents such as the USLTA. Thus, it is no surprise that Tilden was able to combine his previous experience as a journalist with his demonstrated on-court success to dispatch a powerful sports organization’s attempts to corral him as easily as he did a first-round tournament opponent. 64

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Tilden’s strategy of aligning himself with the greater interests of the game successfully put the USLTA leadership on the defensive, even admitting within their June 1924 executive committee meeting that Tilden and his editor, Merrihew, ‘are running the Association. … [There] isn’t the slightest question of that’ (United States Lawn Tennis Association 1924, 4 June). Within a sporting culture that was experiencing numerous transitions, particularly a transformation from an upper-class “gentleman amateur” mindset to more of a populist approach that increasingly accepted professionalism, Tilden knew his message would find an accepting audience (Dyreson 1989).When combined with a sports-hungry American public that followed the exploits of Jazz Age icons such as Tilden, Babe Ruth, Jack Dempsey and Red Grange – not to mention the nationalism created by multinational spectacles like the Olympics and the Davis Cup – the USLTA’s defeat was not surprising. That Tilden was able to do so employing strategies of vindication as well as transcendence is even more impressive. While his audience might have been open to the transcendent sporting values he espoused, they likely would have been more resistant to his attempts to vindicate himself, and thus preserve his profitable career. Tilden’s ability to accomplish both rhetorical goals indicates complete triumph in his campaign against the USLTA. Today, highly paid athletes lose public support when they announce “holdouts”, seeking larger contracts. They can learn from Tilden, who was one of the most well-known and highly paid athletes of the 1920s, yet was able to frame himself as a protector of amateur sport, seeking to defend tennis against the ill-conceived machinations of the USLTA, while also vindicating himself individually. That timeless strategy left the Association’s leadership as certain losers even before they took the court.

References Benoit, W.L. (1987) Image repair discourse and crisis communication. Public Relations Review, 23 (2), 177–186. Benoit,W.L., & McHale, J.P. (1999) Kenneth Starr’s image repair discourse viewed in 20/20. Communication Quarterly, 14 (3), 265–280. Carvalho, J. (2007) The banning of Bill Tilden: Amateur tennis and professional journalism in Jazz Age America, Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly, 84 (1), 122–136. Carvalho, J. (2009) ‘An honorable and recognized vocation’: Bill Tilden makes the USLTA back down, Journal of Sport History, 36 (1), 83–95. Davis Cup official replies to Tilden (1923, 4 December) New York Times, p.18. Deford, F. (1975) Big Bill Tilden:The triumphs and the tragedy. New York: Simon and Schuster. Dyreson, M. (1989) The emergence of consumer culture and the transformation of physical culture: American sport in the 1920s, Journal of Sport History, 16 (3), 261–281. Holt, R. (1990) Sport and the British: A modern history. New York: Oxford University Press. Kruse, N.W. (1981) Apologia in team sport, Quarterly Journal of Speech, 67, 270–283. Rice, G. (1924) Big Bill Tilden. Collier’s, 29 November, 1924, pp.17, 25. Rowland, R.C. & Jerome, A.M. (2004) On organizational apologia: A reconceptualization. Communication Theory, 14 (3), 191–211. Smith, R.A. (1990) Sports and freedom:The rise of big-time college athletics. New York: Oxford University Press. Tilden, B. (1923) Tilden’s passing shots. American Lawn Tennis, 15 September, 1923. Tilden, W. (1948) My story: A champion’s memoirs. New York: Heilman, Williams, & Company. Tilden arraigned as a bad example (1924, 20 April) New York Times, pp.S1, S4. Tilden has lost only once in matches for Davis Cup (1924, 27 April) New York Times, p.J1. Tilden hits at ruling (1924, 4 February) New York Times, p.24. Tilden quits place on US tennis teams (1924, 22 April) New York Times, p.15. Tilden quits US Davis Cup defense. (1924, 22 April) Philadelphia Public Ledger, p.1. Tilden threatens to abandon game (1924, 2 March) New York Times, p.23 Tilden threatens to quit Cup play (1923, 5 December) New York Times, p.15. 65

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Tunis, J. (1928) The lawn tennis industry. Harper’s, January 1928, pp.289–298. US makes sweep in Davis Cup play (1924, 14 September) New York Times, p.J1. USLTA names four on rules committee (1924, 13 June) New York Times, p.J1. United States Lawn Tennis Association (1924, 3 February) Annual meeting. [Meeting minutes]. United States Lawn Tennis Association (1924, 4 June) Annual meeting. [Meeting minutes]. United States Lawn Tennis Association. (1923, 15 December) Executive Committee meeting [Meeting minutes]. Ware, B.L. & Linkugel, W.A. (1973) They spoke in defense of themselves: On the generic criticism of apologia. Quarterly Journal of Speech, 59(3), 273-283. Warren L. (1928, 20 July) Tilden is barred from Davis Cup. New York Times, p.1.

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7 Fred Perry and the amateur-Professional divide in British tennis between the wars Kevin Jefferys1

The amateur authorities in world tennis faced an increasing challenge from the rise of professional tours in the inter-war period.The large majority of national associations who affiliated to the global governing body, the International Lawn Tennis Federation (ILTF), formed in 1913, shared a strong commitment to amateurism: the notion that sport was played primarily for pleasure, not profit. Those taking part in elite-level events such as major national championships were forbidden from receiving direct payment for their endeavours; professionalism was disdained, and usually associated with the corrosive influences of money and excessive competitive spirit. But as tennis expanded after the Great War, the likes of Wimbledon and the Davis Cup – rising rapidly from five participating nations in 1919 to over 30 a decade later – attracted growing media coverage and spectator numbers, one result of which was the emergence of the first globally recognised tennis celebrities. Some of these elite performers resented the fact that under prevailing amateur rules, they were entitled to little more than trophies and shopping vouchers for their key role in attracting paying customers and popularising the sport. Growing concern arose about the spread of “shamateurism”, with stories circulating of top players being offered “under-the-counter” financial inducements by tournament organisers to ensure their presence and to draw in the crowds (Jefferys 2009b). By the mid-1920s, a few of the world’s best-known stars, winners of multiple titles, were growing tired of ongoing battles with their national associations over the amateur regulations. The French “empress of the court” Suzanne Lenglen (and later her compatriot Henri Cochet) and the American Bill Tilden took decisive action, accepting offers from American businessmen to embark on well-remunerated exhibition tours. Although immediately banned from any further participation in amateur tournaments, the first professional events featuring Lenglen and Tilden marked an important landmark for lawn tennis. Unlike before 1918, it was now possible for a select few to earn money openly through the game, other than via the usually poorly paid routes of coaching or court maintenance. Through to the Second World War, “pro” exhibitions were generally few in number and derided by the amateur establishment. The majority of leading players – even if susceptible to officially outlawed incentives such as small behind-the-scenes cash payments – remained anxious to prove themselves at the world’s most prestigious amateur events. But from the late 1920s onwards there was a version of the sport that theoretically

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challenged existing power structures, providing an alternative outlet for those who felt they should be paid handsomely and above board (McCauley 2003, p.18–23). This chapter provides a case study in the operation of the amateur-professional divide between the wars by assessing the decision of British and world number one Fred Perry to turn professional in 1936. As will be seen, the issue formed a powerful undercurrent in Perry’s thinking during his amateur career, which after a gradual rise in the early 1930s saw him secure eight top singles titles (including at least once each of the four major “grand slam” events,Wimbledon and the US, Australian and French national championships), as well as leading his national team to four successive Davis Cup triumphs. Coming from a modest social background and lacking the independent means of many of the “gentlemen amateurs” who dominated the upper echelons of British tennis, Perry increasingly flirted with the idea of securing his long-term financial future by joining Bill Tilden’s professional circuit (Henderson 2009; Jefferys 2009a; 2017). This brought him into conflict with the British Lawn Tennis Association (LTA), which – confronted for the first time with the prospect of one of its top players breaking ranks – stuck to its belief that Perry was already well treated and received generous expenses to compete around the world.The chapter explores the rival sides of the argument and shows that the topic became ever more pressing the more successful Perry became in the amateur game. The question of whether his departure could have been avoided will be considered, as will the reaction to, and consequences of, his decision. What becomes clear is that Perry’s decision – and especially the manner in which it came about – had a profound and lasting impact: on the balance of power between the amateur and professional variants of the game, on the player himself, and above all on the subsequent development of British tennis.

Perry’s rise to pre-eminence in world tennis, 1933–4 Question marks over Perry’s future playing status first arose as he established himself at the top of the men’s game in 1933–4. In addition to helping Britain to a first Davis Cup triumph since 1912, his reputation was enhanced considerably after he won the American national championships in the autumn of 1933. His path to victory in New York was eased by the poor form and early departure of the powerful American Ellsworth Vines, who was on the verge of turning professional; in the process thereby providing a potential co-star for Perry in future Tilden-organised pro events (Vines 1985, p.116–8). Perry’s victory in the US over the Australian “Gentleman” Jack Crawford, which he repeated at the Australian national championships in January 1934, marked the start of three years of singles’ ascendancy. When he arrived back in England in March, after nine months of travel, journalists began to pester Perry with the question: as champion of both America and Australia, would he be turning professional? In his memoirs, published in 1984, long after his playing days were over, he recalled his response at this time was to say that he was not remotely interested; his over-riding priority after winning two major titles was to capture the greatest of them all, the Wimbledon crown (Perry 1984, p.66). While his answer was sincere, he was undoubtedly reasonably well disposed in principle towards professionalism, and, according to rumours in the US, had already been made a substantial offer to join Tilden’s pro circuit (Newsweek 1935, 7 September, p.23). His views on the matter were barely concealed in a book he produced in conjunction with the London Evening Standard journalist Bruce Harris. My Story was penned in the spring and published in the summer of 1934, before he became Wimbledon champion. While much of the book consisted of accounts of his rise through the ranks, a whole chapter was devoted to ‘The Case for Professionalism’. This was topical at the time as the sport’s global authority had recently denounced illicit abuses of the amateur rules. In an effort to show flexibility and an awareness that top players warranted 68

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some support, however, the ILTF had also introduced, at the discretion of individual national governing bodies, an ‘eight weeks’ rule’, allowing a set amount of legitimate expenses for what it felt was a reasonable period of play in any one calendar year (Cunnington 1988, p.15–6). It was clear from My Story where Perry’s sympathies lay. Top players, Perry noted, gained from tennis ‘every material advantage except money’, even though cash was paid by the public to see them perform and their careers would be short. Although he acknowledged the generous support his own governing body gave him (meeting for example his travel and subsistence costs to play in Davis Cup ties overseas), much of the wording in Perry’s book was easy to interpret as a veiled attack on amateurism. Hitherto reliant on financial backing from his father, the Labour MP Sam Perry, Fred earned small sums writing on tennis for London newspapers, in compliance with amateur rules. But this represented his sole source of private income, and on his travels around the world, he noted, the LTA was invariably ‘strict in enforcing its rules about expenses’ (Perry 1934, p.150–3). Indeed, unlike many associations overseas, the LTA took such a hard line that it opted out of implementing the eight weeks’ rule, feeling it would be difficult to police and the thin end of a wedge leading to unlimited expenses for top amateurs.With Britain ascendant in world tennis as the holder of the Davis Cup, and with no overt concern that it might lose players to professionalism, the LTA saw no reason to change its stance (Lawn Tennis & Badminton 24 March 1934, p.1278–9). At this crucial stage in his career, Perry was thus well-apprised of the dilemma facing the world’s elite players, and reading between the lines of his book it was apparent in which direction he was inclining. He refused to follow the example of amateur officials who condemned the likes of Vines for choosing professionalism. Unlike most of his public school-educated Davis Cup team-mates such as Henry “Bunny” Austin, Perry lacked formal qualifications and had had training for a future career in the likes of banking or commerce. He did not have ready-made options to turn to once his playing days were over. Hence, more than most of his domestic rivals, he was thinking about how he might support himself after he could no longer compete at the highest level. Perry knew, however, that to cash in on his talent at this point, following the path trailed by Tilden and Vines, would mean early exile from the amateur game, and so for the time being his priority remained to consolidate his place at the pinnacle of the men’s game. This he did by taking his first Wimbledon title in 1934, following that up with a successful defence of his American crown. By the end of 1934 Perry held three of the four grand slam titles, and none of his opponents seemed to have an answer for his irresistible all-court game. Fred the international star, known to fraternise when in California with Hollywood actresses, was on the crest of a wave, even featuring on the cover of Time magazine. But this did not tell the whole story of how he was feeling off the court. If there was a period when Perry enjoyed in an entirely uncomplicated way his world number one status, then it was short-lived. Now that he was champion of Australia, Wimbledon and the US, as he recollected in his memoirs, ‘I was bombarded by the media, wanting to know if and when I would leave amateur tennis for the paid ranks’ (Perry 1984, p.84–6). From the autumn of 1934 onward, interrogations of Perry about his future dogged him relentlessly, and even occasionally affected his performance on the court.

1935: the drift towards professionalism In 1935, Perry moved significantly closer to deciding he would turn professional. As he made his way across the Pacific with a view to defending his Australian title early in the New Year, journalists pestered him at every landfall. In Australia, the same pattern continued, and he played poorly in warm-up events before losing to Jack Crawford in the final of the national championships. According to the renowned journalist Arthur Wallis Myers, Perry may have been guilty of 69

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complacency, having grown accustomed to getting the better of “Gentleman Jack” (Daily Telegraph 13 January 1935, p.11), though another possible cause of his demise was later revealed. American promoters had not given up hope of persuading him to turn professional in time for a winter tour in the United States.Talks rumbled on throughout the Australian championships, and culminated in a dozen phone calls from London and America the night before the final, the last coming at 4 a.m. local time. It may be that Perry exaggerated for effect the scale of intrusion, but it clearly unsettled him: ‘This was… not the best possible preparation for the defence of my Australian title and as a result I was duly beaten in four sets’ (Perry 1936, p.87; Perry 1984, p.87–8). In spite of the defeat in Australia – which potentially undercut what could be demanded in fees of professional promoters – Perry continued to be dogged by stories that he was about to quit amateur tennis. He wasn’t helped in this regard by his travel arrangements. His long journey home went via the US, where pro tennis was more established than in Europe. In California, Bill Tilden got the impression Perry was edging closer to coming on board.While he derived enormous pleasure from representing his country in the Davis Cup and winning top individual titles, to set against this, Perry knew he was close to achieving all he could in the amateur ranks.There followed a degree of ambiguity in his public and private utterances, which included hints that he might move to base himself in America. It was certainly difficult to kill off rumours about his intentions at a time when, behind the scenes, he was made offers to make cameo appearances in Hollywood films. Such appearances, Perry wrote in 1936, could have made him wealthy enough ‘not to need to do another stroke of work’. He felt strongly that there would be no contravention of regulations about being paid for demonstrating shots, but the ILTF ruled that if he went ahead, his amateur status would be revoked (Perry 1936, p.85–9); a resolution that hardened his distrust of the authorities. Interest in Perry’s intentions intensified as his form picked up again and he experienced his most successful European season yet, becoming the first British man to take the French title and retaining his Wimbledon crown with ease. But once back in New York for the American championships, Perry was plagued by renewed speculation. He later admitted that by this point he was seriously considering a move to professional ranks (Perry 1984, p.92).This perhaps marks the decisive moment, during the autumn of 1935, when a change in playing status became almost certain; only the timing remained unclear. Had the switch been made at this juncture, Perry would have been able to claim he had won all the grand slam titles, as well as helping Britain to a hat-trick of Davis Cup successes. Another triumph at Forest Hills might well have been enough to push him over the cliff-edge. North American promoters were desperate for a fresh face to add to the Tilden-Vines tour, and Perry was the obvious contender, especially as his nationality would allow any new circuit to be billed as a titanic Anglo-American clash. But any plans for an imminent move to the pro ranks had to be shelved when Perry – injured mid-match with a broken rib – was beaten in the semi-finals of the US national championships. Nursing his wounds, he decided on the spur of the moment that he and his actress girlfriend, Helen Vinson, should get married that same night, a development that grabbed newspaper headlines the next day, though, as the dust settled, it further added to Perry’s desire to make firmer provision for his financial future. Echoing conventional marriage standards of the day, Perry commented that his first duty was to ensure that ‘Helen Vinson is taken care of in a fitting manner’ (cited in: Henderson 2009, p.189). His enforced absence from the courts for several weeks through injury made it ever more difficult to avoid journalistic probing about his plans. Heading to Australia late in 1935, hoping to regain the national title there, brought little succour. In his opening match in one of the warm-up tournaments Perry narrowly scraped through a five-setter, but he was in great pain by the end. He left soon afterwards without even competing in the Australian championships. 70

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In spite of marriage, two grand slam victories in 1935 and his continuing status as world number one, Perry was confused and at a low ebb. He knew his price for becoming a professional had diminished as a result of defeat at Forest Hills and withdrawal in Australia. He also knew he had not recovered sufficiently to do himself justice in any circuit matches against Tilden and Vines.Yet friends in New York were still advising him that he would be “crazy” not to turn pro soon, having achieved so much in amateur tennis. Adding to the turmoil in his mind whilst still in Australia were telephone calls from his father urging him not to turn professional, saying that something would be “worked out” with the British authorities in the near future. Whilst it was not clear what the LTA might offer to persuade him to stay in the amateur ranks, these intimations from his father at least provided a foundation for keeping an open mind. The balance of the argument by this point appeared to have shifted decisively towards switching codes. But there was one last possibility of him pulling back from the brink. He wrote in his memoirs that at the beginning of 1936, with Helen due to be in England making a movie, ‘we decided to drop everything and gamble that the LTA would turn up with something’ (Perry 1984, p.95–6).

Leaving the amateur game in 1936 In reality the prospects of a last-minute deal preventing Perry from leaving amateur ranks were remote. Although Sam Perry used his political connections to talk with Sir Samuel Hoare, the LTA President – preoccupied as he was with duties as a senior minister in Britain’s National government – had little interest in Fred’s predicament. Hoare exemplified the strong commitment to the amateur ethos that characterised the inter-war LTA. Like many of the upper-middle classes who administered tennis, he regarded the game as a pleasant pastime, not a means of gainful employment (Hoare 1949; 1954). Unlike its American and French counterparts, the British governing body had not hitherto been confronted with the prospect of a leading player threatening to break ranks, and its general position remained straightforward: Perry had been amply supported on his various foreign trips; he should abide by the rulebook and be grateful for the chance to represent his nation. As Hoare once commented, professional tours constituted ‘a very formidable danger to every Association’, threatening to ‘strike at the very root of lawn tennis as a game and as a sport’ (cited in: Lake 2015, p.169). Perry claims in his memoirs that Hoare once said in an ‘off-guarded moment’ to his father during a discussion about Fred’s future, ‘After all, we do not consider your son to be “one of us”’ (Perry 1984, p.96). This wording illustrated the gulf that long existed between the LTA and the brash outsider Perry. In the exclusive, southern English-dominated corridors of tennis power, he had long struggled to fit in: both because of his northern working-class roots and owing to his refusal to always display gentlemanly restraint on court. The overwhelming sense as 1936 unfolded was that mutual suspicions remained. For Fred, the only comfort in the short term was a gradual recovery in fitness, though not sufficient to enable him to retain his French title in the spring. Defeat in the final left him fearing that – as the silence from the LTA grew more deafening – he was ‘getting the treatment’, with the “bigwigs” in the tennis establishment half-hoping that he would fail to repeat his Wimbledon success, so diminishing his appeal to professional promoters. He resolved, he later recalled, that ‘come hell or high water… I was going to win Wimbledon a third time, and then turn pro’ (Perry 1984, p.96–8). The only remaining question in the summer of 1936 was: would Perry leave on a high? He knew that if Wimbledon was lost along with his other titles, his whole amateur career would be cast in a less flattering light. It would look as if he was turning pro because his reputation was on the slide. In the event, Perry survived a closely fought semi-final before crushing an injured and 71

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out-of-sorts Gottfried von Cramm in a one-sided final. Ted Tinling, employed by Wimbledon at the time to accompany players onto court, recalled that as the finalists made their way back to the dressing room Perry, ‘with the incisiveness that made him unpopular in some quarters, said, “It didn’t take me long to fix him, did it, Ted?”’ (Tinling 1979, p.147). Aside from wanting to avenge defeat to von Cramm in the French championships a few weeks earlier, Perry’s lack of mercy towards a struggling opponent at Wimbledon indicated that the topic of turning professional was uppermost in his mind. He was determined that nothing should prevent the process going as smoothly as possible. As in previous years, victory at Wimbledon was followed by a telegram from New York promoter Bill O’Brien,Tilden’s manager, offering a deal for Perry, this time mentioning a minimum figure of £10,000 for joining a planned circuit in North America. Convinced the powers-that-be were not genuine about wanting to retain his services, Perry prepared for a swansong on home territory – the final of the Davis Cup. He clearly experienced mixed emotions after winning the deciding singles rubber against Australian Jack Crawford, thereby securing Britain’s fourth consecutive victory. The team coach Dan Maskell noted how Perry took a last lingering look at the emptying stands on Centre Court, the arena that had done so much to make him world-famous. At the age of 27, Perry knew he would never play on the hallowed turf again (Maskell 1989, p.179). While he admitted to a ‘great love affair’ with the place, he had reached a parting of the ways with the British tennis establishment. At the eleventh hour, there were moves by the businessman Albert Slazenger to coordinate a scheme that involved selling to Perry a house he owned in SW19 for £500. The idea was that wealthy associates of the Slazenger chairman would contribute to a ‘Save Fred Perry fund’ in order to buy the house back for £100,000, so giving the Wimbledon champion a sizeable income. A few of those contacted expressed interest, but the majority said Perry should be proud to represent his country by playing for nothing. As he embarked for America, he lamented, ‘still smarting over my treatment in England’, and once there he contacted his lawyers with the instructions: ‘“Get me the best possible terms”’ (Perry 1984, p.86, 103–4). Talks subsequently got under way between Perry’s lawyers and the wealthy American entrepreneur (and former Davis Cup player) Frank Hunter, who was in the process of putting together a pro tour for the winter ahead. The sums of money mentioned were more generous than anything previously in the pipeline, and Perry was keen to go ahead by putting pen to paper. But as the proposed tour would only commence at the start of 1937, he delayed signing a formal contract. His main reason for prevarication was that he wanted to bid farewell to amateurism by taking the American national title for the third time, which he did by coming through a tense five-set final against fast improving American Donald Budge (Myers 1937, p.205–7). The climax of the match unfolded against a bizarre backdrop. Before the players went on court Frank Hunter drew up two contracts. One, based on Perry taking the title, contained higher guarantees and percentages than the other, which would be offered if Budge was crowned the champion of America. As the long deciding set ebbed and flowed, one of Hunter’s legal advisers flourished the larger contract every time Perry won a game, but held up the smaller when Budge did the same. ‘They thought it was a great running gag’, Perry recollected, though he had struggled to see the funny side at the time (Perry 1984, p.105–6). Perry ultimately came through 10-8, and as the first three-time overseas winner of the American championships, he took permanent possession of the trophy. There was, however, a price to be paid shortly afterwards. Perry had set his heart on bringing down the curtain on his amateur career at one of his favourite tournaments, the Pacific Southwest in California. But after the long journey west he found it difficult to summon the same physical and mental energies for a rematch in the final against Budge, especially as the higher bounce on the cement courts in Los Angeles favoured the American. Perry admitted he 72

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was no longer in the right frame of mind, and he subsided tamely in four sets. The final part of his ‘exit strategy’ was therefore a let-down, though this was soon forgotten once confirmation of Perry’s switch to professional tennis came on the 6th of November, when he signed contracts at the New York offices of his lawyer. It was announced that he would go head-to-head with Vines and others in North America on a five-month tour starting in January 1937, with a figure of $100,000 involved as his minimum income from a guaranteed proportion of gate receipts. The decision had been so long anticipated that immediate reactions were muted. ‘This time it really is true’, wrote the tennis correspondent of The Times. ‘After the annual crop of rumours… Perry has gone over to the growing band of professionals, who can now boast with conviction that among them are the best players in the world. Tilden, Cochet,Vines – now Perry’ (The Times 10 November 1936, p.8).

Conclusion: reactions and implications In the weeks after Perry’s departure from amateur tennis was confirmed, strong opinions were offered from contrasting perspectives. Reflecting a concern that the Davis Cup was certain to be lost to Britain, some newspapers accused Perry of having swapped ‘glory for gold’. Others however, felt that ‘no fair-minded person will upbraid him’ (Manchester Guardian 10 November 1936, p.5), a sentiment echoed from within the tennis community by the British Davis Cup coach Dan Maskell, who reflected that the time had come for Fred to ‘capitalize on all the hard work and dedication that had made him the greatest champion of his generation’ (Maskell 1989, p.179). From the game’s governing body in Britain, the response was stern and unforgiving. Perry was told that, notwithstanding his status as world number one, he would be relieved forthwith of his honorary membership of the All England Lawn Tennis Club (bestowed on him as Wimbledon champion) and barred from membership of LTA-affiliated clubs. Although some generous references to Perry were made at the LTA’s annual general meeting in December 1936, at the same time the governing body’s official journal referred disparagingly to him having decided to ‘seek his fortune in the ranks of the exhibition player’ (Lawn Tennis & Badminton 5 December 1936, p.888). In terms of where responsibility lay for this sour outcome, it seems fair to conclude that the blame did not all rest on one side. Reflecting on the whole sorry episode years later, Perry admitted to being inflexible and ‘uncompromising’ at times. He also acknowledged that with his focus on playing and winning, he ‘never took the time to understand’ those who ran the LTA. In the calmer perspective of later life, he now tried to see the issue from the authorities’ point of view. Perry recognised that some of what he faced was a defensive reaction to the threat of losing a key Davis Cup performer, especially in circumstances that had not arisen in Britain before (Perry 1984, p.108–9; Wancke 1986, August, p.3–4). These admissions underline the point that the LTA should at least be credited with trying to preserve Britain’s place in world tennis. The governing body, after all, had chosen Perry to represent Britain as early as 1930 and regularly funded his overseas trips thereafter. One of his fellow British players, Ted Avory, felt that Perry’s mistake was to regard the tennis establishment as monolithic and uniformly hostile, rather than being a collection of separate characters of varying sympathies. ‘I had no title and no land and there were clubs I simply never tried to join’, Avory tried telling Perry. ‘But Fred never really saw that’ (cited in: Evans 1995, p.16). In view of the ‘dialogue of the deaf ’ that took place between Perry and the LTA in the mid-1930s, a parting of the ways was probably unavoidable. But could and should the governing body have done more to retain its star player? While conceding he was not blameless, Perry could not help feeling a huge sense of rejection after all he had achieved on behalf of British 73

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tennis. It confirmed his view that he had always been tolerated, not embraced, and it still rankled with him in his memoirs, 50 years on from the heat of battle, that the LTA had refused to engage in discussion about possible ways forward, hiding instead he felt behind traditions and regulations: ‘I always hated being told by the authorities that something wasn’t possible “because it wasn’t done”, whereas in fact it was possible, provided they didn’t know about it officially’ (Perry 1984, p.110). Perry was alluding here to the double standards whereby some governing bodies elsewhere in the world, while espousing the virtues of amateurism in theory, were in practice turning a blind eye to breaches of the rules in order to maintain strong Davis Cup squads. France had been known to make efforts to retain its ‘four musketeers’ (Henri Cochet, René Lacoste, Jean Borotra & Jacques Brugnon) who delivered Davis Cup success for several years and in Australia, it was becoming common for sporting goods companies to employ or subsidise the best players, so enabling them to develop full-time amateur careers. But in Britain, he felt, no such subtle financial arrangements were on the table. Instead, as noted earlier, the LTA flatly refused after 1934 to even accept that amateurs should be entitled to eight weeks of legitimate expenses per year. In view of its long-standing commitment to amateur principles, it was hardly surprising that the LTA refused to regard Perry as a special case. Indeed, the LTA took comfort from the knowledge that – despite Perry joining Vines and others in successful money-making tours after 1936 – the amateur authorities remained firmly in the ascendant through to the Second World War and beyond. In contrast to the lavish media coverage of major amateur tournaments, pro tours barely rated a mention on the sports pages or the radio airwaves. The enduring popularity and success of top amateur events meant that governing bodies worldwide, including the LTA, were able to treat pro tennis largely as an irrelevance. Although the signing of ex-Wimbledon champions such as Perry made for greater credibility, professional promoters knew their “product” would become stale if it could only promise endless match-ups between a tiny band of players. Amateur administrators, confident that the established game would always throw up new stars bursting to make a breakthrough, even believed that pro tours – starved of a string of highquality recruits – might fizzle out and disappear altogether (Jefferys 2009b, p.2250). In the final analysis, perhaps the most damning charge against the LTA was that it made so little effort to part with Perry on anything like reasonable terms. In November 1938, Don Budge – after becoming the first player to win all four grand slam titles in a calendar year – was given a warm send off by the US tennis association when he turned pro, despite the American tennis establishment, like the British, being renowned for its dim view of ‘defectors’ (Budge 1949, p.15–7). American administrators, perhaps heeding the lesson of how the LTA handled its own renegade, felt it was right to show gratitude to Budge, who in Perry’s absence helped the US to beat Great Britain and reclaim the Davis Cup in 1937 for the first time in more than a decade. By contrast, Perry had been turned into something of an outcast in his homeland, shunned by officialdom and forced to play on makeshift courts when he arrived in Britain as part of a European leg of his first professional tour in the spring of 1937. By far the most successful player the nation had produced since the First World War, Perry became something of a non-person in the eyes of the LTA, and almost airbrushed out of tennis history (Wind 1985, 21 October, p.62). The result of the manner of Perry’s departure was that all sides were left bruised. Perry built a new life for himself as a tennis pro living and working in the US, though he could never of course compete again in the sport’s top (amateur) tournaments. His name remained well known throughout the world after 1945 (and his bank balance healthy) following the success of his business venture, the Fred Perry sportswear label, but the severing of his ties in Britain left a bitter taste in his mouth. He was an elderly figure in his mid-70s– and pay-for-play “open” tennis well established – before a painfully slow reconciliation with the British tennis establishment 74

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was complete. In the short-term, the LTA preserved the amateur status quo globally by not offering Perry a deal in 1936, but, taking the longer view, it shot itself in the foot by parting so acrimoniously. Far from launching a campaign to find and cultivate new champions to follow in Perry’s footsteps, the LTA on the eve of the Second World War was still fighting a rear-guard action against widening expenses for amateurs via the eight-weeks rule. Its stance prompted anger among hitherto loyal stalwarts such as Ted Avory, who complained that British amateurs were severely disadvantaged in seeking to compete internationally.The LTA, Avory fumed, were more responsible for this ‘deplorable’ outcome than were any ‘shamateurs’ (Evans 1995, p.34; Lake 2015, p.173–4). British tennis, in other words, was the real loser in the aftermath of Perry’s departure, a point increasingly underlined as the decades passed with no male player coming close to emulating his individual achievements or his contribution to the nation’s Davis Cup cause. For home fans and commentators, it was to be an interminable 77 years on from Perry’s final victory in 1936 before another British man held aloft the Wimbledon trophy.

Note 1 This chapter is adapted, with the permission of the publishers, from the author’s biography Fred Perry: British Tennis Legend (Pitch Publishing, 2017).

References Budge, D. (1949) Budge on Tennis. London: Jarrold. Cunnington, D. (1988) 75 Years of the International Tennis Federation, 1913–1988. London: The ITF. Evans, H.D. (1995) Ted Avory. A Life in Tennis. Wimbledon: All England Lawn Tennis Club. Henderson, J. (2009) The Last Champion.The Life of Fred Perry. London:Yellow Jersey Press. Hoare, Sir Samuel (1949) The Unbroken Thread. London: Collins. Hoare, Sir Samuel (Viscount Templewood) (1954) Nine Troubled Years. London: Collins. Jefferys, K. (2009a) Fred Perry and British Tennis: ‘Fifty Years to Honor a Winner’. Sport in History, 29(1), 1–24. Jefferys, K. (2009b) The Heyday of Amateurism in Modern Lawn Tennis. International Journal of the History of Sport, 26(15), 2236–52. Jefferys, K. (2017) Fred Perry: British Tennis Legend. Worthing: Pitch Publishing. Lake, R.J. (2015) A Social History of Tennis in Britain. Abingdon: Routledge. Maskell, D. (1989) Oh I Say! London: Fontana. McCauley, J. (2003) The History of Professional Tennis. Windsor: Short Run Books. Myers, A.W. (1937) Great Lawn Tennis. London: Cassell. Newsweek. (1935, 7 September) ‘Perry:World’s Finest Tennis Amateur’: 23. Perry, F.J. (1934) My Story. London: Hutchinson. Perry, F.J. (1936) Perry on Tennis: Expert Advice for All on Lawn Tennis. London: Hutchinson. Perry, F.J. (1984) An Autobiography. London: Hutchinson. Tinling, T. (1979) Love and Faults: Personalities Who Have Changed the History of Tennis in My Lifetime. New York: Crown. Vines III, E.. (2005) The Greatest Athlete of All Time. Bloomington, Indiana: 1st Books. Wancke, H. (1986, August) ‘Interview: Fred Perry’. Tennis World: 3–4. Wind, H.W. (1985, 21 October) ‘The Sporting Scene’. The New Yorker: 62.

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8 Boris Becker and Steffi Graf German tennis, media images and national identity Kristian Naglo1

Until the appearance of the iconic figures Steffi – actually Stefanie Maria – Graf (born 14 July 1969) and Boris Franz Becker (born 22 November 1967) in the mid-1980s, tennis in Germany was not very popular – neither in a broader popular cultural sense, nor in terms of media coverage. Whilst Michael Stich became a world-class player during the same period – the so-called “golden age” of German Tennis which lasted until the late 1990s – he was never regarded as a figure of national importance as they both were. For the purpose of this chapter, Graf and Becker represent ideal case studies for comparison. They were raised in the same provincial region close to Heidelberg, and played professionally during the same time period (c.1985–2000). Due to their success, they simultaneously became part of the media revolution in Germany with the rise of commercial (private) television in the second half of the 1980s. It could be argued that because of their popularity and prominence they triggered not only a tennis boom, but greater public engagement with private television in Germany too. After retirement both turned away from Germany and both made news for doing so: Boris by identifying Wimbledon as his favourite home, Steffi by joining her future husband, Andre Agassi, in Las Vegas. Notwithstanding these similarities, they were and are perceived as very different personalities. Whereas Boris was regarded as an outgoing pop-cultural icon from the start, which turned him into an international and cosmopolitan figure, the media representation of and narratives revolving around Steffi more readily reinforced stereotypes about German character and values. As individuals they stood in stark contrast to the successful but uniform sporting elite of the German Democratic Republic (Teichler 2010). Against this backdrop they were arguably the first individual athletes in recent German history to generate a media narrative that can be linked to the concept of a mythical German national identity. Up until the 1980s, only the football World Cup champions of 1954 and 1974 accomplished something similar – as teams. With reference to memorable tennis matches and aspects of their private lives, this chapter elaborates on the public image of both players as representative symbols of a new German national identity. I begin by providing an overview of key sociological concepts linking national identities to the modern media, before identifying the specific German cultural-historical

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context of the 1980s. Both were crucial to the reception of Becker’s and Graf ’s success, but simultaneously produced specific narratives around their playing styles and personalities, both of which came to shape public perceptions of them. Their achievements triggered a tremendous tennis boom in Germany.Yet, as will be shown, their relationship with the German public and media was destined to become ambivalent. Firstly, on account of their achievements, behaviour and challenges on and off the court; secondly, precisely because of the way in which these were interpreted by the media.

National identities, imaginaries and the role of the media The construction of national identities can be a dimension of sport if competitions are organised accordingly. This is true for the big international tennis tournaments such as the four official championships colloquially known as the “Grand Slams”, i.e.,Wimbledon, the French Open, the Australian Open and the US Open, where players represent themselves as well as their respective nations. While the Grand Slams are individual competitions, the tennis Davis Cup for men and the Fed Cup for women are team competitions (Gillmeister 1998; Smart 2007). Tennis and its cultural expressions – either in the form of competitions or the personal style of players – can undoubtedly help to construct imagined communities that are based upon different myths, narratives and images (Kautt 2014, p.195). In modern sport, such encounters have generally been interpreted as substitutes for military engagement, or as a unifying factor constituting the nation – conceptually defined as an imagined community (Anderson 1991, p.6): ‘It is imagined because the members of even the smallest nation will never know most of their fellow-members, meet them, or even hear of them, yet in the minds of each lives the image of their communion’. It is obvious that sport contestations in modern and post-modern times are very important in (re)producing symbols, such as flags, anthems and badges which help to create those images of community that, in turn, take on meaning.Within international sporting contexts, national identities as collective identities cohere around such images and can level differences between individuals while they strengthen and stress communion at the same time (Assmann 1994, p.22). Myths are an integral part of constructed and imagined national identities. They usually take the form of a narrative, and are held by a certain community about itself. The concept of myth stresses perception instead of validated truth; it defines what is normal and natural and what is not, thereby ordering world-views. Myth is not evidenced history; thus people may be aware that the narratives they believe in are not completely accurate. However, the content of myth often takes on more importance than the historical account (Schöpflin 2000, p.80). The third concept of particular interest after those of imagined community and myth is Eric Hobsbawm’s invented traditions: The term invented traditions … includes both “traditions” actually invented, constructed and formally instituted and those emerging in a less traceable manner within a brief dateable period – a matter of a few years perhaps – and establishing themselves with great rapidity. The royal Christmas broadcast in Britain (instituted in 1932) is an example of the first; the appearance and development of the practices associated with the Cup Final in British Association football, of the second. … ’Invented tradition’ is taken to mean a set of practices, normally governed by overtly and tacitly accepted rules and of a ritual or symbolic nature, which seek to inculcate certain values and norms of behaviour by repetition, which automatically implies continuity with the past. In fact, where possible, they normally attempt to establish continuity with a suitable historic past. (Hobsbawm 1983, p.1) 77

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In this sense, the international tennis competitions are invented traditions, with ritualised national symbols circulated which include not only flags, anthems or emblems but also images of the players themselves and their respective styles. Wimbledon, for instance, is renowned for having its own style. For example, one dimension of the display of a specific national style is food, above all strawberries, which are in season during the tournament. This is a tradition that presumably goes back to Victorian times when the fruit and the ritual of afternoon tea became fashionable (Borg 2015). Sporting style is central to the tournament: firstly, as an expression of etiquette on court and, secondly, through playing with skill on lawn which is a rapid and unpredictable surface. As a sport predominantly focused on play by individuals, it is probably only in tennis that personal style can be linked to a national style. As Kelly (2007, p.85) observes: One cultural idiom for expressing relations of affinity and opposition is that of sporting “style”, generally taken to be a distinctive, albeit elusive configuration of coaching philosophy, game strategy, player attitudes, and team social relations. Individual players and coaches have styles; teams have style, but the notion is used broadly (and most problematically) as a national style of sports. … Sports styling is, in effect, a core grammatical construction of sports glocalization. Whereas Anderson in his famous study focuses on print capitalism as the major trigger in the linguistic creation of imagined communities (together with written languages of power, i.e., national languages), today it is media capitalism which helps to create new perceptions of imagined worlds.This is particularly relevant to sport with television being the “key medium” in this context. In the audio-visual medium of television, the perception of the real can be amplified over the silent images provided by (iconic) photographs. This includes ‘the appropriation of agonistic bodily skills that can further lend passion and purpose to the community so imagined’ (Appadurai 1996, p.112). In this sense, media discourses and corresponding narratives about sporting events form an important basis of everyday cultural-linguistic spaces, which impact on national and local imaginaries. An important aspect to consider here is the so-called live performance, specifically when it comes to the theatrical game of tennis: ‘The notion of “performance” suggests and evokes glamour, romance, nostalgia and drama, and it is these emotions which the mass of people attending live matches seek’ (Naglo & Waine 2014, p.20). Additionally, the idea of a knock out principle (no ties; only one player survives), which generally characterises tennis tournaments, enhances the tension for spectators. Otherwise, live broadcasts give the public an opportunity to participate directly in and interact with the ongoing event and identify with the mythical heroes in the sporting arena in relatively direct ways. This way, the media can function as a generator of national identification as they help the audience to detect differences in the behaviour of players: their style of play, how they handle defeat and success, their commitment to fair play, reactions to fans in the stadium and so on. They judge what they have just seen as typical (or not) for the members of a specific nation (Kautt 2014, p.201). This serves as a basis for emotional participation and the criteria that qualify as potential elements of identification can be either individual or a mesh of aspects; they can be mutually complementary, and can influence or exclude each other. Typically, they relate to and address elements such as ethnicity, national identity, aesthetics, performance and behaviour. Moreover, in today’s world of sports, this list can be extended by criteria that are outside of the actual competition, to reflect the popstar-status of an athlete (Schauerte 2016, p.70). 78

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The German context, tennis and the media Germany in the 1980s: self-recognition, individualisation and the media revolution The historical and cultural context of the 1980s in Germany, both East and West, was influenced by the – eventually failed – intention to introduce a so-called geistig-moralische Wende (conservative counter-revolution) by Christian Democrat Helmut Kohl, who became chancellor in October 1982. Broadly, Kohl’s project was characterised by a deliberate relativisation of National Socialism in order to rekindle and raise a national consciousness and identity ‘beyond Auschwitz’ and the existing two German states (see Schildt & Siegfried 2009, p.431) Though the political climate was very negative and conservative and often called depressing (bleierne Zeit) by the media afterwards, many people increasingly identified with the old Federal Republic of Germany towards the end of the decade. Apart from various political reasons for this development, the highly visible counter-culture of the 1970s with its focus on the idea of subjectivity is important here. It was linked to an increasing leisure sector, an expanding consumerism and the growing economic importance of the so-called culture industry and the media (Eisenberg & Gestrich 2012; Schildt & Siegfried 2009, p.403). One can, therefore, consequently speak of the individualisation and mediatisation of everyday cultural life (Alltagskultur).2 Trends towards new patterns of consumption and ongoing individualisation were noticeable in different areas such as holiday bookings, leisure activities, buying property and cars, or the internationalisation of German cuisine, especially via the rise of Italian restaurants. Further important aspects in this context were the development of sports and the (electronic) media. Here, the realm of television is particularly important because of its strong connection with the popularity of Boris Becker and Steffi Graf. The development, coined as a media revolution (or Medienwende – media turn), included the privatization of television. This was made possible by a verdict of the German Bundesverfassungsgericht (Federal Constitutional Court), delivered in June 1981. It finally came into effect 3rd April 1987 with a reorganisation of broadcasting into co-existing public and private providers (Schildt & Siegfried 2009, p.415). The TV channels RTL plus and SAT.1 especially pushed through as providers financed by advertising and consequently had great impact on watching habits in Germany. While consumption of television increased, the medium was now predominantly used for the purpose of entertainment and much less for information. Whilst the Kohl government supported the idea of privatisation to discipline occasionally critical public broadcasters, other well-known figures like former Chancellor Helmut Schmidt found private television to be ‘more dangerous than nuclear energy’ (Schildt & Siegfried 2009, p.416). However, the up and coming private broadcasters benefited from the tennis boom. SAT.1 for instance, heavily supported by the German tabloid press, exclusively broadcasted the 1987 US Open and concluded a deal with Steffi Graf as an advertising partner (Freese 1987). In the coming years, private television focused on exclusively broadcasting tournaments with Becker and Graf, even smaller ones which had to be shown at night-time. While private TV could use both players for advertising reasons in Germany, they promoted them not only as world-class tennis players, but also like pop-stars. This created a new interest in both personalities that exceeded everything familiar up to this point in German sporting history. Boris Becker and Steffi Graf represented a new phenomenon as individuals, and they neatly fitted the needs of private broadcasters to create sporting heroes – as well as providing more or less scandalous news stories.

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The revolution of German tennis Before the “golden years” of German tennis took off, first and foremost represented by Boris Becker, Steffi Graf and Michael Stich, the game of tennis was regarded as a fringe sport and upper-class pastime (see Eisenberg 1999, p.193). However, in Germany, just as in other nations, the coming of the open era after 1968 meant that the elite game had been changing. Not least, a different generation of players were coming through, such as Ilie Nastase, Arthur Ashe, Martina Navratilova, Jimmy Connors and John McEnroe. As professional players in the spotlight, by background, approach and personality they managed to change perceptions of the game worldwide. There were the occasional talents in German men’s tennis too, but they usually disappeared without winning important tournaments. Women’s tennis in Germany, however, did produce some decent players in the early 1980s, such as Sylvia Hanika, Claudia Kohde or Bettina Bunge. Thus, it is fair to say that these women already represented the first signs of the nascent “tennis miracle” (Koditek 2002). Nevertheless, tennis was still not very popular in the most important medium: television. When Arthur Ashe beat Jimmy Connors in the Wimbledon final of 1975, for instance, the most important public broadcaster in Germany, ARD, switched after an hour to the popular children’s program Sendung mit der Maus (The Show with the Mouse) because it guaranteed a higher audience rating. The same happened during the classic 1980 Wimbledon final between Bjorn Borg and John McEnroe when the other public channel (ZDF) decided to switch to a different show in the middle of the match (Deike 2002, p.202). Opinions changed dramatically when Boris Becker won Wimbledon in 1985; he completely turned the German tennis world and media and public perceptions of the game upside down. Additionally, this had a huge influence on the relationship between popular culture and ideas about German identities. Beating Kevin Curren at the age of 17 not only made Boris Becker the youngest Wimbledon Champion ever, he also became one of the most popular Germans virtually overnight. It was a time when his success really made a difference in the German sports world, in the social world and even in the political realm; football, by far the most popular pastime in Germany, was in crisis after the very negative performance of the Nationalmannschaft at the 1982 World Cup in Spain and an embarrassing knock-out at the 1984 European Championships in France against Albania. Whereas German football was regarded as joyless and results-oriented, negative and conservative (Honigstein 2015, p.94) – just like the general political climate in the country – Boris Becker came along as the opposite:;he was young, joyful, creative, hard-working and exciting. On the one hand, he symbolised youth, while on the other he could act credibly as advertiser for conservative institutions such as the Deutsche Bank and the car company Opel at the same time. He immediately became a pop-cultural icon, for example appearing in Thomas Gottschalk’s then famous TV show Na Sowas (Gottschalk & Becker 1985) and featuring in Bruce & Bongo’s hit single Geil (Bruce & Bongo 1986),3 and successfully took on the role of the passionate and cheeky son of the nation – an image that still clings to him. When Boris Becker went on to successfully defend his Wimbledon title in 1986 by beating Ivan Lendl in straight sets, Steffi Graf followed on the spot, by winning her first tournament on the ATP-tour at Hilton Head (6-4, 7-5 over Chris Evert). She was even younger than Becker but also had a very specific style – an incredible forehand and a backhand slice that was difficult to return (Brinkbäumer, Leyendecker & Schimmöller 1997, p.53). She showed herself very reluctant to change or even adapt her game over time and whilst she received a lot of criticism for this, her style of play became a trademark. Regarding her personality, she appeared to be just the opposite of Boris Becker: very shy and often doubting her own potential. Her image was that of the good and honest German daughter, and her father Peter Graf – who was also her 80

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coach and manager – did everything to stress that she was not like Becker, that actually she was the better German.4 When Steffi beat Martina Navratilova in 1986 (6-2, 6-3) to win a tournament in Berlin, it became clear that this was the beginning of a new era in women’s tennis. The year after, she won her first Grand Slam title in Paris, again beating Navratilova. Only months later, after winning another tournament in Los Angeles, she became the official world number one at the age of 18. Towards the end of 1987, she won the Federation Cup with the German team as well as the Masters in New York, but her greatest achievement came in 1988 when she achieved a Golden Slam – so called because, in addition to winning all four Grand Slam titles, she won Olympic gold at Seoul.

Narratives and styles As mentioned already, Boris Becker was transformed into a popular cultural hero from the start. He appeared to win Wimbledon out of nowhere as the youngest player ever, developing a unique style that formed the basis of the mythical narrative revolving around him. The myth behind the tennis player Boris Becker is that you can achieve your goals simply through a strong will and fighting capacity – even if you are not as talented as other players are. His style was characteristic of these attitudes, expressed by his resilience and capacity for playing high energy, fast-paced games. The German tabloid press called him ‘Boom-Boom Boris’, a reference to his powerful service and forehand. He played tennis with obvious athleticism – more like a footballer, not like a gentleman – inventing the Becker-Hecht (Becker lunge) and other trademarks such as the Becker-Säge (a saw-motion fist pump) or the Becker-Blocker (an early return shot) (Pappin 2015). Because of the way he played, his clothes were always covered in dirt, a fact that irritated even his manager Ion Tiriac in the early stages of his career (Sellin 2002). However, he was always highly motivated and known for his emotional outbursts, which made his performances entertaining to watch, too. Thus, on the court he embodied both the cool winner as well as the hot-headed competitor, while off the court his lifestyle took on the appearance of a cosmopolitan jet-setter. In this sense, he was a newsworthy symbol of success for the German public and remained so, even if he lost matches. Since the end of the Second World War right through until 1990, West Germany had intentionally pursued a policy of low key, low visibility national identity, and Becker – with the help of the media – through his purely individualistic sporting performances was able to transcend this and become a national icon. What made life complicated for him at this early stage of his career was the responsibility bestowed on him to be the ambassador and iconic representative of a new, cool Germany. When he played Davis Cup on the other side of the globe, people stayed up the whole night watching (Witt 2002, p.261). One of his most iconic matches outside Wimbledon was the 1987 tie at Hartford (USA) – also known as the Battle of Hartford – versus John McEnroe which lasted 6:39 hours. After winning for his national team (4-6, 15-13, 8-10, 6-2; 6-2), he celebrated as a German patriot, waving a huge national flag (Helpensteller 2017). This is without question one of the most iconic images linking him to a newly found idea of a vibrant German national identity. During these first successful years the public celebrated Boris Becker and his every step was followed by the media. However, he quite often struggled to cope with the pressure; his selfstaging as a constant rebel and some unfortunate choices in his private life damaged his public image in Germany deeply. To mention only two instances: he played in South Africa during the time of apartheid, which is why he lost his status as UNICEF ambassador, and he made some questionable remarks about the behaviour of fans and National Socialism (MacLachlan 2001). There was also his chaotic romantic relations and sex life, which are at the centre of his latest 81

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autobiography (see Becker 2013). And in his autobiographical work, The Player (2003), he compared himself to the mythical figure of Goethe’s Dr Faust. This is consistent with biographical literature which describes him as a very self-involved character (see Sellin 2002). In line with a consistent presence in the tabloid press, he intermittently publishes more-or-less scandalous and redundant autobiographies.5 In contrast to his image in Germany as someone unable to grow up, after his retirement from tennis Boris became a popular pundit for the BBC at Wimbledon – the place he also chose to live and feels most respected (Becker 2013). In an interview with the UK media magazine Radio Times (Boris Becker: ‘England is my home now – I have no privacy in Germany’ 2015, June), he said ‘Here I’m given space. People will politely say hello, nice you’re here, and then walk on. I’m not national property’. He has undoubtedly established a special relationship with the iconic tournament, as well as with the British public and media, somehow developing a status as Britain’s adopted son. Nevertheless, Boris endures as an ambivalent figure: whilst he has managed to reinvent himself in Germany thanks to successfully coaching Novak Djokovic and a decent outing as pundit for German television during the Australian Open (Kleffmann 2017), in contrast the British media recently scrutinised the twists and turns of his fortunes after he was declared bankrupt in June 2017 (Connolly 2017, 10 July). Having already been convicted of tax evasion in Germany in 2002, this is not the first time Boris has found himself financially compromised. It is, however, something his female counterpart Steffi Graf has just about managed to avoid. Generally, Steffi Graf has shown resilience in maintaining self-discipline and good behaviour, but her reputation as a law-abiding German citizen was placed under much strain by what journalist Steve Crawshaw called ‘tax evasion on a stunning scale’ by ‘the Graf clan’ (Crawshaw, 1995, 10 October; Ein Leben als Steffis Vater 2013, 1 December). Taken into investigative custody in 1995, Peter Graf was subsequently convicted in 1997 for his misdemeanours. Steffi’s status as a global sporting icon meant the scandal inevitably became world news. The fact that Steffi’s coaching and professional career since childhood had been very publicly controlled by her narcissistic father allowed her fans and the public to perceive her as a victim of her family background rather than a villain by association (Deiss 2002). At the same time, Brinkbäumer, Leyendecker and Schimmöller (1997) have suggested that she needed the family as a shelter and fortress against the public attention, which got out of hand at times. Paradoxically, while her father-manager was imprisoned, Steffi appeared to free herself psychologically to a certain extent. Only in the late stages of her career, when she had to come back from several injuries, was she eventually recognised as an independent and strong woman, celebrated for her performances whether she lost or won. In her last major win at Roland Garros (French Open) in 1999 she literally broke down Martina Hingis’ game, causing the younger player to leave the court in frustration at the end of the match (Hingis & Graf 1999). After Hingis returned to the court, Graf told her, ‘Martina, you are going to have many more chances to win, so don’t worry about it, please’ (Atkin 1999, 5 June). It is perhaps unsurprising that Der Spiegel dubbed her ‘clean, decent’ and ‘so wonderfully German’ (Sauber, anständig, wunderbar deutsch 1988, 29 August). Whilst she showed kindness to Hingis, her efficient and outstanding performances generally lacked passion or drama; at her best she was unbeatable, almost machinelike and therefore quite often interpreted as boring by the media and the public (Deiss 2002). Yet, at the same time Steffi was appropriated to represent stereotypical German values. Indeed, internationally she was nicknamed ‘Fräulein forehand’ and the German tabloid press gave her the moniker die Gräfin (“the countess”) – a wordplay on her family name which indicates distance, and this distance is certainly evident up until today. After marrying tennis star Andre Agassi in 2001 she chose to live in Las Vegas, visiting her old home town in Brühl and 82

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Germany only now and then. She disappeared, as it were, from the spotlight, but still retains a very good reputation and – at least in Germany – she seems to be respected for what she achieved, as well as for her understated personality (Gertz 2016). It is almost certainly this attitude which helps to generate Graf ’s mythical narrative: apart from keeping a superficial website, she very rarely appears in public or in interviews – which is exactly how a heroic and noble character would behave (‘Never complain, never explain’; Gertz 2016).6 In sharp contrast to Boris Becker, Steffi Graf gave little away about her feelings and was not emotional on court.This is probably the reason she never reached the same level of popularity as Boris.

Conclusion No sportsperson in West Germany had ever encapsulated national success as individuals like Boris Becker and Steffi Graf did during the second half of the 1980s when the media appropriated them as strong symbols of the West German state. The emphasis changed after the breach of the Berlin wall in 1989, when they gradually turned into representatives of a newly unified Germany that desperately needed new forms of identification after the relatively controversial reunification process (Niethammer 2000, p.552). Arguably, Becker and Graf paved the way for the reception of later German athletes nationally and internationally, such as Michael Schumacher in Formula One or Jan Ullrich in cycling. It is in a way ironic and paradoxical that two tennis-playing youths representing Germany came to be so expressive of their country’s national identity, when hitherto it was led by a much older generation of post-war statesmen such as Willy Brandt, Konrad Adenauer, Helmut Schmidt and Helmut Kohl. However, the emergence of Boris Becker and Steffi Graf fit perfectly into an emerging self-recognition of West Germany as it coincided with the start of a media revolution, thereby making them the ideal protagonists for new narratives. In turn, these narratives helped to form new national imaginaries which challenged static understandings of German identity. Both players suited this media purpose well because they represented different kinds of style, captured in the opposition of proximity (Becker) versus distance (Graf). Because of the specific Becker style and his public birth on the Centre Court in Wimbledon, he turned into a popular cultural figure overnight, and the Battle of Hartford secured his place as a national hero. Both Becker and Graf won the respective men’s and women’s international team competitions (Davis Cup and Federation Cup) twice; they even went on to win Olympic gold medals, however, his image was always an ambivalent one. The public suffered together with the player Becker, but they lost respect for him when he failed in their opinion. Steffi Graf, on the other hand, won most of her games seemingly effortlessly, without showing emotion. She embodied the better-understood organised and self-disciplined Germany, always in control of the situation and her opponents.The audience respected her for that, but for the same reason it was never easy for the public to connect with her: she simply was too dominant and too restrained. Even when she finally struggled for the first time in her career and was replaced as number one on the 11th of March, 1991, by her biggest rival, Monica Seles, the latter was stabbed in the back in April 1993 in Hamburg by a mentally ill fan of Graf. Thus, shortly after ,Steffi was able to regain the number one spot again, although she has since been criticised for her seemingly insensitive and opportunistic behaviour in this affair (Brinkbäumer, Leyendecker & Schimmöller 1997, p.227). She was also constantly followed by the tabloid press and involved in several scandalous stories, however, unlike Becker these were exclusively linked to her father and not generated by her own misdemeanours (Brinkbäumer, Leyendecker & Schimmöller 1997). This helps to explain why her image in Germany is still relatively flawless compared to Boris Becker’s. 83

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Finally, it can be claimed that the success of tennis in Germany during the “golden years” from the mid-1980s to the mid-1990s brought a new form of cosmopolitanism to German identities, which had the effect of reconciling the local and the global. Thus, Becker and Graf provide an example whereby tennis can be understood as part of a “glocalised” world, one in which social actors interpret global phenomena according to their particular beliefs and local needs at a given time – in this case those associated with understandings of national identity. According to Robertson (1992), “glocalization” comprises the endeavour to ­re-contextualise global phenomena locally, assuming mutual influences of the universal and the particular. Cultural globalization therefore finds expression as homogenisation and heterogenisation and, consequently, constitutes ambivalent spaces of meaning. Boris and Steffi were the first genuinely global German celebrities to embody this dynamic.

Notes 1 I would like to thank Stephen Wagg for his invitation to write this chapter, Carol Osborne for her editorial support and Tony Waine for proofreading and commenting on the manuscript. 2 The German term Alltagskultur is more specific than the Anglo-American expression popular culture. After comparing both terms, Waine (2007, p.161) concludes: ‘The term Alltagskultur thus expresses common sense, compromise and consensus, the very foundation stones of the post-war German success story’. 3 “Geil” is one of the most influential terms in German youth language of the 1980s and is still used today. In a colloquial sense, it can mean awesome or great, but its original meaning, often used in a derogatory sense, is horny or to be oversexed. 4 Apparently, he used to call Becker ‘der häßliche Kerl’ (‘the ugly guy’) (Brinkbäumer, Leyendecker & Schimmöller, 1997, p.55). 5 The latest, Das Leben ist kein Spiel (Life is not a game), published 2013. More recently, Boris Becker’s Wimbledon: my life and career at the All England Club (2015), London: Blink Publishing. 6 See: www.steffi-graf.net/.

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Eisenberg, C. (1999) ‚English Sports‘ und deutsche Bürger. Eine Gesellschaftsgeschichte 1800-1939. Paderborn: Schöningh. Eisenberg, C. & Gestrich, A. (eds.) (2012) Cultural Industries in Britain and Germany. Sport, music and entertainment from the eighteenth to the twentieth century. Augsburg, Wißner Verlag. Freese, G. (1987, 18 September) Ein schwacher erster Satz. Das Bundeskartellamt macht sich für mehr Sport im Privatfernsehen stark. Die Zeit. Available at: http://www.zeit.de/1987/39/ein-schwachererster-satz (accessed February 2017). Gertz, H. (2016, 31 March) Immer die eigene Linie entlang. Sueddeutsche.de. Available at: http://www. sueddeutsche.de/sport/steffi-graf-im-portraet-immer-die-eigene-linie-entlang-1.2926266-2 (accessed March 2017). Gillmeister, H. (1998) Tennis: a cultural history. London: Leicester University Press. Gottschalk, T. & Becker, B. (1985, 15 September) Thomas Gottschalk im Gespräch mit Boris Becker 1985, video. ZDF.Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9GioZWdc2g (accessed February 2017). Helpensteller, A. (2017, 1 March) 1987—Die Schlacht von Hartford. Sporthelden.de. Available at: http:// www.sporthelden.de/artikel/Artikel/1987-die-schlacht-von-hartford.html (accessed March 2017). Hingis, M. & Graf, S. (1999) Martina Hingis vs Steffi Graf 1999 RG Highlights, video. France 2/France 3. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bYMTF1Dgsvg (accessed March 2017). Hobsbawm, E.J. (1983) Introduction: inventing traditions. In Hobsbawm, E.J. & Ranger, T. (eds.), The invention of tradition (pp.1–14), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Honigstein, R. (2015) Das Reboot. How German soccer reinvented itself and conquered the world. New York: Nation Books. Kautt, Y. (2014) Profifußball und Nationalität im Netz der Bilder—das Beispiel der Europameisterschaft 2012 im Spiegel deutscher und englischer Printmedien. In Waine, T. & Naglo, K. (eds.), On and off the field. Fußballkultur in England und Deutschland. Football culture in England and Germany (pp.193–215), Wiesbaden: Springer VS. Kelly, W.W. (2007) Is baseball a global sport? America’s ‘national pastime’ as global field and international sport. In Giulianotti, R. & Robertson, R. (eds.), Globalization and sport (pp.79–93), Oxford: Blackwell. Kleffmann, G. (2017, 27 January) Ich spüre Freiheit. Sueddeutsche.de. Available at: http://www.sueddeutsche. de/sport/boris-becker-ich-spuere-freiheit-1.3352870 (accessed March 2017). Koditek, D. (2002) Die goldenen Jahre. In Deutscher Tennis Bund e.V. (ed.), Tennis in Deutschland. Von den Anfängen bis 2002 (pp.236–49), Berlin: Duncker und Humblot. MacLachlan, H. (2001, 26 November) Fans remind me of Nazis, says Becker. The Daily Telegraph. Naglo, K. & Waine, A. (2014) Constructing national football cultures. In Waine,T. & Naglo, K. (eds.), On and off the field. Fußballkultur in England und Deutschland. Football culture in England and Germany (pp.9–24), Wiesbaden: Springer VS. Niethammer, L. (2000) Kollektive Identität. Heimliche Quellen einer unheimlichen Konjunktur. Hamburg: Rowohlt. Obituary: Peter Graf (2013, 4 December) The Daily Telegraph. Pappin, L. (2015, 24 June) 6 more personalities we miss on court. Tennis Canada. Available at: http://www. tenniscanada.com/videos-6-more-personalities-we-miss-on-court (accessed March 2017). Robertson, R. (1992) Globalization: social theory and global culture. London: Sage. Sauber, anständig, wunderbar deutsch (1988, 29 August) Der Spiegel. Schauerte,T. (2016) Die Theatralität des Sports. In v.d. Heyde, J. & Kotthaus, J. (eds.), Wettkampf im Fußball— Fußball im Wettkampf (pp.68–79), Weinheim: Beltz Juventa. Schildt, A. & Siegfried, D. (2009) Deutsche Kulturgeschichte. Die Bundesrepublik—1945 bis zur Gegenwart. Bonn: Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung. Schöpflin, G. (2000) Nations. Identity. Power.The new politics of Europe. London: NYU Press. Sellin, F. (2002) „Ich bin ein Spieler“. Das Leben des Boris Becker. Hamburg: Rowohlt. Smart, B. (2007) Not playing around: global capitalism, modern sport and consumer culture. In Giulianotti, R. & Robertson, R. (eds.), Globalization and sport (pp.6–27), Oxford: Blackwell. Teichler, H.-J. (2010) Sport und Sportpolitik in der DDR. In Krüger, M. & Langenfeld, H. (eds.), Handbuch Sportgeschichte (pp.227–40), Schorndorf: Hofmann. Waine, A. (2007) Changing cultural tastes. Writers and the popular in modern Germany. New York: Berghahn Books. Witt, P. (2002) Der Becker. In Deutscher Tennis Bund e.V. (eds.), Tennis in Deutschland.Von den Anfängen bis 2002 (pp.261–5), Berlin: Duncker und Humblot.

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9 The female hero through the cultural lens Comparing framing of Li Na in Chinese and Western media Steve Bien-Aimé, Haiyan Jia and Chun Yang

The future of women’s tennis might hinge on retired Chinese tennis player Li Na, winner of the 2011 French Open and 2014 Australian Open, according to the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA).WTA chief executive Stacey Allaster said, ‘I believe that Li Na is the player of this decade who will have the most impact on the growth of women’s tennis. … We will see the fruit of her contributions. We’re experiencing them now… and I believe for decades to come’ (Rothenberg 2014, p.D6). Li moved into international prominence by becoming the first Chinese player to reach a Grand Slam singles final in the 2011 Australian Open. Reaching a major final was a great feat in itself considering that tennis was not played in China until the late 1800s, when missionaries introduced it (China Daily 2011c), and the Chinese state system did not pay attention to tennis until 1988, leaving its players at a disadvantage compared to competitors from abroad (Newman 2013). Though Li lost, her success in major tournaments extended to the French Open, five months later. There, she won, to become the first Asian-born player to achieve a major tournament victory. Interestingly The New York Times used ‘Breakthrough for China in French Final’ as its headline for Li’s victory against Italy’s Francesca Schiavone in the final (Clarey 2011b, p.S1).The same article quoted Allaster as saying,‘She was already a national hero; she’s just going to go to rock-star status. Look at Yao Ming. She’s going to be there’. Erasing her personal achievement, The New York Times created a narrative that Li is a revered national hero who plays for all the 1.3 billion people in China. However, China Daily presented her accomplishment as an individual achievement, with the headline: ‘Li Na makes history!’ (China Daily 2011b). Leela Fernandes (2013, p.70) discusses this difference in framing using the idea of ‘otherness’ when it comes to non-Western subjects. Most Americans will never go to China, and so Li Na essentially has to serve as the representative for all things Chinese, for The New York Times. We can surmise then Li is not like Americans; she is Chinese, and therefore, she is the best approximation of China. This difference can also be seen in certain discourses in stories such as this: ‘Unwilling to be shackled by the Chinese sports system, leading to clashes with officialdom and a reputation for being difficult, she’s managed to do it her way and that way has worked in the end’ (Agence France-Presse 2011a). Fernandes explains that for the West, any non-Western practice it deems bad must be ­excoriated (2013, p.73). 86

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Li’s various media portrayals illustrate the vital roles that media sources serve in creating public perceptions (Boomgaarden, de Vreese, & Semetko 2011; Kitzinger 2010;Van Gorp 2007). The news media do not simply present news to the public; instead, as communication sources, they define and construct issues and public controversies (Nelson, Clawson & Oxley, 1997). Framing theory suggests that a frame is the main concept being transmitted by the media (Melkote 2009). While covering the same issue, different media will focus attention on different events, aspects, people, reactions, results, etc., and therefore influence the choices people make in processing the information (Boomgaarden, et al. 2011; De Vreese 2004; Levin & Gaeth 1988). News media’s framing of international events and foreign countries, in particular, has a large effect on domestic citizens’ perceptions, according to Wang and Shoemaker (2011, p.4): ‘Since most people lack direct experiences with foreign countries, their opinions of them are based mainly on the information they receive from the media’. At the same time, Clausen (2004, p.27) identifies a tendency to ‘domesticate’ foreign news such that ‘international news is presented within frames of interpretation of local audiences in each nation, which makes global news particular to each country’. Thus, through thematic analysis, this chapter compares the frames applied to Li Na in Chinese (China Daily and Xinhua News Agency) and Western media (The New York Times and Agence France-Presse). The analysis illustrates differences in Chinese and Western media systems, sports systems and cultural values.

Literature review Chinese and Western media From the perspective of comparative media systems research, China differs from many Western countries in areas such as media and political freedom, diversity, centrality and tradition (Engesser & Franzetti 2011). With its unique political structure underlying the media system, media framing reflects strong state control, and influences other aspects that are dependent upon such a political system, such as freedom of media, media ownership, financing of media, political parallelism and media culture (Rohrhofer 2013). While the Chinese government plays a huge role in which stories its media cover and ignore, it is disingenuous to say that all Chinese media simply regurgitate what the government says (Luther & Zhou 2005; Wang 2013). Intricate interactions exist between the public and the state in regards to media. The government cannot create content on its own; however, the state does influence the content creation through its relationships with the media, social networking sites and various constituencies – e.g., rich vs. poor, or urban vs. rural (Wang 2013). While scrutinizing the relationships between the state and the media, it is important to note that not all Chinese media companies are run similarly or share the same purposes, both of which speak to the diversity surrounding the Chinese media system. For example, China Daily, which was created in 1981, ‘was designed to introduce foreigners to China as part of China’s economic reforms and open-door policy’ (Luther & Zhou 2005, p.862). The content found here, which takes some cues from Western media in terms of what is reported, would be far different from the stories created by the Xinhua News Agency. Xinhua is ‘China’s only national news agency’ and ‘remains one of the [Communist] Party’s most loyal “mouthpieces” and plays a leading role in the Party’s propaganda works targeting foreigners’ (Xin 2009, p.364). Xinhua’s coverage of ‘sensitive’ stories often helps create ‘the official tone that other Chinese media outlets follow’ (Xin 2009, p.364). For Western media, the profit motive borne from capitalism more often than not dictates their final behaviors. However, it must be clearly understood that ‘state structures’ are ‘embedded’ in myriad ways throughout society, even in media (Fernandes 2013, p.144). 87

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Chinese and Western sport systems Prior to Li Na, basketball player Yao Ming was China’s most well-known sport star of the 2000s, covered extensively by both Chinese and Western media (Wang 2004). His success also highlighted a strange duality between China and the West, more specifically the US, as Yao represented China ‘as a resistant force to the US hegemony’ but also reifying the American dream, as an individual ‘whose economic and cultural achievements in the West are symbols of the nation’s progress’ (Wang 2004, p.264). Arguably, the success of Chinese athletes on the global stage has implications for capitalism alongside international bragging rights. Unlike their Western counterparts, Chinese athletes experience much more direct influence from the state (Wei, Hong & Zhouxiang 2010). Starting from the late 1950s, China’s juguo tizhi (‘whole-nation sports system’) was geared to ‘governmental actions of gathering resources nationwide to accomplishing major tasks’ (Xing 2016, p.185). Within the system of juguo tizhi, Chinese women athletes started to win world championships in a whole host of different sports, and, aside from the 1984 Olympics, have won the majority of their country’s Olympic medals (Tizhi 2012). While there have been market-based reforms implemented in the Chinese sport system, it still aims to identify exceptional youths to specialize in a particular sport, and then essentially pushes them toward elite-level competition (Wei, et al. 2010).This contrasts with the perception of ‘choice’ offered by market-based Western economies where perhaps parents with economic means or outside sponsors – non-state actors – hold more sway in determining a child’s progress in sport.

Why Li Na? Generally speaking, Li serves as a good example by which to examine media framing between China and the West. China is the world’s most populous country and contains the second-largest economy, so it is indeed a big player on the world stage. This is becoming increasingly true in sports; for instance, at the 2008 Olympic Games, China placed first overall in the medal count. It is well acknowledged that Chinese women have made the greatest contribution to China’s rise in international sports (Agence France-Presse 2011b); however, very limited research has been conducted to examine Chinese women and sports. Li, Asia’s first and only Grand Slam singles champion (Rothenberg 2014), excelled in a sport in which China traditionally has never dominated. Li was pushed into badminton at age five by her father, a former player, but was later deemed not competitive enough to excel in this sport. Before she turned eight, a coach persuaded her parents that she would have a better chance in tennis, a sport that few Chinese knew at that time, and that was overseen by the national and provincial sporting bureaus and management centers (Larmer 2013). In September 2004, she become the first Chinese tennis player to win a WTA event (Agence France-Presse 2011a), and when she won the 2011 French Open, China Daily (2011c) praised Li as ‘now on par with basketball giant Yao Ming and heroic hurdler Liu Xiang in promoting Chinese sport around the world’. When she retired in September 2014, Li was ‘the world’s second-highest paid female athlete’ (Rothenberg 2014, p.D6), with most of her income coming from endorsements (Badenhausen 2014). Her accomplishments and character – in particular her rebellious remarks and actions – make her an interesting case for research. Within China’s rigid sports system, Li pushed for the experimental reform policy, termed “Fly Solo” by Chinese media, to gain the freedom to hire her own coaching staff, be responsible for the costs of training and expenses and keep more of 88

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her earnings (China Daily 2013c; Larmer, 2013). Even Li’s body became a site of controversy because she has two tattoos, and having tattoos in China is abnormal (China Daily 2011a). This attitude is different in the West where tattoos are more accepted and prevalent.

Method The content from two Western news outlets (The New York Times and Agence France-Presse) were compared with two Chinese news outlets (China Daily and Xinhua News Agency).Yang (2003) adopted a similar comparative approach but paired The New York Times and Washington Post against People’s Daily Online and China Daily. Yang (2003, p.236) wrote that China Daily ‘enjoyed the same reputation’ as The New York Times and Washington Post in terms of being viewed as a serious and ‘influential’ newspaper, and Neumann and Fahmy (2012, p.174) described Agence-France Presse as one of the ‘leading Western news agencies’. By using Agence-France Presse in place of The Washington Post, a European perspective is added, allowing better comparisons between Chinese media and Western media, not just US media.The Xinhua News Agency was used in place of People’s Daily Online because it is a wire service, somewhat akin to Agence France-Presse, and is ‘China’s only national news agency’ (Xin 2009, p.364). For comparative studies, it is best to contrast two systems that are at least similar in construction, but this cannot be done here. While Yang’s (2003) work provides precedent for comparing dissimilar media systems, it must be acknowledged that there are limitations with the current news outlets under analysis. The operational structures are not shared (private ownership versus state owned), they are not responsible to the same entities (shareholders versus the state), and they each have different rationales for coverage. This creates certain limitations, but as with Yang’s (2003) research, valuable work can still be done with such a comparative study. The articles for this current study were published from January 2011 to September 2014, the period between when Li reached her first major tournament final and her retirement. The search term ‘Li Na’ was typed into news databases LexisNexis and Newsbank to generate the articles for analysis. Li Na had to be the subject of the headline or the opening paragraph to be included in the analysis. The authors used thematic analysis to derive the frames for analysis in the manner described by Lindlof and Taylor (2011), in which the articles were closely read multiple times until clear patterns emerged. However, it was quickly determined that articles that simply depicted the results of a match or contained more of a ‘hard news’ focus were discarded as those stories did not yield anything contributing to this current study.

Results Not surprisingly, there are clear differences between how Western media and Chinese media portray Li in profile stories. The first frame that appears in Western stories describing Li’s personality is a conflict frame between Li and China that manifests itself in a few ways. The first is the West’s fascination with Li’s tattoo. The New York Times described the 28-year-old Li as a late bloomer with a flower tattoo on her chest and an independent streak who, frustrated by her results on the satellite tour, once took a two-year break from the game to follow a media-studies program at a Chinese university before returning in 2004. (Clarey 2011a, p.1) Two Agence France-Presse articles used the same sentence structure: ‘She defied Chinese convention by getting a tattoo – a red rose – on her chest’ (Agence France-Presse 2013a, 2013b). 89

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From a Western perspective, Li is showing independence by doing what is perceived to be a “Western” behavior, getting a tattoo. While the Xinhua News Agency does not even mention Li’s tattoo, China Daily does discuss it: ‘Having a tattoo is rare among Chinese athletes. However, Li has two tattoos – a rose and a heart above her left breast and a butterfly on her lower back. Li said the rose-and-heart tattoo represents her love for her husband’ (China Daily 2011a). In Chinese history, tattooing has had a less than stellar history as tattoos were often given to criminals as a way of marking and shaming them (Reed 2000). Reed’s historical research found that tattooing extended to labeling slaves and castigating others as sexual deviants. While some members of the military also had tattoos, there was a stigma generally associated with this form of body art. Thus, having tattoos is among a number of small acts of rebellion that Li chooses to engage in, as she wrote in her memoirs: ‘The tattoo made me move away from the unhappiness of the national games for a while’ (Beech 2014). It symbolizes her fight with the confines of the system, among other instances including her romantic relationship with her then partner and now husband, Jiang Shan, and her decision to quit tennis and go to university with Jiang in 2002. However, the tattoo became a source of exasperation for Li, as she ‘has thought about getting rid of it after being asked so many times about its meaning’ (China Daily 2011a). While another New York Times article does describe that one tattoo is dedicated to her husband, the framing of the tattoo is still markedly different: ‘Beloved in China as a renegade who frequently makes fun of her husband on television and has a rose tattoo as an emblem of her love for him, Li has shattered traditional Chinese stereotypes of shyness and obedience for the younger generation’ (Levin 2011). The rose tattoo’s symbolism is secondary compared to the fact that Li is apparently a ‘renegade’ who does whatever she wants, which sits in stark contrast to other Chinese athletes. Accordingly, the second conflict frame is Li as a rebel (Agence France Presse 2014; SebagMontefiore 2013). For example, Agence France-Presse (2014) said, ‘Over the years she has earned a reputation as a maverick and a prickly character in China, a nation where state-trained sports stars typically keep their emotions strictly in check’. Western media portrayed the typical Chinese athlete as overly staid, but Li is called a ‘feisty and fiery personality’, having had ‘tangles with Chinese authorities and media during her long journey to the top’ (Agence France-Presse 2013a). While Chinese media acknowledges Li’s outgoing nature, there are often some subtle, sometimes more overt, calls for Li to temper her emotions. The same article refers to Li’s response to a Chinese reporter’s question after her loss in an earlier 2013 French Open event. When asked if she had an explanation to her Chinese fans regarding her loss, Li responded in Chinese, saying: ‘Do I need to explain? It’s strange. I lost a game and that’s it. Do I need to get on my knees and kowtow to them? Apologize to them?’ (China Daily 2013b). Chinese media responded negatively to this; for example, China Daily (2013c) quoted a public relations expert as saying, ‘Professional athletes always keep their tempers under control while showing off their personalities. It’s a vocational skill as important as their athletic abilities’. The criticism, however, is seen not just about keeping her temper in check, but rather, about Li’s refusal to be painted as a patriot. The New York Times’ reported on this media controversy, saying Li’s ‘independent streak’ is ‘a fundamental challenge to the way the Chinese Communist Party has rallied its subjects for 64 years’ (Larmer 2013). Li’s remarks and actions apparently contradicted China’s newspaper headlines that credited years of state training for Li’s victories. Regarding her 2014 Australian Open championship, a Xinhua article titled ‘Why did Li succeed?’ said: ‘The country took care of Li and cultivated her. The state is her sponsor’ (Meng 2014, p.6). A similar narrative is applied to male Chinese athletes of other sports. Wang Zhizhi, the first ever Chinese player in the National Basketball Association, was criticized as disloyal to his homeland in 2002 after not reporting back to the Chinese national team after the NBA season. 90

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The Chinese Basketball Association said, ‘When the mother country needed him, he did not care about what’s good for the country and was unwilling to serve his country’ (Armitage 2002, p.8). However, Li faced additional pressure because female athletes are especially expected to be obedient and well-tempered. Research analyzing media images of male and female professional athletes has shown that media coverage tends to reveal female athletes’ imperfections and character flaws that are closely associated with stereotypically feminine gender roles, while reinforcing the concept of professional sport as a male preserve (Hilliard, 1984). A second difference found between Western and Chinese media is the perception that Li was forced to play tennis. While articles in both sets of media discuss how Li wants for children to have more freedom to select their activities, Western media created a perception that Chinese youths have no choice but to participate in activities they detest. A New York Times Magazine article said her father gave ‘his daughter no choice when he enrolled her at age 5 in a local staterun sports school’ (Larmer 2013). The same paragraph said, ‘A coach persuaded her parents that she would have a better chance in a sport that few Chinese at that time had ever seen. “They all agreed that I should play tennis,” she said, “but nobody bothered to ask me”’ (Larmer 2013). Xinhua and China Daily were more measured in its reporting in this arena, quoting Li after her 2011 French Open win as saying, ‘I think parents should let their children fall in love with tennis first. That is very important’. The same article did not depict Li’s entrance to tennis in such draconian terms, giving her more agency than in Western media’s portrayal. The article said, ‘Li originally played badminton and was introduced to tennis by her coach. Li has repeatedly said she did not like playing tennis in her early years and decided to quit the sport when she was only 21’. A related difference in frames lies within how Western and Chinese media reported on the Chinese athletic system. The New York Times and Agence France-Presse depicted the state system as ‘rigid’, a ‘machine’ from which Li needed to break free, with The New York Times going further to describe the Chinese tennis system as repressive and brutal: The first time Li defied her coach came at age 11, when, on the verge of collapse, she refused to continue training. Her punishment was to stand motionless in one spot during practices until she repented. Only after three days of standing did Li apologize. (Larmer 2013) Interestingly, Xinhua acknowledged some issues with Chinese practices by using the phrase ‘controversial state tennis system in China’ in its review of Li’s autobiography (Wang 2012). In addition, China Daily pointed out that while leaving the state system was beneficial for some, abandonment is not a panacea for all Chinese tennis players (China Daily 2012a). All that said, Chinese media made sure to highlight the state’s contribution to Li’s French Open victory. Xinhua quoted Li as saying, ‘I truly felt that my success belongs not to myself but to the country. Without the support from the government, the society and all my coaches, I would not have done this’ (Xinhua News Agency 2011). Connected to the difference in portrayals of the state sports system is the difference in describing Li’s departure from the Chinese system. Western media describes it as breaking away or rebelling compared to Chinese media saying the state permitted Li to leave. However, there was one frame that was shared in both media systems. Li was described as an agent of capitalism in all four news outlets. More specifically, the WTA was seen as being able to benefit from Li’s success. An additional WTA tournament in China was added to the schedule thanks largely to Li (China Daily 2012b). Allaster, the WTA chief executive, called Li ‘the most important player of the decade’ (China Daily 2013a). The same article highlighted 91

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‘the importance of Li to the sport’ as Allaster ‘is pulling out all stops to commercialize the women’s game on the continent, especially with flagging interest in the United States’. Such was her potential commodity value that when Li retired in September 2014, there were ‘ambitions to attach her to other projects, including hotels, resorts and spas branded with her name’ (Rothenberg, 2014). However, Xinhua noted months earlier that financial gain was not always positive. An article describing Li’s major title gap, between her 2011 French Open and 2014 Australian Open victories, said: Li had struggled to adjust to her new status as a major champion after the 2011 French Open while distractions of sponsors and media also drove her off her game. For almost a year, she had been without a title and even found it hard to reach a final. (Wang 2014) Indeed, while the Western media celebrated Li’s money-making potential, the Chinese media would acknowledge it, but sometimes in a dismissive or critical tone.

Discussion Western media celebrate Li Na’s outspokenness and accentuate her differences from what Western media perceive to be Chinese norms. For instance, Western media often mentioned Li’s tattoos while Chinese media largely ignored them. The New York Times and Agence France-Presse reveled in describing Li as either ‘tattooed’ or mentioned her having a tattoo. More interest was garnered for the rose on her chest than the butterfly on her back, which, given its location on her body, might indicate her being sexualized, thereby removing her from the sporting arena and placing her more as an object for desire. Also, by even mentioning Li’s rose tattoo,Western media might be playing into the stereotype that Asian kids are essentially nerds (Chang & Kleiner 2003).The attention Li got for her tattoo positions her outside of the “typical” Asian stereotype; in other words, she is presented by the Western media as being cool because she is different to other Asians. Also, by framing the tattoo as something distinctive,Western journalists are able to escape any criticism for sexualizing Li’s gesture of honoring her husband. Indeed, it would be more interesting to see how many other tennis players, male and female, have tattoos and what their rationales are for having them. It could be that Western people are reading Li’s tattoo as rebellious because that is essentially what Laumann and Derick (2006) found in their survey: that US people with tattoos are more associated with risk-taking. However, this could be a severe misreading; because tattoos are a taboo subject in China does not mean that Chinese people with tattoos get them to be rebellious. The New York Times had a consistent narrative about Li being forced to play tennis, which plays into the Wang and Shoemaker (2011) study that US media portray the Chinese as having less freedom than their Western counterparts. This viewpoint combined with the depiction of the Chinese state tennis system as brutal (Sebag-Montefiore 2013) paints the West, by default, as a place where children are free to choose any activity they like, and all the coaches are kind, caring individuals. We see two interrelated processes occurring here: firstly, the Western-style coaching system is being projected as naturally and unquestionably superior to its Chinese counterpart within a kind of broader ethnocentric, neo-imperialist ideology; secondly, criticisms of how the Western capitalist system creates an elitist structure of tennis academies and coaches are overlooked. By fostering the narrative that Chinese players need to forgo the state and use private instructors, Western media seek to further push the Chinese into Western modes of participating in sports, because the West is apparently where the best coaches and facilities are. This narrative 92

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that implicitly critiques the Chinese system also silences any criticisms of elitism within tennis systems in Europe and the US, places where money rather than talent often dictates a player’s progression in the sport. Therefore, a capitalist-driven system is heralded as the ideal without ever being scrutinized, yet for some players, the elitism and social exclusivity inherent within this capitalist system prevents them from advancing in the sport.Western media’s portrayal of the Chinese system as inferior and cruel fits a pattern of actions in which moral arguments are made to justify erasing an existing structure and replacing it with a better – i.e., Western – structure (e.g., Altwaiji, 2014; Fernandes 2013). In this same vein, The New York Times lambasted Chinese parents and the government for co-opting children into participating in sports against their wishes, but the newspaper failed to acknowledge how some US parents did the same, forcing their own children to participate in sports, sometimes against their wishes. For example, former American stars Andre Agassi and Jennifer Capriati suffered meltdowns because their parents pushed them too far at young ages, seemingly for material and financial benefits (Carpenter 2015; Eastaugh 2016). Children in the US are often pushed to specialize in sports as early as possible, in order to most effectively develop their talents and maximize earning potential. While few athletes make it to elite status, the US system offers many inducements for parents to push children into sports, willing or not, including scholarships at high school and college level (Koba 2014). Both Western and Chinese media failed to provide a true introspective look into both systems. In lieu of a robust critique from different media, Western and Chinese stories employed media frames that often reinforced the boundaries that separate East and West. Journalists should take heed of this statement by Fernandes (2013, p.107):‘Knowledge production is a much riskier act than we sometimes realize’. By not crossing all the boundaries, journalists can leave their consumers in the same isolation they were in before consuming news from “afar”. It would appear that this border-crossing needs to occur if media practitioners are to fulfil a key ethical component put forth by the Society of Professional Journalists: ‘The duty of the journalist is to further those ends by seeking truth and providing a fair and comprehensive account of events and issues’ (n.d.). This study indicates that Chinese and Western media each captured only some of Li Na’s complexity. While Li crossed many borders – physically and culturally – much of her news coverage failed to do the same.

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Newman, P. (2013, October 7) The Chinese revolution: country aims to become world tennis power. The Independent. Available at: http:​//www​.inde​pende​nt.co​.uk/s​port/​tenni​s/the​-chin​ese-r​evolu​tion-​count​ ry-ai​ms-to​-beco​me-wo​rld-t​ennis​-powe​r-886​5107.​html (accessed 29 July 2017). Reed, C.E. (2000) Tattoo in early China, Journal of the American Oriental Society, 120(3), 360–76. Rohrhofer, E. (2013) Media systems in East Asia: olitics and media in Japan, South Korea and China (PRC). Doctoral dissertation, University of Vienna. Rothenberg, B. (2014, 22 September) Retiring Li has eyes on business, and future of tennis in China. The New York Times. Scheufele, D.A. (1999) Framing as a theory of media effects, Journal of communication, 49(1), 103–22. Sebag-Montefiore, C. (2013, 3 July) Fighting Communism, one athlete at a time. The New York Times Blogs: Latitude. Society of Professional Journalists (n.d.) SPJ code of ethics: preamble. Available at: http://www.spj.org/ ethicscode.asp (accessed 17 December 2013). Tizhi, J. (2012) From Barcelona to Athens (1992–2004): “Juguo Tizhi” and China’s quest for global power and Olympic glory, The International Journal of the History of Sport, 29(1), 113–31. Van Gorp, B. (2007) The constructionist approach to framing: bringing culture back in, Journal of Communication, 57, 60–78. Wang, C. (2004) Capitalizing the big man:Yao Ming, Asian America, and China Global, Inter-Asia Cultural Studies, 5(2), 263–78. Wang, J. (2012, 19 December) China superstar Li Na “playing herself ” in 2012. Xinhua News Agency. Wang, J. (2014, 27 January) Li Na, a story of believing. Xinhua General News Service. Wang, W.Y. (2013) Weibo, framing, and media practices in China, Journal of Chinese Political Science, 18, 375–88. Wang, X. & Shoemaker, P.J. (2011) What shapes Americans’ opinion of China? Country characteristics, public relations and mass media, Chinese Journal of Communication, 4(1), 1–20. Wei, F., Hong, F. Zhouxiang, L. (2010) Chinese state sports policy: pre- and post-Beijing 2008, The International Journal of the History of Sport, 27(14/15), 2380–402. Xin, X. (2009) Xinhua News Agency in Africa, Journal of African Media Studies, 1(3), 363–77. Xing, X. (2016) China. In E. Kristiansen, M. M. Parent & B. Houlihan (eds.), Elite Youth Policy and Management: A Comparative Analysis. London: Taylor & Francis. Xinhua News Agency (2011, 5 July) French Open winner Li Na honored by government. Xinhua News Agency. Yang, J. (2003) Framing the NATO air strikes on Kosovo across countries: comparison of Chinese and US newspaper coverage, Gazette:The International Journal for Communication Studies, 65(3), 231–49.

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10 The world’s game? Globalisation and the cultural economy of tennis Barry Smart

Tennis as a competitive professional sport is played around the world for most of the year. Both the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) men’s tour and the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) tour open in Australia at the beginning of the calendar year and end in November. During the 11-month season, tournaments are held on every continent around the globe. It is a schedule that offers players a global profile, status and prestige from playing success, as well as lucrative financial rewards and a range of commercial opportunities, but also it is experienced by players as ‘a seemingly never-ending timetable of tension-filled tournaments, tedious travel and, for some … inescapable injuries’ (Macur 2011). Tennis is now a world game, one that provides a media platform for transnational corporations to raise the profile of their brands and enhance the market appeal of their consumer goods and services by taking advantage of the high profile and iconic cultural status of leading players who with the development of a consumer society have become, as Jean Baudrillard (2017, p.63) remarked, ‘heroes of consumption’. Without doubt tennis has acquired a cosmopolitan character as it has successfully exploited the world market and become a world game, but the origins and developmental trajectory of this global sport are complex and warrant close consideration.

A genealogy of tennis Historical evidence of people playing numerous different ball games, including hand-ball games and racket sports, in communities and societies around the world, serves as confirmation both of Johan Huizinga’s (1949) observations on the universality of a play spirit in human civilizations and, in turn, the complex origins of modern tennis. As Heiner Gillmeister’s (1998, p.2) cultural history reveals, from the mid-twelfth century a range of ball games were being played, with characteristics comparable to the later French game jeu de paume, ‘from which modern tennis evolved’. The medieval game jeu de paume has been identified as the earliest precursor of a family of racket sports, which includes “rackets” played with a hard ball on a large wallenclosed court, “squash racquets” played with a small rubber ball on a smaller wall-enclosed court than rackets, which has its roots in Harrow public school in the mid-nineteenthth century

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(https​://ww​w.bri​tanni​ca.co​m/spo​rts/s​quash​-rack​ets), “real tennis”, or court or “royal tennis” as it is sometimes described, and “lawn tennis” or tennis as it became known following the variety of surfaces on which the game began to be played after its establishment at Wimbledon in 1877 (Gillmeister 1998). From early roots in monasteries and public schools to the growth of clubs, formation of associations, development of international tournaments, professionalisation, growing media coverage and increasing corporate interest and involvement, a genealogy of the sport of tennis demonstrates its global diffusion and the growing influence of commercialism, corporate sponsorship and promotion, media communications and spectacle and celebrity on the game. The sport of tennis represents a celebration of competitive individualism and constitutes an ideal vehicle for promoting the virtues of individual effort, training, application and pursuit of self-interest. Although there are team tennis tournaments and competitions, the most significant being the Davis Cup, the sport of tennis foregrounds the contribution of individuals and celebrates their athleticism, ability, competitiveness and physical prowess and power. Given the global communication flows which extend the global reach and appeal of tennis competitions and tournaments, the associated forms of consumerism (sportswear/trainers/rackets) stimulated by corporate brand sponsoring of events and players, and cultivation of iconic global celebrity tennis figures, it is understandable that tennis now constitutes a globally popular game, if not the world game.To explore the various dimensions of the global profile of tennis, consideration will be given to the global development of tennis; the global tennis landscape, sponsorship and the media; and global sports brands and iconic celebrity tennis figures.

Tennis and globalisation: phases of development Drawing on Giulianotti and Robertson’s phase model of ‘football’s historical globalization’ (2009, p.5), I suggest the global development of modern tennis can be conceptualised via the following six phases. A “germinal phase” from the fifteenth to the eighteenth century saw early ball games with tennis-like features develop and grow in influence across the continent of Europe. This is a period in which versions of tennis-like ball games played by monks in the cloisters of monasteries were usurped and developed in various ways by the aristocracy (Gillmeister 1998). Following this, there was an ‘incipient phase’ from the mid-eighteenth century to the 1870s which ‘witnessed the steady decline of the ancient game of tennis’ and the development of various modern racquet sports (Gillmeister 1998, p.174). A ‘take-off’ or formative phase can be identified from the 1870s to the 1920s, a period in which Major Walton Clopton Wingfield obtained a patent in 1874 for a new form of tennis that he called ‘Sphairistiké’, followed in 1877 by the All England Croquet Club, in the vicinity of Wimbledon, becoming the All England Croquet and Lawn Tennis Club and announcing an annual tournament. Further manifestations of the game’s global development in this period include the formation of the Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) in 1888, the first formal international lawn tennis championship, the Davis Cup, held in 1900 between teams from the US and Great Britain, and the establishment of the International Lawn Tennis Federation (ILTF) in 1913. Tennis also featured in the first modern Olympiad in Athens in 1896 and in subsequent games held in Paris (1900), St Louis (1904), London (1908) and Stockholm (1912). The Great War meant that there was no Olympiad in 1916, but tennis featured in the Antwerp Olympic Games (1920) and again in the VIII Olympiad in Paris (1924). However, that would be the last time until tennis returned for the 1988 Seoul Olympics. Lake and Llewellyn (2015) explain that organisational problems at the Paris Games in 1924 and disagreements between the IOC and the ILTF, coupled with worries on the part of the latter that tennis at the Olympics might 97

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detract from the appeal of the Grand Slam tournaments and the Davis Cup, led to the withdrawal of tennis from the Olympics. In their account of the history of tennis at the Olympics, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) describe the removal of tennis from the Olympic Games as a consequence of ‘the breakdown in negotiations’ with the International Lawn Tennis Federation ‘over the latter’s various demands (being able to apply its own definition of amateurism in particular)’ (IOC 2017). It is tensions and disagreements over the terms and conditions under which competitors participated in tennis that are integral to the fourth phase, the struggle over professionalism, from the mid-1920s through to the late 1960s. Tennis in the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century was primarily a social activity played in accordance with the values and assumptions of the amateur ethos in social class-exclusive country club environments. Professionalism, in a number of forms however, was steadily compromising, if not eroding, the amateur ethos. An embryonic professionalism was present in the form of employed grounds-men or court attendants who were ready and able, for a fee, to offer instruction on strokes and tactics to tennis club members who wished to improve their game. A second respect in which a vestige of professionalism, as payment for playing, began to be a feature of tennis was in the form of competitors in tournaments receiving contributions towards their travel costs and in some instances prize money for winning (Smart 2005). As the number of prestigious international tournaments grew the costs of participation increased significantly and players began to be paid more generous expenses for appearing (Jefferys 2009). It was concerns over the respects in which money transactions in various forms were becoming a feature of the sport, coupled with an inability to construct an agreed operational notion of amateurism, which had precipitated the fall out between the IOC and the ILTF after 1924. The growth of tennis as a spectator sport after the Great War, the increasingly international and competitive character of major tournaments, which meant players had to commit themselves to the sport full-time and effectively become professional in approach, and the decision of very successful high profile players to abandon the amateur game and join professional tennis tours, called into question the amateur ethos and raised the public profile of the professional game (Jefferys 2009). Early examples of players turning professional include in 1926 the iconic Suzanne Lenglen from France, the first tennis diva, and in 1930 Bill Tilden from the US, each of whom dominated women’s and men’s tennis respectively to such an extent that they became global celebrity figures (Smart 2005).1 Fred Perry, whose approach to tennis was highly competitive and thereby deemed to be at odds with the prevailing amateur ethos, provides another example. Perry won three Wimbledon single’s titles and three US Championships, as well as the French and Australian Championships before turning professional in July 1936. On signing his contract, Perry was reported in the Philadelphia Inquirer as having ‘swapped glory for gold’, and before endorsement contracts became a prominent feature of professional sport, he began to receive attractive offers ‘from motorcar and cigarette people’ (Perry 1984, p.109). In addition, and in anticipation of the potential consumer appeal and commercial value of sports goods and brands, Perry emulated Rene Lacoste in establishing a sport shirt company, Fred Perry, with a distinctive wreath logo (Smart 2005). Following the Second World War, amateurism endured despite a succession of leading male amateur tennis players turning professional, participating in major professional tournaments, and taking advantage of the increasing range of commercial opportunities becoming available to professional athletes. While the professional game was not always successful in attracting spectators, and the amateur game, especially the Grand Slam tournaments (Wimbledon, and the French, Australian and US National Championships), retained the loyalty and interest of the public, the sport was very much in transition. As the schedule of tournaments grew, so the costs 98

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of playing increased and became a ‘full-time occupation’ funded by expenses, calling into question the reasons for perpetuating the differentiation between amateur and professional (Jefferys 2009, p.2255). In this period there were differing practices by tennis governing bodies in respect of amateurism and concerns were expressed that ‘shamateurism was rife in top-level tennis’ (Jefferys 2009, p.2258). The American player Pancho Gonzalez (1959, p.168), US Nationals singles champion in 1948 and 1949, cryptically commented in the course of his successful professional career: ‘In tennis the difference between an amateur and a professional player is related to a phantom table. The amateur receives money under it, the professional over it’. From the late 1950s, there were a series of changes to the rules regulating amateur expenses, growing calls for a radical restructuring of the game, and votes at several ILTF annual general meetings – in 1960, 1962 and 1964 – to propose open tennis competitions and remove the amateur-professional distinction among players, among a number of creative suggestions to include professional players but retain amateur control. All were defeated, however, having failed to receive sufficient support from tennis governing bodies (Lake 2015). In 1967, following a series of significant subsequent developments, including a BBC-televised professional tournament held at Wimbledon over the August bank holiday, which was very well received, and the formation of a new professional event,World Championship Tennis, which attracted more leading amateur players, the LTA voted in December ‘to abolish the words amateur and professional from its domestic rules’ (Jefferys 2009, p.2265) and, notwithstanding expressions of outrage from some regions of the tennis world, effectively inaugurated the era of “Open” tennis. At an emergency ILTF meeting on 30th March in Paris the proposal for “Open” tennis was agreed by 47 member nations.2 Open tennis improved the quality of play, raised the number of spectators at tournaments and ‘made the sport … more attractive to television audiences’ (Brown & Soulier 2013, p.xi). The final two phases of the globalisation of tennis to be considered are closely articulated and involve firstly, the increasingly close relationship formed between tennis, the media and sponsorship, and secondly, the development of global tennis brands and iconic globally popular celebrity tennis figures. The tennis landscape became indisputably global, as did the players who were increasingly drawn from countries around the world to compete in the various tournaments staged on the men’s and women’s tours. The developing global tennis landscape became closely articulated with, indeed was shaped and transformed by, the development of global communications, media and transnational corporate sponsorship. In turn, this contributed to the emergence of global tennis brands and iconic celebrity tennis figures, including Roger Federer and Serena Williams.

The global tennis landscape, communications media and sponsorship The global tennis landscape went through a marked transformation in 1970 by a group of female tennis players who refused the growing prize money differential between men’s and women’s tennis in the Open era. In 1968, when Rod Laver won the men’s singles title at Wimbledon, he received £2000 while Billie Jean King, who won the women’s single’s title that year for a third time, received only £750. The differential was even greater in other tournaments, including an 8:1 differential in favour of the men’s game at the Pacific Southwest Championships in 1970, which led to the women players withdrawing from the event (Spencer 2000, p.390). Nine players, including King, alongside Rosie Casals and Nancy Richey, signed 1$ contracts with World Tennis publisher Gladys Heldman to compete in a new women’s tour, which with the sponsorship of the Philip Morris tobacco company and the inaugural Virginia Slims event in 99

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Houston on 23 September 1970, became the Virginia Slims Series (WTA 2017). In 1971 there were 19 Virginia Slims tournaments and in 1973 Billie Jean King established the WTA which united ‘all of women’s professional tennis in one tennis tour’ (WTA 2017). In July 1973, in an attempt to appease female players, the United Stated Tennis Association (USTA) offered equal prize money to women and men competing in the US Open, and in the September Billie Jean King responded to a ‘Battle of the Sexes’ challenge from Bobby Riggs, a former Wimbledon and US National Championships (now US Open) winner and former world number one. Throughout 1973, Riggs had repeatedly claimed the women’s game was inferior and in May he defeated Margaret Court in two sets and bragged that he could beat any of the leading women players (Spencer 2000). The contest between King and Riggs took place at the Houston Astrodome in front of the largest live audience for a tennis match. A reported 90 million people around the world watched the contest on television, making it the most watched match in tennis history. In a five-set match, King beat Riggs in three straight sets and the global media coverage of the contest ‘brought tennis into the lives of millions of people for the first time’ (Court & McGann 1975, p.170).3 Tennis tournaments involving the ATP and the WTA are now held across the globe throughout the year. Tournaments are concentrated in Europe and North America but are also held in South America, Asia, Africa, Australia and New Zealand. The growth of tennis into a truly global sport has been made possible by a number of other factors, including the technologies of jet travel and satellite television. As US former world-number-one tennis player Jim Courier (2004) observed: ‘With tournaments in every continent and with the players often moving to a different country each week, tennis is a sport dependent on jet travel’. The hectic schedule would not be possible without air travel. Courier (2004) added: ‘Flying certainly allowed our tour to become more global and it’s opened up new horizons for tennis’. However, while air travel allowed the ATP and WTA tennis schedules to become global it was developments in television technology and the advent of satellite television that created the possibility of global audiences for live sports events and, in turn, tennis tournaments taking place across the world. As Tomo Martelanc (1974, p.3, 4) commented in a UNESCO paper on the impact of satellite television, communication satellites provided the prospect of ‘world-wide diffusion’ of television programmes, made possible global audiences for the transmission of local events, and indeed created the possibility of ‘global television’. The globalisation of sport gathered momentum with the development of television technology and the advent of the Entertainment and Sport Programming Network (ESPN), which was established in 1979 by Bill Rasmussen (Smart 2007). ESPN was particularly significant as regards innovative coverage of sport as it recognised the potential that communication satellites offered for delivering a national audience in the US for live coverage of local sports events. In turn, by revealing the potential of satellite communications for sport coverage in the US, ESPN opened up the possibility of global sports coverage, led to sport around the world becoming ‘electrically contracted’ in the words of Marshall McLuhan (1973, p.12–3; see also McLuhan & Fiore 1967, p.63); effectively the world of sport became a ‘global village’, major events, teams and players became known across the globe. Bill Rasmussen’s understanding of the potential opened up by communications satellite technology ‘eventually wrought a giant explosion of the sports world in America and an even greater one in the internationalization of sports’, including tennis (Halberstam 2001, p.126). Developments in communications media have transformed the ways in which sports events and tournaments are organised, staged and consumed. In respect of tennis, the first radio broadcast across the UK of Centre Court matches at the Wimbledon Championships commenced on 29th June 1927, and on the 21st June 1937 the BBC Television Service began live coverage 100

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of Wimbledon tennis to the relatively few who possessed television sets (Escolme 2018). In 2015, 40 networks and 3,000 broadcasting personnel provided global television coverage of the Wimbledon Championships for over a billion people across 200 territories (Kirkham 2015). In the intervening period, the playing surfaces, stadiums, structure and rules of tennis have changed in good part to ensure tournaments and television schedules are not too disrupted by local weather conditions and the risk of lengthy matches. The introduction of covered venues and indoor tournaments, tie breaks to reduce the length of sets, reduced sets in some tournaments and other innovations, including, with the exception of Wimbledon, a relaxation of dress codes, has contributed to the growing appeal of tennis to global corporations, media companies and their audiences.4 As Woods (2011, p.56) noted, ‘Satellite television and the internet have allowed events to be seen around the world’ and that has further increased the popularity of tennis and tennis players who have ‘attracted huge sponsorship dollars’. In 2015, the WTA released its global television digital audience data for 2014 which revealed an increase of 22.5% over 2013 in viewers of its 22 Premier tournaments, ‘cementing women’s tennis as the world’s most popular women’s sport’ (WTA 2015). The five WTA tournaments that drew the biggest cumulative television and digital audiences for women’s tennis in 2014 were as follows: 1 2 3 4 5

BNP Paribas WTA Finals Singapore presented by SC Global (Singapore) – 26,928,804 Miami Open (Miami) – 23,065,116 BNP Paribas Open (Indian Wells) – 22,975,675 Rogers Cup (Montréal) – 20,271,499 Mutua Madrid Open (Madrid) – 18,659,536 (WTA 2015).

As Management Today reported, with ‘a growing legion of … fans worldwide’ (Gale 2016), tennis has become a profitable sport for tournaments, venues and leading players and an increasingly attractive investment proposition for sponsors. Significant increases in television viewing figures in the US, Australia and Europe for the 2017 Australian Open – a tournament that previously had struggled to attain good viewing figures – provided further evidence of the growing global appeal of tennis (Tandon 2017).The rising global interest in tennis was confirmed the following year by an ATP website report that announced satellite delivery of ‘the excitement of the ATP World Tour to a global audience’ of 973,000,000 in 195 broadcast territories, complemented by a digital subscription service delivering ‘a rich tennis streaming experience to a global audience, all year round from all ATP World Tour tournaments’ (ATP 2018a). In 2015 Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal were ‘among the world’s top-ten highest-paid athletes’, benefiting substantially from lucrative endorsement contracts and sponsorships as well as tournament prize money (Gale 2016).Venues, tournaments, match statistics, even aces served have acquired sponsorships. In addition, fan zones have been established by sponsors as they strive to take advantage of opportunities to promote their brands. In 2010, tennis sponsorship worldwide was reported to be US$600 million rising to US$703 million in 2013 and US$801 in 2016 (Statista 2018). As Gale (2016) observed of the appeal of tennis to sponsors, it is now ‘a global, gladiatorial, year-round game, with natural breaks perfectly suited for commercials and analysis’. The ATP tour has a number of sponsoring partners, including Emirates, FedEx, Infosys, Peugeot, Moet & Chandon, Rolex, Head and Tecnifibre. The WTA tour sponsoring partners include Porsche, Dubai Duty Free, QIYI (the largest online video service platform in China), SAP (a data processing and software company), USANA (a nutritional products and dietary supplements company), PEAK (a sportswear company), Cambridge Global Payments and Tennis Warehouse. Players have clothing, shoe and racket sponsors; both Roger Federer and 101

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Serena Williams, for example, have clothing and shoe deals with Nike and racket endorsement deals with Wilson. A study of the clothing, shoe and racket sponsors of the leading 30 men and women players at the beginning of 2018 revealed that Nike and Adidas were the most prominent brands as far as sport apparel was concerned, with Babolat, Wilson, Head and Yonex standing out in respect of rackets.5

Global sports brands, iconic tournaments and celebrity tennis figures In addition to the players and their respective tours, tennis tournaments also attract significant levels of sponsorship, with the four grand slams regularly drawing strong support from high-profile global corporations keen to increase brand engagement and awareness. As the Chief Revenue Officer of the United States Tennis Association observed of the game’s appeal to sponsors, ‘tennis is the most successful gender-neutral sport’, including its fan base, which tends to be ‘affluent, well educated, and increasingly diverse’ (Austin 2017). Principal partners and official suppliers for the Grand Slams in 2018 are identified in Table 10.1.

2018 Grand Slams – sponsoring partners and official suppliers The global reach of one tennis tournament sponsor, the French international banking group BNP Paribas, is mapped in Table 10.1. A number of sports brands have been associated with tennis, and what are now iconic global tournaments, from a relatively early stage in the game’s history. For example, Slazenger, established in England in 1881, has provided the balls at Wimbledon since 1902. The ball production process itself, including various raw materials, stages of manufacture and packaging, has been estimated to now involve ‘11 different countries across 4 continents before … final assembly in the Philippines and then shipment to England’, which reveals an occluded aspect of the globalisation of tennis (Geography News Network 2013). Dunlop, another English company,

Table 10.1 2018 Grand Slams: sponsoring partners and official suppliers Grand Slam events

Partners and official suppliers

Australian Open

•• •• •• •• •• ••

French Open Wimbledon US Open

KIA, ANZ, Jacob’s Creek, Rolex, Disney, Emirates, Mastercard, Toshiba, and Wilson. 20 other ‘Partners’ listed including Häagen-Dazs, LavAzza, and Yonex. BNP Paribas, Emirates, Peugeot, ENGIE, Lacoste, Longines, and Perrier. 13 ‘Official Suppliers’ listed including Adidas and Mastercard. Slazenger, Robinsons, IBM, Lanson, POLO Ralph Lauren, HSBC, Evian, LavAzza, Stella Artois, Jaguar, Häagen-Dazs, and Pimm’s listed as ‘Official Suppliers’. •• American Express, Emirates, Chase, J P Morgan, CITIZEN, Deloitte, IBM, POLO Ralph Lauren, Visit Orlando, Dean & Deluca, Evian, Mercedes, Spectrum and Westin. •• 10 ‘Official Suppliers’ listed including Jacob’s Creek, LavAzza, Heineken and Wilson •• ESPN identified as ‘Domestic Broadcast Partner’

Sources: Australian Open https​://au​sopen​.com/​event​-guid​e/par​tners​; French Open http://www.rolandgarros.com/; Wimbledon https​://ww​w.wim​bledo​n.com​/en_G​B/ato​z/off​icial​_supp​liers​.html​; US Open http:​//www​.usop​ en.or​g/en_​US/ab​out/s​ponso​rs.ht​ml, Accessed 7 February 2018.

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was formed at the turn of the twentieth century and moved into manufacture of tennis balls and rackets in the 1920s, and it is argued that more Grand Slams have been won with Dunlop rackets than any other brand (Smart 2007).Wilson, established as a sports goods company in the US in 1931, was identified in 2018 as the most popular of the 18 major racket brands on the market and reportedly used by 37% of the top 30 male and female players (Anonymous 2018). Slazenger, Dunlop and Wilson continue to occupy a significant place in the game, along with other long-established brands such as Babolat (established in 1875 in France), Head (1915 US) and Yonex (1946 Japan). A measure of the growing global appeal of tennis since the advent of the Open era is the increasing number of tennis clothing and racket brands that have emerged around the world, including Prince (1970 US), Pacific (1972 New Zealand and Germany), ProKennex (1978 Taiwan), Tecnifibre (1979 France), ANTA (1994 China), Under Armour (1996 US), PowerAngle (2000 US) and Solinco (2010 US). With the growing commercialisation of tennis, high-profile players have become global brands. In some respects, John McEnroe, a highly controversial figure whose playing prowess and on-court (mis)conduct attracted global media attention, might be regarded as the first tennis player, following his signing with Nike in 1978, to acquire something like a global brand status (Smart 2016). Nike produced a signature McEnroe tennis clothing and footwear collection with a distinctive logo, a red swoosh and ‘Mc’ emblem, championing ‘the athlete’s divergence from conventional tennis attire’ and embodying his rebellious attitude (Nike News 2015). Global advertising campaigns created by Nike traded on McEnroe’s tennis brilliance and the public’s awareness of his frequently irreverent conduct by presenting images of footwear with captions

Figure 10.1 BNP Paribas partnerships with tennis tournaments and competitions around the world. Source: https​://gr​oup.b​nppar​ibas/​en/gr​oup/b​np-pa​ribas​-tenn​is-ga​me-lo​yalty​ (accessed 6 February 2018).

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announcing ‘McEnroe Swears by Them’ and ‘Nike – McEnroe’s Favorite Four-Letter Word’ (Strasser & Becklund 1993, p.353). The 2017 film Borg-McEnroe, about the 1980s tennis rivalry between McEnroe and Bjorn Borg, signified the durability of McEnroe’s global profile and, in turn, confirmed the continuing international box-office appeal of tennis. Alongside these developments for male players, tennis is the only sport in which a number of women have had the opportunity to earn substantial prize money and acquire lucrative endorsement contracts. As the Forbes (2015) ranking of the highest-paid female athletes in the world revealed, seven of the top ten played tennis and two of those, Serena Williams and Maria Sharapova, were the only women to make Forbes’ overall top-100 highest paid athletes list. Incidentally, both received less than half the income of Roger Federer who was the highest paid male tennis player (Thomasson 2015; see also Rothenberg 2016), which reveals that while tennis might be regarded as the most successful sport as far as reduction of gender differences is concerned, there remains a disparity in endorsement income between the top male and female players. Serena Williams has more Grand Slam titles than Federer but in 2015 her endorsement deals were $13 million in total compared to Federer’s $58 million. The fact that Sharapova, a considerably less successful player, secured endorsement contracts worth $23 million in 2015 led one critic to remark that female athletes are marketable ‘only insofar as they look a certain way’ (Bain 2015).

Concluding remarks: on the cosmopolitan character of tennis Whether professional tennis has become the world game, as Jack Kramer anticipated it would, is questionable (Kramer & Deford 1979, p.305), but it is certainly a very popular world game, a cosmopolitan game played on every continent for 11 months of the year, and popular with fans, media and corporate sponsors. The major tennis tournaments provide global exposure for their corporate brand partners and sponsors. A survey of the most globally active corporate tennis sponsors in 2016 revealed Emirates to be the most prominent, followed by FedEx and Peugeot, with BNP Paribas, Wilson, Head, Coca-Cola and Rolex also being significant contributors to tournament events. In respect of industry sectors engaged in global tennis sponsorship financial services, airlines and the auto industry were the most prominent (ESP 2018). In 2018, players in the top 100 on the ATP tour were drawn from thirty-nine countries (ATP 2018b) and the top 100 on the WTA tour from 33 countries (WTA 2018). As Wertheim and Bourkoff (2017) note of the growth in the game’s global diversity, between 1974 and 1999, 16 of the end-of-year number one men’s tennis players were from the US, but by 2017 there was only one in the top ten, and at the ATP Tour’s World Tour Final in London that year ‘the eight players in the field hailed from eight different countries’. Comparable signs of diversity are evident in the women’s game with the four Grand Slam and WTA Finals winners in 2017 coming from the US, Latvia, Spain, the US and Poland respectively. Tennis is now a thoroughly cosmopolitan sport, in good part because of the respects in which it has been able to successfully court sponsorship by staging not only popular and well attended tournaments around the world but also by providing broadcasting, streaming and social media platforms, and since 2003 a Tennis Channel (‘Where Champions Live’), for commercial corporations to promote their brands and market their products globally to tennis fans and consumers. Tennis is a sport that crosses borders, transcends differences of age, gender, ethnicity and to a lesser extent class. It is now a global product, a part of the entertainment industry, an exemplification of the respects in which with the globalisation of capitalism’s cultural industries ‘creations of individual nations become common property’ (Marx & Engels 1968, p.84), and which in the specific case of tennis has led to it becoming a world game, a game closely articulated with global capital. 104

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Notes 1 Lenglen received a fee of approximately $100,000 (equivalent to around $1.3 million in 2017) to play a series of matches against another former amateur Mary Browne in the US and Canada. Lenglen had defeated Browne in the 1926 French Championships. They were joined on Pyle’s professional tennis tour by Paul Foret,Vincent Richards, Harvey Snodgrass and Howard Kinsey. 2 The word ‘lawn’ was removed from the title of International Lawn Tennis Federation in 1977. 3 A measure of the historic significance, global reach, and world-wide interest in the King-Riggs match is provided by the subsequent release of the Golden Globe-nominated film Battle of the Sexes in 2017. 4 Further rule changes were tested in a new tournament in 2017, the Next Gen ATP Finals held in Milan, for the eight highest ranked players under 21 years of age. The changes aimed to ‘squeeze matches into a two-hour format that were faster-paced and would attract fans between 25 and 40’ and produce matches that would be ‘much more attractive to TV stations that are wary about signing up to air matches that could last much longer than their allotted times’ (Reynolds 2017). 5 Additional information on ATP partners can be found at http:​//www​.atpw​orldt​our.c​om/en​/part​nersh​ ips/a​tp-pa​rtner​s and WTA partners at http:​//www​.wtat​ennis​.com/​offic​ial-p​artne​rs accessed 6/2/18. Further information on the clothing, shoe and racket sponsors of the leading thirty men and women players in 2018 can be found at https​://ww​w.sco​reand​chang​e.com​/the-​spons​orshi​p-lan​dscap​e-at-​the-t​ op-of​-prof​essio​nal-t​ennis​/ accessed 7 February 2018.

References Anonymous (2006) Squash rackets. The Encyclopaedia Britannica. Available at: https​://ww​w.bri​tanni​ca.co​m/ spo​rts/s​quash​-rack​ets (accessed 22 December 2017) Anonymous (2018, 13 February) The sponsorship landscape at the top of professional tennis. Score and Change. Available at: https​://ww​w.sco​reand​chang​e.com​/the-​spons​orshi​p-lan​dscap​e-at-​the-t​op-of​-prof​ essio​nal-t​ennis​/ (accessed 16 February 2018) ATP (2018a) Global broadcast, production & sales of the ATP world tour. ATP Media Available at: https:// www.atpmedia.tv/ (accessed 26 January 2018) ATP (2018b) ATP Rankings. ATP World Tour. Available at: http:​//www​.atpw​orldt​our.c​om/en​/rank​ings/​ singl​es?ra​nkDat​e=201​8-2-5​&countryCode=all&rankRange=0-100&sort=country&sortAscending=T rue (accessed 9 February 2018) Austin, C. (2017, 8 September) Why the US Open remains such a draw for corporate sponsors. Fortune. Bain, M. (2015, 31 August) Why doesn’t Serena Williams have more sponsorship deals? The Atlantic. Baudrillard, J. (2017) The consumer society: myths and structures, revised edition. London: Sage. Bowers, R. (1999) Suzanne Lenglen and the first pro tour. Between the Lines. Available at: http:​//www​.tenn​ isser​ver.c​om/li​nes/l​ines_​99_10​_31.h​tml (accessed 22 December 2017) Brown, J. & Soulier, C. (2013) Tennis: steps to success, fourth edition. Leeds: Human Kinetics. Courier, J. (2004) Tennis is dependent on jet travel. CNN International.com. Available at: http:​//edi​tion.​cnn. c​om/20​04/TE​CH/12​/02/e​xplor​ers.j​imcou​r ier/​index​.html​ (accessed 24 January 2018) Court, M. & McGann, G. (1975) Court on court: a life in tennis. New York: Dodd, Mead & Co. Engelmann, L. (1988) The goddess and the American girl: the story of Suzanne Lenglen and Helen Wills. New York: Oxford University Press. Escolme, J. (2018) Wimbledon and the BBC 1927 to 2017. History of the BBC. Available at: http:​//www​ .bbc.​co.uk​/hist​oryof​thebb​c/res​earch​/prog​rammi​ng/wi​mbled​on (accessed 4 January 2018) ESP (2018) Global spending on tennis to grow 4.2 per cent in 2016. ESP Sponsorship Report. Available at: http:​//www​.spon​sorsh​ip.co​m/ieg​sr/20​16/09​/12/G​lobal​-Spen​ding-​On-Te​nnis-​To-Gr​ow-4-​2-Per​ cent-​In-2.​aspx (accessed 9 February 2018) Forbes (2015) The world’s highest-paid female athletes 2015. Available at: https​://ww​w.for​bes.c​om/pi​cture​ s/mli​45fdl​lh/th​e-wor​lds-h​ighes​t-pai​d/#29​3ff83​c5279​ (accessed 9 February 2018) Gale, A. (2016) Tennis becomes a profitable player. Management Today. Available at: https​://ww​w.man​ageme​ nttod​ay.co​.uk/t​ennis​-beco​mes-p​rofit​able-​playe​r/fut​ure-b​usine​ss/ar​ticle​/1347​692 (accessed 7 February 2018) Geography New Network (2013) Globalization of tennis balls. MAPS.com. Available at: http:​//med​ia.ma​ ps101​.com/​sub/g​nn/ar​chive​s/pdf​/2013​0707_​4_ten​nis_b​w.pdf​ (accessed 7 February 2018) Gillmeister, H. (1998) Tennis a cultural history. London: Leicester University Press. 105

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Gonzales, P. (1959) Man with a racket: the autobiography of Pancho González. New York: A.S. Barnes and Company. Halberstam, D. (2001) Playing for keeps: Michael Jordan and the world he made. London:Yellow Jersey Press. Huizinga, J. (1949) Homo Ludens: a study of the play element in culture. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. International Olympic Committee (2017, 19 October) Tennis: history of tennis at the Olympic Games.Available at: https​://st​illme​d.oly​mpic.​org/m​edia/​Docum​ent%2​0Libr​ary/O​lympi​cOrg/​Facts​heets​-Refe​rence​ -Docu​ments​/Game​s/OG/​Histo​r y-of​-spor​ts/Re​feren​ce-do​cumen​t-Ten​nis-H​istor ​y-at-​the-O​G.pdf​ (accessed 21 December 2017) International Tennis Federation (2018) History. ITF Tennis.com. Available at: http:​//www​.itft​ennis​.com/​ about​/orga​nisat​ion/h​istor​y.asp​x (accessed 3 January 2018) Jefferys, K. (2009) The triumph of professionalism in world tennis: the road to 1968, The International Journal of the History of Sport, 26(15), 2253–69. Kirkham, S. (2015) Throwback Thursday: the first Wimbledon on television. Wimbledon.com. Available at: http:​//www​.wimb​ledon​.com/​en_GB​/news​/arti​cles/​2015-​02-05​/2015​0205_​throw​back_​thurs​day_t​ he_fi​rst_w​imble​don_o​n_tel​evisi​on.ht​ml (accessed 4 January 2018) Kramer, J. & Deford, F. (1979) The game: my forty years in tennis. New York: Putnam. Lake, R.J. (2015) A social history of tennis in Britain. London: Routledge. Lake, R.J. & Llewellyn, M. (2015) The demise of Olympic lawn tennis in the 1920s: a case study of shifting relations between the IOC and international sports federations, Olympika, XXIV, 94–119. Macur, J. (2011, 3 September) It’s called a season; it lasts 11 months. The New York Times. Martelanc, T. (1974) Social and cultural impact of satellite-based television. UNESCO. Available at: COM.74/WS/5, http:​//une​sdoc.​unesc​o.org​/imag​es/00​01/00​0112/​01124​4eb.p​df (accessed 25 December 2018) Marx, K. & Engels, F. (1968[1848]) The communist manifesto. Harmondsworth: Penguin. McLuhan, M. (1973) Understanding media. London: Abacus. McLuhan, M. & Fiore, Q. (1967) The medium is the massage: an inventory of effects. New York: Bantam Books. Nike News (2015, 20 August) The history of Nike tennis. Available at: https​://ne​ws.ni​ke.co​m/new​s/the​ -hist​ory-o​f-nik​e-ten​nis (accessed 9 February 2018) Perry, F. (1984) Fred Perry: an autobiography. London: Arrow Books. Reynolds, M. (2017) Falling out of love: inside the weird struggle to save tennis. Wired. Available at: http:​ //www​.wire​d.co.​uk/ar​ticle​/next​-gene​ratio​n-atp​-fina​ls-fu​ture-​of-te​nnis-​rule-​chang​es (accessed 26 January 2018) Robertson, R. (1990) Mapping the global condition: globalization as the central concept, Theory, Culture & Society, 7, 15-30. Robertson, R. & Giulianotti, R. (2009) Globalization and football, London. Sage. Rothenberg, B. (2016, 13 April) Roger Federer, $731,000; Serena Williams, $495,000: the pay gap in tennis. The New York Times. Smart, B. (2005) The sport star: modern sport and the cultural economy of sporting celebrity. London: Sage. Smart, B. (2007) Not playing around: global capitalism, modern sport, and consumer culture, Global Networks, 7(2), 113–34. Smart, B. (2016) Sportsmanship in question: the impact of professionalism and commercialization on the ethos of sport. In T. Delaney (ed.), Sportsmanship: multidisciplinary perspectives (pp.222–33), Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company. Spencer, N. (2000) A reading between the lines: a discursive analysis of the Billie-Jean King vs. Bobby Riggs “Battle of the Sexes”, Sociology of Sport Journal, 17, 386–402. Statista (2018) Tennis sponsorship spending worldwide from 2010 to 2016 (in million US dollars). Statista. Available at: https​://ww​w.sta​tista​.com/​stati​stics​/3802​96/te​nnis-​spons​orshi​p-spe​nding​-worl​dwide​/ (accessed 3 February 2018) Strasser, J.B. & Becklund, L. (1993) Swoosh: the unauthorized story of Nike and the men who played there. New York: HarperBusiness. Tandon, K. (2017) Australian Open finals pull in massive ratings all over the world. Tennis.com. Available at: http:​//www​.tenn​is.co​m/pro​-game​/2017​/01/a​ustra​lian-​open-​telev​ision​-rati​ngs-f​edere​r-nad​al-se​rena- ​ venus​/6388​2/ (accessed 26 January 2018) Thomasson, E. (2015, 17 June) Sponsors catch on to booming women’s sport. Reuters. Wertheim, J. & Bourkoff, A.B. (2017, 13 November) What tennis can teach the world about globalization. Sports Illustrated. Woods, R.B. (2011) Social issues in sport. Leeds: Human Kinetics 106

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WTA (2015) WTA’s TV & digital audiences keep rising. Wtatennis.com. Available at: http:​//www​.wtat​ennis​ .com/​news/​wtas-​tv-di​gital​-audi​ences​-keep​-risi​ng (accessed 26 January 2018) WTA (2017) The WTA story. About the WTA. Available at: http://www.wtatennis.com/about-wta (accessed 26 January 2018) WTA (2018) WTA rankings singles. WTA Rankings. Available at: http://www.wtatennis.com/rankings (accessed 9 February 2018)

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11 Jeu de Paume, lawn tennis and France’s national identity from the 1870s to the Musketeers era Patrick Clastres

Although the history of sport has become an important field in contemporary French history, the development of lawn tennis in France is more or less terra incognita. Only certain eras have received in-depth scholarly attention, including the beginnings of lawn tennis in France (Gillmeister 2017; Peter & Tétart 2003), the inter-war dominance of Suzanne Lenglen and of France’s “Musketeers”, and tennis’ decline in the 1990s (Waser 1995). This chapter re-examines the early history of French tennis, from the 1870s to the 1930s, a time when nationalists still insisted on the primacy of France’s jeu de paume as the ancestor of English lawn tennis. Examining how different forms of and rules for tennis were imported and indigenised before the Second World War shows that the cultural processes involved were much more complex than the mere adoption of an anglophile lifestyle by aristocratic elites. Moreover, I argue that the importation and adoption of the quintessentially English lawn game prior to 1939 contributed to the history, not only of France’s “British colonies”, but also of France’s national identity. This chapter is divided into three parts. Firstly, the diffusion of lawn tennis across France from the 1870s to 1914 is discussed, focusing in particular on the Atlantic coast, the Riviera and Paris and inland cities. During this period, lawn tennis and real tennis remained closely linked, enjoying ties that went beyond the sort of genealogical relationships described by Guttmann (1978) in his canonical distinction between traditional games and modern sports. Secondly, the role of France in the sport’s broader development is examined, focusing on the British-French socio-political rivalry that characterised key aspects of the sport and on the creation of the International Lawn Tennis Federation (ILTF) in 1913. Thirdly, the role of key figures like Marguerite Broquedis – a champion who was a committed advocate of professionalism and feminism ten years before the “Divine” Suzanne Lenglen – and the tennis “Musketeers”, who represented the new sporting and patriotic class that emerged in France between the wars, is examined.

France’s early tennis mania Postcards from locations across France testify to the mania for tennis that swept across the country during the Belle Époque (1896–1914) when numerous clubs were created to satisfy the arrival of the first middle-class “tourists”, alongside the upper-class visitors who began 108

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holidaying in France in the 1840s.This distinction is important, as the upper classes played tennis in private settings and exclusive circles as soon as 1875, whereas the middle classes played later in public, often on courts provided by hotels, casinos or municipal authorities. Tennis and other games were part of a broader socio-cultural dynamic that led to what leading historian Alain Corbin called “the invention of the beach” (1988) and “the advent of leisure” (1995). It is difficult to trace the spread of Wingfield’s lawn tennis sets before 1885, as only scraps of information appear in newspaper articles and contemporary literature. Consequently, private diaries, such as the one kept by Cosme de Satgé, a Franco-British citizen who lived in Dinan from 1873 to 1898, are extremely precious. De Satgé first encountered lawn tennis at a private garden-party in July 1879. Despite describing it as ‘a pretty game but rather difficult’, he continued playing tennis that summer, generally with a girlfriend on her family’s croquet lawn (quoted by Monier-Moore 2017, p.289–90). He went on to join Dinan Cricket Club – where lawn tennis had been played twice weekly since August 1875 – which became Dinan Lawn Tennis Club in 1885. The year 1875 also saw the first record of Wingfield’s tennis sets being used in Dinard, which, three years later, became home allegedly to France’s first lawn tennis club outside Paris, formed by the Comte des Francs and British locals. According to L’Illustration (6 November 1880), lawn tennis reached Normandy in 1880: ‘this year has seen lawn tennis, in other words jeu de paume on grass, sweep across the beaches beloved by the English and all along the grassy cliffs’. British visitors to Etretat and Dieppe, who had first played tennis on the lawns of their villas, united with wealthy Parisians like Vicomte de Janzé or Baron Pierre de Coubertin to form clubs, and even the small seaside resort of Coutainville, in Cotentin, contained one (Peter & Tétart 2003). Generally speaking, from the mid-1880s onwards, in many locations it seems lawn tennis clubs were formed, and tournaments hosted, to entertain mostly British visitors, for example in Boulogne, Arcachon and at Le Touquet’s “ParisPlage” resort (see Chovaux 2011). Southwest France was both a gateway for lawn tennis and a bastion of real tennis. Pau’s real tennis society, which was founded in 1887 and run as a joint-stock company, built two adjacent outdoor lawn tennis courts. The club’s Easter handicap tournament became international in 1902 when a separate Comité du Lawn-Tennis was formed and two new courts were added inside Pau’s velodrome.When the Count de Gallifet became president of both the real and lawn tennis societies, the two clubs merged to form a single club, but this signalled the decline of real tennis. Similarly, tennis usurped real tennis at the Société Athlétique de la Villa Primrose, founded in 1897 in Bordeaux, but interestingly, until the 1930s, its members were said to play a distinctive style of tennis characterised by genuine courte paume sliced backhands and forehands, locally called coups chopés, probably from the English word chopped (Taliano-des-Garets 1997).

Tennis on the French Riviera By the 1870s the French Riviera had become a fashionable winter destination for Britain’s wealthier classes, who enjoyed the Mediterranean landscape and healthy climate. They brought with them Wingfield’s tennis game, which quickly spread from the villas’ lawns to luxury hotel gardens. However, it is difficult to establish an accurate timeline for the development of tennis because its prestigious status led some hotels to exaggerate their connections with the game.1 The Côte d’Azur’s first tennis court was probably constructed in 1874 by Thomas Robinson Woolfield, a Glasgow textile merchant and Riviera property developer, who, according to a booklet written by his niece in 1890, converted the croquet lawn at his Villa Victoria in Cannes (Gillmeister 2017). Other British ex-patriots followed Woolfield’s initiative, and even invited tennis champions to play exhibition matches at their villas.To stay competitive, hotels and casinos 109

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across the region built tennis courts to attract enthusiastic tourists. The first hotels in Cannes to do so were the Central and the Prince of Wales, in 1879, followed in 1881 by the Beau-Site and the Gallia. However, the town did not get its own tennis club until 1886, when Captain Clifton Perceval founded the Réunion Club at La Redoute. As intended, the club attracted many of the world’s best players, such as William and Ernest Renshaw, Herbert Wilberforce, and even Dr James Dwight, the United States National Lawn Tennis Association (USNLTA) president (de Nanteuil, de Saint-Clair & Delahaye 1898). After Perceval’s death in 1892, the Beau-Site eclipsed the Réunion in prestige stakes, and hosted popular handicap tournaments. Nice’s first tennis club, Nice LTC, was founded in 1885 by the city’s British winter residents. Although it embraced a wide variety of outdoor games such as lawn tennis, croquet, pistol shooting, archery, bowls and bowling, the club was closed from May-October (Gastaut & Mourlane 2009). Moreover, until the death of its first president, Henry E. Salisbury, in 1902, the club’s members were all British or American, and, until it moved to the Parc Impérial in 1918, English was the club’s compulsory language. In neighbouring Monte Carlo, the initiative for developing tennis lay as much with Monaco’s ruling princes as with the Anglophone community. Tennis was first brought there by Charles III, who could sometimes be seen playing on his clay-pigeon shooting lawn above the sea. However, it was his successor, Albert I, who recognised tennis’ potential for attracting visitors to Monaco. The year 1893 saw the creation of Lawn Tennis de Monte Carlo, by the fashionable Société des Bains de Mer. Initially based at courts above the cellars of the Paris Hotel, the club moved to La Condamine in 1905, and then to the roof of the Beausoleil’s garage in 1921, when it became known as the Festa Country Club. To further enhance its prestige, the club was resituated after land was acquired from the neighbouring municipality of Roquebrune. Renamed the Monte-Carlo Country Club, it was now perfectly situated to take advantage of the craze for tennis sweeping along the Riviera. Arguably, tennis tournaments contributed greatly to the Côte d’Azur’s success as a tourist destination. The winter tennis season, which opened with the Beau-Site’s tournament (from 1889) in December and closed with the Monaco tournament (from 1897) at Easter, became synonymous with the Riviera, attracting top Frenchmen like Max Decugis alongside several international champions including England’s Reginald and Laurence Doherty, and New Zealand’s Anthony Wilding. The sport’s growth here was enhanced by positive press/magazine coverage, such that by the early 1920s, the Riviera – and in particular Cannes – had displaced the Atlantic coast as the epicentre of French tennis (Wilson 2014). The days in which tennis champions mingled with European aristocracy, including Russia’s Grand Duchess Anastasia and Britain’s Duke of Windsor (later King Edward VIII), climaxed in 1922 with the “match of the kings”, when Suzanne Lenglen and Sweden’s King Gustav V played Miss Beamish and Portugal’s King Manuel II.

Developments in Paris and inland Surprisingly, scholars have often overlooked tennis history in Paris and inland cities, even though the sport’s French roots lay there. By the 1890s, tennis was being played at elite boys’ and girls’ schools (lycées), and had become fashionable among the officer class at military schools like the Prytanée National Militaire (Clastres 2008) and in garrison towns such as Châlons, Castres and Reims (D’Effeuille 1899).The sport’s image as a healthy pastime led many spa towns to embrace it, illustrated in numerous Belle Époque postcards vaunting the attractions of Saint-Nectaire, Uriage, Vittel and Vichy (Dutheil 2003). Once again, tennis spread through Paris by way of British and American ex-patriots in conjunction with wealthy Parisians. 110

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The city’s first lawn tennis club, the Decimal Lawn Tennis and Boating Society, was founded in 1877 in Neuilly-sur-Seine, although the game had undoubtedly been played before then in private gardens. Unlike the Decimal, which was closed to French people until its dissolution in 1895 and subsequent renaissance as the Island Club, the exclusive Cercle de Saint-James was always a Franco-British affair. Launched in 1883, the “Cercle” had rowing facilities and lawn tennis courts on what was known as Rothschild Island. Encouraged by the club’s success, in 1886 its members decided to increase its share capital and open up the club, now known as the Société des Sports de l’Île de Puteaux (SSIP), to anyone from the upper echelons of European and American society. Consequently, SSIP grew from 250 members (including 100 shareholders), to 400 members and five courts in 1890, and to 800 members and nine courts in 1893. Pierre de Coubertin, who enjoyed playing tennis there, worked to ensure the SSIP hosted the tennis tournament at the 1900 Olympics (de Coubertin 1909). The sporting needs of Parisian elites were also catered to by two multi-sport clubs, the Racing Club (1882) and Stade Français (1883). The former introduced lawn tennis to its programme in 1885 and subsequently established two non-permanent grass courts in the Bois de Boulogne. By 1900, it had no fewer than seven clay courts. At Stade Français, the only courts available to members until 1887 were on the poor ground outside the Château des Tuileries, which doubled as a running track (Prêtet 2009). Eventually, in 1891, the club’s players moved to the three tarmac courts in the Galerie Desaix, which can be considered Paris’ first indoor tennis courts, and that same year, one of its members – an Englishman called Briggs – became French tennis champion.2 Stade Français relocated several times – to the indoor courts on Avenue Bourdonnais in 1893, then to the Trotting Club’s four clay courts, and finally to the very British Messenger Lawn Tennis Club, which Stade Français absorbed in 1898 – but permanent facilities for the club were eventually obtained within the Château de Saint-Cloud grounds. Five courts quickly became 14, upon which Stade Français hosted the “world championships” from 1912 to 1914, and in 1920, 1921 and 1923. This competition, now known as the French International Championships, moved to Roland Garros in 1928. The precepts of amateurism applied by Racing Club and Stade Français appear to have been followed less strictly by the Tennis Club de Paris, founded in 1895, which launched an international tournament on its two fast heated indoor oak courts that was open to coachingprofessionals in 1898.

France’s role in early lawn tennis According to Gillmeister (2017, p.266),‘at a time when imperialism was at its peak, the ascension of lawn tennis was a particularly subtle form of colonialism, but, somewhat surprisingly, contemporaries do not seem to have been very much aware of it’. Upper-class French anglophiles did indeed contribute to the rise of tennis, but those more devoutly asserting their “Frenchness” oftentimes reacted against the new game’s British associations (Lichtenberger 1914). While writers in Victorian and Edwardian Britain were forging the imperialistic idea of Britain as the birthplace of modern sports, French educationalists such as Paschal Grousset and Pierre de Coubertin were trying to convince everyone that France was the cradle of most sports, including tennis, which was claimed to be a direct descendent of jeu de paume. As a result of increasing tension between France and Britain following the 1898 Fashoda Crisis, the French government decided to ignore the tennis tournament at the Paris 1900 Olympics, which Coubertin had organised at the SSIP, but sponsored the longue paume event. This competition between France and England for symbolic leadership of sport is perfectly illustrated by Jean-Jules Jusserand, France’s ambassador to the US from 1902 to 1925 111

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(Clastres 2018). As a philologist and a specialist of English medieval literature, Jusserand (1901, p.2) addressed the etymology of the word “sport”: ‘It came to [our neighbours] from France, as did most of the games it describes. That is, from our old French words desport and desporter’. Jusserand then asserted, assuredly and patriotically, the French origins of each sport then associated with Britishness, claiming tennis derived from the French word “tenetz”, which the server called to the receiver just before hitting the ball. For Jusserand, the link between the French Renaissance game of jeu de paume and modern tennis was unquestionable. Until the 1890s, when the newly appointed lawn tennis commission of the Union des Sociétés Françaises de Sports Athlétiques (USFSA) – formed in 1887 – issued standardised rules that were almost identical to those of Britain’s Lawn Tennis Association (LTA), tennis players in France adopted rules in a haphazard way.3 At Arcachon, for example, the statutes drawn up in 1880 stipulated: ‘croquet and lawn-tennis players may refer to the rules of the Mary-la-Bone (sic) circle’ (Société de gymnase et lawn-tennis 1880, p.4). Moreover, some clubs – mostly those predominantly British – decided to affiliate with the LTA, rather than the USFSA (Waser 1996, 2007). While the proliferation of tournaments open to foreigners, and often to professionals, helped standardise the rules used in France, the USFSA used the issue to secure a monopoly over international tennis matches, especially those involving British clubs. It actively supported competitions organised by affiliated clubs, for example when the SSIP created a competition between Paris’ best players and their amateur counterparts from Winchester House LTC. Another of the USFSA’s aims, albeit unstated, was to bring all French tennis clubs under its supervision and thereby combat professionalism, which was being encouraged by the tournaments organised by hotels and casinos. The USFSA responded to this threat by launching national inter-club and inter-collegiate championships for men in 1891 and a national singles championship for ladies in 1897. However, it was difficult for the USFSA to control open tennis tours, which moved from resort to resort along the Atlantic coast or the Riviera.

Made in Paris: the International Lawn Tennis Federation Despite the origins of lawn tennis and other sports in Britain, the ILTF, founded in 1913, was one of many international federations created in Paris before the First World War on the initiative of USFSA members. Arguably, British and American officials were too fixated on standardising rules and enhancing the prestige and attractiveness of their competitions to notice the newly emerging international bodies, including the IOC. They were also reluctant to adopt the French model of sport (Clastres & Bayle 2018). Whether Duane Williams approached Henri Wallet directly, as Gillmeister (2017) asserted, or whether Charles Barde acted as an intermediary, as Bowers (2013) argued, the Americans, Swiss and French started the process without any British involvement. It is likely that Wallet took advantage of the sporting rivalry between Britain and America, which was illustrated clearly during the London 1908 Olympics, to forward the interests of French tennis. After Williams’ death on the Titanic, in 1912, Wallet changed strategy and invited British involvement. Collectively, they agreed to Wallet as first president – though he changed his name to Henry Walley, presumably to sound more English – accepted French as the organisation’s working language (as it was for the Olympics since 1894) and that the USFSA would organise the world hard (i.e. clay) court championships until 1916. In return, Britain secured the right to stage “the world championships on grass” (i.e. Wimbledon) in perpetuity, and were accorded an extra vote on the ILTF Council. Unhappy with this situation, and the fact that the US were not offered any official “world championships”, the USNLTA refused to join until 1924 when their 112

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demands for equality were finally accepted, alongside standardised rules that adopted some of the American variations (Lake 2015).

Key figures: Marguerite Broquedis Alongside these socio-political developments involving French tennis administrators, the sport was also undertaking a marked cultural transformation in France, led by key figures. Gender became a certain facet of this change. When tennis was first introduced, it was immediately considered a suitable game for upper-class ladies and their daughters (Peter 2014), but the development of tournaments afforded men the opportunity to control and masculinise the sport. Nevertheless, French women continued playing, despite the handicap of long skirts and the pressure to conform to “graceful” feminine ideals. Suzanne Lenglen was inarguably the most famous female inter-war tennis player (Tétart 2014; Wagg 2011). She was also the first French athlete to dominate a sport, and commanded almost constant media attention for her on- and off-court exploits. So great was her fame that other pre-war female champions, in all sports, not just tennis, have been pushed from public consciousness by male journalists and writers. Her title-winning predecessor, Marguerite Broquedis (1893–1983), is one such figure. Broquedis was born and raised in Pau, where her father Emile was one of France’s last maîtres paumiers (coaching professionals) on the real tennis court, and an accomplished pelota a pasaka and real and lawn tennis player. He introduced his daughter to tennis when she was nine, and it was probably on the courts along Rue Saint-Didier in Paris, which he came to manage, that she honed her skills. Broquedis, as stated in her obituary from 1983 in Inside Women’s Tennis (quoted in Peter & Fouquet 2014, p.43), became ‘the first French woman player of world class… author of the first-ever press articles on fashions for championship tennis… [and] the first to discard boned corsets, starched skirts and petticoats in favour of fluid-line dresses’. Broquedis won the French national championships in 1913 and 1914, beating the up-and-coming Lenglen in the final of the latter, and also won a gold medal in the hard-court event at the 1912 Stockholm Olympics. She became an Olympian again in Paris, in 1924, and collected her last major title in 1927, winning the French championship mixeddoubles with Jean Borotra. Her career would undoubtedly have been even more distinguished had it not been for the outbreak of war and the emergence, and subsequent dominance, of Lenglen and Helen Wills. Like the pre-war champion Max Decugis, Broquedis was not opposed to professionalism and would have received offers for under-the-table payments, but overcame the necessity to accept these offers by writing some newspaper sports articles and becoming a fashion model. Her tennis style also betrayed her father’s professional heritage and what the British called ‘abhorrent working class competitiveness’ (Lake 2011, p.876). Generally, the press acknowledged her technical abilities but felt her game lacked power and technical acumen. For example, in 1912, L’Illustration described her style as ‘simple and harmonious’ (15 June, p.108), while Henri Cochet recalls in his memoires: ‘she looked like an antique goddess’ who played ‘wonderfully well… all the different shots, but above all she had a fantastic forehand drive, a splendid volley and a service stroke like few other women tennis players’ (Albaran & Cochet 1960). Not only did Broquedis impose on tennis the sort of power shots and volleys that typify jeu de paume and pelota, she gave sportswomen new status. Thus, while Lenglen is often praised by her male counterparts and journalists for her efforts to advance the female cause in tennis, Broquedis acted as a true feminist a decade earlier. An article about “style in tennis” she wrote for the sporting weekly La Vie au Grand Air (1 November 1912, p.980) shows her deep 113

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understanding of the game, while another piece six months later demanded sporting rights for women: For girls, no football, no boxing, no athletics, no gymnastics, just this boring and appalling calisthenics. We have croquet, of course! But so what? … Given that we are forbidden so many (sporting) pleasures, why shouldn’t we have the right to cry foul? She also maintained that ‘girls could develop the same physical, technical and tactical qualities as male players and that tennis could rouse their fighting spirit’ (La Vie au Grand Air, 30 May 1914, p.484). Alongside her progressive play, she also pioneered fashions: a short hair style – ten years before the garçonne style became popular – which was interpreted as an affirmation of gender equality; and she received her 1912 Olympic gold medal from the King of Sweden while wearing the controversial jupe-culotte (divided skirt) (Bard 2010).

The “Four Musketeers”: France’s Manifest Destiny Developments in the men’s game in France were also significant, particularly in relation to interwar advances in French nationalism. The “Musketeers” – Jean Borotra, Jacques Brugnon, Henri Cochet and René Lacoste – played centre stage, dominating men’s tennis from the mid-1920s to the mid-1930s. Alongside winning numerous major doubles and singles titles, collectively they formed France’s all-conquering Davis Cup team that wrested the trophy from the US in 1927 and held it until 1932. Their defence of the cup in Paris in 1928 propelled the construction of Roland Garros stadium – named to honour a pioneering First World War aviator – built to host Bill Tilden and the US team for the challenge round. The name “Musketeers” was first used by the former US tennis champion Henry Slocum in an allusion to the chivalry and swashbuckling style of The Three Musketeers, which Slocum had discovered through the popular Alexandre Dumas film of 1921. However, it was Paul Champ, a sports journalist for Le Figaro, who popularised the nickname after France beat Denmark in July 1927. The name resonated as it accorded with well-known stereotypes about French honour and arrogance, which had been revived by French successes in the First World War. At this time, France, Britain and the US were in intense competition to protect their colonial interests and to achieve economic and cultural leadership. In 1920, France set up the Service des Œuvres Françaises à l’Étranger as a way of extending the country’s cultural influence by, among other things, publicising sporting successes (Arnaud 1994). Such was the Musketeers’ popularity that French consulates inundated the Ministry of Foreign Affairs with requests for visits. Subsequently, Borotra and Brugnon toured South America, the US, Tahiti, New Zealand, Australia and England in 1928, and Cochet and Brugnon toured Japan, Indochina, India and Egypt in 1930 (Le Faou 2009). As unofficial ambassadors, they were expected to promote French culture in new territories. As individuals, their stories were also compelling. Their emergence from middle-class backgrounds reflected a broader class shift during the 1920s, in a sport that had previously been the preserve of France’s upper class (Faure 2007). Henri Cochet (1901–87), who won seven major singles titles, was considered the world’s best amateur from 1928 to 1931. Tilden, who lost seven of his nine encounters with Cochet, called him “the magician”. Cochet probably had the humblest origins of all the Musketeers. His father was a self-made man who, despite being born into a poor family in Picardie, rose to manage a sporting goods company. By the time his son was born, he had been asked to run the Tennis Club de Lyon, one of France’s oldest tennis clubs and the host of a major international tournament. Cochet funded his return to competitive tennis in 1923 by opening a tennis goods shop 114

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with his sister, in which they sold the first French racket strings made by Babolat, one of the Musketeers’ unofficial sponsors. Cochet, the only Musketeer to turn professional, toured South and North America with Tilden and Vines in 1933. Jacques Brugnon (1895–1978) became famous for his “quick-slap” volleys and lifted lobs. He discovered tennis on the lawn of his family’s mansion in Franche-Comté, but went on to play for the Paris Sporting Club, as his father was an attorney at Paris’ Court of Appeals. He was Suzanne Lenglen’s long-time mixed-doubles partner, and together they won the French mixed-doubles title five times between 1921 and 1926.4 Following the First World War, he obtained a law degree and worked as a journalist for Tennis et Golf magazine, and after retiring from competitive tennis, he became a coaching-professional in California. René Lacoste (1904–96), the driving force behind France’s 1927 Davis Cup win in Philadelphia, had abandoned his studies at the prestigious Ecole Polytechnique in order to devote himself to tennis. Also known for the Lacoste brand, his business career began through his association with André Gillier, a successful clothing manufacturer who asked Lacoste to wear his company’s pique-knit polo shirts. In 1933, the two joined forces to create the Lacoste clothing company, with its famous crocodile logo. Lacoste also invented the world’s first tennis ball launcher in 1927 and the first metal tennis racket in 1953, later sold by Wilson as the T2000, that Jimmy Connors made famous. Although Jean Borotra (1898–1994) was not the most talented Musketeer, he was undoubtedly the most emblematic, both because he was the first Frenchman to win Wimbledon, in 1924, and because of his unique playing style and long career. His style was undoubtedly influenced by pelota a pasaka, which he played almost every day until he was 16, in his Basque-country hometown of Arbonne. Pelota not only furnished Borotra with an arsenal of unusual strokes that often surprised opponents, it almost certainly moulded his nationalist beliefs, as the game was dominated by conservative Catholic priests and the far right (Mendiague 2007). He first discovered lawn tennis at age 13 on a school trip to England, but did not definitively adopt the sport until after the war, when he entered the elite military university, Ecole Polytechnique. As a sportsman, there were two distinct sides to Borotra’s character. Nicknamed the “bounding Basque”, he had a natural elegance, set off by his traditional beret, and was often a perfect gentleman. However, his tendency to show sportsmanship only on unimportant points and to interact with spectators to distract his opponents led Tilden to describe him as ‘the biggest showman and charlatan ever’ (Amson 1999). The First World War brought out the patriotism of all four Musketeers, but Borotra was particularly involved in public life and politics (Amson 1999; Gautier 2009). After serving in the army (he enlisted when he was just 16), Borotra went on to support the para-military Croixde-Feu League, whose members included the future French president François Mitterrand. Although he was staunchly anti-German, Borotra served in the Vichy government from October 1940 to April 1942 and never spoke out against Vichy’s anti-Semitic laws or their Nazi partnership. Interestingly, because of his arrest by the Germans, de Gaulle’s policy of rebuilding national unity and the principle of separating sport from politics, Borotra was the only Vichy politician not to be tried after the war. In contrast, the All England Lawn Tennis Club took a more critical view and rejected his application to play at Wimbledon in 1946. Nevertheless, in 1962 France’s High Commissioner for Sport, Maurice Herzog, asked Borotra to serve on the Doctrine Commission, devised to revitalise French sport and instil the Gaullist moral order in young people. The following year he was even designated a résistant-déporté, a title used to honour political opponents of the Vichy regime. In 1989, the president of the Fédération Française de Tennis (FFT), Philippe Chatrier, unveiled bronze statues of the four Musketeers at Roland Garros, which in my opinion were erected not to perpetuate de Gaulle’s ideal of national reconciliation, but to challenge Wimbledon’s hegemony over tennis’ heritage. 115

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Conclusion To paraphrase Peter Laslett (1965), French tennis, from the days of Cosme de Satgé to the Musketeers, is a “world we have lost”. Not only was this a time when tennis players used amateurism, gallantry and fashion to distinguish themselves from working-class players and nonplayers, the 1930s was also the last dfecade when real tennis and lawn tennis coexisted in France. Outdoor lawn tennis required simpler facilities and was easier to play than the complex, traditional, indoor game of real tennis, and it was also more suitable for women and the new urban classes who unreservedly supported the new republican regime. Wingfield’s lawn tennis game quickly found its way into France through a variety of channels, including seaside towns, sanatoriums and mountain resorts, schools and universities, and in major cities such as Paris, Bordeaux and Lyon. However, the game that was played informally on beaches and private lawns was different, both socially and culturally, from tennis played in casinos, hotels, exclusive (British or French) upper-class clubs, private schools and army quarters. The success of tennis, however, cannot be considered simply an expression of anglophile sentiment among the game’s many followers. Like Coubertin and Jusserand, many French tennis players admired Britain’s power and polity, but were also nationalists. The competitive spirit and creation of international tournaments helped tennis spread and encouraged the development of clubs during the Belle Époque. Tennis can be seen to reflect France’s egalitarian concept of democracy, as it spread from the recreationally minded upper-class aristocrats and grands bourgeois to the more competitiveminded middle classes (de Saint-Martin 1998). As early as 1909, the Écho des Sports orchestrated a revolt by ‘more modest clubs’ and ‘players from different social classes’ against the small number of elitist Paris clubs whose members formed the “Who’s Who” of France’s high society (Clastres 2006). Hence, the USFSA had no alternative but to join forces with major provincial clubs such as Villa Primrose in Bordeaux, where the French Championships were moved in 1909. This had an important impact on the game, as did the foundation of the FFT in 1920, which attracted many independent players and clubs. Statistics show that more than 100 clubs with 5400 players had joined the USFSA by 1912, but these figures grew to 268 clubs with 17,691 players by 1924 (Waser 1996).5 Because aristocrats rarely competed but often presided over the main clubs, the upper and new urban middle classes were thrust together in interesting ways. Further research is needed to consider if tennis helped create a sort of classless society (not considering the poorer), or at least the illusion of a classless society, in France.

Notes 1 For example, the Renshaw brothers are credited with designing seven courts at the Beau Site Hotel, which they used to prepare their domination of Wimbledon during the 1880s. As Gillmeister (2017) showed, this story is a myth invented by the hotel’s Swiss manager, Georges Gougoltz, after he went bankrupt in 1884 and his hotel was placed under administration. Another myth is that the Renshaws invented clay courts when they replaced the Côte d’Azur’s sun-scorched grass with powdered clay from the neighbouring Vallauris pottery factories. Again, this story was contrived for the prestige it gave to the area’s new luxury hotels, such as the Metropole, opened in 1889 by the Prince of Wales, and the Carlton, built in 1910. Alternatively, these stories might have been intended to protect amateur players from accusations of professionalism, even though they were receiving free board and lodging and probably "under-the-table" exhibition fees. 2 At this time, foreigners could enter the French championships. 3 The USFSA’s rules included bisques, a system of advantages inherited from real tennis (removed in 1892), and services were played with the foot close to the line (à pied touchant), rather than on the line, as in the LTA’s rules (de Saint-Clair 1894). This foot-fault rule was revised in 1908 and again after the First World War. 116

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4 Tellingly, all four Musketeers readily acknowledged the debt they owed Suzanne Lenglen for her inspiring example and precious advice on how to improve and win. 5 Nevertheless, many clubs and players remained unaffiliated, even after the Second World War (Waser 1992).

References Albaran, P. & Cochet, H. (1960) Histoire du tennis. Paris : Fayard. Amson, D. (1999) Borotra de Wimbledon à Vichy. Paris : Tallandier. Arnaud, P. (1994) Le sport français face aux régimes autoritaires (1919–39). In P. Arnaud & A. Wahl (eds.), Sport et relations internationales (pp.277–323), Metz : Centre de recherche de l’Université de Metz. Bard, C. (2010) Une histoire politique du pantalon. Paris : Le Seuil. Bowers, C. (2013) The International Tennis Federation. A century of contribution to tennis. New York: Rizzoli & ITF. Clastres, P. (2006) Gymnastique, sport et nation (1870–1914). In P. Clastres & P. Dietschy (eds.), Sport, société et culture en France, XIX-XXe siècles (pp. 41–71), Paris: Hachette. Clastres, P. (2008) Éducation sportive et formation militaire. Pierre de Coubertin au Prytanée (19 mai 1889). In Prytanée militaire national et Université du Maine (eds.), Bicentenaire de l’installation du Prytanée militaire français à La Flèche, 1808–2008 (pp.167–92), La Flèche: Prytanée national militaire. Clastres, P. (2018) L’origine des sports comme enjeu national. Une invention française selon Jean-Jules Jusserand (1901). In E. Belmas & L. Turcot (eds.), Jeux, Sports et Loisirs en France à l'époque moderne, Rennes: Presses universitaires de Rennes. Clastres, P. & Bayle, E. (2018) Introduction: becoming a global sport leader. In E. Bayle & P. Clastres (eds.), Global Sport Leaders: A Biographical Analysis of International Sport Management (pp.1–30), London: Palgrave. Corbin, A. (1988) Le territoire du vide. L’Occident et le désir du rivage, 1750–1840. Paris: Flammarion. Corbin, A. (1995) L’avénement des loisirs, 1850–1960. Paris: Flammarion. de Coubertin, P. (1909) Une Campagne de vingt-et-un ans (1887–1908). Paris: Librairie de l’Education physique. de Nanteuil, E., de Saint-Clair & G., Delahaye (1898) La Paume et le Lawn-Tennis. Paris: Hachette. de Saint-Clair, G. (1894) Lawn-Tennis. Paris: Armand Colin. de Saint-Martin, M. (1998) Une sociabilité mondaine: les débuts du vélocipède et du tennis en France. Traverse: Revue d'histoire, 5, 45–55. Dutheil, F. (2003) Le sport à la cure: le corps médical face à la diffusion des pratiques sportives dans la station thermale de Vichy. 1875–1914. Staps, 61(2), 39–52. D’Effeuille, vicomte (1899) Le lawn-tennis. In M. Leudet (ed.), L’Almanach des sports (pp.427–32), Paris: Librairie Paul Ollendorff. Faure, J.-M. (2007) National identity and the sporting champion: Jean Borotra and French history. The International Journal of the History of Sport, 13(1), 86–100. Gastaut,Y. & Mourlane, S. (2009) Les débuts du tennis sur la Côte d’Azur (1880–1930): tourisme mondain et transfert culturel. In P. Clastres & P. Dietschy (eds.), Paume et tennis en France, XVe-XXe siècles (pp.91– 101). Paris: Nouveau monde éditions. Gautier, D. (2009) Tennis et politique. L’exemple de Jean Borotra. In P. Clastres & P. Dietschy (eds.), Paume et tennis en France, XVe-XXe siècles (pp.183–96). Paris: Nouveau monde éditions. Gillmeister, H. (2017) Tennis. A cultural history (2nd ed.). Sheffield: Equinox Publishing. Guttmann, A. (1978) From ritual to record: the nature of modern sports. New York: Columbia University Press. Jusserand, J.-J. (1901) Les Sports et jeux d'exercice dans l'ancienne France. Paris: Plon. Lake, R.J. (2011) Social Class, etiquette and behavioural restraint in British lawn tennis 1870–1939. The International Journal of the History of Sport, 28(6), 876–94. Lake, R.J. (2015) A social history of tennis in Britain. London: Routledge. Laslett, P. (1965) The world we have lost: England before the Industrial Age. London: Routledge. Le Faou,Y. (2009) Les ‘Mousquetaires’ ambassadeurs de la France. In P. Clastres & P. Dietschy (eds.), Paume et tennis en France, XVe-XXe siècles (pp.167–81), Paris: Nouveau monde éditions. Lichtenberger, A. (1914) Le Tennis. Notes, méditations, souvenirs. Oudin: Paris. Mendiague, F. (2007) Religion, tradition et politique. Le cas de la Pelote Basque dans l'entre-deux-guerres. Terrains & travaux, 12 (1), 28–46. Monier-Moore, D. (2017) Dinan. La colonie anglaise, 1800–1940. Jersey : Plessix. 117

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Peter, J.-M. (2014) Du dehors au-dedans. Les transformations des représentations corporelles du XVIe au XXe siècle. L’exemple de la paume et du tennis. Corps, 12 (1), 177–86. Peter, J.-M. & Fouquet, G. (2014) Marguerite Broquedis: une femme championne olympique en 1912. European Studies in Sports History, 7, 41–58. Peter, J.-M. & Tétart, P. (2003) L'influence du tourisme balnéaire dans la diffusion du tennis. Le cas de la France de 1875 à 1914. Staps, 61(2), 73–91. Prêtet, B. (2009) Le tennis parmi les autres sports au Stade français, des origines du club à 1939. In P. Clastres & P. Dietschy (eds.), Paume et tennis en France, XVe-XXe siècles (pp.145–56), Paris: Nouveau monde éditions. Société de gymnase et lawn-tennis (188) Statuts. Arcachon: Eugene Faure Imp. Taliano-des Garets, F. (1997) La Villa Primrose. Un siècle d’histoire sportive à Bordeaux. Bordeaux, Éd. Confluences. Tétart, P. (2014) Champion androgyne, combattante et danseuse. Portrait flou de Suzanne Lenglen (1913– 1923). International Review on Sport and Violence, 8, 63–82. Wagg, S. (2011) Her dainty strength: Suzanne Lenglen, Wimbledon and the coming of female celebrity. In S. Wagg (ed.), Myths and Milestones in the History of Sport (pp.122–40), London: Palgrave Macmillan. Waser A.-M. (1992) La genèse d'une politique sportive. L’exemple du tennis. Actes de la recherche en sciences sociales, 91–2, 38–48. Waser, A.-M. (1995) Sociologie du tennis. Genèse d’une crise (1960–1990). Paris: L’Harmattan. Waser, A.-M. (1996) La diffusion du tennis en France. In T.Terret (ed.), Histoire des sports (pp.101–33), Paris: L’Harmattan . Waser, A.-M. (2007) Tennis in France, 1880–1930. The International Journal of the History of Sport, 13(2), 166–76. Wilson, E. (2014) Love game: a history of tennis from Victorian pastime to global phenomenon. London: Serpent’s Tail.

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12 Lawn tennis in Ireland The untold history, 1870–1914 Simon J. Eaves and Tom Higgins

In 1900, Lawn Tennis (1 August 1900, p.258), the official mouthpiece of the Lawn Tennis Association (LTA), enthused: Tens of thousands of spectators lined the route. … The police with their jubilee medals pinned to their chest directed the enormous vehicular and pedestrian traffic. … The mob yelled itself hoarse with delight, the massed bands playing “God save the Queen” and “Yankee Doodle” at the same time with brilliant effect. As the three British (English) players, Herbert Roper-Barrett, Arthur Gore and Ernest Black set forth to challenge their American cousins for the inaugural International Challenge Trophy (later called “The Davis Cup”), it appears that nationalistic feeling among throngs of lawn tennis aficionados was at fever pitch. However, in reality the occasion was much more muted: Lawn Tennis even proclaimed this depiction of the departure, ‘A very amusing account’ (1 August 1900, p.255). The “mob” that converged on Euston Station was in fact nothing more than a handful of dignitaries and well-wishers. While readers of Lawn Tennis were likely amused at the parody, the Americans viewed the impending contest as highly significant. For the British, it was clearly a less serious affair; they were, apparently, more concerned with the pre-departure dinner than the forthcoming competition (Lawn Tennis 1 August 1900, p.255). Despite their seemingly laissez-faire attitude, this was a significant moment for the British in the development of the game’s international character. The Anglo-American relationships fostered in the incepting of this event have been viewed as central to the game’s internationalisation. What has been overlooked in this historiography, however, was the contribution of Ireland – a smaller, but not less significant, nation that has been relegated to the periphery of lawn tennis history. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Ireland emerged as a significant lawn tennis playing nation, and could rightly claim to be a leading contributor to the incipient development of the game as a global sport. In these formative years, the Irish played a fundamental role in several crucial areas, namely: the development of the amateur player, the initiation of the

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coaching-professional, the development of the game in Europe and the fostering of transatlantic international relationships.

The emergence and development of lawn tennis in Ireland The spread of lawn tennis from England to Ireland reflected a well-worn path of sport diffusion across the British Empire. As Mason and Riedi (2010, p.32) highlight, the important agents of this movement were ‘the services, together with traders, missionaries and educationalists’. Ireland, as part of the British Empire in the 19th century, was an extensive military outpost under English control.The “garrison” games of cricket, golf, association football and lawn tennis flourished, although in conflict with the more “traditional” Irish games. As in England, lawn tennis clubs emerged in Ireland in the latter quarter of the 19th century, growing rapidly over the ensuing decades.While the garrison influence was evident in introducing the game – several garrisons being represented in the early Irish Championship tournaments (Higgins 2006b, p.662) – it was almost exclusively the middle-/upper-class businessmen who established the early tennis clubs. Many of these early organisations emerged as subsidiary sections of more established sporting clubs, for example, the County Dublin (Monkstown) Archers Club, the boat clubs at Belfast and Sunday’s Well in Cork (Higgins 2006a, p.225). By 1914, an estimated 158 clubs existed in Ireland, in comparison to the 1000 clubs founded in England by this time (Rouse 2015, p.125). In the early years on the game’s foundation in Ireland, the Limerick Lawn Tennis Club emerged as a leading force. In 1877, the club organised the first open championship, a few weeks prior to the inaugural Wimbledon Championships at Worple Road. However, the pre-eminence of the Limerick Club was short-lived, as the hub for tennis development shifted towards the university city of Dublin. Trinity College Dublin, also known as the University of Dublin, was an ideal training ground for aspiring lawn tennis players; it already offered the game of rackets to its undergraduate population, and in recognition of the growing interest in the lawn game, they founded its lawn tennis club in 1877 (West 1991). The club, though successful in its own right, was perhaps more fundamental in providing high quality players to the more prestigious Fitzwilliam and Lansdowne clubs, which formed at a similar time. The Lansdowne Lawn Tennis Club is arguably the oldest tennis club in Ireland, but it is the Fitzwilliam Lawn Tennis Club that can perhaps claim to have been the most significant catalyst for the game’s development in Ireland in the 19th century. The club established the Irish Championship Meeting in 1879 – a move that was fundamental to the promotion, and success, of the emerging game. While other tournaments would be instituted, the Fitzwilliam would hold the premier position ahead of Limerick, Lansdowne and Howth, where ‘the attendance of the public is mainly needed to ensure a success’ (Pastime 4 May 1887, p.288). The Fitzwilliam meeting had no such concerns, and became, in some eyes, equal, if not superior, to the Wimbledon Championships. A correspondent writing in Pastime (30 April 1884, p.274) suggested that ‘although, of course, the championship (Wimbledon) meeting … is the most important of the year, it is very doubtful if any gathering exceeds in brilliancy that of the Irish Championship’. Crowds flocked to fashionable Dublin, and it rapidly gained favour amongst the visiting throngs. ‘Everything was carried out in the most perfect style; hospitality was unbounded, and Fitzwilliam Week quickly developed into one of the chief social events of the Dublin year’, wrote Treacy (1927, p.9). The frivolities often continued long into the evenings and ‘in the mornings, the young ladies would sleep on after their late night’ (O’Connor 1977, p.5). The invitations to balls and parties abounded, but few stayed away from the tennis courts the next day. In 1884, ‘6,000 or 7,000 … watched the final for the Ladies’ Irish Championships’; 120

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this was a stark contrast to Wimbledon, which failed to muster ‘more than 300 or 400 [on the final day]’ (Pastime 22 July 1885, p.65).The magnetism and influence of the Irish Championships was evident, and its success in no small part can be attributed to the numerous overseas competitors who ventured there each May/June. The tournament was initially dominated by the visiting British ‘cracks’; the Renshaw brothers, William and Ernest, and Herbert Lawford, who each secured three victories over a nine-year period. Players also came from further afield, with Pastime (14 May 1884, p.306) proclaiming, ‘The “international element” … appears to be increasing. Already, entries have been received from Messrs. Jas. Dwight, R. D. Sears and A. L. Rives – a trio of Americans’; a significant coup for Dublin, as Dwight and Sears were the top two players in America at this time. The Irish Championship Meeting was the showpiece of the Fitzwilliam club and a watchword for quality. Pastime (17 April 1884, p.246) in discussing the 1883 event opined: The management had earned the name of having all the arrangements perfect. Under these favourable conditions it is not to be wondered at the immense number of spectators who congregated round the courts were highly pleased with the sport provided for them. The championship meetings, managed for many years by the “Master”, Arthur Courtenay, surpassed the seemingly poorer efforts in England. Highlighting a number of problems with the All England Lawn Tennis Club (AELTC) management, Pastime (22 July 1885, p.65) suggested that, ‘The Wimbledon committee might take a trip to the Dublin meeting next year; they would learn many things that are useful in the management of a tournament’. The success of the tournament, and the influence of the Lansdowne and Fitzwilliam clubs, in the latter years of the 19th century was fundamental to the foundation of Irish lawn tennis and cultivating the emerging Irish players, who became highly influential international ambassadors for the game.

The Irish amateurs to the fore Towards the end of the 1880s, Irish players, both men and women, were coming to the fore. A correspondent for Pastime (1 September 1886, p.155), reflecting on the season past, reported: The Irish players have successfully “spoiled the Saxon” this season. They have won the first prizes and the Challenge Cups for the Gentlemen’s Singles at Cheltenham, Penarth (Welsh Championship), Scarborough, Harrogate and Buxton, and the Ladies’ Singles at Cheltenham and Buxton. To this list must be added the Doubles Cup won by Miss May Langrishe at Buxton, making a total of eight. While Langrishe had demonstrated her undoubted ability in England, albeit never at Wimbledon, she and several other Irish women were beginning to dominate the Irish Championships, with several women from rural Ireland leading the Irish ascent. May Langrishe, from Knocktopher in County Kilkenny, was victorious on three occasions (1879, 1883 and 1886) with Louisa “Mollie” Martin, from nearby Ballyragget, claiming the prize on nine separate occasions between 1889 and 1903. Martin also visited the All England Club on several occasions, without ultimate success, each time suffering defeat at the hands of Charlotte “Chattie” Cooper Sterry in the final round (1898, 1900 and 1901). Helena “Lena” Rice, from County Tipperary, was more successful, claiming victory in 1890 when Blanche Hillyard – who had defeated her in the previous year – decided against defending her title in the challenge round. While Rice captured the All England title, another Irish woman would emulate her on the other side of the Atlantic. Mabel Cahill, 121

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from County Kilkenny, relocated to America, around 1889, settling in New York. She immediately joined the New York Tennis Club and quickly established herself as a leading exponent of the game, winning the singles and doubles at the US championships in 1891 and 1892. In 1976 she became the sole Irish player to be inducted the International Tennis Hall of Fame. In the early to mid-1880s Eyre Chatterton, Ernest de Sylly Hamilton Browne and Vere Thomas St. Leger Goold dominated the men’s game in Ireland, with the latter winning the Irish Championships in 1879, and Browne and Paul Aungier securing the doubles in 1882, defeating the Renshaws in the final. However, Irish accomplishments at Wimbledon were less evident, with only Vere Goold claiming some success in reaching the final in 1879, where he lost to the Reverend Hartley in three sets. With Chatterton’s ordination and retirement from the lawns in the mid-1880s, and Browne being ‘kept continually busy in the country … [where he] gets no practice’, the future for Irish tennis must have seemed bleak. However, any suggestion of an imminent Irish decline proved a false dawn. By the late 1880s, the Lansdowne and Fitzwilliam clubs could boast several highly-ranked players, who could challenge the very best of the English. In 1890, “Willoby” Hamilton, a native of County Kildare, became the first “overseas” player to win the Wimbledon singles title. A son of County Wicklow, Dr Joshua Pim, quickly followed Hamilton’s success, lifting the trophy in 1893 and 1894, and alongside Dublin-born Frank Stoker won the doubles championship in 1890 and 1893. Harold Mahony completed the hat-trick of Irish victors in the singles event, emerging victorious in 1896. The impact of these Irish players was highly significant and ably illustrated by Pastime (17 July 1895, p.243), which bemoaned their absence at the 1895 Championships; the ‘Lament from Wimbledon’ read: Mr. Pim, Mr, Mahony, Mr. Stoker, Do you hear the sights upon the classic green? Do you hear us saying what a sorry joke a, Week at Wimbledon, with you left out, has been? Are your triumphs so insipid that, escaping, You forgo your English laurels for a whim? Come back again and put them in their places, Mr. Mahony, Mr. Stoker, Mr. Pim! By the early 1880s, the notion of international competition between nations became an intriguing prospect, as many Irish players sought to challenge the dominance of the English. In May 1881, a correspondent for Bell’s Life wrote, ‘Arrangements are being made for a grand International Lawn Tennis Tournament between England and Ireland to be held in Fitzwilliamsquare, Dublin … on Monday May 23rd’ (14 May 1881, p.9), and the Irish Freeman’s Journal enthusiastically proffered that ‘the affair is likely to prove a “tall” success’ (12 May 1881, p.7). Apparently, it was, and the match was repeated in 1882 with the Irish team avenging the defeat of the previous year. Interest in the international match dwindled for several years, but was rekindled in 1886, with rumours abounding of a movement to create an Irish lawn tennis association primarily ‘for the purpose of providing a committee for the selection of the players’ (Pastime, 9 July 1886, p.388). At this time, the English authorities were reluctant to initiate proceedings for an “official” challenge and it was not until the 1890s that they were roused to consider an England vs. Ireland contest. However, according to Lake (2015, p.70-71), a conflict over ‘diplomatic etiquette’ initially delayed negotiations, as the higher status club should, according to accepted protocol, retain the right of first refusal. A stalemate ensued, as both clubs – the AELTC and the Fitzwilliam Club – considered themselves senior to the other. Fortunately, the stand-off was resolved when, in 1892, a group of ‘well-known Irish players’ approached 122

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the LTA directly to initiate arrangements for six Irishmen to compete against six Englishmen. The inaugural match, held on the Friday before the Irish Championships in May 1892, resulted in narrow defeat for England, and reports that ‘there is little to choose between the best men of the two countries’ (Pastime 1 June 1892, p.350).

The “ghosts” of lawn tennis: Ireland’s coaching-professionals While the amateur players were central to bringing the Irish game to the fore, lawn tennis historiography has largely overlooked the role of others who were also fundamental to the development, and later internationalisation, of the game. As Eaves, Lake and Cowdrey (2017) wrote, early coaching-professionals were like the “ghosts” of lawn tennis past, hidden from view but of great influence. In the game’s formative years, the aspiring amateur in England had many opportunities to observe the great players of the day; high-quality tournaments abounded, unlike in Ireland where such meetings were limited to a handful in Dublin. Moreover, English players who sought to compete in tournaments had first-hand experience of playing together with, and against, the “crack” players. Alongside early instruction manuals, for most players, this was the fundamental method of acquiring the necessary skills of the game; seeking external advice was deemed not only unnecessary, but arguably in contravention of the prevailing rigid amateur code (Lake 2010). Unlike other sports like track-and-field athletics, swimming and rowing, where coaching was becoming an accepted part of the game (see Day & Carpenter 2016), in lawn tennis, this was, initially at least, perceived as being in the domain of the professional and, in that regard, non acceptus. Despite a reluctance to engage with “non-amateurs”, several coaching-professionals emerged in the 1880s. While Queen’s Club in London became one of the foremost “nurseries” for these boys/men, Ireland’s coaching-professionals, such as George Kerr, were already plying their trade several years before Queen’s Club opened its doors in 1886. Kerr was the first known club “pro” at the Fitzwilliam club; he was first mentioned as being ‘an assistant’ to an apparently unknown superior in 1885 (Pastime 28 October 1885, p.295), and may have been in situ prior to 1883, according to the New York Times (14 January 1917, p.87).Treacy (1927, p.9) suggests that he began ‘as a ball boy, was appointed assistant professional, and quickly promoted to the chief position’. Despite his working-class background, George Kerr did ‘much to bring the Irish amateurs to their present high standard’ (Pastime 20 August 1890, p.146), and was a significant catalyst in the club’s early success. Kerr was a player of great ability and it was suggested that ‘if he practised thoroughly, [he would] probably be able to put W. Renshaw on his mettle’ (Pastime 28 October 1885, p.295). Later, he did, defeating the seven-times Wimbledon singles champion in an exhibition match in 1890 (American Lawn Tennis 15 May 1918, p.8). He similarly frustrated his fellow Irish amateur players. When Harold Mahony claimed the Wimbledon crown in 1896, he immediately declared ‘he was after Kerr’.The Fitzwilliam club hosted the challenge, however the match finished unresolved, for ‘when Kerr had it match point, Mahony walked up to the net, threw his bat at Kerr and shouted “There’s no beating you”’ (American Lawn Tennis 15 May 1918, p.58). Kerr’s reputation was widespread and as early as 1886 there was a growing interest in “George” taking on the British-born court/real tennis world champion, Tom Pettitt, who was based in Boston (Pastime 29 September 1886, p.207). When the Boston Herald proclaimed Pettitt the ‘champion professional at court and lawn tennis’, Pastime (8 August 1888, p.107) took umbrage and declared, ‘He has undoubtedly earned the premier honours of the older game, but he is certainly not champion professional at the modern game. George Kerr, the Fitzwilliam ground man, has the greater claim to the title’.The disagreement was resolved when 123

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American businessman Harry Ditson ventured to Ireland to cement the challenge. Immediately, the American publication, Outing (August 1889, p.394) excitedly proclaimed that this contest would result in ‘the establishment of international tennis relations’, and, ‘the beginning of an annual interchange of thought, experience and play’. The event was an enormous attraction; at Longwood, a crowd of 1100, including the presence of many other ‘noted athletes’ witnessed Kerr’s victory in four sets, securing the series of matches 2-1 (Boston Globe 26 September 1889, p.2). Kerr repeated his challenge with Pettitt in Dublin the following year, this time winning all three matches. These were significant moments in the incipient development of international lawn tennis, as while other (amateur) players had ventured to compete in America in the 1880s, no one had caught the public’s imagination, nor made such an impact, as the Fitzwilliam groundsman, George Kerr. What Kerr fostered at Fitzwilliam, Thomas Burke emulated at Lansdowne. Burke regularly defeated both amateur players and his fellow English coaching professionals in a number of “professional” tournaments, exhibition games, and “practice” matches. Pastime (12 May 1897, p.22) argued that the Lansdowne professional was even superior to the great four-time Wimbledon singles champion, R.F. Doherty. His court craft was compared to the ‘unapproached and unapproachable, Dr. Pim’ (The County Gentleman 26 February 1898, p.261), although considering Pim learned his craft from the Lansdowne professional, it would be more appropriate to compare Pim to Burke! Both Burke and Kerr were first-rate players and “professors” without peer; they were invaluable as coaches to the top amateurs at their respective clubs. The four-time Wimbledon singles champion, Anthony Wilding (1912, p.41), considered the professional ‘an excellent type of man, capable, intelligent and courteous’, and professed his hope that ‘every club [could] afford to place one on its staff ’. Several British clubs could afford them, but were reluctant to reward the “club workers” appropriately. By contrast, continental clubs adopted a very different approach toward coaching-professionals; they recognised their influence and importance and more satisfactorily rewarded them. By the end of the 1880s, with offers of improved working conditions and enhanced remuneration, many British “professors” were enticed to Europe. Kerr was one of the first to relocate, around 1890, working predominantly, but not exclusively, in Germany. Twenty-five years later, he was still there, ‘engaged to coach at Berlin, and in a sense he may be said to have made the game there’ (Referee 24 February 1915, p.10). George Hillyard, secretary of the AELTC (1907–25), had first-hand experience of Kerr’s influence on the development of tennis in Germany. In 1912, at the Turnier Club in Berlin, he was invited to view ‘Kerr’s boys’; ‘a dozen young fellows playing who all had beautiful style and the obvious makings of great players’. It was a stark contrast to Hillyard’s earlier visit ‘when there was only one man of first-rank in the country’ (Hillyard 1924, p.245). Kerr’s role in the development of lawn tennis in Germany remains relatively unreported, yet he was held in great esteem. ‘So much the vogue did he become that the Crown Prince and various other samples of royalty … were included amongst his patrons’ (Referee 24 February 1915, p.10). Thomas Burke was equally in demand by European “Royalty”, teaching the Grand Duchess Anastasia and her children, at their home near Rostock, in northern Germany. While regularly visiting the Grand Duchess, it was predominantly in France where Burke took up residence. He became the tutor at the Tennis Club de Paris in the 1890s, and coached throughout the country, most notably in Nice and Monte Carlo. His influence on the development of the emerging French players was widely acknowledged by the tennis experts of the period. ‘The great advantage which … the best of the Frenchmen, possess over their continental rivals, lies chiefly in the excellent coaching of the Irish professional, Burke’, remarked American writer, J. Parmly Paret (Outing 5 August 1899). Anthony Wilding (1912, p.255–6) concurred, noting 124

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that ‘up until 1900 French players considered tennis a mere pastime, but latterly, the best players … all improved greatly under the tuition of Tom Burke’. He has ‘had an experience in the art of coaching second to none’, proffered the tennis journalist A. Wallis Myers (1908, p.304), who claimed, ‘I warrant there are not many tennis wrinkles that this genial tennis master has not picked up’. The move overseas by Kerr and Burke was evidently to the great benefit of the players and the general standard of the game in Europe – a fact not missed back in Britain. In 1904, discussing ‘continental progress’, Lawn Tennis and Croquet (LT&C) (27 April 1904, p.14–5) bemoaned, ‘We have lost Burke and Kerr from Dublin’ who like others ‘had to go abroad for the better wages’. They were joined by several English coaching-professionals, including Charles Haggett, Tom Fleming, Harry Cowdrey and W. Marshall. ‘They are each the centre of a number of young foreign players, who every day are learning style, pace and placing’, reported LT&C (27 April 1904, p.14–5), yet, ‘we, in our game, possess but two [coaching-professionals] in the whole of the United Kingdom and Ireland’.

The Irish and the emergence of international challenges While the coaching-professionals were venturing into Europe, the Americans were making further strides to institute transatlantic competition; however, the English authorities met the approaches with subdued enthusiasm. The United States National Lawn Tennis Association president, James Dwight, had made several failed attempts in the 1880s to entice the English cracks to compete against the American players. However, the LTA remained intransigent, which reflected Britain’s ‘parochial and ethnocentric view of sport’ (Llewellyn 2011, p.631). The English, according to Eaves and Lake (2018), believed they had no true rivalry with the US and defiantly opposed the determined American enticements to compete. Hence, while several American players – the Clark brothers, Joseph and Clarence, Dwight, Sears and Rives – had ventured to British shores to compete in the Wimbledon Championships and other tournaments, reciprocal trips were rare. Those who had ventured from Britain’s borders were lesser known and lower-ranked players, in stark contrast to the American visitors. James Dwight was acutely aware of the need to attract the best players to American shores. Writing in 1894, he proclaimed, ‘There is nothing that I should like better than to see some of the best English players here’; such visits would ‘excite more interest or stimulate our players more’ (Official Lawn Tennis Bulletin 1897, p.206). His long-term aim in part came to fruition in the form of Dublin-born Manliffe Francis Goodbody, a highly regarded player who had participated in the early international matches against England. He made several ventures “across the pond” in the late 1880s and early 1890s, and in doing so made a significant contribution to instigate relations that were a fundamental prerequisite to facilitating later international competition. His most significant trip came in 1894, when, despite being badly out of practice, he managed to reach the Challenge Round of the US National Championships, losing to Bob Wrenn. The American press were enthralled and wrote favourably of Goodbody’s visit; a correspondent for the New York Times (3 September 1894) enthusiastically proclaimed, ‘Goodbody deserves a vote of thanks, according to lovers of tennis. His appearance at Newport imparted a kind of international flavor to the proceedings and roused interest in the game to the highest pitch’, and it was expected that his ventures would lead to ‘international contests’ being staged ‘on both sides of the water’. Equally, if not more significant was the advice that he proffered on leaving America. The editor of Golf and Lawn Tennis (16 April 1900, p.113) claimed that Goodbody had proposed the idea of an ‘international competition between say six of the leading players of each country, on a perfectly neutral soil, and under neutral conditions’. 125

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It is evident that Goodbody’s trip was highly significant in terms of building relations with the Americans, and paving the way for the subsequent visit of his compatriots, Dr Joshua Pim and Harold Mahony, in 1895. At the time, Pim was undoubtedly the best player in the world, having won back-to-back Wimbledon singles titles in 1893 and 1894. Mahony was only slightly his inferior – he would later claim the Wimbledon crown in 1896. The Americans were overjoyed at the prospect of their arrival. ‘This is the first time American tennis experts will defend their laurels against a recognised English [i.e. Wimbledon] champion’ opined a correspondent of the Roanoke Times (27 June 1895, p.6), adding, ‘Pim is unquestionably the greatest player in the world today, and his visit will stir up tennis players even more than Goodbody’s did last year’. The “team” of Pim and Mahony thus represented the arrival of “international” team lawn tennis in America. Unsurprisingly, the Irish experts were victorious on court, beating four of the best Americans comprehensively in exhibition matches. What was most significant about the trip, however, according to Eaves and Lake (2018), was its role in fostering the relationship between Mahony and American crack, Bill Larned, which would become very significant. Mahony’s role in this aspect has been significantly underplayed, yet clearly, he was central to informal negotiations between British and American players aiming to instigate transatlantic competition. He returned to America in 1897 on a self-funded visit, accompanied by Wilberforce Eaves and Harold Nisbet, for a tour that would prove pivotal in Anglo-American lawn tennis. This was the first time that a “British team” had travelled to the US to compete in tournaments against the best the Americans could muster. According to Eaves & Lake (2017, p.1977) ‘it is almost certain that the 1897 tour … laid much of the groundwork for solidifying the prerequisite Anglo-American relations’ necessary for establishing the Davis Cup challenge in 1900. Ultimately, the tour was unsatisfactory for the British, with only Eaves playing close to form, narrowly losing to Bob Wrenn in the All-Comers Challenge at the US Nationals. For the Americans, in contrast, the matches provided evidence of their arrival as a tennis power. Parmly Paret lauded the triumph as hugely significant, proclaiming, ‘American players have won the greatest international victory in the annals of the sport’ (Outing October 1897, p.73). Irrespective of the result, the tour provided the fillip the Americans required to shake off the shackles of their perceived inferiority. The American press had followed proceedings with great interest, and the visits by the Irishmen from 1894 to 1897 provided ample evidence of the futility of lawn tennis isolationism. International competition was the future, one that the Irish – namely, Goodbody, Pim and Mahony – catalysed in the 1890s, when the Irish knew few peers on the lawn courts.

The decline of Irish lawn tennis When James Cecil Parke, from County Monaghan, won the singles and doubles events at the 1912 Australasian championships and the Wimbledon mixed-doubles title in 1914, he seemed solely responsible for keeping the flame of Irish lawn tennis burning. It was, however, a dying ember, as numerous factors conspired to initiate the decline of lawn tennis in Ireland. Ireland’s “jewel in the crown”, the Irish Championships, was beginning to falter in the mid1890s. The retirement in 1896 of the Fitzwilliam club honorary secretary, Arthur Courtenay, ‘the guiding spirit of the tournament’ (Lawn Tennis 30 September 1896, p.240), was a significant setback. He had masterminded affairs for more than a decade, and had been fundamental to the esteem in which the Irish Championships was held. In his absence, the championships struggled. Lawn Tennis reported, ‘It is generally admitted that the game is not so popular there [Ireland] as it used to be’ (23 September 1896, p.226). Later secretaries laboured under the “Master’s” shadow. 126

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Poor scheduling in 1905 meant the championship event clashed with the popular Queen’s Club meeting (LT&B 14 June 1905, p.128). This proved catastrophic, since at Queen’s, ‘in addition to a good class entry of English players’, the arrival of the American Davis Cup team – Bill Clothier, Holcombe Ward, Bill Larned and Beals Wright – alongside the Australian sensation Norman Brookes, ensured Dublin’s entry suffered by comparison (LT&B 28 June 1905, p.160). The Ireland/England international fixture that used to be played immediately following the Irish Championships also ceased around this time, so the “crack” English players chose the Queen’s Club tournament over the Irish Championships, as it was closer to home. LT&B (28 June 1905, p.163) reported of the Fitzwilliam event: The entries were composed of all the best known players in Ireland… but the lack of support from the other side was this year [1905] the worst that the Fitzwilliam has ever suffered from. Not one single Englishman entered the tournament. To compound this problem, the quality of the Irish players had declined since Mahony’s Wimbledon victory in 1896. The earlier first-ranked Irishmen were either retired or past their best, and there was a dearth of young Irish talent to fill the void, such that by 1904, F.W. Payn was compelled to report, ‘Ireland nor Scotland possess a single player of the first rank’ (LT&C 3 August 1904, p.264). While English players appeared reluctant to venture to Ireland, and European tournaments became a more attractive option, the increase in pro-nationalistic feeling in Ireland likely hampered the further development of “English” games. Particularly in the country districts, where the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) and the Gaelic League (GL), founded in 1884 and 1893 respectively, had become highly influential, the popularity of lawn tennis noticeably declined, while “new” pastimes, such as golf and bicycling rose in prominence. In 1905, LT&C bemoaned the ‘dearth of rising talent among Irish players, and the rivalry of other games had begun to make themselves felt … more especially in the country districts’ (1 March 1905, p.488). Powell (2017, p.62) argues that the establishment of the GAA led to the formation of powerful rural networks of clubs across Ireland and as such, ‘Gaelic games became synonymous with national identity and the cult of masculinity’. This was the antithesis of what Thomas Croke, the founding patron of the GAA, labelled the ‘effeminate follies’ of lawn tennis. The GAA fought ‘for the preservation and cultivation of our [Irish] national pastimes’ (Ranelagh 2012, p.172), and sought to wean young people away from playing ‘garrison games’ (Powell 2017). They initially banned the military and police from membership, later extending this to all who attended or took part in foreign games (Higgins 2006a). Similarly, the GL, formed by a leading figure in the “Gaelic revival” – the future president of Ireland, Douglas Hyde, alongside Douglas MacNeill and the Rev. Eugene O’Growney – was also influential in promoting Ireland’s rural heritage. Unlike the GAA, however, the GL was ‘a decidedly non-political and non-sectarian organisation’, although equally dedicated to the promotion of Irish identity. It was Hyde who had urged his countrymen to ‘make up their minds to be Irish or English’ and to ‘end the anomaly of aping England and hating her at the same time’ (Higgins 2006c, p.1703).

Conclusion In the latter years of the 19th century, the Irish players, clubs and tournament meetings d­ iffered little in quality to their counterparts in England; the English being acknowledged leaders of lawn tennis during this embryonic period. In particular, Dublin’s Fitzwilliam Club and to a lesser extent the Lansdowne Club were fundamental to the game’s development in Ireland, 127

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and ultimately abroad, producing top-ranked players and fostering the first ­international challenge-matches many years prior to the commencement of the Davis Cup.The Irish clubs, geographically remote from England, adopted a different approach to the game, and in particular viewed player development as central to the sustainability of the clubs and the sport in general. In a period where a rigid amateur ethos pervaded the game, the Irish clubs were among the first to embrace the “professional”. Coaching-professionals would emerge in England in the late 1880s, ostensibly at the London clubs of Queen’s, Hyde Park and Maida Vale, but the Irish professionals were plying their trade several years earlier. George Kerr and Thomas Burke played fundamental roles in developing the amateur players at their respective clubs, coaching future Wimbledon champions, “Willoby” Hamilton, Joshua Pim and Harold Mahony. The Irish amateurs later ventured across the Atlantic to demonstrate their skills and foster an Anglo-American relationship that would ultimately incept transatlantic competition and the true internationalisation of the game. While across the Atlantic, American players benefited from the visits of Mahony, Pim and Goodbody, the Europeans also felt the influence of the Irish. According to Eaves, Lake and Cowdrey (2016, p.509): ‘As the game developed on the Continent, the top clubs in Germany, France, Austria and beyond courted many British professionals who succumbed to the better working conditions, wages and social standing on offer’. Kerr and Burke were among the first and became instrumental in raising playing standards throughout Europe, but their departure from Ireland would have disastrous effects on Irish tennis. As a LT&C correspondent bemoaned in 1904,‘It is this point which may turn the scale against us in the future’ (27 April 1904, p.14–5). As the top Irish amateur players retired, there were fewer younger men to replace them, and the Irish Championships declined in popularity. This situation was exacerbated by the rise of both Irish nationalism and the increase in popularity of “new” sporting pastimes. The GAA and GL grew in influence, and sought to promote the Irish language and traditional country pursuits, while golf and bicycling developed as direct competition to lawn tennis. The combined effects of these factors were catastrophic for the international game in Ireland, and the nation’s role in bringing lawn tennis to the world stage was quickly forgotten. However, were it not for their players, coaches and tournaments, the game’s internationalisation would have faltered, particularly during the crucial period from 1880 to 1900. For these reasons, Ireland is owed a significant debt of gratitude for its role in the game’s incipient development.

References Day, D. & Carpenter, T. (2016) A History of Sports Coaching in Britain: Overcoming Amateurism. London: Routledge. Eaves, S.J. & Lake, R.J. (2018) Dwight Davis and the Foundation of the Davis Cup in Tennis: Just another Doubleday Myth? Journal of Sport History, 45(1), 1–23. Eaves, S.J. & Lake, R.J. (2017) The ‘Ubiquitous Apostle of International Play’, Wilberforce Vaughan Eaves: The Forgotten Internationalist of Lawn Tennis. International Journal of History of Sport, 33(16), 1963–81. Eaves, S.J., Lake, R.J. and Cowdrey, S. (2016) The ‘Ghosts’ of Lawn Tennis Past: Exploring the Forgotten Lives of Early Working-Class Coaching-Professionals. Sport in History, 36(4), 298–521. Elias, N. (1978) What is Sociology? London: Hutchison. Higgins, T. (2006a) The History of Irish Tennis [volume 1]. Sligo: Tom Higgins. Higgins, T. (2006b) The History of Irish Tennis [volume 2]. Sligo: Tom Higgins. Higgins, T. (2006c) The History of Irish Tennis [volume 3]. Sligo: Tom Higgins. Hillyard, G.W. (1924) Forty Years of First-Class Lawn Tennis. London: Williams and Norgate. Lake, R.J. (2010) Stigmatised, Marginalised, Celebrated: Developments in Lawn Tennis Coaching 1870– 1939, Sport in History, 30(1), 82–103. 128

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Lake, R.J. (2015) A Social History of Tennis in Britain. London: Routledge. Llewellyn, M.P. (2011) Prologue: An Indifferent Beginning, International Journal of the History of Sport, 28(5), 625–47. Lowe, F. (1924) Gordon Lowe on Lawn Tennis. London: Hutchinson & Company. Mason, T. & Riedi, E. (2010) Sport and the Military: The British Armed Forces 1880–1960. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Myers, A.W. (1908) The Complete Lawn Tennis Player. Philadelphia: George W. Jacobs and Co. O’Connor, U. (1977) The Fitzwilliam Story 1877–1977. Dublin: Fitzwilliam Lawn Tennis Club. Powell, F. (2017) The Political Economy of the Irish Welfare State: Church, State and Capital. Bristol: Policy Press. Ranelagh, J. (2002) A Short History of Ireland. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Rouse, P. (2015) Sport & Ireland: A History. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Treacy, J.J. (1927) Fitzwilliam’s First Fifty: Half a Century of Irish Lawn Tennis. Dublin: Fitzwilliam Lawn Tennis Club. West, T. (1991) The Bold Collegians. The Development of Sport in Trinity College, Dublin. Dublin: The Lilliput Press Ltd. Wilding, A.F. (1912) On and Off Court. New York: Doubleday, Page and Co.

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13 Socio-cultural transformations of tennis in the Czech Republic Arnošt Svoboda and Dino Numerato

In the Czech countries – the countries of the Czech Republic and Slovakia, within the former Czechoslovakia – tennis is historically one of the most popular sports. At the top level, it has produced a number of Grand Slam winners. Simultaneously, it maintained high numbers of registered players. However, as is the case in many areas of Czech society and culture throughout the whole 20th century, it was heavily afflicted by the political context and changes. Against this backdrop, the aim of this chapter is to provide a socio-cultural and historical analysis of the development of tennis in the Czech countries. The chapter is structured as follows: firstly, a brief outline of the history of the Czech tennis since its beginning in the 19th century is provided. Secondly, the main focus is given to tennis’ development after 1945, when Czech tennis went through difficult years, facing disfavour of the political regime. Finally, the main changes after the fall of communist regime in 1989 are discussed. Media reports, journal and newspaper articles, biographies of tennis players and interviews with several key actors provide an account of important socio-cultural and political issues and historical milestones.

The origins of tennis in the Czech countries Tennis is one of the oldest formally established sports in the Czech countries. Czech tennis began to flourish towards the end of the 19th century under the Austro-Hungarian Empire, at first amongst members of the aristocracy. They started to practice tennis after it arrived from England via France to Germany and Austria. New clubs, tournaments and courts emerged in the last two decades of the 19th century throughout the Czech regions of Bohemia and Moravia. Among the founding members of first tennis clubs were mainly citizens of major cities from various professional backgrounds, including imperial bureaucrats and government officials, landowners, lawyers, business leaders, and entrepreneurs (I. ČLTK Revue 2013; Olivová 1989). Hand in hand with the increasing popularity, the Austro-Hungarian Empire started to view tennis as a political danger. Similar to other sport disciplines as well as other cultural and, more generally, public activities, tennis was viewed as one of the vehicles to stimulate national awareness of Czech countries that strived for independence and separation from the 130

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Austro-Hungarian Empire. This is why Czech clubs and societies were under strict control of Austrian authorities. Sports were prohibited in schools and, considering the high popularity of tennis among students and teachers, many active athletes and organisers had to be discreet with their doings. The emancipation of Czech national identity through tennis was enhanced by the first significant sporting achievement, when the Žemla brothers, Ladislav and Zdeněk, won the Austrian Championship title in 1906.1 Their sporting success was followed by the foundation of the Czech Lawn-Tennis Association in 1906 (Rokosová 1996), though, only two years later, the Austro-Hungarian Empire authorities banned Czech tennis players from participating in international competitions. However, using tennis diplomatic contacts, the Czech association acquired membership of the British Lawn Tennis Association whose charter enabled such an unusual step. By escaping direct power of the Austrian tennis body, Czech tennis players were able to compete in the fourth Olympic Games in London in 1908 (Rokosová 1996). The end of the First World War was followed by the establishment of the new independent national state, Czechoslovakia. The newly gained autonomy of the Czech countries in 1918 led to the further development of the organisational basis of Czech tennis. In 1919, the Czech association broadened into the Czechoslovakian Lawn-Tennis Association. During the 1920s, its base rose to approximately 10,000 members and was practised mainly by highly educated and economically well-off people (Rokosová 1996; Tenis 1993b). New clubs were founded across the whole country and, in the next two decades, Czechoslovakian tennis players regularly participated in the Olympic Games (until the exclusion of tennis after the Games at Paris in 1924) and the Davis Cup.2 After having survived the economic crisis at the early 1930s, tennis was further suppressed by the Nazi occupation and World War II. In 1940, the last tournaments were played until the end of the war in 1945 (Rokosová 1996).

“Bourgeois” sport in the socialist regime Similar to its European neighbours, Czech tennis in the post-World War II period underwent a relatively fast turn back to organised sporting activities (Strachová & Grexa 2015), notwithstanding the struggle with destroyed courts and facilities (JTS 1993; Rokosová 1996). However, tennis had soon to face another political challenge after 1948, as it was confronted with the political influence of the Soviet Union and the communist ideology.3 The governance of sport, including tennis, lost its roots in the non-governmental sector and totally adhered to the highly centralised, hierarchical, state-driven and highly ideological model of governance inspired by the Soviet sport model (Jakubcová 2012; Numerato & Flemr 2013; Slepičková 2007,). Tennis with its middle- and upper-middle-class roots and individualistic ethos was at odds with the communist vision of sport, and its focus on the working class and the mass character of physical activities. This perspective, commonly imprinted into the pejorative label of tennis as “a bourgeois sport”, symbolically, albeit not necessarily factually, hindered the growth of the discipline for the next decades (Tenis 1992b).4 However, unlike golf but similar to sailing as two other so-called “bourgeois” sport disciplines in the communist regime (see Numerato 2009), the tennis movement managed to find spaces for its development even beyond the ideological gaze.Yet, the possibility of travelling abroad, even for international competitions, was limited and commonly preceded by the political “training” of players in order for them to compete in “capitalist” countries (Tenis 1991). Elite players were requested to ‘have a world view fully clarified’ (ÚV ČSTV, ČSTS 1978, p.37) and to symbolically spread the picture of a ‘new socialist man’, rejecting individualism and the consumerist lifestyle (Pravidla tenisu 1960).

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Sport in early 1950s represented one of the social spheres in which the “hunt” for a class enemy took place. The majority of the national ice hockey team was arrested and, later, absurdly sentenced for acts of espionage and high treason in 1950 (Hokej.cz 2015; Jakubcová 2012). The tennis field stayed out of big political trials. Nonetheless, it did not remain untouched by the first wave of emigration from the Czech countries after 1948, including tennis players Jaroslav Drobný and Vladimír Černík (Tenis 1991).5 Their acts were condemned by a statement of the umbrella sport governing body, Sokol,6 for ‘serving sporting capitalist entrepreneurs for money’ (Tenis 1991, p.20). Following the critique, the names of both players disappeared from the mass media. After the first wave of the “tennis migration”, domestic conditions for the development of the game got much worse. Moreover, from 1950 until 1954, the Czechoslovakian national team did not apply to compete in the Davis Cup, with the excuse that Czech tennis had to “rebuild” its national structure. Together with other communist states of Central and Eastern Europe, Czechoslovakia even planned to establish a new competition, the Peace Cup, as another demonstration of detachment from the “capitalist” sporting order. Nevertheless, in 1954, the Soviet Union, as a leading member of the “Eastern bloc”, turned back to the Davis Cup, opening the way for the Czech countries as well (Tenis 1993c).

Tennis and its internal ambiguities beyond the Iron Curtain The decision to participate in the Davis Cup suggests how tennis, and sport more broadly, played an important role in international relations and diplomacy. Like in other socialist countries, sport remained almost the last source of national pride for many people and represented one of the scarce opportunities to match economically developed Western countries (Riordan, 2007). Somehow ironically, the previously refused Davis Cup became the most preferred international competition – probably due to its team character, which was close to the communist ideal seeing sport as a mass activity with no place for individualism and club culture (I.ČLTK 2009). Towards the end of the 1950s, the position of tennis was full of contradiction. Notwithstanding its “bourgeois” label, tennis began to be assessed as a standard part of the socialist sporting structure, having a ‘people’s, mass and united’ character (Závodník 1975, p.16). The symbolic meaning of tennis was progressively redefined and co-opted by the communist ideology, wiping off its historical roots as an ‘elite’ leisure activity for ‘a chosen few’ (ÚV ČSTV, ČSTS 1978). This discursive re-interpretation of tennis was accompanied with extensive promotional activities that targeted working youth and students of working-class origin and at vocational schools (ÚV ČSTV, ČSTS 1976). Furthermore, the popularity of tennis came hand in hand with the sporting successes of Czechoslovak tennis players (e.g. Věra Suková, Jan Kodeš, Ivan Lendl, Martina Navrátilová and Hana Mandlíková). Tennis as a mass sport activity (with the membership base more than doubling between the 1950s and 1980s) seemed to be finally symbolically fully acknowledged by being included in the mass gymnastic display, Spartakiáda—heavily ideologically laden, periodical, mass synchronised exercises, comprising in some years over one million gymnasts in various categories. In 1985, young boys performed there with tennis rackets (Kolář 2006; Roubal 2006). Last but not the least, the popularity of tennis was also publicly legitimised by the interest of various politicians, among whom the prime minister, Lubomír Štrougal, has often been mentioned, and local pop culture celebrities recognised by the political regime, such as the popular singer Karel Gott (Bolardt 1980). Czech tennis could be totally separated from the Western world but the communist regime had to face new challenges related to the increasing encroachment on tennis of capitalist culture, notably with the mass media and the professionalisation of the game.

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The Professionalisation of Czech tennis The idea of socialist sport was based on the celebration of the ideals of amateurism and Olympism (Sportovní ročenka 1959), which were co-opted by the communist ideology as norms and power tools to control the sporting field and its actors (see Wagg 2015). Tennis, as a non-Olympic sport between 1924 and 1988, stood somewhat apart from the primary focus of ideological overseers. Yet, even tennis could not avoid the controversial issue of the division of the sport into amateur/ professional segments.Although tennis players had to be strict amateurs, the best athletes could more adequately be defined as a hybrid category of ‘state amateurs’, sometimes known as ‘shamateurs’ (Llewellyn & Gleaves 2014; Sportovní Ročenka 1959; Stloukalová 2008). As of the 1950s, a selected group of top-level athletes was officially employed by state-owned factories and public offices but at the same time benefited from special reliefs from their employers. However, these jobs were fictitious, and, actually, the athletes’ training was a full-time process, comparable to the training of any other sporting professional (Stloukalová 2008). As one of the 1970s players, Pavel Huťka, remembered: ‘After finishing the studies, I had a chair and a name sign on the office door in the Public Transport Company. Of course, I’ve never been there, not even once.’ (I.ČLTK Revue 2006, p.38). The approach towards professionalisation of Czechoslovakian athletes further changed in the context of broader transformation of the stance taken by both the International Olympic Committee (Llewellyn & Gleaves 2014) and the International Lawn Tennis Federation (ILTF) that, under the pressure of World Championship Tennis, started to tolerate professionalism (Lake 2015). The ILTF let national bodies decide how they would differentiate players of amateur and professional status (Grasso 2011). The official Czechoslovakian sport governing bodies, similar to other socialist countries, resented the idea of professionalism. However, being confronted with the stance of the ILTF and the general professionalising process in the international top-level tennis, in 1968 the Czechoslovakian Physical Education Union (ČSTV) and the Czechoslovakian Tennis Association/Union (CTA)7 defined three categories of tennis player status based on the level of professionalisation: amateur, semi-professional and professional. As a quite rare instance of professionalisation in the socialist Czechoslovakia, the first tennis players finally acquired the status of semi-professional players (also known as statutory players), namely: Jan Kodeš, Milan Holeček, Jan Kukal, František Pála,Vladimír Zedník and Vlasta Vopičková. As the “semi-” prefix suggests, these players were far from being independent of the socialist sporting system. Upon signing a contract with the ČSTV/CTA and later with the Pragosport agency (which managed the Czech sporting professionals abroad), they had to be available to play at competitions according to the “needs” of the umbrella sport association (Kolář 2006). Furthermore, the number of players with the chance to compete in professional tournaments abroad remained strictly limited (I. ČLTK Revue 2007). Semi-professional tennis players had to transfer a significant portion of the prize money to the CTA (later to Pragosport as well) and they also had to cover their travel expenses and other tournament-related costs. Hana Mandlíková, winner of the US Open in 1984 and later captain of the Czechoslovakian Fed Cup team, described in her autobiography one of the strategies to deal with the constraints; after having won a new car as part of the prize money for Australian Open in Melbourne, she had to ask a tournament director to arrange the sale of the car so that the withdrawn money would remain hers (Mandlíková & Škutina 1991). The establishment of Czechoslovakian tennis “semi-professionals” invited regular criticism of their activities in newspaper articles, which hinted at the discrepancy between the professional and the socialist view on sport, whilst often using normative language of power, typical 133

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of the communist regime in the normalisation period: ‘Everything should be seriously revised, amended and put on the righteous platform of today’ (Kolář 2006, p.161); ‘wouldn’t it be better to disband them?’ (Kolář 2006, p.162); or ‘the state representation is on the first place’ (Kolář 2006, p.164).8

Tennis, politics and emigration The peculiar position of tennis can be demonstrated by the turbulent relations of tennis players with journalists loyal to the communist regime, and with other Czechoslovakian athletes. Tennis players were sometimes viewed by them as wannabe celebrities benefiting from the nonOlympic status of their sport discipline and, thus, being in a position to receive money from sponsors. Notably, those poor relations were clearly seen at the 1988 Summer Olympic Games in Seoul, where professional tennis players met the rest of the Olympic sports competitors for the first time in many decades (Kreuz 1990). A former Czech tennis player remembered in an interview denouncing personal remarks, pointing at the alleged wealth and arrogance of the tennis professionals when even his former schoolmate – one of the Olympics competitors – ostentatiously wondered why tennis professionals lived together in the Olympic Village instead of some classy hotel. According to miscellaneous sources, tennis had a strong ally in the Czechoslovakian Prime Minister Lubomír Štrougal who, together with Antonín Himl, the chair of the ČSTV, supported tennis, though probably only insofar as their political positions were not endangered by the attachment to a “bourgeois” sport (Kolář 2009; Navrátilová 1990; Tenis 1992b, 1992c). However, it should be emphasised that political pressures were experienced differently by individual athletes. One elite player of the 1980s, who was not ideologically conflicted, stated in an interview that the political coercion was practically unnoticeable, and also acknowledged that the absence of political awareness could be related to the closed “bubble” of global, top-level tennis. However, the “bubble” cannot be generalised. The possibility of networking with the Western world could also stimulate stronger political engagement as is documented in case of Jan Kodeš. Due also to his organisational work and Davis Cup team captainship, he was strongly exposed politically, and perceived the political system to be oppressive and constraining for his career (I.ČLTK 2009; Kolář 2006; Navrátilová 1990). As seen in many other spheres of life in the communist countries, several tennis players opted for emigration in response to their political oppression. The omnipresent ideology was not only at odds with democratic principles but also significantly affected the opportunities of tennis players to materially benefit from globalised, professionalised and commercialised sport. Martina Navrátilová and her emigration to the US in 1975 is probably the best-known example. For Navrátilová, the whole system of Czechoslovakian elite tennis in the 1970s was perceived as unjust (Navrátilová 1990). In 1973 and 1974, she had to pay tens of thousands of dollars of prize money to the national tennis union, keeping just a few dollars a day as a meal allowance. Soon after, she began to cooperate with an American manager, Fred Barman, and they negotiated better conditions, splitting the money in the ratio of 80 and 20 per cent, in favour of Navrátilová. However, with growing success in international tournaments and a corresponding amount of time spent in the “capitalist West”, Navrátilová had to face negative reactions of domestic officials. She was being accused of excessive “Americanisation” and according to some testimonies, the former non-playing captain of the Davis Cup team and tennis official Antonín Bolardt even stated: ‘We trim Martina’s wings’ (Kolář 2006, p.372). In 1975, the pressure from the tennis union was on the rise, escalating before the US Open (Kolář 2006; Navrátilová 1990). 134

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In August 1975, during the US Open, 18-year-old Navrátilová applied for asylum in the US.The Czechoslovakian Tennis Union issued the statement ‘Martina Navrátilová has suffered a defeat in the face of the Czechoslovakian society. She had all the possibilities in Czechoslovakia to develop her talent, but she has preferred a doubtful professional career and a fat bank account’ (Navrátilová 1990, p.128; New York Daily News 2015). Following this denouncement, for the next 15 years the official Czechoslovakian media acted as if no tennis player named Navrátilová existed; news reports from international tennis tournaments were apparently incomplete and omitted her name. Furthermore, to play doubles with Navrátilová was a taboo for Czechoslovakian players. On the other hand, personal encounters between Czech tennis players at tournaments were not necessarily affected, since all censorship remained a matter of interventions at the political level. Apart from personal arguments, as in the case of Hana Mandlíková, Czech players seemed to get on well with Navrátilová without any visible ill will (an interview with a former player; Kolář 2006; Mandlíková & Škutina 1991; Navrátilová 1990). However, the weakness of propaganda was apparent at the occasion of the Federation Cup in 1986 when Prague hosted international teams, including the US squad with Navrátilová. Despite being an American at that time, she received a massive ovation, especially after being individually welcomed by the captain of the domestic team, Hana Mandlíková. By contrast, the Czechoslovakian media deliberately ignored her and her profile was removed from the official tournament catalogue. After the US victory, Navrátilová said into the microphone in front of the crowded court: ‘I hope that it won’t take another eleven years before I get back again’, while communist governmental elites, in the reaction to this immensely political statement, quickly left the box (Mandlíková & Škutina 1991; Navrátilová 1990; Sport.cz 2012;Williams 1986). After Navrátilová’s emigration, the control over players tightened. Miroslava BendlováKoželuhová, a member of the Czechoslovakian Fed Cup winning team in 1975, recounts how the state stopped her career at its peak by taking away her passport for two years (Vyškovská 2014). Nonetheless, probably the next most striking example was Ivan Lendl, the multiple Grand Slam winner. As one of the best professional players of his time, he spent a lot of time in the US, playing exhibitions, and had an American manager and a Polish coach. Although logical for Lendl, all of these activities were, at the same time, a thorn in the side of the political regime (Lidovky.cz 2013; Tenis 1992c). Yet, the player and ČSTV, with the Tennis Union, came to an agreement, signed in 1982, stipulating Lendl’s representative duties in the Davis Cup, specifying a sum of money to be paid to the ČSTV and restricting the list of countries in which he could play. The Czechoslovakian officials had undertaken to let Lendl stay and play legally abroad or let his parents accompany him at tournaments (Kolář 2006). Also of importance to Lendl was that the agreement lacked a provision about an emigration passport, which would enable him to stay abroad and keep Czechoslovakian citizenship. After the escalation of conflict with tennis officials, Lendl left the country for the US in 1986 (Jůdl 2016). Furthermore, the emigration of athletes was not exclusively a matter of international stars; coaches and a critical mass of amateur players used their tennis skills to build social networks and find jobs in times of existential uncertainty after leaving their home country. For example, Switzerland, Germany, Austria and the Netherlands are countries with a strong imprint of Czech tennis migration, with numerous coaches and custodians working in local clubs. This infrastructural imprint is apparent even at the top level; one of the first tennis emigrants, Adolf Kacovský, coached Roger Federer at the start of his career (Tennis Arena 2016), and the Dutch player Richard Krajíček has Czech origins.

“The Velvet Revolution” and its aftermath The so-called Velvet Revolution in 1989 brought the non-violent and radical change of the political system and the arrival of democracy. These changes have affected many social, political 135

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and cultural institutions, including sports and, more specifically, tennis. The transformation period meant liberation from the ideological burden but also new economic challenges, as the old state system of funding ceased to exist. Economically, the certainty of centrally planned support of sport was replaced by the focus on competition, individualisation and liberal free-market ideology (Strachová & Grexa 2015). The first decade after the Velvet Revolution witnessed players and coaches leaving for other countries with borders being finally opened (Tenis 1990; 1992a; 1995a; 1995b). Above that, the member base of the former Czechoslovakian and later Czech Tennis Union, after almost equalling 60,000 Czech members in 1988 (ÚV ČSTV, ČSTS 1988), decreased after 1989 by 10,000, only to move back up to the pre-revolution level towards the end of the 1990s. In the last decade, the member base has oscillated between 50,000 and 60,000 (Statistics of the Czech Sporting Union). The congruence of tennis – unlike many other traditional sport disciplines in the Czech Republic – with a new free-market economy and its individualistic nature, related to the broader tendencies towards individualisation in sport after 1989, may partly explain the successful struggle of tennis with decreasing membership. The symbolic meaning of tennis was again redefined.The image of tennis as a bourgeois sport, latently reproduced beyond the public gaze of the tennis player as “a socialist man”, resonated with the newly emerging stratification processes in the Czech society.The newly established elites used tennis as a symbolic marker of their cultural capital. In this context, tennis-related magazines in the early post-1989 period warned about tennis becoming the privilege of the rich again (Tenis 1992b). Similarly to Poland, another post-communist country, the lack of state guaranteed subsidies gradually resulted in the exclusion of low-income classes from tennis due to rapidly increasing costs of coaching, equipment, fees to rent courts and halls and travel costs (Lenartowicz 2016). It is worth noting that the openness of Czech society to international markets rendered Western equipment, dress and shoes accessible to the broader mass of tennis players. In a newly established sporting market economy, tennis clubs and tournaments looked for new financial resources beyond the membership base. Besides the international contacts brought by a few top-level players and promoters, tennis has been quickly identified and publicly presented as a partner by newly established entrepreneurs and other economic, cultural and political elites.This can well be seen in a frequently reproduced photograph from the Škoda Czech Open tournament in 1993 that portrays Slovak entrepreneur Peter Kovarčík sitting in a box with the Prime Minister, Václav Klaus9 and another entrepreneur Viktor Kožený, currently accused of major financial frauds running to billions of Czech crowns from the mid-1990s. The discursive redefinition of tennis is also apparent from Czech tennis journals and club reviews since the 1990s, commonly providing insights from “VIP” tournaments, where actors, politicians and businesspeople meet together with retired competitive players (Tenis 1992b; 1992d; 1993a). Nonetheless, the legacy of the communist past, bringing new controversies, did not fully disappear. The Prague Open tournament in 2006 witnessed the return of Martina Navrátilová, playing doubles. She remembered her appearance as an emotional moment as this was only the third time she had competed in her home country since she emigrated in 1975. Meanwhile, her gesture was openly denounced by the president of the Czech Tennis Union, Ivo Kaderka, who stated: ‘While she was saying goodbye to the audience, she touched the chest and revealed the appearance in Prague to be a biggest moment of her life. To tell the truth, the money was one and only condition for her’ (iDNES.cz 2006). A further line of the open dispute between the current Czech tennis officials and former players surfaced in 2009, when former winners of the 1980 Davis Cup (Kodeš, Lendl, Šmíd and Složil) did not appreciate the form and conditions of an invitation to the Davis Cup finals in Spain issued by the Czech union managed by Kaderka (iDNES.cz 2012). 136

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In other words, even a quarter of a century after the fall of communism, many controversies surrounding the socio-cultural, political and economic nature of tennis in the Czech countries persist. It is worth noting that tennis has primarily gained popularity among middle and uppermiddle social classes. Grassroots tennis, on the one hand, can benefit from numerous subsidies but, on the other hand, it has to cope with noticeable costs early in junior divisions. In connection with the deepening social inequalities in the Czech Republic and inaccessibility of top-level tennis to lower classes, the symbolic and somewhat mythological labelling of tennis as a “leisure of the rich” continues to resonate. These narratives are further nourished by the fact that national subsidies, similar to other sports, are directed towards so-called “national sporting centres” that are, in tennis, firmly intertwined with a narrow group of entrepreneurs from the sports industry. Regardless of the controversial debate over the socio-economic nature of tennis in the Czech countries, the contribution of tennis to the reproduction of Czech national identity cannot go unnoticed. As of 2017, the five victories of the Czech women’s team in the Fed Cup in the last six years and the two Davis Cup Victories in 2012 and 2013 achieved by the men’s team received significant attention, as did Petra Kvitová´s two Wimbledon Championships and the successes of Karolína Plíšková who became the first Czech player to reach number one in the WTA ranking. In a tentative hypothesis rather than a definite conclusion we would concur that it was the combination of individual socio-economic conditions of players combined with globally recognised coaching expertise that together developed the talent and fostered the performance of Czech players.The coaching expertise has some of its roots in the scientific and systematic methodological approaches elaborated during the communist era.At the same time, it was significantly enriched by the expertise and social contacts imported by numerous coaches who were active abroad.

Conclusions Tennis in the Czech countries, seen as both a sporting and socio-cultural phenomenon, underwent complex and ambiguous development. From the beginning of its existence in the AustroHungarian Empire, Czech tennis had to strive for legitimacy. As of 1918, in the newly established state of Czechoslovakia, tennis experienced two decades of relatively uninterrupted growth. After the onset of the communist political regime in 1948, the game witnessed long years of obstacles. Actually, it was in a contradictory position; tennis had to endure institutional, ideological, symbolic and power pressures from political and sport governance elites. Tennis was often denounced for luxury and wealth and accused of Americanisation, in contrast with the ideals of a modest and equitable socialist nation. Last but not least, the bourgeois origins of tennis were occasionally remembered by the regime. Even so, the isolation of tennis could not be total. Sporting successes served propaganda purposes and international relations and, therefore, some level of contact with the Western world was maintained. After 1989, tennis had to face new political, economic and social conditions. The convergence of tennis and new well-off social groups has been apparent while, at the same time, the legacy of the communist era still resonates in occasional references and conflicts between players, managers and politicians. However, its ongoing international successes, past achievements, relatively high popularity and links to economic capital cause tennis to be both a traditional and dynamic part of Czech sport.

Notes 1 Due to the aforementioned political reasons, the Žemla brothers as the first well-known Czech players had to occasionally use pseudonyms (Rázný and Jánský) while competing publicly (Rokosová 1996). 137

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2 Among the most notable players were Jan Koželuh (Wimbledon quarter-finalist in 1926 and 1927), Karel Koželuh (six times winner of the French professional ‘Bristol Cup’ between 1926 to 1932 and US Pro Tennis Championship in 1929, 1932 and 1937) and Ladislav Hecht (member of the Davis Cup team in European finals) (Mikulička 2016). 3 After World War II, the Soviet Union was praised for the liberation of Czechoslovakia from the Nazis. Consequently, popularity of the Communist Party, coordinated by the Soviet centre, rose and in 1948, communists seized most of the significant institutions in the state (Jakubcová 2012). 4 Although the label “bourgeois” itself is slightly unclear, it has been used in many backward remarks about tennis (Bolardt 1980; Sportovní ročenka 1969;Závodník 1975). The notions about tennis as a “bourgeois” sport were most likely related to the public image of tennis as a discipline practised mainly by upper social classes and to the emerging debates about professionalisation (Tenis 1993c), within the context of the Olympic spirit and its focus on amateurism (Sportovní ročenka 1969). 5 The decisive moment came in 1949 during a tournament in Gstaad, Switzerland. Czech officials demanded an immediate return of both Czech players due to trumped-up political reasons, reportedly in a very arrogant and offensive manner (Rokosová 1996). 6 Although the name referred to the traditional Sokol (Falcon) movement (one of the mass nationalistic movements in the Central Europe founded in 19th century), the umbrella sport association was fully under communist control after 1948. Many members of the Sokol movement were persecuted and the organisation was definitely banned in 1952 (Thorne 2011; Waic & Zwicker 2009). 7 The term ‘Union’ in the name replaced ‘Association’ in 1970. The organisation replaced the former Tennis Section of the Czechoslovakian Union of Physical Education (Swierczeková 2007). 8 The normalisation label usually refers to the years following 1968, when Czechoslovakia was occupied by allied armies of the Warsaw Pact, led by the Soviet Union, which resulted in the tightening of political, cultural and social spheres of Czechoslovakian society (see Ulc 1978). 9 Václav Klaus, who later became President of the Czech Republic, was also a serious candidate for the post of President of the Czech Tennis Union in 1998 (Tenisportal.cz 2010).

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14 A brief historical, political and social analysis of Argentine tennis Robert G. Rodriguez

Many historical narratives of international tennis fail to recognize the early history of the sport in Latin America. By focusing on the country of Argentina and the contributions of Guillermo Vilas and Gabriela Sabatini in particular, this chapter seeks to correct this ­narrative by utilizing historical sources published primarily in Latin America to sketch the early h ­ istory of the sport that elite British expats in Argentina called “El Deporte Blanco” [“The White Sport”]. ‘Los tenistas latinos son ganadores’ [Latin tennis players are winners], says Vilas, himself a ganador of four major championships and 62 ATP titles (Estévez 2007, September). It is indisputable that Vilas and Sabatini, his fellow International Tennis Hall of Famer, are synonymous with tennis in Latin America, and this chapter delves into some of the political and social issues that emerged during their careers to influence how they were reported. It asks: aside from reports of their athletic prowess, what do Eurocentric and North American texts reveal about Vilas’ relationship to the military junta that brutally reigned over his country while he was collecting trophies around the world? And what are we to make of the seemingly incessant media inquiries into Sabatini’s sexuality and gender role? This chapter goes on to examine the effects of their legacies on the current generation of Argentine tennis players.

Early history and the institutionalization of tennis in Latin America With all due respect to the US, “America” is best understood as a continent that stretches from Canada to Argentina. The introduction of tennis to the so-called New World is often attributed to Mary Outerbridge, who was said to have brought back a lawn tennis box set from a trip to Bermuda in 1874 (see Collins 2016; Gillmeister 1998). However, this ignores the rudimentary form of the sport played 68 years earlier in pre-independent Argentina. In Breve historia del deporte argentino (Brief History of Argentine Sports), Ezequiel Fernandez Moores described how British prisoners of war, General William Carr Beresford and Major-General Sir Denis Pack, introduced a version of tennis in the city of Lujan in 1806 after their failed invasion of the River Plate (Buenos Aires). Fernandez Moores explains that while imprisoned after their defeat,

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Beresford, Pack and other subalterns played in front of the Lujan Town Hall with a net and British rackets on packed dirt. At an academic conference held in 1927, renowned Argentine historian Enrique Udaondo spoke of Beresford and Pack’s leisurely activities while imprisoned, which included “playing tennis”, thereby being perhaps the first to play the sport in the country (Fernandez Moores 2010). It is entirely possible that the form of “tennis” played by Beresford and Pack only loosely resembled the modern form of the game. Argentine journalists Roberto Andersen and Eduardo Puppo, who in 2012 published the 2,800-page Historia del Tenis en la Argentina (History of Tennis in Argentina), explain that during a second British invasion in 1807, soldiers built an improvised net by hanging clothes on a nine-meter long rope tied to trees. Witnesses said that two soldiers were positioned on each side, using rustic sticks to volley a ball made of string back-and-forth (cited in Fernandez Moores 2010, p.49–50). It is documented that by the 1860s, primitive forms of tennis were being played in many districts of Buenos Aires where British immigrants lived, according to the official history of the Buenos Aires Lawn Tennis Club.1 These games were likely different than the lawn tennis game that Major Wingfield devised a decade later in Britain. At any rate, Fernandez Moores (2010) found evidence to suggest that the first tennis tournament using Wingfield’s rules in Argentina was held at the Rosario Cricket Club in 1877, thereby predating the first North American tournament held on Staten Island in 1880. This marked a rapid ascension of the sport in Argentina. Andersen and Puppo (2012) explain that after each of the matches held at the first tennis tournament held in Buenos Aires in 1886, it was teatime with a bit of Argentine flair (dulce de leche) (cited in Fernandez Moores 2010, p.182). In 1892, the Buenos Aires Lawn Tennis Club was founded, and by the following year the first edition of the Campeonato Abierto del Rio de la Plata (Rio de La Plata Open, a.k.a. the first “Wimbledon of South America”) was held (Fernandez Moores 2010). During the early part of the twentieth century, multiple sporting clubs emerged to provide the Argentine elite with opportunities to engage in leisurely activities. Many of these clubs began to offer tennis as an option, alongside cricket, rugby and football (soccer), all of which (in addition to boxing, polo and others) reflect the profound cultural impact of British immigrants to Argentina. Since its inception in the late 1800s, tennis was known in Argentina as “El deporte blanco” (the white sport), to connote the white outfits worn to make perspiration somewhat less obvious than if colored clothing was worn. This practical measure, coupled with the Wimbledon tradition that the players wear all (or almost all) white was carried over to nineteenth-century Argentina. Unlike in the United States, where the national tennis association predated the establishment of tennis clubs, in Argentina independent clubs were established first. By 1914, efforts to create a national association were underway, as the clubs realized the need for an umbrella organization to provide structure, have authority over the various clubs, create a national ranking system and organize tournaments (La Razon 1980, p. 392). According to the official history detailed on the Argentine Tennis Association website, representatives of seven clubs came together in 1914 to discuss the creation of a governing body for the sport.They established the Lawn Tennis League of the River Plate – the official name was in English – headed by Arthur Stuart Turner, which soon became the Liga Argentina de Lawn Tennis. Despite being a leader in the development of Latin American tennis, Argentina was not the first independent Latin American country to formally establish a national governing association for the sport. Among nations in the so-called “New World”, only the United States (1881) and Canada (1890) have older associations than Belize, which as “British Honduras” established a national association in 1910. Among independent Latin American countries, Uruguay was the first to create a national governing body for tennis in 1915. Argentina spearheaded Latin America’s participation in the Davis Cup, beginning in 1921, when it agreed to participate yet withdrew without playing a match, and in 1923 when it lost in the quarterfinal. 142

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Pioneers of the modern era In spite of any preconceived notions of male dominance in Latin American sports, up until the 1960s, the most significant global tennis stars to emerge from the region were women. The first, Chilean Anita Lizana, was the first woman from the region to win a Grand Slam – the US National Championships (later renamed the US Open), in 1937 – and also the first Latin American woman to achieve a world-number-one ranking. Brazilian Maria Bueno, who was inducted to the International Tennis Hall of Fame (ITHF) in 1978, was the first non-American woman to win Wimbledon and the US Championships in the same year. She was also among the very few who won both three times, in addition to being the top-ranked player in the world on four occasions in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Bueno, who won Wimbledon at just 17 years of age, went on to win 19 Grand Slam singles, doubles and mixed-doubles titles (71 total career titles). Argentine Mary Terán did not achieve anywhere near the same level of accolades as Lizana and Bueno, yet her contributions toward the development of tennis in her country cannot be overlooked. She was a world top-twenty player in the 1940s and early 1950s, winning two gold medals at the 1951 Pan American Games, 28 international titles and the Wimbledon Plate—a now defunct competition for those who were eliminated in the early rounds of the Wimbledon competition (Lupo 2004). Nevertheless, her significance for the sport primarily came off the tennis court. Terán was long associated with Argentine President Juan Perón, a major sporting enthusiast. Perón’s first reign coincided with Terán’s reign as the top-ranked Argentine player.Terán and her husband Heraldo Weiss, himself a tennis medalist at the Pan American Games, were immediately co-opted by the regime to popularize tennis, which had been considered an elite sport (Lupo 2004). El Litoral newspaper reported that Terán established tennis schools for poor children from the outskirts of Buenos Aires, while the Eva Perón Foundation provided rackets, clothing and other equipment. When Perón was deposed in 1955, Terán became a casualty of the new Argentine authorities who sought to ban her from playing on the tennis circuit and exiled her to Spain due to her association with Perón (Lupo 2004). Terán was eventually readmitted to Argentina, but never regained the respect she had as a player or functionary of the Perón regime. She even wrote an “Open Letter to Public Opinion” published in the popular Argentine sports weekly, El Gráfico, where she accused her government detractors for ‘inhumane and unjust persecution’ (Duchini, December 2017, p.80). She would stay out of the public eye until 1980, when she presented a letter of support to Vilas, whom she referred to as the “zurdo tenista”, which is a play on words that literally means “left-handed tennis player”, but also reference to his “leftist” politics (Lupo 2004, p.280). Terán committed suicide in 1984, with some claiming that she was tired of being injured, deceived, lied to and forgotten (Rodriguez, 8 December 2008). Once the political tides turned again, the Buenos Aires government named a new multisport stadium after her in 2006.

The politics of Guillermo Vilas In 1980, Mary Terán said that though she wasn’t able to make tennis a sport for all classes with all the support she received from Juan and Evita Perón, Guillermo Vilas was able to do this ‘with his left hand and a racket’ (Lupo 2004, p.421). Indeed, according to the article entitled “Guillermo Vilas, 21 años” in El Gráfico (25 November 2016), when Vilas won his first professional title in 1973, only 80,000 Argentineans played tennis in the entire country, but by the time he represented Argentina in the Davis Cup final in 1981, close to 3 million Argentineans had picked up the sport. 143

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Born to a middle-class family in 1952 and growing up in Argentina’s swanky seaside beach resort city of Mar del Plata, Guillermo Vilas is not a rags-to-riches story. By all accounts of his storied life, he picked up the sport as a child at a local nautical club and took an obsessive approach to practicing. As a teenager in 1968, he faced an equally young Jimmy Connors on the way to winning a doubles title at the prestigious Orange Bowl Tennis Championship.Vilas made his professional debut in 1970 and won his first title in Argentina by defeating future tennis giant Bjorn Borg. By the late 1970s, Vilas was a household name, ranking among the top-ten for nine years and lifting numerous trophies, including the French and US Open titles in 1977 and the Australian Open in 1978 and 1979. In total, he won 66 singles and 14 doubles titles. He never won the Davis Cup, though he played for the Argentine team from 1970 to 1984. Notably,Vilas won 49 titles on clay surface courts, a record that lasted until Rafael Nadal surpassed it in 2017. Controversially, he never attained a number-one ranking by the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP), though World Tennis Magazine named him the top-ranked player of 1977, when he won a record-setting 17 singles titles in a season. He retired at age 36 in 1989 and was inducted to the ITHF in 1991. Vilas’ pedigree as a tennis player is unrivaled by any of his countrymen before, or since. He is widely credited for popularizing the sport in Argentina. A 1984 profile of Vilas in El Gráfico says it all: ‘[Vilas] brought the public to his front door…With his soul, with his courage, with his example. It’s just that…Vilas created tennis’ (cited in: Hernández 1984, 12 June). During his career,Vilas and other world-class Argentine athletes were used by Argentine officials for political purposes. His peak years as a tennis player roughly coincided with Argentina’s last military dictatorship (1976–83). During this dark period in Argentine history, the state engaged in what they termed the Process of National Reorganization, or simply “Proceso”, suppressing those the regime considered, or suspected, to be left-wing subversives. The activities of the regime would result in most of the highest leaders being investigated, tried and convicted for human rights abuses that included kidnapping, torture and the deaths of 10,000–30,000 socalled “desaparecidos” (disappeared) in what many refer to as a “Dirty War”. Historians have examined the ways the Argentine Junta utilized nationalism and sports during this time frame, especially with respect to football and the 1978 World Cup that Argentina hosted and won (see Llonto 2005). However, Sheinin (2008) argues that the de facto Argentine President Jorge Rafael Videla (who ruled the junta from 1976-1981) co-opted Vilas and Formula 1 race-car driver Carlos Reutemann in a similar fashion.While they were not personal supporters of the dictatorship, they both came to represent and define ‘the dictatorship’s new Argentina, and the military’s own purported victories over poverty, political instability and economic uncertainty’ (Sheinin 2008, p.24). An examination of multiple articles published in El Gráfico during the late 1970s and early 1980s confirms Sheinin’s findings regarding the media portrayals of Vilas during his career. An exception is an interesting pre-dictatorship article from 1974 that hints at Vilas’ views on the Vietnam war; alongside contributing to rescue funds, he explains that he wears two wristbands with the names of two soldiers declared Missing in Action (MIA) and/or Prisoner of War (POW), even though he did not know them personally (cited in: Trenado, 5 September 1999). Sheinin’s article does not address Vilas’ perspective on the Junta or their deadly Proceso agenda. An exhaustive internet search of publications in both Spanish and English, including El Gráfico, reveals virtually no published remarks by Vilas on this matter. Even highly prominent Argentine sports journalist Carlos Irusta, a longtime writer for El Gráfico who interviewed Vilas extensively, was stumped by this question: I do not have any information about [Vilas’ perspectives on the Junta], which as you can imagine, is highly delicate in Argentina. Even if I knew his thoughts on the matter, from 144

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an ethical standpoint, I would not reveal them. But the truth is in this case, I do not have absolutely any information… Perhaps it is because Vilas never wanted to express himself about this issue. (interview with author, April 2018) From this, we are resigned to deduce Vilas’ perspective from the scant articles and videos that provide a glimpse into his political perspectives, which are difficult to discern with any confidence.The closest relevant remarks found are from a 2003 interview when Vilas was asked questions about his “playboy” and “jet-set” images parading in Monaco, to which he replied that the reason he went to Monaco was because of all of the dangers that existed in Argentina at the time, being under a military dictatorship with many economic problems (Guerra 2003, 11 January). It is interesting to note that in this statement he did not directly criticize the regime. He apparently understood what Argentina was going through, but as a superstar athlete he did not personally face the dangers inflicted by the regime or the economic problems faced by most Argentineans. During the military regime, very few athletes were targeted, with one notable exception: Daniel Schapira, a tennis player and instructor, who actually lost to Vilas when the latter was young and up-and-coming. Schapira was a militant in the Juventud Unida Perónista (Young United Perónists), and was sequestered by the regime in April 1977 and subsequently disappeared (read: killed). His wife, Andrea Yankilevich, was also detained while eight months pregnant, and as was the case with hundreds of similarly documented cases, she was executed after the birth of their son, who was eventually raised by his grandmother (Veiga 2013, 17 September). In 2010, the Argentine Congress honored Schapira by declaring the 18th of October (Schapira’s birthday) the “National Day of the Tennis Professor”. When the Secretariat of Argentine Sports announced the declaration,Vilas is widely quoted as saying, ‘I think it’s a great idea, with this initiative all professors [coaches] are recognized, and they are the foundation for tennis throughout the world. … All coaches can contribute significantly to the education of a child’ (cited in: Pinco 2012, 24 March).Vilas carefully avoided remarking on Schapira, or the dictatorship that took the lives of his former opponent and his wife, but a photo of Vilas with his hand on a plaque erected to commemorate Schapira in 2004 is widely circulated online. In addition to these statements, an official Argentine government video produced during the military dictatorship shows General Videla meeting with Vilas during his visit to the US in September 1977. The video depicts the suit-clad tennis champion shaking hands with the dictator, smiling and conversing.2 Cordial “photo opportunities” between athletes and politicians are commonplace, and this was not the only time that Vilas and Videla met during his career. Sheinin (2008, p.32–3) explains that in April 1977, after Vilas defeated American Dick Stockton in a Davis Cup match in Buenos Aires – his first moment of dramatic triumph – Videla saluted Vilas for his victory. ‘Military order was tied to Vilas’ triumph not only in Videla’s presiding over the match, but in police protection for the tennis star in the face of what [popular Argentine weekly magazine] Siete Dias called the crowd’s delirium’. The relaxed manner of the Argentine fans reinforced notions of a country at peace. An article about the same match published by United Press International similarly mentioned boisterous flag-waving fans who ‘swarmed the red clay court’ after the ‘grueling’ match and ‘carried Vilas out on their shoulders’ toward Videla.The President responded by standing up, applauding and waving at Vilas, while the fans chanted: ‘See, See, See. Mr. President. Now we are the champions of the Americas’ (Argentina Shocks US, 2 May 1977). In a 2017 interview published in an article entitled “Menotti y la dictadura” [Menotti and the Dictatorship], Argentina’s 1978 World Cup winning coach Cesar Luis Menotti said that Vilas would not go on to face the same critiques for appearing with Videla, unlike some of his World Cup winning players (Los Andes, 20 June 2017). 145

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Contrasting the public connections between Vilas and Videla was the relationship the tennis star formed with Argentine musician Luis Alberto “El Flaco” Spinetta. Vilas has a well-known penchant for the arts, particularly rock-and-roll and poetry, and while his talents in both have been open to public questioning, Vilas and Spinetta, one of the most notable Argentine musicians against the military regime, produced a rock album in 1979 that sold very poorly (Wilson & Favoretto, 2016, August). It is highly unlikely that the two would have come together if they were on opposite ends of the political spectrum during this highly sensitive era. Vilas’ overt political commentary, however, has seemingly always been kept at a minimum, at least in print media. According to Irwin (2015), the American press deliberately kept him at bay from coverage of Argentina’s “Dirty War”. After the military regime’s debacle in the Malvinas (Falkland Islands) war, Argentina returned to democratic rule in 1983. Raul Alfonsín, a leader of the Union Civica Radical (UCR) party, became Argentina’s first democratically elected president since the military dictatorship. Among his first actions as president was the creation of a National Commission on the Disappearance of Persons (CONADEP) to investigate and document human rights abuses committed by the military regime. In 1985, Alfonsín and Vilas, among other notable Argentineans, were invited to a state dinner at Ronald Reagan’s White House. Radcliffe and Hill (1985, 20 March) reported in The Washington Post that Vilas was making his first appearance at the White House, and the player stated:‘It’s the first time I am seeing my president, too. I haven’t been in Argentina in two years. It’s a thrill’. As the years went by, and Vilas’ career ended, Argentina continued under democratic rule, and Vilas came to be associated with all of Alfonsín’s successors, regardless of political party, though he seemed to have more of an affinity for Partido Justicialista (Perónist) leaders.3 It was widely reported that Vilas voted for, then expressed his regret for supporting, Perónist Carlos Menem to succeed Alfonsín in 1989. During his first term in office, Menem pardoned military officials for their activities during the “Dirty War”. Yet, in an interview with El Gráfico, Vilas stated that he supported Menem in his 1995 reelection bid (Gorroño 1996, 16 January). Menem’s successor in 1999 was longtime UCR leader Fernando de la Rúa.Vilas (and Gabriela Sabatini) collaborated with the government’s efforts to promote domestic beef consumption and beef exports, in addition to embarking on a government sponsored tourism campaign.4 Argentina’s decidedly left-wing Perónist presidential couple, Nestor (president from 2003 to 2007) and Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner (2007–15) were ardent opponents of the military regime. While in office, they took multiple measures to prosecute the former military officials who were pardoned by Menem for additional charges. When Nestor Kirchner died in 2010, Vilas attended the funeral and said the following to television reporters: ‘It’s a sad day. And the truth is that all Argentineans lived through his time in office and have felt the changes. So, I came to support, just like I have felt supported during the entire administration’.5 Most recently, in 2014,Vilas was honored with a statue by then-Chief of the Buenos Aires Government (and current Argentine President) Mauricio Macri, who is neither Perónist nor Radical, but rather from a center-right coalition known as Cambiemos [Let’s Change]. Without definitive declarations from Vilas himself to the contrary, the information revealed in this research suggests that Vilas was privately against the dictatorship’s policies, though he steered clear of making any public declarations for or against the generals during his career. If Vilas has any strong political convictions, it is not clear what they are, other than being willing to associate with whomever is in the Pink House (Argentina’s presidential palace), regardless of their politics. His remarks upon the death of Nestor Kirchner are perhaps the closest we may come to asserting that Vilas is a center-left Perónist, But those remarks have come long after his playing days finished. If anything,Vilas’ celebrity status has enabled him to transcend politics in a way that few Argentines have been able to do. 146

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The glamour of Gabriela Sabatini Very few tennis players have roses, dolls and perfumes bearing their names, but Gabriela “Gaby” Sabatini is one of them. A 2014 retrospective in El Gráfico profiling the most significant female athletes in Argentine history refers to Sabatini as ‘Argentina’s most popular sportswoman on the planet’ (Estevez, 2014, November). This is not hyperbole – Sabatini has been in the public eye since she became the number-one-ranked World Junior tennis player when she was 13. In 1985, she was named Tennis magazine’s rookie of the year (Lapchick & Bovinet 2010). By the time she burned out from the sport and retired at the young age of 26 in 1996, Sabatini had maintained a top-ten ranking for ten consecutive years. In 2013, ESPN.com proclaimed Sabatini to be the sixth most influential Hispanic woman in sports. In 1988, she won an Olympic silver medal and in 1990, she defeated archrival Steffi Graf to become US Open champion and Argentina’s first female singles Grand Slam winner. She finished her career with 27 singles and 14 doubles titles, with a final singles record of 632-189. Sabatini received more press coverage than any other Latin American female athlete, as she was, argued Arbena (2002, p.222-3), attractive, personable, talented and financially very successful both on and off the court. … Writers in many countries found her “alluring”, noted her appeal for commercial endorsements, and hoped that she would serve as an example for other Latin American women who needed to break out of their traditional restraints and work to enjoy the opportunities for athletic development available in the United States and Europe. In her youth-oriented autobiography, she recalls the adulation of her fans during her playing days: ‘I remembered how as a little girl those years before I saw people on television chanting for Guillermo Vilas, and suddenly I felt so proud’ (Sabatini 1995, p.65). Unlike her famed countryman, Sabatini embarked on her career after Argentina returned to democracy and never had to face questions related to the dictatorship. However, she regularly had to deal with questions surrounding her femininity and sexuality. Citing Argentine publications, Arbena (2002, p.223–34) goes on to synthesize many of the gender-based challenges that female athletes in Argentina faced, from limited resources and training facilities, to jokes and insults about them playing male-dominated sports, and even to having to be careful not to ‘lose their own gender identity’. Investigative journalist Michael Mewshaw (1993) recalls interviewing Sabatini for a 1990 article in Vogue magazine that was ultimately never published. He asked Sabatini if she saw ‘any contradiction, any unfairness, in the fact that worldclass women athletes had to bear the burden of being judged by their beauty and femininity, as well as their performance’, to which Sabatini replied, ‘No. I think every woman wants to be feminine and to look good.That’s what I try to do – look feminine and look good’ (Mewshaw 1993, p.16). Countless publications make references to Sabatini’s beauty, and Mewshaw’s book contributes to Sabatini’s feminization when he writes: ‘Long-legged and lovely, she had a face framed by tresses as iridescent as a raven’s wing; she possessed a movie-star’s glamour, a ballerina’s grace, and an Olympic athlete’s grandeur’ (1993, p.4). However, Mewshaw decries the tabloid-like assessments of Sabatini’s sexuality: Drawing on no greater evidence than their own imaginations, they claimed Gabriela must be gay. Others maintained that the right man could put a smile on her face. Whether they believed she needed a man or a woman, people assumed the answers to Sabatini’s problems lay outside herself. (1993, p.6) 147

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When asked about life after tennis in Mewshaw’s earlier interview with Sabatini, she said, ‘I don’t know. It’s hard. I always say I want to get married and have children’ (1993, p.14). Nevertheless, speculation about Sabatini’s sexuality continues to abound as she never married and never had children. A 2003 interview in The Guardian newspaper exemplifies the media’s attention to this issue. In the context of discussing Sabatini’s highly successful perfume line, the subject of family emerges: The “vitalising essences of mandarin and pineapple, together with aquatic elements of melon”, apparently represent in olfactory form Sabatini’s wish “for a partner for life, for children and a family of her own”. She does, she says, long to find a husband. Men, particularly in Argentina, are fazed by her fame. She isn’t seeing anyone at the moment and hasn’t had a serious relationship for several years. Having spent 12 years protecting herself from outsiders, it is now less easy to let them in. (Turner 2003, 16 June) While Sabatini’s sexuality is irrelevant to her tremendous on-court accomplishments and later accomplishments as a highly successful businesswoman, discussions about it continue to exist, even in the present day’s far more tolerant climate toward homosexuality. Argentina is remarkably progressive on homosexual rights, in 2010 becoming the first country in Latin America and tenth in the world to legalize same-sex marriage. Although Sabatini never made a definitive statement on her sexuality, Sheinin (2008, p.42) asserts that her ‘lesbian identity eventually crept out as an open secret, one that the media, respectfully and to their credit, would never report in a degrading manner – to a public that did not much care’. By all accounts, Sabatini’s post-tennis life is filled with the happiness that eluded her as a player. According to an article in The New York Times (16 July 2006) she earned over $8.7 million in prize money and an additional $20 million in endorsements as of 2006, and stated ‘I had my day, and now I’m having another kind of day. And I’m happy.Very happy’. She has dedicated herself to supporting amateur sports, especially girls’ tennis, contributing hundreds of thousands of dollars to the Argentine Tennis Association and covering the costs of young players traveling to tournaments and playing exhibitions (Goldschmidt, 2007, March).

Conclusion: legacies for the next generation In the decades that followed Vilas’ retirement, scores of young Argentineans took up the sport and several gained world-wide recognition. The so-called “Legión Argentina” (Argentine Legion) took the world stage by storm in the mid-2000s. David Nalbandian reached the Wimbledon Final in 2002, then the 2004 French Open held an all-Argentine final with Gastón Gaudio defeating Guillermo Coria, and, by 2005, five Argentinean players were ranked in the top-12 (three in the top-ten: Gaudio, Guillermo Cañas and Mariano Puerta). Argentina also reached the Davis Cup Finals in 2006, 2008 and 2011, before finally winning in 2016. Juan Martin del Potro defeated arguably the greatest player of all time, Roger Federer, for the 2009 US Open title and has won two Olympic medals. As of December 2018, there are six Argentine men ranked in the top-100, with del Potro at no.5. In case Vilas’ influence on this generation of players is not readily apparent, multiple sources report that Coria and Cañas were named “Guillermo” after Argentina’s grandest player. While Vilas is head and shoulders above his Latin American counterparts in tennis history, the same cannot be said of Sabatini. She was certainly Argentina’s best female player – past and present – but among Latin Americans, Brazilian Maria Bueno’s credentials are far superior. Nevertheless, both Vilas and Sabatini had, and continue to have, a profound influence on 148

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Argentine and Latin American tennis. Among the Argentine women who would follow in Sabatini’s footsteps, the most successful was Paola Suárez. Although she ranked as high as ninth in the world in singles, Suárez truly made her mark in doubles tennis (Estevez, 2013, June). As a doubles player, mostly with her Spanish partner Virginia Ruano Pascual, Suárez won five Grand Slam tournaments (32 total titles) making the pair the third leading team in the Open era (Collins 2016). In addition, Suárez and fellow Argentine Patricia Tarabini won the doubles bronze medal at the 2008 Olympics. Gisela Dulko also reached a world doubles top ranking in 2010 and won a Grand Slam with Italian partner Flavia Pennetta in 2011, but would only reach number 26 as a singles player (Estevez, 2013, June). In sum, since Sabatini’s retirement, only 28 Argentine women have been ranked in the world top-150, and none have achieved anywhere near Sabatini’s success as a singles player (Estevez, 2013, June). By 2007, El Gráfico magazine contrasted the success of male Argentine players with that of their female counterparts, asserting that Sabatini’s successor had yet to emerge (Goldschmidt 2007).The crisis of Argentine women’s tennis was not much better in 2013, when El Gráfico lamented that the images of Sabatini and Suárez are fading away, and that economics and machismo are to blame for the dearth of Argentine female tennis players (Estevez, 2013, June). Such problems have persisted, and as of December 2018 there are not any Argentineans in the top-200 WTA rankings. Tennis in Argentina has a long and distinguished history. Several outstanding players have surpassed a multitude of social, cultural and political barriers to become champions and, in a few cases, ITHF inductees. Argentina’s success on the tennis court has been punctuated by Guillermo Vilas and Gabriela Sabatini, who experienced various challenges in their professional playing days, but today they continue to serve as reference points, if not inspirations, to young Argentine players. Finally, while Argentine men continue to carry the torch of excellence in tennis, their female counterparts have struggled to achieve a comparable level of results in recent years, for reasons as yet not fully understood.

Notes 1 See: http:​//www​.balt​c.net​/el-t​enis-​en-la​-arge​ntina​-1860​-1866​/ 2 See: https​://ww​w.you​tube.​com/w​atch?​v=dGs​CqBNz​PDk 3 In Argentina, political party ideologies are fluid and cover the breadth of the ideological spectrum. The Partido Justicialista (or Peronist party) has at times been considered center-left, center-right and “Third Position,” rejecting both Communism and capitalism and forging alliances with the (traditionally conservative) military and (traditionally liberal) labor unions. 4 See: “De la Rúa, con los embajadores del agro”, in La Nación (24 April 2000); and “De la Rúa pide que se veranee en el país”, in: Clarín (17 December 2000). 5 See: https​://ww​w.you​tube.​com/w​atch?​v=pu4​0ELyE​gng

References Andersen, R.C. and Puppo, E.C. (2012) Historia del Tenis en la Argentina. Buenos Aires: EP Press. Arbena, J.L. (2002) In Search of the Latin American Female Athlete. In J. L.Arbena and D. G. LaFrance (eds.), Sport in Latin America and the Caribbean (p. 219–32), Wilmington, Delaware: Jaguar Books. Argentina Shocks US (1977, 2 May) United Press International. Collins, B. (2016) The Bud Collins History of Tennis: An Authoritative Encyclopedia and Record Book, (Third Edition). Chicago, IL: New Chapter Press. De la Rúa, con los embajadores del agro (2000, 24 April) La Nación. Available at: https​://ww​w.lan​acion​ .com.​ar/14​254-d​e-la-​rua-c​on-lo​s-emb​ajado​res-d​el-ag​ro (accessed April 2018) De la Rúa pide que se veranee en el país (2000, 17 December) Clarín. Available at: https​://ww​w.cla​r in.c​ om/po​litic​a/rua​-pide​-vera​nee-p​ais_0​_BJx-​AEtl0​Yx.ht​ml (accessed April 2018) 149

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Duchini, A. (2017, December) Mary Teran De Weiss: Gloria, Persecucion y Suicidio. El Gráfico. Estévez, M. (2007, September) Los tenistas latinos son ganadores. Fox Sports en Español. Available at: http:​// mar​tines​tevez​.blog​spot.​com/2​009/0​6/ent​revis​ta-gu​iller​mo-vi​las.h​tml (accessed April 2018) Estévez, M. (2013, June) Alegrias en extinción. El Gráfico. Estévez, M. (2014, November) Las Mejores: Gabriela Sabatini. El Gráfico. ESPN.com (2013) Hispanic Heritage 2013: Most Influential Hispanic Women in Sports. Available at: http:​ //www​.espn​.com/​espn/​hispa​niche​r itag​e2013​/inde​x (accessed April 2018) Fernández Moores, E. (2010) Breve historia del deporte argentino. Buenos Aires: El Ateneo. Gillmeister, H. (1998) Tennis: A Cultural History. New York: New York University Press. Goldschmidt, M. (2007, March) El Trono Vacante. El Gráfico. Gorroño, G. (1996, 16 January) Vilas Cien Por Cien. El Gráfico. Guerra, M. (2003, 11 January) La interminable magia de Vilas. ESPNdeportes.com. Available at: http://www. espn.com.mx/nota?id=194341 (accessed April 2018) Hernández, L.A. (1984, 12 June) Y Vilas creo el tenis. El Gráfico. Irwin, R.M. (2015) Guillermo Vilas, “Tennis’s Sexiest Man”: The Argentine Dictatorship in the US Tennis Press, 1974–1982. In H. Fernández L’Hoeste, Irwin, R. M. & Poblete, J., Sports and Nationalism in Latin/o America. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. La Razón (1980) La Razón: 1905–1980 Historia Viva. Buenos Aires: Talleres Gráficos. Lapchick, R. & Bovinet, J. (2010) 100 Campeones: Latino Groundbreakers Who Paved the Way in Sport. Morgantown, WV: West Virginia University. Litsky, F. (2006, 16 July) Off the Court, Sabatini is Still in Her Prime. The New York Times. Llonto, P. (2005) La Vergüenza de Todos: El dedo en la llaga del Mundial 78. Buenos Aires: Ediciones Madres de Plaza de Mayo. Menotti y la dictadura: “La crueldad con los desaparecidos no la imaginaba” (2017, 20 July) Los Andes. Available at: http:​//www​.losa​ndes.​com.a​r/art​icle/​menot​ti-y-​la-di​ctadu​ra-la​-crue​ldad-​con-l​os-de​sapar​ ecido​s-no-​la-im​agina​ba (accessed April 2018) Lupo,V. (2004) Historia política del deporte argentino (1610–2002). Buenos Aires: Ediciones Corregidor. Mewshaw, M. (1993) Ladies of the Court: Grace and Disgrace on the Women’s Tennis Tour. New York: Crown. Pinco, O. (2012, 24 March) Cuando el periodismo deportivo se transforma en una herrameinta de compromiso. Noticias de Cuyo. Available at: https​://no​ticia​sdecu​yo.wo​rdpre​ss.co​m/201​2/03/​24/24​ -de-m​arzo-​cuand​o-el-​perio​dismo​-depo​r tivo​-se-t​ransf​orma-​en-un​a-her​ramie​nta-d​e-com​promi​so/ (accessed April 2018) Radcliffe, D. & Hill, C. (1985, 20 March) MXimum Delight. The Washington Post. Redacción E.G. (2016, 25 November) Guillermo Vilas, 21 años. El Gráfico. Available at: http:​//www​.elgr​ afico​.com.​ar/20​16/11​/25/C​-1668​1-197​3-gui​llerm​o-vil​as-21​-anos​.php (accessed April 2018) Rodriguez, T. (2008, 8 December) La historia trágica de una grande: María Luisa Terán de Weiss. El Litoral. Available at: http:​//www​.elli​toral​.com/​index​.php/​diari​os/20​08/12​/08/d​eport​es/DE​PO-24​.html​ (accessed Apr. 2018) Sabatini, G. (1995) Gabriela Sabatini: My Story. Orange, CA: Avatar General Corporation. Sheinin, D. (2008) Sport and the Nation in Proceso Argentina: Dictatorship Ideologies, Media Representations, and the Rise of Guillermo Vilas and Carlos Reutemann, MACLAS, Latin American Essays, 22, p.24–53. Trenado, J.M. (1999, 5 September) Vilas entre comillas: Golpe a golpe. La Nación. Available at: https​://ww​ w.lan​acion​.com.​ar/21​1668-​vilas​-entr​e-com​illas​-golp​e-a-g​olpe (accessed April 2018) Turner, J. (2003, 16 June) My Tennis Nightmare. The Guardian. Veiga, G. (2013, 17 September) La lucha continua. Pagina 12. Available at: https​://ww​w.pag​ina12​.com.​ar/ di​ario/​depor​tes/8​-2291​48-20​13-09​-17.h​tml (accessed April 2018) Wilson, T. and Favoretto, M. (2016, August) Rock Nacional in Argentina During the Dictatorship. Oxford Research Encyclopedia: Latin American History. Available at: http:​//lat​iname​r ican​histo​ry.ox​fordr​e.com​/ view​/10.1​093/a​crefo​re/97​80199​36643​9.001​.0001​/acre​fore-​97801​99366​439-e​-368 (accessed April 2018)

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Lawn tennis was imported to India by her British colonial rulers almost a century after two of the most popular Indian sports, cricket and football (soccer), reached Indian shores, courtesy of British East India Company officers. In a cricket-crazy country, tennis has always found a respectable place. Its appeal to the status of the affluent has made the sport a significant profession in post-independence India. Along with cricket and soccer, the introduction of tennis, an archetypal gentlemen’s sport, has been attributed to the recreation of British officers. In his seminal work on the history of cricket in India, Guha (2014, p.5) elucidated: ‘Cricket and other sports were a source of much comfort to the expatriate Englishman’. This aspect of sports promotion, it may be stated, stemmed from ideologies of the empire and was replicated in most other colonies. In Britain, as Mangan (2000) explained, headmasters used organised sport and controlled leisure time outside the classroom to control time inside it. In a similar way, the birth of tennis in India was greatly stimulated by local European administrators, and it was from their European teachers that Indian boys got their first lessons in the game. Notably, despite having a rich tennis legacy, only a handful of Indian players have reached world standard to date. However, unlike cricket with its mass appeal and ubiquitous pan-Indian presence, tennis participation has been primarily confined to those from elite clubs and international or public schools, or institutions in some selective patches across urban India. It is no wonder, therefore, that India’s success in tennis has been nothing but mostly “flash in the pan”. Despite notable doubles successes from the likes of Vijay and Anand Amritraj, Leander Paes, Mahesh Bhupathi, Sania Mirza and Rohan Bopanna, which brought India into the elite league of traditional doubles powerhouses – alongside the US, Australia, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Sweden, the Netherlands, the Czech Republic and Serbia – in Grand Slam singles, widely acknowledged as the “real” tennis, India has drawn a blank. The second most populous country with more than a billion people has produced a handful of very good singles players, like Ramanathan Krishnan, Premjit Lall, Amritraj, Paes and Mirza, but none have reached further than a major semi-final. One argument suggests that, outside of cricket, Indians have been traditionally lazy when it comes to pursuing sport and attempting to excel at the highest level (Sen 2015). The country’s abysmal record at the Olympics, with an overall 28 medals – most from hockey – from its 24 appearances, is a testimony to its sporting mediocrity. However, tennis has always found a 151

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respectable place in the country and has significantly contributed to India’s limited excellence in global sports. In fact, if one considers Indian sports sans cricket, tennis has, arguably, brought more international glories and laurels than any other sport over the past couple of decades. As Indian sport historian Ronojoy Sen (2015, p.211) writes, ‘Besides the team sports and Olympic events, a few Indians performed admirably well in other individual sports’.The aim of this chapter is to provide a brief history of tennis in India, focusing on the performances of top players, set in broader contexts of major developments and issues in Indian history more generally.

The pioneers Almost two decades after the watershed 1857 Mutiny – which eventually ended the rule of the East India Company and paved the way for the new British Raj through the Government of India Act 1858 – and almost a decade after its present form was formulated in England in the 1870s, the British Officers brought tennis to India. Incidentally, the sport was introduced to India around the same time as the inaugural Lawn Tennis Championships at Wimbledon in 1877. It is difficult to say who, if anyone, introduced the sport in India, but tennis was seen being played by British Army Officers as a leisure activity in their barracks, cantonment clubs and gymkhanas as early as the 1880s in North India (Datta 2001). The first known tournament in India was the Punjab Lawn Tennis Championships that started in 1885 at the Lahore Gymkhana Club (now in Pakistan). Wimbledon archives reveal that a certain B. Nehru had quite inconspicuously made it to second round without playing a match in 1905, but a UK-based Sikh, called Sirdar Nihal Singh, made history by becoming the first Indian-origin player to play at Wimbledon three years later. Alongside one of the earliest cricketing icons, K.S. Ranjitsinhji (famously known as the Jam Sahib of Nawanagar) and the Anglo-Indian athlete, Norman Pritchard (India’s first-ever Olympic medal winner)1, Singh was a pioneer, among the first Indian/Indian-origin sportsmen to rub shoulders with top international competitors in their respective sports. By the 1920s, the Indians had evidently started playing the game at the highest level and also registered some impressive performances in various tournaments abroad. In its early decades, tennis in India was primarily restricted as a leisure activity to the elite and exclusive clubs and gymkhanas, before the All India Lawn Tennis Association (AILTA) – the governing body of Indian tennis – was formed at Lahore in March 1920. Since then, Indian tennis has gradually baby-stepped into the international arena but without any epoch-making success in its early decades. Among its earliest endeavours, the most notable was the victory of an Indian team – comprising Mohammed Sleem, Lewis Deane, A.A. Fyzee and the British-origin but Indianborn civil servant, S.M. Jacob – over a formidable French team to reach the Davis Cup semifinals in 1921. Subsequently, the pair of Deane and A.H. Fyzee stormed into the Wimbledon doubles semi-final two years later while Jacob reached the Wimbledon quarter-final in 1925, after making that year’s French Championship semi-final. Despite these victories, colonial patronage of tennis continued. Having imported sport to discipline local subjects, colonialists tended to look upon native prowess in European sports as symbolic of the success of the imperial agenda.The suggestion that native success in sport could ignite a nationalist resurgence was peremptorily dismissed, but there emerged, according to Boria Majumdar (2004, p.94),‘an underlying realization and consequent apprehension that sport had the potential to stir up national resurgence in the colonies’; imperialists did their best to blunt this potential. Consequently, on occasions of native triumph on the sporting field, what the colonisers emphasised was the harmony and sporting 152

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spirit, demonstrated by rival European and Indian teams following sporting encounters, rather than the significance of a native victory. That spirit of celebrations never went beyond the acceptable norms associated with sport was touted as a success of the colonial enterprise. Until the end of the 1930s, however, there was no notion of tennis and cricket being elite sports, subject to nationalist discourses. Such conditions were, however, transformed in independent India, a reversal firmly in place by the end of the 1950s (Majumdar 2004).

The trailblazers & giant killers On August 15 1947, India won freedom from the British after three centuries of colonial rule, and Indian tennis got a new identity as Dilip Bose made his newly independent country proud by winning the inaugural Asian Championship in Kolkata in 1950.This was arguably the biggest triumph by an Indian in an international sporting event post-independence since the invincible Indian hockey team’s gold medal triumph at the 1948 London Olympics. His victory helped Bose become the first-ever seeded Indian player (15th seed) at Wimbledon. It was not until the 1960s, however, that Ramanathan Krishnan transformed Indian tennis into a world force. Krishnan was arguably one of the greatest Indian players of all time; he reached a career-best world number-three ranking in 1959, and was unofficially ranked in the world top-10 for some time. In his prime, he accomplished a slew of giant-killing acts, defeating, among others, Jaroslav Drobny, Rod Laver and Roy Emerson. In 1960 and 1961, Krishnan reached the Wimbledon semi-final, and remains the first and only Indian player to do so. As the most successful Indian tennis player of all-time in singles, a trailblazing Krishnan not only put India on the world tennis map but also gave the Asian continent a tennis identity. Spearheaded by Krishnan – the man with trademark touch-play – India repeatedly became “zonal” champions in the Davis Cup throughout the 1960s, and played in numerous inter-zone finals. He made Davis Cup history for India in 1966 when he led the golden generation of Premjit Lall, Jaidip Mukerjea and Shiv Prasad Mishra to the Davis Cup final for the first time ever. If Krishnan was the torch-bearer of that generation, then the trio of Lall, Mukerjea and Akhtar Ali, from Kolkata’s prestigious South Club (known as the “Wimbledon of the East”), kept the Indian tricolour flying. The gifted Lall, the original poster-boy of Indian tennis with his dashing good looks and powerful serve-and-volley game, was arguably the best Indian singles player of his era after Krishnan. The showpiece moment of Lall’s career was in 1969 when he took a two-sets-to-love lead against Rod Laver, then world no. 1, in Wimbledon’s second round before squandering the golden opportunity with an unforgettable blunder mid-way through the third set. In 1973, in the twilight of his career, Lall brought out his vintage best against a 17-year-old prodigy called Bjorn Borg, stretching the Swedish genius to 20-18 in the third-set tie-break, in what became the longest tie-break in Grand-Slam history.

Swag & style In the early 1970s, the Amritraj family took over the mantle of Indian tennis. As a teenager, the charismatic Vijay Amritraj won his first national title in 1972, defeating first Mukerjea then Krishnan in the semi-final and final respectively. If his predecessors added touch, grace and elegance to world tennis,Vijay arrived with sheer swag and unflinching exuberance in the early 1970s. Close on the heels of Indian Test cricketer, Sunil Gavaskar, who made a dream debut 153

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against the West Indies in 1971, Armitraj became the new sensation in Indian sports during this period, as India began flexing its muscles in world sports. The Chennai-born champion’s finest achievement, which eventually became a moment of eternal agony, came in the quarter-final of the boycott-marred 1973 Wimbledon, when he led Jan Kodes in the fifth set 5-4 and 30-0. Missing an easy overhead smash, he then lost concentration and, with it, the match. That ‘unforgettable smash’ probably denied the 19-year-old Indian a once-in-a-life-time chance of winning the most coveted tennis crown and the elusive major. The Times wrote ‘Vijay had missed a smash to glory’, while Amritraj lamented in his autobiography: ‘that smash could, possibly, have meant the difference between winning a Wimbledon title’ (1990, p.91). He did well to respond strongly in that year’s US Open, ambushing Laver in the third round in an edge-of-the-seat five-setter that was voted the best match of the decade on CBS at the time (Gupta 2005). Interestingly, 1973 also marked the arrival of two future icons, Bjorn Borg and Jimmy Connors, who, along with Amritraj, were collectively dubbed the ‘ABC of the game’s next generation’ by iconic tennis writer Bud Collins in the Boston Globe (Amritraj 1990, p.91). Prolific in both singles and doubles, Amritraj had victories against a swathe of top players, including Laver, Borg, Connors and Yannick Noah. In his 15-year career, Amritraj won 16 ATP Tour singles titles – the all-time highest by any Indian – and guided India to the Davis Cup final twice, in 1974 and 1987. Following in Armitraj’s footsteps was Ramanathan’s son Ramesh Krishnan, whose best moment came at the 1989 Australian Open as he, then ranked 51, out-manoeuvred the world no. 1 and defending champion, Mats Wilander. Subsequently, Krishnan, who had a career-high singles ranking of 23 in January 1985, acted as a bridge between Amritraj and the future wunderkind, Leander Paes.

Birth of a star Compounded by the emergence of a crippling economic crisis, which forced India’s government to airlift its gold reserves in order to secure an emergency IMF loan, the 1990s also began inauspiciously in the broader sphere of Indian sport. The nation had not won a single medal in the 1984 and 1988 Olympics, and showed little promise of improvement, particularly as India’s hockey team fell from its once impregnable perch. Cricket icons Sunil Gavaskar and Kapil Dev closed in on the end of their careers, and the illustrious badminton career of Prakash Padukone was all but over. In tennis, the Amritraj brothers had retired, leaving Krishnan, who was grappling with indifferent form and injury worries, to defend the nation’s honour on his own. Soon, however, the economy would bounce back – as India opted for an historic economic liberalisation plan in 1991 that saw it undergo a marked transformation from a closed economy to a market economy – and Indian sport also showed signs of progress. Ever since hockey star Dhyan Chand in the 1920s & 1930s, India had been desperately seeking a sporting icon, who could beat the world’s best and win the highest honours. Once Dev and Padukone were past their prime, it was the time for the almost simultaneous emergence of a prodigious triumvirate: Viswanathan Anand, the first Indian Chess Grand Master in 1988; Sachin Tendulkar, the youngest cricketer to play Test cricket for India in 1989; and Leander Paes, who made a stunning Davis Cup debut in 1990, beating that year’s Wimbledon quarter-finalists, the Japanese duo of S. Ota and S. Matsuoka, in the crucial doubles match. In time, all three would become icons in their own arenas but also national heroes for the new middle class in post-liberalisation India. For Paes – the son of Olympic hockey medallist, Vece, and former captain of the Indian basketball team, Jennifer – that victory marked the beginning of a new era for Indian tennis, 154

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transforming it into a potential Grand-Slam-winning nation, as its young prodigy went on to reset the benchmark for global standard in doubles tennis. Despite making a stuttering start on the professional tour, Paes became the fulcrum for the Indian Davis Cup team that competed in the World Group from 1991 to 1998. In those years, he defeated a slew of higher ranked players like Jeremy Bates, Jakob Hlasek, Henri Leconte, Arnaud Boetsch and Wayne Ferreira. However, his most memorable triumph was when the then world no. 130, after going 0-3 down in the third set, famously humbled Goran Ivanisevic (then world no. 7) in a breath-taking five-setter, spanning over five and a half hours, to help India win a Davis Cup rubber against Croatia. Incidentally, the epic Davis Cup tie against Croatia also saw Paes pairing up with Mahesh Bhupathi for the first time in the tournament’s history as the Indian duo edged past Ivanisevic and Saša Hiršzon to kick-start their stunning record of 24 consecutive wins (total 25-2) in the century-old annual tennis event. Arguably, Paes saved his best performance for the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, when the 126thranked player won the bronze medal in the singles event, making it India’s second-ever individual Olympic medal after K.D. Jadhav’s bronze in wrestling at the 1952 Helsinki Games. Though Paes beat the Brazilian Fernando Meligeni in the bronze-medal play-off despite a torn tendon in his right wrist, it was perhaps his semi-final loss to Andre Agassi that was most intriguing as a spectacle. As a testament to Paes’s unique character and playing-style, the eventual gold-medallist and eight-time Grand-Slam winner Agassi described his experience of the match in his autobiography: In the semis I meet Leander Paes, from India. He’s a flying jumping bean, a bundle of hyperkinetic energy, with the tour’s quickest hands. Still, he’s never learned to hit a tennis ball. He hits off-speed, hacks, chips, lobs – he’s the Brad [Gilbert] of Bombay. Then, behind all his junk, he flies to the net and covers so well that it all seems to work. After an hour you feel as if he hasn’t hit one ball cleanly – and yet he’s beating you soundly. (Agassi 2009, p.237) Paes’s fairy-tale bronze-winning triumph not only ended his country’s agonisingly long Olympic drought but catapulted him to an iconic status in a nation that has been traditionally worshipping its cricket heroes. However, Leander’s limited success in singles, and his new-found winning partnership with compatriot Bhupathi, eventually convinced him to shift his focus entirely to doubles: After I won the Olympic bronze in 1996, then the Asian games medal, (my Davis Cup singles record was very good then), I found that the game had evolved.The courts slowed and balls became heavier. For a serve-and-volley player like me, I had to choose. I couldn’t have played both because the duration of a singles matches were so much that I had no energy left for doubles. By playing doubles I realised I could play for really long. (cited in: www.sportstaronnet.com) That partnership became a winning combination in the subsequent years, as Bhupathi’s strong serves, baseline play and backhand returns complemented Leander’s agility and speed at the net.

The epoch-making Between 1997 and 1999, Paes and Bhupathi achieved unprecedented success for Indian tennis. In fact, it was Bhupathi who became the first-ever Indian to win a major championship after 155

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lifting the 1997 French Open mixed-doubles crown (with Japan’s Rika Hiraki). That historic triumph not only boosted his own career but also helped progress his partnership with Paes. The watershed year of their doubles career was 1999, when the “Indian Express”, as they were dubbed by the media, clinched two Grand Slam doubles titles (French Open & Wimbledon), alongside reaching the final of the other two majors, the Australian and French Opens, to become the first pair in five decades – and the first ever in the Open era – to play in all four Grand-Slam finals since the legendary Australian duo of Ken McGregor and Frank Sedgman, in 1951 and 1952. Unsurprisingly, the Indian duo ended the year as the world-number-one ranked doubles pair, with Paes first and Bhupathi second in respective doubles rankings. Soon, the almost all-conquering “Indian Express” became the hottest property in the ATP doubles circuit, knocking the indomitable “Woodies” (the Australian pair, Tood Woodbridge and Mark Woodforde) off the perch. The two made their signature chest-bumping celebrations almost legendary and, with their seemingly telepathic on-court chemistry, they grabbed more media coverage and television viewership for men’s doubles, which previously had been ignored (Raha 2010). They redefined tennis viewing and the perception and coverage of the sport in India, as Grand Slam and Davis Cup success became an entirely achievable expectation. Every time the duo played, they were viewed as potential champions, as perceptions of tennis underwent a major paradigm shift in India. Arguably, Paes and Bhupathi were both in the same league as their contemporary cricket icons – Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly and Rahul Dravid – in terms of their pan-Indian popularity and their premium commodity value, as they translated their tennis success into lucrative endorsement deals. But like all good things come to end, the blockbuster Indian partnership hit a rough patch and subsequently the pair decided to part ways in 2000. They reunited occasionally, primarily for the Olympics, Asia Games and the Davis Cup, but with limited success; they triumphed at the 2001 French Open, but continued to fall short in their quest for the ever-elusive Olympic doubles medal. Their best chance came in Athens in 2004, but they lost in the bronze medal play-off. From 2002 onwards, both Paes and Bhupathi continued to achieve success, finding new male partners alongside mixed-doubles success. An ageless Martina Navratilova joined Paes to win the Australian Open and Wimbledon in 2003, and Martin Hingis teamed up with Bhupathi to win the 2006 Australian Open, which helped him accomplish a career Grand Slam – the first ever by an Indian player. Cara Black paired with Paes to triumph in three more majors between 2008 and 2010, including the 2010 Wimbledon triumph that made him the second man after Rod Laver to win Wimbledon titles in three decades, before a 35-year-old Hingis (during her second career comeback in 2013), joined Paes to win the 2015 Australian Open.The Indo-Swiss pair, with a combined age of over 75, went on to win two more majors – Wimbledon and the US Open – in that superlative year before adding another at Roland Garros in 2016. To date, Paes has won 18 major doubles titles (eight doubles and ten mixed-doubles), and Bhupathi 12 (four doubles and eight mixed-doubles). However, despite their stellar achievements they have become bitter rivals, resorting to public “mud-slinging” through the media, name-calling, manipulating their governing body to get the upper hand and creating factions within Indian tennis. All of this has been detrimental to the development of Indian tennis at the highest level and become a huge hindrance to the free-flowing rise of junior players.

The women’s era Historically, while massively under-reported by the media, there were several references to women, predominantly the wives, daughters and other female family members of British/ Anglo-Indian officers and aristocracy, pursuing tennis as a leisurely sport in the late 19th century. 156

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The first recorded instance of an Indian woman’s entry to a Grand Slam event was in 1920 when Phyllis Berthoud, nee Hamilton Cox, registered for the Wimbledon singles draw. Subsequently, N. Polley became the first ever Indian woman to take part in the Olympics, in the 1924 Paris Games. In 1930, Jenny Sandison reached Wimbledon’s second round (courtesy of a bye), making her the first Indian woman to play in the second round of a Grand Slam event. The 1920s also saw Pandita Kshama Row win the singles crown at the Bombay Presidency Hard Court Championship in 1927, while Oxford-educated Rajkumari Amrit Kaur of the Kapurthala royal family becoming the doubles champion at the Punjab Championship in that year (Datta 2001). Incidentally, Kaur, an ardent follower of Mahatma Gandhi and a future Health Minister in the first-ever Cabinet of Independent India under Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, had cofounded (along with Irish-Indian educationist, suffragist and theosophist Margaret Cousins) the All India Women’s Congress (AIWC) – an organisation dedicated to the empowerment and emancipation of women and children – in the same year. This is significant because it makes room for the argument that the emergence of women’s tennis in India was closely tied with the movement for women’s suffrage and emancipation in colonial conditions. With the establishment of the AIWC in 1918, the move for women’s suffrage gathered momentum, and through the 1920s, most women in India earned voting rights. Sarojini Naidu’s campaign for women’s suffrage was to a large extent responsible for this development. Around this time, some female commentators espoused the cause of women’s sport, demanding better sports facilities for them. With the establishment of the AIWC, attempts were made to give women a voice, which was previously absent. With men acting on behalf of their female counterparts, women had, through the 19th century, remained as per Lata Mani’s term a ‘site’ upon which the colonial state and the Indian intelligentsia had discussed issues of governance and reform (Mani 1998). As part of this broader movement for emancipation, sports, especially European sports, gained currency among Indian women. In 1934, Leela Row won her first-round match at Wimbledon to become the first-ever Indian woman to win a match at SW19. Since then only two women from India – Rita Davar and Sania Mirza – have played the main ladies’ singles draw at Wimbledon. Incidentally, since Row’s first-round victory at the 1934 Wimbledon, only two Indian women – Nirupama Sanjeev nee Vaidyanathan and Mirza have managed to win a match in the main draw of any major. Between Davar and Mirza, for almost half a century, there were only a handful of female tennis players like Nirupama Mankad nee Vasant (national champion in the 1960s & 1970s) and Kiran Bedi, nee Peshawaria (winner of the Asian Lawn Tennis Championship in 1972), who made an impact on Indian tennis before Sanjeev, a contemporary of Paes and Bhupathi, won her first-round singles match at the 1998 Australian Open.

One woman show If Paes has been the ultimate pioneer in Indian tennis, then Sania Mirza is nothing but a trailblazer in the true sense of the superlative. Mirza not only overcame numerous hurdles to carve a niche for herself but also shattered the glass ceiling to redefine women’s sports in India and abroad. Before Sania, there was hardly any Indian woman athlete of international stature, with only P.T. Usha, who missed a medal by 1/100th of a second in the 400-metre hurdles at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, and Karnam Malleshwari, who won a bronze in weightlifting at the 2000 Sydney Olympics to become India’s first woman Olympic medal winner, managing to rub shoulders with the world’s best in their respective sports. Coming from an orthodox Muslim family was a major challenge for Mirza, as a Government of India report (prepared by Justice Sachar Committee) released in 2006, just as Mirza was 157

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rising in world tennis, highlighted the poverty and the low social and economic statuses of women in India in terms of education, employment and health (see http://ncm.nic.in/pdf/ compilation.pdf). In 2003, Mirza’s Junior Wimbledon triumph instantly made her the heartthrob of India and soon she became the world no. 1 junior girls’ doubles player – the first Indian to be ranked world no. 1 junior since Paes. That was a major stepping-stone to her future success in the international arena as she progressed steadily thereafter.The teenage sensation’s phenomenal popularity and rising rankings in a breathtakingly short span catapulted the brand Sania – managed by Bhupathi’s management company, Globosport since 2003 – to the same level as then Indian cricket legend Rahul Dravid (INR 15 million a year for each endorsement) and second only to another icon, Tendulkar (Bobb & Padmanabhan, 2005). A celebrated Indian sports writer, Rohit Brijnath (2005), had then described the sensation as: ‘She is a few biryanis (flavoured rice) heavier that an elite athlete can afford to be and her acceleration on court is more Ford than Ferrari. But no big deal; this you can teach an 18-year-old.What you can’t is chutzpah, and toughness, and Sania Mirza has both’. Mirza’s sensational career can be bifurcated with respect to her success in singles and doubles. She began the decade as a singles sensation and went on to become one of the world’s best doubles players. She became the first Indian to clinch a WTA singles title, at the 2005 Hyderabad Open, and with her hallmark forehand – one of the best on the tour – she pulled off some ground-breaking performances. However, her wobbling singles career, comprising of a solitary WTA Tour title since 2005, compounded by a slew of injuries and surgeries, eventually forced Mirza to focus primarily on doubles/mixed-doubles. With Sania following in the footsteps of Paes and Bhupathi to become doubles/mixed-doubles specialists, she started flourishing and tasting unparalleled success on the tour. In fact, it was her mentor Bhupathi who helped Sania clinch her first major title in mixed doubles at the 2009 Australian Open.The once unimaginable glass ceiling was shattered by Mirza as she became the first Indian woman to win a major. Since then, she has partnered both Daniel Nestor and Bob Bryan to win two further Grand Slam titles in mixed doubles to date. Meanwhile, Mirza tasted reasonable success in doubles but her dream flight took off only after she paired up with Cara Black to win the WTA Finals in 2014. However, her dream of winning a Grand Slam doubles title was accomplished only after comeback legend Hingis, already a lucky charm for Indian tennis since winning mixed-doubles majors with both Paes and Bhupathi, joined her on the tour in March 2015. Known by the moniker ‘Santina’, the Indo-Swiss pair emphatically won three successive majors – the 2015 Wimbledon, the 2015 US Open and the 2016 Australian Open – with an enviable 41-match winning streak. Meanwhile, Mirza created history by becoming the first Indian female tennis player to achieve the worldnumber-one rank in doubles. Hailing Mirza’s unparalleled achievements (with three Grand Slams each in doubles & mixed-doubles), former Indian tennis legend Vijay Amritraj remarked: ‘Sania has put our sport on the front pages and that’s what is important, not just for girls’ tennis, for tennis across the board, sports across the board especially for girls’ (cited in: www.timesofindia.com). Nevertheless, with her revolutionary rise and subsequent reign at the top flight of world tennis, Sania has been one of the world’s most popular sportspersons. A combination of her stupendous success, street-smart and casual approach, extraordinary exuberance, carefree and nononsense attitude, unabashed viewpoints and unequivocal stand on different issues, has helped the girl with the trademark nose-ring enter the exclusive pantheon traditionally reserved for glamorous Bollywood film actresses and sultry beauty pageant winners. Her appeal transcends regions, religions, castes, creeds and countries. Mirza commands over 12 million Facebook fans, 158

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over five million followers on Twitter and 2.7 million on Instagram. In fact, Sania is in the list of top-100 most followed athletes on Twitter, behind only Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer and Serena Williams in tennis. In a cricket-crazy country like India, she has been the only non-cricketer who has been consistently in the top-10 list of most-followed Indian sportspersons on Twitter. She has, to date, earned $6.5 million in career prize money, which is over a thousand times the annual per-capita income in India. Despite her successes, it has not been easy for Sania, who has too often been a victim of misogynist, jingoistic and sexist barbs, trolls and media trials. However, like her powerful forehand returns, Sania has always responded strongly to her critics, earning her a feature in Time magazine’s 2016 list of 100 most influential people in the world. Sachin Tendulkar, eulogised: ‘Sania’s confidence, strength and resilience reach beyond tennis. She has inspired a generation of Indians to pursue their dreams – and to realise that they can also be the best’ (Time, 2016).

Paes & beyond Apart from the terrific trio of Paes-Bhupathi-Mirza, Indian tennis has also witnessed the unobtrusive arrival of young Indian players like Rohan Bopanna, who won the 2017 French Open in mixed doubles, to become only the fourth Indian to win a major.The journeyman’s previous tour success came when he teamed up with Pakistan’s Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi to reach the 2010 US Open final.The not-so-long-lived partnership, known as the “IndoPak Express”, won many laurels and hearts as the harbingers of hopes and promoters of peace. Indeed, India’s intense rivalry with Pakistan is legendary, particularly in cricket where close contests between the two nations have led to the sport’s unparalleled success and sky-rocketing popularity. However, Pakistan’s almost non-existence in international tennis (except for Qureshi) may not evoke the cricket-like nationalism, but tennis has enjoyed passionate play and gritty performances from players like Paes, who have brought Indian fans to the game with its emotional and patriotic attachment. Critics often argue that, leaving aside Ramanathan Krishnan’s two Wimbledon semi-final appearances, India’s success in world tennis has largely been in doubles – a discipline purists and pundits often denigrate as an alternative genre, predominantly pursued by ‘also-rans’ of the tour who can’t make it in singles. In legend Bjorn Borg’s (1980, p.68) words, ‘If you’re trying to do well in the singles, it just doesn’t make sense to play the team event’. His contemporary, John McEnroe, won more doubles titles (78) than singles titles (77) in his career, and argued that the doubles game was not attracting the best players anymore: Why we are even playing doubles at this point is a mystery to me. I love doubles but I don’t even recognise what this is. Most doubles players, I hate to say, are the slow guys who were not quick enough to play singles. (The Telegraph, 5 December 2013) The fatigue factor and the popularity, prestige and charm of singles created a massive vacuum in doubles in the 1970s and 1980s when almost all the leading players of the era (except McEnroe) stayed away from doubles, and there was also a significant absence of any real doubles stars. However, it was Paes-Bhupathi who spearheaded the revival of doubles play, adding star power and leading the charge of a new generation of doubles players. In fact, in April 2018 against China, Paes, still going strong at the age of 44 and after playing with 120 partners, surpassed Italy’s Nicola Pietrangeli’s previous Davis Cup world record of 42 doubles wins. 159

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In a country like India, which has historically made sloth-like progress in all world sports except cricket and hockey for over a century, the successes of Paes, Bhupathi, Mirza and Bopanna have helped make tennis a premium sport in their country. While acknowledging that their combined successes have encouraged many youngsters in the country to take up tennis, in singles India continues to remain a microscopic entity. Unlike badminton, with an assembly-line of top-notch senior and junior players with respectable international performances, Indian tennis has been badly languishing and desperately seeking an elusive world-class singles player. When Paes, Bhupathi and Mirza set up their respective tennis academies and/or coaching clinics, they chose to run those more as a franchise than a dedicated, personalised and tailor-made model like the state-of-the-art Badminton Academy in Hyderabad, run by former All England Open Badminton Championship winner Pullela Gopichand. Perhaps as a consequence, while India’s success in tennis has been limited to only doubles, the story in badminton is the reverse with the Indian “shuttlers” achieving more global success in singles. Moreover, the Indian tennis administrators, in addition to what has been regarded as their inept handling of the Paes-Bhupathi enmity, have miserably failed to create a badminton-like system that can develop champions. India does not even have a top-tier tennis tournament hosted in their country. Nevertheless, if Paes and Bhupathi have catapulted the popularity, passion, acceptance and visibility of tennis to new heights in India, Mirza, who is still the most successful Indian woman to ever play singles, has played a massive role in encouraging young girls to pursue their dreams with the racket and, thus, has kick-started a significant emancipation drive for women’s sports. But once Paes and Mirza retire, there will be an immediate void as none of the upcoming Indian junior players like Yuki Bhambri, Ramkumar Ramanathan, Prajnesh Gunneswaran, Sumit Nagal and Saketh Myneni have shown much promise in majors to date. There may be a substantial surge in the popularity of tennis with the mushrooming of tennis academies, classes and clinics across the country, but the emancipation and enhanced popularity of women’s tennis in India have failed to translate into future success, while the fading fortunes of men’s tennis is desperately seeking a beacon of hope and success in the post-Paes/Mirza era.

Note 1 Pritchard won two silver medals at the 1900 Paris Olympics.

References Agassi, A. (2009) Open: An Autobiography. New York:Vintage. Amritraj,V. (1990) An Autobiography. Kolkata: Rupa & Co. Bobb, D & Padmanabhan, A. (2005, 19 September) Sania Mania. India Today. Borg, B. (1980) Bjorn Borg: My Life and Game. London: Sphere Books. Briggs, S. (2013, 5 December) John McEnroe Makes Controversial Call for Doubles Tennis to be Ditched from the Major Tournaments. The Telegraph. Brijnath, R. (2005, 9 February) The Girl who is Breaking Barriers. British Broadcasting Corporation. Available at: http:​//new​s.bbc​.co.u​k/2/h​i/sou​th_as​ia/42​32197​.stm Datta, P.K. (2001) A Century of Indian Tennis. Publications Division, Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, Govt. of India. Guha, R. (2014) A Corner of a Foreign Field:The Indian Story of a British Sport. London: Penguin. Gupta, S. (2005, 4 October) I Hope I Represented India in a Proper Manner. The Financial Express. Majumdar, B. (2004) Cricket in Colonial India, 1880–1947. D.Phil Thesis, University of Oxford. Mangan, J.A. (2000) Athleticism in the Victorian and Edwardian Public School. London: Frank Cass. Mani, L. (1998) Contentious Traditions. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. 160

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Press Trust of India. (2005, 23 September) Vijay Amritraj Hails Sania Mirza for Putting Tennis on Front Page. The Times of India. Available at: http:​//tim​esofi​ndia.​india​times​.com/​sport​s/ten​nis/t​op-st​ories​/Vija​ y-Amr​itraj​-hail​s-San​ia-Mi​rza-f​or-pu​tting​-tenn​is-on​-fron​t-pag​e/art​icles​how/4​90774​44.cm​s Qureshi, MS. (2010) Compilation of Observations & recommendations made by Sachar Committee & Ranganath Mishra Commission, The National Commission of Minorities, Government of India, July 2010. Available at: http://ncm.nic.in/pdf/compilation.pdf. (Accessed September 2017) Raha, S. (2010, 15 August) I Don’t Believe That I am a Talented Tennis Player. The Telegraph India. Sen, R. (2015) Nation at Play: A History of Sport in India. New York: Columbia University Press. Sudarshan, N. (2014, 29 November) I am Particularly Proud to Have Won Titles in Three Different Decades. Sportstar. Tendulkar, S. (2016, 21 April) An Inspiration on the Court. Time.

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16 Tennis in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region Mahfoud Amara

“Do they play tennis?” an American anthropologist once asked me in reference to Qatari sport practice. This question triggered a number of issues relevant to the focus of this chapter. First, in relation to the socio-economic status of tennis, perceived as a sport of the “rich”. Why, then, did the Qataris, who had the highest GDP in the Arab world, not engage with tennis, supposedly the natural sporting activity that reproduces the lifestyle and tastes of the rich? The other dimension of the question is the cultural representation of competitive sport, as defined by Western-European values of modern sport practice. Tennis with its rational performance system and compartmentalised space is representative of Westernised advances and modernity. Interestingly my interlocutor did not ask me whether they practiced horse-riding or camel-racing, maybe to avoid the trap of orientalism, but he did not ask me whether they played football either – the very question that you might expect in reference to (male-dominated) sporting culture in the region and elsewhere. The conversation has helped persuade me to reflect on the societal significance of tennis in the region, which is the chief aim of this chapter. In terms of content, the chapter first discusses the social, political and economic significance of tennis in the Arab world. Tennis, as in other societies, has been associated in Arab countries with the elite. It is usually practiced in exclusive space/courts, inside (highly) secured luxurious resorts and villas. It is a sport practice with a high symbolic capital that distinguishes the elite – dignitaries and members of the party apparatus, and high military ranks – from the masses.With regard to elite sport performance, Moroccan Younes El Aynaoui’s high ranking of 14 in the early 1990s represents the golden era of Arab tennis in the international arena. Alongside him in the top 25 were fellow Moroccans Hicham Arazi and Karim Alami. Considering the “prestige” associated with tennis, Morocco in North Africa and the United Arab Emirates (venue for the Dubai Duty Free Tournament) and Qatar (which stages the ATP1 Qatar Exonmobil Open and WTA Total Open) in the Middle East, are investing in hosting international tennis tournaments as a strategy for global branding through sport.

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Tennis and nation formation After the 1988 riots in Algeria and the beginning of so-called political pluralism, Chedli Ben Jdid, the Algerian president from 1979 to 1991, was once asked by a journalist during a televised political debate which sport he likes most to practice during his free time. His answer was tennis. His response was received with mixed feelings by Algerians; on the one hand they were critical, tennis being a sport of the wealthy/bourgeois people (the enemy of socialist Algeria), and, on the other hand, they admired him as it was the first time that an Algerian president talked about his leisure time on television. One could argue that his answer signalled an end to “socialism” in Algeria and the one-party-state dominance over politics (at least for a short period) and public morality.Yes, it is right for an Algerian President to practice sport and to have some leisure, and it is not against the principles of the Algerian revolution or contrary to anti-imperialist sentiment against the former coloniser, France. During the French occupation of Algeria, tennis had been reserved for wealthy European settlers, high ranking army officers and their families. This reference to tennis in Algeria is anecdotal, and tennis is still a marginal sport there. In Morocco, however, the royal family has invested in tennis as part of its strategy for development of tourism. As the second largest foreign exchange earner in Morocco, after the phosphate industry, tourism is a vital strategic component of Morocco’s development project since it became an independent nation in 1956. Morocco is in competition with popular destinations around the Mediterranean Sea such as Spain, Italy, Malta and Egypt. These countries heavily invested in sport tourism, for example building golf courses and hotels. The royal family also initiated national and international tennis tournaments, including the Grand Prix Princesse Lalla Meryem for women’s tennis that began in 2001, which is now integrated in the professional WTA Tour.The Grand Prix Hassan II for men’s tennis has been organised since 1986 and has been integrated, since 1990, into the ATP World Tour (ATP 250). This explains the emergence of talented male and female tennis players in Morocco, and they have dominated the game in the MENA region. The trio Karim Alami, Hicham Arazi and Younes El Aynaoui symbolise the success of Moroccan tennis and that of Morocco on the international tennis circuit. Arazi reached the final of the Monte Carlo Masters and a number of times was a grand-slam quarter-finalist (in the Australian Open in 2000 and 2004, and the French Open in 1997 and 1998). El Aynaoui at his best in 2003 was ranked 14th in the world, and Alami won two ATP tournaments and reached the quarter-final at the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games. Thanks to their performances, Morocco competed in the World Group of the Davis Cup in 2001, 2002 and 2004. For the political establishment (Al Makhzan), the success of Morocco in track and field and tennis represented a showcase for Morocco’s proclaimed leadership in the region, in opposition to socialist and “third world” Algeria and Doustourian Tunisia.2 In Egypt there is a long tradition of playing tennis, particularly among the middle class, including professionals, government civil-service employees and their families, within the national network of multisport sport clubs (Al-Nadi), the most popular of which are al-Nadi al-Zamalek and al-Nadi al-Ahli, both formed in 1911. As described by Jacob (2010, p.660), Al-Nadi represented in the era between the two World Wars ‘a gendered site of bourgeois culture as much as it was a story of colonialism and nationalism’. Tennis is also practiced at hotels in resorts such as Sharm El Sheikh, which is a venue of numerous small-scale international tennis tournaments. The luxury accommodation and warm climes on offer in places like the Red Sea resort of Sharm El-Sheikh are ‘attractive for players beneath the world tours’ (Dickson 2014). The year 2014 had seen the staging of 91 events, 51 of them for women and 40 for men, all of them in Sharm El Sheikh. This could be explained by the tight security at Sharm El Shaikh, which is strategic for income generation for an Egyptian state that is anxious in the midst of political turmoil to protect a tourist industry that employs five million Egyptians from collapsing. 163

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Regarding the international performance of Egypt in tennis, Mohamed Safwat is the top-ranked Egyptian in ATP rankings (as of October 2017, he is number 281). His predecessor, Ismail El Shafei, was the only Egyptian player to make it to the top 40 in Grand Prix/ATP ranking history. This is considered low when taking into account that Egypt is the most populated Arab country (91.51 million) with 39.7% of the population residing in urban areas. The tables include the list of male (other than Safwat) and female tennis players who made it to the ATP and WTA rankings, as of October 2017.

Tennis, city branding and place making3 According to an SMG Insight report (2016) about sport participation in the MENA region, surveying a representative sample of 108,673 respondents across 13 countries, tennis is ranked fifth among the top ten most followed sports (19%). The Wimbledon Championships was ranked in tenth position among MENA top ten sports events. In terms of attendance, tennis is ranked sixth among MENA’s top ten most attended live sport events. The general interest in the sport, particularly among expatriate communities in the countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC),4 and the attraction of tennis tournaments such as the US Open, French Open and Wimbledon, as well as the brand value of top international tennis players, helps explain the GCC’s investment in tennis for city and country branding. Huge investments are made to attract, host and sponsor international sports events on the Arabian Peninsula in order to showcase the economic development of the region and to demonstrate the openness of the monarchy states in the GCC to modernity. Cities such as Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Manama and Doha are increasingly associated with the sport industry and are promoted as must-go-to destinations for fans of golf, jet skiing, sailing and motor racing. Scharfenort (2012, p.211) observed that sports and the hosting of sports events are at the heart of neo-liberal urbanisation policies and branding activities of many coastal cities in the Gulf region as they combine ‘a confluence of strategies of consumerism, entertainment and global tourism’. Countries in the Gulf region, particularly the UAE, Qatar and to a lesser extent Bahrain, have embarked on a strategy of integrating their country into the global sport sector, thanks to significant revenue from oil and gas exports. Sport is now at the core of the (hyper) modern project of urbanisation in the region. “Sport cities” and “urban zones” built around the theme of sport, combined with high tech, retail and hospitality are emerging, offering the local population (citizens or tourists) the possibility of being part of the global sporting experience. Brannagan Table 16.1 Arab Tennis men in the top 1000 ATP ranking Name

Nationality

Ranking Points

Malek Jaziri Karim-Mohamed Maamoun Lamine Ouahab Youssef Hossam Moez Echargui Anis Ghorbel Amine Ahouda Issam Haitham Taweel Aziz Dougaz

Tunisian Egypt Morocco Egypt Tunisia Tunisia Morocco Egypt Tunisia

75 280 395 540 580 610 668 696 842

671 176 106 59 50 43 33 31 18

Source: ATP World Tour, 2017. http://www.atpworldtour.com/en/rankings/singles

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Tennis in the MENA region Table 16.2 Arab Tennis women in the top 500 WTA ranking Name

Nationality Ranking Points

Ons Jabeur Fatma Al-Nabhani

Tunisia Oman

106 474

576 66

Source: WTA, 2017. http://www.tennis.com/rankings/WTA/

and Guilianotti (2014) explain that the theme of sporting architecture in the region represents a ‘dramatic symbol of change’, capturing notions of modernism and national ambition in similar ways to Asian cities that have undergone rapid development, such as Kuala Lumpur and Singapore. The contemporary utilisation of modern sport can be explained in relation to modernisation debates as a way for Gulf countries to build a new identity, in opposition to the old “orientalist cliché”. It is based on the emerging model of a (liberal) monarchic state that has succeeded in finding the right balance between Western “efficiency”, symbolised today by the efficient management of major sport events, and the “authenticity” of Arab culture. As explained earlier, smaller states in the region who are surrounded by more populated and globally influential neighbours (i.e. Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Iran) found in sport an “identity marker” to boost their sovereignty and “uniqueness” (Leonard 2013). Dubai took the lead in using tennis as a branding tool for its mega urban project in the region. Tennis implies luxury, and access to wealthy and influential persons in the realms of show-business and politics. With players such as Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal among the world’s top ten highest-paid athletes by endorsements alone (Gale 2016), tennis as a sport fits well with the Dubai “brand”. Particularly noteworthy was the game played by Andre Agassi and Roger Federer in 2005, at the top of the seven-star hotel Burj Al Arab – the third tallest building in the world standing on an artificial island 211 metres above the ground. A helipad area that covered a surface area of 415 square metres was converted into a tennis court for the occasion. It was an iconic moment that represented perfectly the marketing of Dubai as the new place where “everything is possible”. The event was produced by the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships, which in 2017 celebrated its 25th anniversary. According to Abulleil (2017), Dubai is becoming a privileged destination now chosen by top tennis players for practicing, making use of the state-of-the-art facilities available at luxurious hotels around the city. It is worth noting that, according to Abulleil (2017), Federer bought an apartment in Dubai almost a decade ago and he’s been a regular here ever since. Many others have followed suit, with the latest being French professional Lucas Pouille, who lives just a couple of buildings down the road from the Swiss. For Abdulleil (2007, n.p.), the reason for bringing high-profile tennis tournaments and players to Dubai has been less to develop home-grown talent but more to position the city as a tourist destination: The vision of Sheikh Mohamed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the ruler of Dubai and the vice president/prime minister of the country, was to bring some of the biggest sporting events in the world to the emirate, in order to raise its status and relevance globally. He also believed sports tourism would benefit the country greatly, and he was not wrong.

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Capitalizing on the fame around the Dubai Duty Free Tournament held under the patronage of H.H. Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, privately run tennis facilities and academies emerged in large numbers around the country, to cater mostly for the large expatriate community. Tennis tours are organised by travel agencies offering their clients a taste of “middle eastern” tennis culture, “Arabic charm” and shopping in the world’s biggest malls. This narrative is well illustrated in the following advert of a local travel agency in Dubai offering a tennis tour, which reproduces somehow the old colonial narrative of the “exotic” orient. Thanks to a burgeoning economy and expanding ex-pat community, there is a wealth of state-of-the-art facilities on offer here, as well as an enthusiasm for sport that is really coming on in leaps and bounds. And whether you want to shop ‘til you drop, go for a dusty drive in the dunes, make a splash at the Wild Wadi Water Theme Park, or soak up the sights, sounds and smells of a souk, Gullivers can organise the perfect Middle Eastern tennis tour to suit your squad. (gulliverssportstours.co.uk) Following the same theme of the production of space around the “spectacular”, resulting also from the competition (or rivalry) between Dubai and Doha, the organisers of the Doha Open in Qatar, which is the other ATP tournament in the region, offered in 2011 another exhibition game, this time between Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer (Pickup 2011), and on a floating platform in the sea at the West Bay area in Doha, surrounded by the city’s iconic high towers.These towers similarly represent also the Qatari model of modernization and urban development. As stated by Wiedmann et al. (2012, p.47) Tourism was identified as a crucial factor in the establishment of Doha as an emerging hub in order to diversify the economy as well as brand the city to attract investment. The success story of sports events in Qatar began with the Qatar Open and was followed by the selection of Qatar to host the 2006 Asian Games, which led to the development of the 250-hectare Aspire Zone. The Qatar ExxonMobil5 Open Men’s Tennis is the first in the prestigious ATP World Tour 250 Series that takes place across the globe, which in 2017 celebrated its 25th year.The 2017 edition held at the Khalifa International Tennis and Squash Stadium in Doha (from 2 to 7 January) was sponsored by Qatar Airways and Qatar Duty Free. The December to March period represents the peak of the tourism season in the region, and most international tournaments and championships are held in this period before the heat season that starts in April. This reinforces the strategy of Qatar and other countries in the region (although to a lesser extent in Saudi Arabia) to implement these high-profile events for city branding and the development of tourism sector. As rightly suggested by the Qatar Airways Group chief executive This important extension to the ATP World Tour 250 Series celebrates the very finest in men’s tennis, providing international and local audiences a thrilling six-day festival of elite sport. Important sporting events such as the Qatar ExxonMobil Open Men’s Tennis 2017 tournament help establish Qatar as a world class sporting and entertainment destination and I wish all competitors the best of luck in what I am sure will be an exhilarating competition.

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To this end, long-distance travellers transiting via the brand-new Hamad International Airport are encouraged to extend their stay in Doha to attend the tournament.Visitors are offered the opportunity the draw to win a Qatar Duty Free Millionaire Ticket and a chance to take home $1 million. One could argue that this aggressive marketing strategy of Qatar Airways in partnership with Qatar Duty Free is also aiming at taking a slice of the market from Dubai Duty Free and other rival Gulf carriers including Emirates, Abu Dhabi-based Etihad Airways and Bahrain-based Gulf Air (the official sponsor for Formula 1 in Bahrain) (Rapoza 2014). According to Foreign Policy Magazine, the Gulf city-state has emerged as an air super-hub, a modern crossroads connecting East and West. The rise of Dubai and other Arabian Peninsula air hubs – Abu Dhabi and Doha – has reshaped global commercial aviation. And the Gulf “Big Three” airlines – Emirates in Dubai, Etihad Airways in Abu Dhabi, and Qatar Airways in Doha – have emerged as major global carriers, capable of going toe to toe with the industry’s giants. (Molavi 2015, n.p) Having highlighted the importance of Men’s tennis, Dubai and Qatar have been also active in promoting women’s tennis through the staging of WTA6 tournaments on their soil, usually during the month of February, including the Qatar Total Open Women’s Singles followed by Dubai Tennis Championships. In addition, there are other low-profile tournaments such as the Al Habtoor Tennis Challenge, sponsored by the Al-Habtoor Group7, which was the first women’s tennis tournament in the Middle East when it started in 1998 (Rizvi 2015). In total, Dubai and Doha host five women’s tennis tournaments. To break with the traditional stereotype about the status of women in societies in the Arabian Peninsula, these tournaments position the two countries as promoters of women’s sport in the region. This is despite the absence of female players from Qatar and the UAE, or from the Gulf region generally, with the exception of the 24-year-old Muscat native Fatma Al Nabhani, who (as of October 2017) is ranked at 367th in the world. She explained the absence of female tennis players from the region in an interview with the Qatari state-owned news channel Al Jazeera: A career in tennis was made harder by the lack of prominent female idols from my region. I wish when I was younger, I had a role model. If I knew that someone from the Middle East or from the GCC has done it, I believe that I could have done better. But being the only one there and you don’t know if you can make it or you can’t make it, so it is tough. (Aziz 2016, n.p) Interestingly, in relation to the global broadcasting of women’s tennis, beIN sport, which has its headquarters in Doha – owned by beIN Media Group whose Chairman and CEO, Nasser Al-Khelaifi, the current Chief Executive of the Qatari-owned football club Paris Saint Germain – recently struck a five-year deal with the WTA, which started in 2017. The deal included exclusive coverage of more than 40 WTA tournaments live on beIN SPORTS CONNECT, the network’s streaming service, on a dedicated WTA channel within the platform. Select tournaments also aired on beIN SPORTS and beIN SPORTS en Español. For the year 2017, beIN SPORTS showcased 43 WTA events including 17 premier tournaments (beINSports. com). This helped to reinforce the dominance of beIN SPORTS over sport broadcasting in the MENA region and its presence in the international market. There has been substantial criticism of the beIN SPORTS business model, much of it from United Arab Emirates, which competes with Qatar to attract high-profile international sports 167

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competitions. BeIN SPORTS investment has been associated with Qatar’s ambition to dominate the sport broadcasting industry in the region and has been accused of being driven more by a “soft power” political agenda than by pure profit maximisation.

Conclusion The aim of this chapter has been to offer an overview of tennis in the MENA region reflecting on local historical and societal contexts as well as on the global sport trends. In particular, tennis has been shown as a sport practiced by an affluent minority, that has been integrated into a strategy of nation formation and promotion, built around key figures of the state and ruling elites, and in the development of tourism sector. This has been the trend in Morocco, Tunisia and Egypt, whose economies depend on the influx of tourists, but which have been directly hit by the region’s recent political turmoil. The hosting of high-profile tennis tournaments, particularly in Qatar and the UAE, is part of the strategy for city branding and place-making. The ideal package would be a combination of the following: to travel with Qatar Airways and Emirates, enjoy shopping in Dubai and Qatar Duty Free, and buy tickets to watch top tennis players competing for lucrative prizes. This is done while enjoying the postmodern landscape of the city that is represented by the tallest buildings in the world, such as Borj Khalifa and “the essence of Arabia” that you can explore in the refurbished souks in the city’s old quarter. The hosting of women’s tennis tournaments in these supposedly “conservative” countries is aimed at breaking free from the “orientalist” vision of these societies as being not tolerant of women’s sport.8 However, the impact of this strategy on the development of women’s tennis in the region is yet to be seen. The hosting of these international tennis tournaments and other sports might be affected by the recent political tensions between GCC countries, but also by the geo-politics of the region as a whole, including the Arab-Israeli conflict. In 2008, organisers of tennis tournaments in Dubai refused to issue a visa for the Israeli men’s doubles team. In 2009, Ms. Shahar Peer was not issued a visa to participate in the Dubai Open, yet she was the first Israeli player to participate in a major tournament in the GCC, in 2008 in Qatar.The UAE justified its decision on the basis of safety to avoid any anti-Israeli protests fuelled by the Israel-Hamas war that year, wherein 1,300 Palestinians and 13 Israelis were killed. Back then, the WTA official response was as follows:‘The WTA believes very strongly and has a clear rule and policy that no host country should deny a player the right to compete in a tournament for which she has qualified by ranking’ (Daily Mail, 16 February 2009) In terms of performance, the presence of Arab male and female tennis players in the international arena is not impactful, mainly because of the lack of investment from sport authorities to promote tennis – which is less politically significantly than football or other Olympic sports – outside the exclusive (closed and secured) clubs and hotel resorts, and into school playgrounds and multisport clubs.Tennis in the MENA region, as in other parts of the world, is still associated with wealth and luxury, hence is not considered as a sport for the masses.

Notes 1 Association of Tennis Professionals, founded in 1972. 2 A reference to the Dostour (Constitution) Socialist Party under the leadership, first of president Habib Bourguiba, followed by Zine Al Abidine Ben Ali. The party is seen as ‘centre left’. There is a similar party in Egypt. 3 See Schneekloth & Shibley (1995) for a discussion on “place-making” 4 Established in 1981, the GCC members are: Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. 168

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5 Headquartered in Texas, ExxonMobil is the biggest publicly traded oil and gas company in the world. It partners the Qatari government in drilling for oil and natural gas, both in Qatar and beyond: see Finn & Blair (2017). It has been strongly criticised for suppressing scientific evidence of the effects of climate change – see, for example, Klein (2017). Sponsorship of a prestigious international tennis tournament presents a more palatable corporate face to the world. 6 Women’s Tennis Association, founded in 1973 7 A conglomerate based in the UAE with interests in hospitality, motor vehicles, real estate, education and publishing. 8 See Said (2003) for a discussion of “orientalism”

References Abulleil, B. (2017, 11 January) Dubai Duty Free Tennis: A 25-year-old World-Class Event, But Where's the Local Talent? Sport 360. Available at: http://sport360.com/article/tennis/dubai-tennischampionship/218150/dubai-duty-free-tennis-championships-a-world-class-event-celebrating-itssilver-jubilee-but-wheres-the-local-talent (accessed February 2017) Aziz, S. (2016, 21 March) Fatma Al Nabhani: Oman's Top Female Tennis Player. Aljazeera News. Available at: http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2016/03/oman-top-female-tennis-player-breaksbarriers-160310092651809.html (accessed April 2017) BeIN SPORTS.com (January 27, 2017) beIN SPORTS Welcomes the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) to its Programming Lineup. BeIN SPORTS. Available at: http://www.beinsports.com/us/tennis/video/ bein-sports-welcomes-the-womens-tennis-associ/435383 (accessed March 2017) Dickson, M. (2014, 11 March) Egypt has conquered its troubles to become a hotbed for the wannabes of world tennis. Daily Mail. Finn, T. & Blair, E. (2017) Qatar Petroleum, ExxonMobil to explore for oil and gas in Cyprus Reuters. Available at: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-qatar-cyprus-energy-idUSKBN17718J (access 24 June 2017) Gale. A (2016, 19 June) Tennis Becomes a Profitable Player. Management Today. Gullivers Sport Travel webpage. Tennis Tour in the Middle East. Gullivers Sports Tours. Available at: http:// www.gulliverssportstours.co.uk/Destinations/Middle-East/Tennis (accessed April 2017) Jacob W.C. (2010) Overcoming ‘Simply Being’: Straight Sex, Masculinity and Physical Culture in Modern Egypt, Gender and History, 22(3), 658–76. Klein, N. (2017) No Is Not Enough. London: Allen Lane. Leonard, M.J. (2013) The Small Gulf States and Sporting Events: Economic and Political Motivations [online]. Available at: http://www.geostrategicforecasting.com/the-small-gulf-states-and-sportingevents-economic-and-political-motivations/#_ftnref35 (accessed 10 October 2016) Molavi, A. (2015, 4 May) The Arab Battle for U.S. Skies. Foreign Policy. Available at: http://foreignpolicy. com/2015/05/04/dubai-qatar-etihad-emirates-fair-skies-open-skies-american-delta-united (accessed December 2016) Pickup, O. (2017, 4 January) Get the Ball Boy Some Scuba Gear… Tennis Stars Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer Play Match on Floating Court IN the Persian Gulf. Daily Mail. Rapoza, K. (2014, 1 April) Why UAE And Qatar Have The 'World's Best' Airlines. Forbes. Available at: https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2014/04/01/why-uae-and-qatar-have-the-worlds-bestairlines/#18c916353209 (accessed December 2016) Rizvi, A. (2015, 8 November) Middle East’s Oldest Women’s Tennis Tournament, Al Habtoor Challenge, Set to Turn 18. The National. Available at: http://www.thenational.ae/sport/tennis/middle-easts-oldestwomens-tennis-tournament-al-habtoor-challenge-set-to-turn-18 (accessed October 2016) Said, E. (2003) Orientalism. London: Penguin. Scharfenort, N. (2012) Urban Development and Social Change in Qatar: The Qatar National Vision 2030 and the 2022 FIFA World Cup, Journal of Arabian Studies: Arabia, the Gulf, and the Red Sea, 2 (2), 209–30. Schneekloth, L.H. & Shibley, R.G. (1995) Placemaking:The Art and Practice of Building. Oxford: Wiley. Wiedmann F., Salama, A.M. & Thierstein, A. (2012) Urban Evolution of the City of Doha: An Investigation into the Impact of Economic Transformations on Urban Structures, Metu Journal of the Faculty of Architecture, 29(2) 35–61. http://jfa.arch.metu.edu.tr/archive/0258-5316/2012/cilt29/sayi_2/35-61. pdf

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Part II

Culture and representations (gender, race, class, the arts and media)

17 Fashioning competitive lawn tennis Object, image and reality in women’s tennis dress 1884–1919 Suzanne Rowland1

This chapter will demonstrate how dress specifically for playing tennis first developed within the boundaries of class, respectability and fashionable taste. By using garment analysis techniques, photographs and printed materials it will question dominant representations of early tennis dress. Moving away from the “garden party” representation of the game, it will reassess performance through dress, and demonstrate that competitive players from the late Victorian and Edwardian period played a strenuous game and competed to win. Cultural anthropologist Daniel Miller (2010, p.55) writes that familiar objects can be taken for granted and as a consequence become invisible. The familiar objects in this study are tennis clothes—from the first Wimbledon Ladies Championship in 1884 to the arrival of a modernist style in 1919 worn by French player and sporting icon Suzanne Lenglen. Using an objectfocused material culture analysis, this chapter provides a fresh representation of women’s tennis. In doing so, it will move away from the often repeated history of garden party tennis, which places an emphasis on courtship, etiquette, femininity and the folly of women who played tennis in fashionable dress (Gillmeister 1997; Lake 2012, 2015; McCrone 1988; Walker 1989). This representation has been repeated so often it has largely become predictable and unquestioned. However, from the outset there was a privileged group of affluent white middle-class women, who regularly competed in tournaments and who played a strenuous and athletic game. Evidence from surviving dress, sports journalism, women’s journals, photographs and testimonials will be used to show that female players stayed within the confines of acceptable dress, but made small modifications to their clothing and footwear to allow for comfort and ease of movement on court. By taking part in tennis tournaments, white women from the affluent English middle classes can be understood as mounting a resistance (albeit without intention) to the prevailing idea that their primary roles were in the domestic sphere of the home as wives and mothers. Following a brief overview of object-focused research, this chapter will outline representations of tennis fashions with a focus on femininity and class. A survey of tennis dress follows in two sections; the first examines early incremental developments, and this is followed by examples of modernity and unorthodoxy in tennis dress. 173

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Using an object-focused, material culture analysis in dress history The application of a material culture analysis in dress history involves a close analysis of dress and associated artefacts, combined with a cultural and contextual interpretation of their use. Writing in The Study of Dress History, Lou Taylor (2002, p.115) explains that a wide range of visual sources can be used for analysis, including surviving examples of clothing, photographic images and descriptive period texts: ‘All provide information on style, quality of fabrics and garments, cut, hair-styles, body stance, accessories and exactly how these were worn… In every case…these images have to be individually assessed through the lens of their own periods’. Taylor further emphasises the acquisition of knowledge gained through the study of garment cut, construction and manufacture (Taylor 2002, p.12), a technique which has been at the forefront of museum-based dress history research (see Arnold 1977). In this chapter an objectfocused analysis of a surviving tennis dress reveals deep armholes designed to accommodate the sweeping movement of the arm. As Daniel Miller (2010, p.42) concludes, ‘in material culture we are concerned at least as much with how things make people as the other way round’. In this case the blouse enabled the player to move without restrictions, a description completely at odds with the usual commentary on tennis dress. Indeed, descriptions of women’s tennis dress from the late Victorian and Edwardian periods tend towards the fanciful and poetic. Representations pass unquestioned and are repeated from one historian to the next leading to the formation of myth. It is to this issue that discussion now turns.

Representation, femininity and class Fashion Historian Christopher Breward notes that every time we “read” clothing in portraits ‘representation is being decoded as text, associative meanings combed out and cultural systems established’ (1998, p.306). Without a multi-layered understanding of women’s fashion, and the context within which it was worn, some commentators write of players being hampered by sweeping skirts, tightly laced corsets, whalebone collars and highly decorative hats. Limited opinions like these can be formed if only visual representations, such as photographs, advertisements, cartoons and paintings, are used to make judgements about modes of dress and methods of play. As social historian Leora Auslander argues, visual representations are useful to historians when it is not possible to view the object directly, but we must take care not to ascribe meaning out of context (2005, p.1018). When tennis dress is viewed through the ‘lens of its own period’ another interpretation is apparent (Taylor 2002, p.115). Much contemporary sports journalism, whether in tennis journal Pastime or the sports pages of society journals such as The Ladies’ Field or The Ladies Realm, focused on match play and the physicality of players. For example, a report of the Northern Championships in Pastime (May 1884, p.111) describes Charlotte Cooper as ‘volleying constantly with great effect, returning the hard drives of her opponents remarkably well… [with] quickness at the net, while her lobbying was almost perfect’.While an article entitled ‘Lawn Tennis Tournaments and Players’ in The Lady’s Realm (1897, pp. 324–31) described lawn tennis as ‘a true game; recreative, athletic, and strongly competitive… With all whole-hearted players it has become a strenuous pursuit.’ Every era has its own standards of representation and between 1890 and 1910 fetishised images of fashionable women appeared in newspapers, magazines and on advertising billboards (Buckley & Fawcett 2002, p.16). In the mid-1890s the corseted waist of the fashionable woman, the very core of womanliness, was narrowed and distorted by fashion illustrators. In one example, smart London department store Peter Robinson advertised in its ‘Catalogue of Fancy Departments’ (c.1895) a tennis shirt in a catalogue of shirts and blouses. It was front fastening 174

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with a high wing collar, leg-of-mutton sleeves and a shirt-style bodice to be worn tucked in at the waist, all elements of a highly fashionable women’s shirt of the period. The sketched figure wearing the shirt has an impossibly small waist, the purpose of which was to provide a great contrast to the voluminous sleeves which were the height of fashion in the mid-1890s. The advertisement depicts a stylised ideal of a woman and is in keeping with fashion illustrations of the period. A photograph on the front cover of Pastime (May 1895) features player Mrs PineCoffin wearing the same style of shirt. Here the shirt also has noticeably large sleeves, but they are balanced by the loose bodice worn tucked into Mrs Pine-Coffin’s normal-sized, although smoothly corseted, waist. The Peter Robinson shirt was part of a small but growing market of clothing designed specifically for playing tennis. In contrast fashion plates in women’s journals often depicted women holding a tennis racquet as a prop. This representation can cause confusion because the tennis racquet in this case was not included as a statement of intent by the designer or manufacturer. The inclusion of the racquet merely infers the garment was lightweight and suitable for summer daywear. The link between the clothing and the racquet can also be read as a marker of tennis as a particular class-based leisure activity. Representations of tennis dress are narrowly focused on the middle and upper classes because as Eustace Miles in The Lady’s World (June 1909, p.1012) explained, ‘Neither the players nor the spectators… belong to the poorer classes’. The poorer classes were excluded by membership only clubs, codes of dress and the cost of entrance fees for tournaments. The cost of entering the first Wimbledon Ladies Championship was ten shillings and six pence (Little 1983 2002, p.1). In contrast, a maker of flannel tennis shirts was paid just over four shillings for making nearly two dozen in a very long working day (Black 1915 1983, p.81). Participation in competitive tennis was one of many developments made by the ‘New Woman’ which became a source of ridicule by satirists. A cartoon featured in Punch in 1885 (p.30) illustrates a prevailing worry of the late Victorian period – the incompatibility of strenuous sport and femininity. A young woman asks a young man to carry her tennis shoes in his pockets, but he replies that his pockets are not big enough; the inference is that due to her tennis playing ways, ‘Miss Gladys’ is becoming unsexed and has developed large, manly feet.Yet, by competing in tennis tournaments, female players broke new ground and, in doing so, became a public spectacle for a paying audience. Although this was a gallery of spectators from their own class, participation enabled women to move from the private space of the home, to the semi-private space of the tennis club, to the public, although rarefied, space of the tournament. In 1897, the spectators at a tennis tournament were described as well-dressed, well-behaved and in some quarters, ‘snobbishly disposed’ (Lawn Tennis Tournaments and Players 1897, p.328). Nevertheless, to step in front of a crowd was still potentially hazardous, ‘It is the running of lawn-tennis tournaments as “Shows” that hinders many physically energetic, but mentally timid, lady-players from competing outside their own county or set’ (Pastime May 1897, p.328). More than a decade later the same concerns prevailed as The Lady’s World (June 1909, p.1012) reported that tournaments involved ‘a very severe ordeal for the mind and nerves as well as for the body’. The personal torment experienced when performing in front of a crowd, alongside the mental and physical discipline needed to play competitive tennis, were subjects touched upon in both Lawn Tennis for Ladies by Dorothea Lambert Chambers (1910) and Lawn Tennis for Girls by Suzanne Lenglen (1920). These issues were deemed worthy of attention because in playing tennis women were effectively challenging contemporary understandings of a woman’s role in society, one which had long been the subject of what J.A. Mangan terms ‘biological justification’ (2006, p.147). Mangan argues that the idealised image of a woman in Victorian society, as ‘the angel in the house’, was 175

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in direct opposition to the qualities needed to play competitive tennis (2006, p.147).This salient point is expanded upon by tennis commentator Mrs. Harris who recorded the high number of injuries sustained during the 1913 season by female players, which resulted in three out of five unfinished championship matches (Harris 1913, p.581). Mrs Harris stressed the perception of what she termed the ‘prehistoric male’ who still longed for women to remain in the domestic sphere of the home: ‘If women burn their fingers making pastry or break their necks falling down stairs with the washing basket it is counted unto them for righteousness, but if they strain a muscle playing games they get no sympathy whatever’ (1913, p.581). In 1914, lawn tennis was suspended at Wimbledon for the duration of the First World War. As Buckley and Fawcett (2002, p.50) note, ‘war drew into even sharper relief those anxieties about feminine identities and women’s roles’.

Development and innovation in tennis dress The winner of the first Ladies’ Championship at Wimbledon was Maud Watson who had a reputation as a formidable player. In a five-year stretch from 1881 to 1886 she was unbeaten in 55 matches (Holland 2011, p.41). From a photograph of Watson taken on the day of her Wimbledon victory she can be seen wearing the fashions of the time – a bustle skirt with apron drape and a tight bodice with fitted sleeves. On first appearance her dress appears to have been a hindrance to her performance, but on closer inspection it can be observed that her skirt was at ankle length, and her small bustle is hardly noticeable. Her separate bodice has three-quarter length sleeves and crucially it was made from silk jersey (Little 2002, p.4). This lightweight knit fabric with cooling properties would have been a vital aid to movement, especially because ‘her over-arm service gave her an edge over most opponents’ (Little 2002, p.3). Dress historian Phillis Cunnington briefly mentions a company called Messrs. Jay who introduced a ‘Jersey tennis costume’ in 1879 (1969, 1978, p.88). From the late 1870s onwards designs for specific tennis dress featured in women’s fashion journals (Cunnington 1969, 1978, p.88). This included the ‘Bloomer Costume for tennis’ in 1880, consisting of a tunic top and divided skirts (trousers), as Cunnington explained, ‘The dread of appearing “unladylike”, however hampered dress reform at this time’ (1969, 1978, p.91). A letter to the editor of Pastime printed in 1886 (19 May, p.32) called for suitable dress to be developed for players who pursued the game in earnest.The writer identified as ‘A Lawn-Tennis Player’ made the following distinction between players: ladies who play at playing, and come upon a tennis ground in tight stays, and even “dress improvers”, … [and] many ladies who excel in the game… and when playing wear nothing more constricting than a short lightly-boned riding stay or belt. A reply from reader Edith M.H. Cole suggested any dress reform would be in bad taste and would be the end of lawn tennis for women as far the public was concerned (Pastime 26 May 1886, p.351). A letter the following year followed up the discussion, although, without irony, complained that a discussion of dress had no place in Pastime (6 July 1887, p.5). The writer noted however that it was a subject that needed to be resolved because women had practical and specific costumes for bathing, gymnastics, yachting and for walking in the countryside. This point is a significant issue in the development of tennis clothing. Women from middle- and upper-class backgrounds were used to wearing practical clothes for outdoor pursuits. For example, practicality in sports clothing was encouraged at Roedean, the exclusive fee-paying girls’ school in 176

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East Sussex. Penelope Lawrence, one of the school’s founders, contributed to a report in 1898 entitled Games and Athletics in Secondary Schools for Girls. She explained that when the school first opened in 1886 the Roedean principle of two to three hours of outdoor exercise a day for girls was generally unusual. Reflecting on the success of this policy she observed, ‘mental and physical feebleness and helplessness as an attribute of the really admirable woman has disappeared’ (1898, p.145). Roedean had four tennis courts and girls wore a general games kit for playing all outdoor sports described by Miss Lawrence as ‘a sailor blouse and a blue serge skirt worn over knickerbockers, and made sufficiently short and full not to impede running… the costume has to be one which does not excite attention by any eccentricity’ (1898, p.151). In an account of the clothing worn by a female tennis player in the early 1900s (private letter to H. Godfrey, 1 July 2005) the player gives insights into the hidden aspects of tennis dress. Her hair was piled up in the fashionable style of the day and padded out with “rats”, which were the combings from her own brush which she kept in a box on her dressing table. She kept her straw hat in place with two long hairpins and a black cord which fastened at the back of her neck. For deodorant she used a dab of powdered starch and Orris root, a derivative of the Iris plant. On her feet she wore lace-up leather boots.This last detail is not surprising as boots were preferred by some players because they provided support to the arches of the feet. In contrast, Dorothea Lambert Chambers preferred a ‘simple white gymnasium shoe’ unless playing in wet weather when she advised ‘a pair of men’s thick shooting stockings or socks worn over… tennis shoes’ (1910, p.67). White was the predominant colour for tennis clothing. For Chambers, white was the best colour because it washed well, did not fade, and looked ‘neater than a coloured material’ (1910, p.65). Located in the south of England, Chertsey Museum has a four-part white cotton tennis dress, dated c.1895–1905. Donated by a local Surrey family, it consists of a separate blouse, skirt, belt and collar. From viewing a photograph held in the museum’s records, the dress appears typically Edwardian – high collar, long sleeves, small waist and long skirt. However, the object itself reveals another story; made from soft, almost sheer cotton fabric, the dress is lightweight and has a number of practical features designed to aid a tennis player. The blouse fastens at the centre front with four buttons and so the wearer would have been able to dress herself without the help of a maid. The armhole in the blouse is deeper than usual to allow for ease of movement, especially when combined with the full sleeves. Three large pleats falling from the shoulders at the front of the blouse were stitched down at the top only, which again allowed the blouse to expand with the sweeping arm movements of the player. The separate collar was not boned but would probably have been starched. The collar is in better condition than the rest of the outfit, and the buttonholes were not stretched indicating that it was unused. The buttonhole at the back of the shirt was stretched so an alternative and perhaps more comfortable collar could have been worn. The blouse was held in place at the waist with a cotton tape tie and it was worn tucked into the skirt. The skirt is flat at the front with all fullness gathered into the back. It is made from seven gored panels and has a full hem measuring over three metres in circumference, again allowing for ease of movement. Notably, this conforms to Dorothea Lambert Chambers’ recommendations for tennis dress: ‘It is essential to remember that you want, above everything else, free use of all your limbs; physical action must not be impeded in any way by your clothing’ (1910, p.64). The museum also has a tennis skirt dated c.1900–10 made from cotton sateen. The slightly flared skirt buttons down the front with buttons stopping 15cm before the edge of the hem. A corresponding slit in the opening of the centre back seam would have allowed the player to run unimpeded. These outfits indicate that the main disadvantage to women came not from their outer garments, but from their layers of underclothes, which usually included a knee-length chemise, 177

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drawers tied at the waist, a corset, a camisole and at least one petticoat. In the late 1870s, The Queen: The Lady’s Newspaper advertised a corset specifically for tennis ‘made from natural fibres… [with] no boning or side steels to break or impede free movement of the body (Elks 2011, p.129). This appears to be a plausible solution, although as dress historian Valerie Steele cautions, sports corset advertising was ‘characterised by a considerable degree of exaggeration and duplicity’ and usually focused on issues of concern to women such as comfort and elegance (Steele 2001, 2004, p.56). Much has been written about the wearing of corsets causing a great deal of discomfort for women players. Ted Tinling who became renowned for his tennis dress designs over several decades, cites player Elizabeth Ryan who recalled that even by 1914 ‘bloodstains were still seen regularly on the women players’ “stays”’ (Tinling 1977, p.5). An interview in 2009 with Honor Godfrey, the museum curator at Wimbledon, confirmed the earlier existence of rails next to an open fire for the drying of corsets after play. This is further evidence of the strenuous nature of competitive women’s tennis at that time, but also evidence of the desperate need for a more suitable form of underwear. Although the brassiere was not to be a feature of women’s underwear until the 1920s, there were attempts made at finding alternatives to the corset for sportswomen. The “Neena” Bust Protector and Improver advertised in The Queen (4 March 1905, p.20) consisted of two cones ‘modelled from the Venus de Milo’ to be held in place by ‘any close-fitting garment’. The cellular fabric brand Aertex was also advertised in The Queen (24 June 1905, p.2) as a healthy alternative for sports underwear for both men and women. It is worth noting that most scholarly attention on tennis dress has been devoted to females. This is perhaps due to the easy assumption that men’s outfits were suitable for the task. But as Catherine Horwood (2004) argues, men’s dress was also bound by tradition and remained impractical until new designs appeared after the Second World War. Shirts were particularly problematic for sportsmen: from the 1840s onwards, there was a move away from the ‘square cut’ shape, which made the most economical use of a piece of fabric, towards a shirt shaped to fit the contours of the body (Cariou 1999, p.3). The Cutter’s Practical Guide acknowledged: Every athletic outfitter knows the complaint that is constantly made by athletes of all classes of the rucking-up of the shirt round the waist, and sometimes bulging out over the top of the trousers. This is often aggravated when the wearer uses a belt instead of braces’. (cited in Cariou 1999, p.187) Nevertheless, an advertisement from 1891 for Chas. Baker & Co featured ‘Gentlemen’s Lawn Tennis Shirts’ made from surprisingly elegant fabrics – fancy checks, silk stripes and white silk twill (Cariou 1999, p.73). The same advertisement promoted flannel shirts for cricket, which suggests a desire to distinguish tennis from cricket dress but an uncertainty in how to do it. Indeed, cricket and tennis dress were closely aligned, with players of both summer sports wearing cricket caps or straw boaters, loosely fitting shirts and long white trousers. Although male tennis players, like their cricket-playing counterparts, adopted the wearing of long white flannel trousers, dress historian James Laver wrote of early players experimenting with breeches: ‘at Wimbledon in 1887, while some of the men played in long white trousers… a considerable proportion of them wore white flannel knickerbockers with black stockings’ (1937, p.222). Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Museum has a photograph of player Herbert Lawford in action in 1887 dressed exactly as Laver describes in white breeches and black stockings. It was not until the early 1930s that tennis pioneers like Henry “Bunny” Austin swapped long trousers for shorts, but even then, the trend was not widely emulated (Horwood 2004, p.102). Horwood claims this

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was partly due to social decorum and partly because men’s legs were considered unattractive (2004; 100–2) – the kinds of explanations typically assumed as relevant to female players only.

Unorthodoxy and modernity in women’s tennis dress In 1905, 18-year-old American player May Sutton triumphed at Wimbledon winning the Ladies’ Singles title, and Cassell’s Magazine (August 1906, p.306) described how she appeared before the Wimbledon crowd looking ‘like a strong and healthy school-girl’. Sutton was an allyear-round active sportswoman; as Cassell’s Magazine stated, she played baseball and basketball, ‘the vigorous indoor pastime which materially helps American girls to maintain their health during the long winter months’ (p.308). From 1890 onwards, well-adjusted, healthy, American college girls played sports in loose and comfortable clothing, which included a shirtwaist worn with a plain skirt and even bloomers (Tuite 2014, p.26–9). It was not Sutton’s healthy demeanour which detracted attention away from her sporting achievement in the British press after her win, but rather her tennis dress, which did not conform to English standards (Horwood 2002, p.47). Reporting on Sutton’s victory at Wimbledon The Queen: The Lady’s Newspaper described how the excited crowd of spectators cheered her skill and ‘unfailing judgement, courage and tenacity’ (15 July 1905, p.118). Her style of play was said to be orthodox in nature, while her choice of dress caused some consternation: [A] novelty that she introduced into the game was the unconventionality of her dress in which the ordinary compromise between utility and fashion was very little respected. Perhaps some day an aspirant for the ladies’ challenge cup will venture to appear at Wimbledon in the costume of the gymnasium. (15 July 1905, p.118) A photograph of Sutton on court shows her wearing an elbow length blouse with loose sleeves, and this was the cause for concern. Lady players at Wimbledon did not bare their forearms at this time. In 1905, elbow-length blouses were starting to appear in fashion plates, but certainly, for middle-class women, photographs show blouses worn with elbow-length gloves (as for example in The Ladies’ Field 27 January 1906, p.321).The English competitive tennis player and all-round sportswoman Lottie Dod held similar views to Sutton and called for sleeves ‘perfectly free and loose in every way, so as to allow of the full sweep of the racket straight from the shoulder’ (1903, p.312). Dod suggested a garment which hung from the shoulders rather than being anchored at the waist. Sadly, this was not something she would experience during her playing career but actually it was to be a feature of the post-war generation of players who pushed the boundaries in dress (Horwood 2005). This included the French player Suzanne Lenglen who was photographed wearing modern shift dresses, including those designed by the French couturier Jean Patou in the 1920s. Until relatively recently, representations based on Lenglen’s style of dress and supposed volatile temperament are rarely supported by reference to her sporting achievements (see Wagg 2011). For example, in Love and Faults (1979, p.19) Ted Tinling gives a hyperbolic account of Suzanne Lenglen’s arrival at Wimbledon in 1919: After her very first practice-session, most of London’s society was agog with controversy about her calf-length cotton “frocks,” and the audacity of her girlish silhouette so “brazenly” revealed. Quite a large section of the British public initially condemned her as

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“indecent,” and only a small minority doubted that Mrs. Chambers would deal summarily with this French hussy. To return to Auslander’s point about placing research in context, 1919 was the first post-war Championships at Wimbledon and although the First World War altered the appearance and attitude of both men and women, in women’s fashions bodices had been loosening and hems rising before 1914. In spite of this, David Gilbert’s (2011, p.190) careful analysis of the 1919 ladies singles match between Lenglen and Dorothea Lambert Chambers highlights the oversimplified ways in which some observers have chosen to read it – namely as a contest between Edwardian “convention” and the “disruption” of modernity. Much importance has been placed on Lenglen’s modern dress as an aid to her success in comparison to the supposed Edwardian costume worn by Chambers with all the restrictions of movement the term implies. However, this is a misleading comparison because actually the final score, 10-8, 4-6, 9-7 – albeit in favour of Lenglen – is evidence that the two players were evenly matched. In Lawn Tennis and Badminton (10 July 1919, p.429) the match was described as ‘the most thrilling ladies’ match ever seen anywhere’. Chambers was wearing a lightweight, loose-fitting V-neck blouse and calf-length, plain skirt, a practical outfit which had become a kind of unofficial civilian uniform for non-combative women during the First World War. Her skirt was made from gored panels which flared at the hem allowing for unimpeded leg movement, and her simple blouse was devoid of decoration, as she herself advocated in her tennis guide Lawn Tennis for Ladies (1910, p.65). Similar white cotton blouses dating from the same period, in the collection at Worthing Museum and Art Gallery, are made from fabrics that are so light in weight they could be folded into the palm of one hand. A close scrutiny of photographs of Lenglen reveal that the dress she wore in the 1919 championship was a loose, short-sleeve,V-neck dress with a knitted tie worn at the natural waist, and a pleated, calf-length skirt.2 The simple style was to become her trademark as American trade publication Women’s Wear Daily (9 April 1925, p.12) observed, ‘Mlle. Lenglen is reported to be fastidious about the cut of the armhole and does not like pockets, monograms or similar style details’. Although French fashion designer Jean Patou is usually credited with dressing Lenglen, there is no evidence to suggest he designed her 1919 dress. Patou re-opened his fashion house when he returned from the war and showed his first collection in autumn 1919 ready for spring 1920 (Etherington-Smith 1983, p.29–30). Although Patou would produce the designs that came to define her look, Lenglen was very much a part of the decision-making process as Women’s Wear (1 October 1926, p.1) wrote in 1926: ‘Mlle Lenglen’s interest in clothes is unmistakable, and makes itself felt not only in her strong preferences but in the practicality of her sportsclothes, in the designing of which she takes a keen personal interest’.

Conclusion By questioning dominant representations of competitive female tennis players through an object-focused analysis, this chapter has demonstrated that a white privileged middle-class group of female tennis players either adopted or made subtle changes to tennis dress to aid their movements on court. On one hand, using a dress history interpretation has illuminated the ways that alterations were made within the boundaries of acceptable taste, particularly by English middle-class players faced with the burden of maintaining respectability and femininity. On the other hand, it has shown that innovative new ideas in dress were more overtly introduced by players unbound by English sartorial codes, such as May Sutton and Suzanne Lenglen. On both counts, familiar representations of female players hampered by restrictive clothing have been 180

Fashioning competitive lawn tennis

Image 17.1 Photographer unknown, Mrs. Lambert Chambers in action on grass at The Championships at Worple Road (date unknown). Held at The All England Lawn Tennis & Croquet Club, Wimbledon; credit: AELTC

questioned and evidence has shown that many in fact played a strenuous game and competed to win.This perhaps points to a less inadvertent contribution to female emancipation than Mangan (2006, p.151) suggests. The assumption that men were unhindered by dress has also been questioned and leaves an opening for further study. However, unlike female players they neither had to endure censure and criticism for participation in tennis, nor learn to compete in the spotlight. Tennis attire chosen by women can, therefore, be understood as a far more sensitive issue during the period under review, one which by 1919 was still apparently drawn along both class and cultural lines in the game, as the arrival of Suzanne Lenglen on the Wimbledon scene makes clear.

Notes 1 Thank you to Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Museum for supplying images of Herbert Lawford and Lucinda Lambert Chambers. I am grateful to the AELTC for giving permission to publish the image of Lucinda Lambert Chambers. I would like to thank fashion historian Randy Bigham for sharing his research about Suzanne Lenglen from the Women’s Wear Daily archive. I am grateful to Dr Charlotte Nicklas from the University of Brighton for comments and suggestions. 2 The outfit can be viewed here: http:​//gal​lica.​bnf.f​r/ark​:/121​48/bt​v1b53​01787​2r.it​em (accessed June 2018)

References Arnold, J. (1977) Patterns of Fashion 2 English Women’s Dresses and Their Construction c. 1860–1940. London: Macmillan. Auslander, L. (2005) Beyond Words, American Historical Review, 110(4), 1015–45. Black, C. (1915, 1983) Married Women's Work (2nd ed.). London:Virago Press Limited. Breward, C. (1998) Cultures, Identities, Histories: Fashioning a Cultural Approach to Dress, Fashion Theory, 2(4), 301–13. Buckley, C & Fawcett, H. (2002) Fashioning the Feminine: Representation and Women's Fashion from the Fin de Siecle to the Present. London: I.B.Tauris & Co Ltd. Chambers, D. L. (1910) Lawn Tennis for Ladies. London: Methuen & Co. Ltd. Cunnington, P. (1969, 1978) Tennis. In P. Cunnington & A. Mansfield, English Costume for Sport and Outdoor Recreation from the Sixteenth to the Nineteenth Centuries (2nd ed.) (pp.81–97), London: Adam & Charles Black. Dod, L. (1890) Ladies’ Lawn Tennis. In J.M. Heathcote, Lawn Tennis, Rackets, Fives (pp.307–14), London: Longmans Green and Co. 181

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Elks, S.J. (2011) Tennis Fashions in the Frame. In Ann Sumner, Court on Canvas: Tennis in Art (pp.125–39), London: Philip Wilson Publishers. Etherington-Smith, M. (1983) Patou. Essex: The Anchor Press Limited. Faiers, J. (2015) Dress Thinking: Disciplines and Interdisciplinarity. In C. Nicklas & A. Pollen, Dress History New Directions in Theory and Practice (pp.15–32), London: Bloomsbury. Gilbert, D. (2011) The Vicar’s Daughter and the Goddess of Tennis: Cultural Geographies of Sporting Femininity and Bodily Practice in Edwardian Suburbia, Cultural Geographies, 18(2), 187–207. Gillmeister, H. (1997) Tennis: A Cultural History. Leicester: Leicester University Press. Holland, R. (2011) Edgbaston’s Gem of a Game: The Origins of Lawn Tennis. In Ann Sumner, Court on Canvas:Tennis in Art (pp.35–46), London: Phillip Wilson Publishers. Horwood, C. (2002) Dressing Like a Champion:Women's Tennis Wear in Interwar England. In C. Breward, B. Conekin & C. Cox, The Englishness of English Dress (pp.45–60), Oxford: Berg. Horwood, C. (2004) 'Anyone for Tennis?': Male Dress and Decorum on the Tennis Courts in Inter-War Britain, Costume, 38(1), 100–5. Lake, R.J. (2012) Gender and Etiquette in ‘Mixed Doubles’ Lawn Tennis 1870–1939, International Journal of the History of Sport, 29(5), 691–710. Lake, R.J. (2015) A Social History of Tennis in Britain. London: Routledge. Laver, J. (1937) Taste and Fashion from the French Revolution Until Today. London: George G.Harrup & Company Ltd. Lawrence, P. (1898) Games and Athletics in Secondary Schools for Girls. Educational Special Reports on Educational Subjects. London: H.M.S.O. Lenglen, S. (1920) Lawn Tennis for Girls. New York: American Sports Publishing Co. Little, A. (1983, 2002) Maud Watson The First Wimbledon Lady Champion (2nd ed.). London: Kenneth Richie Wimbledon Library. Mangan, J.A. (2006) The Social Construction of Victorian Femininity. Emancipation, Education and Exercise. In J.A. Mangan, A Sport-Loving Society Victorian and Edwardian Middle-Class England at Play (pp.145–52), London: Routledge. McCrone, K. (1988) Sport and the Physical Emancipation of English Women 1870–1914. London: Routledge. Miller, D. (2010) Stuff. Cambridge: Polity Press. Taylor, L. (2002) The Study of Dress History. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Tinling, T. (1977) The Story of Women’s Tennis Fashion. London: Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Museum. Tinling, T. (1979) Love and Other Faults: Personalities Who Have Changed the History of Tennis in My Lifetime. New York: Crown Publishers. Tuite, R.C. (2014) Seven Sisters Style. New York: Rizzoli. Wagg, S. (2011) ‘Her Dainty Strength’: Suzanne Lenglen, Wimbledon and the Coming of Female Sport Celebrity. In S. Wagg, Myths and Milestones in the History of Sport (pp.122–40), Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan. Walker, H. (1989) Lawn Tennis. In T. Mason, Sport in Britain: A Social History (pp.245–75). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Wilson, E. (2014) Love Game: A History of Tennis, from Victorian Pastime to Global Phenomenon. London: Serpent's Tail.

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18 Wimbledon women Elite amateur tennis players in the mid-twentieth century Janine van Someren and Stephen Wagg

The history of amateur tennis pre- and post-Second World War has been dominated by the sporting biographies of male players with women’s stories largely ignored. This chapter, based largely on Janine van Someren’s doctoral research,1 addresses this omission within the historiography. By focusing on the previously untold stories of four British tennis players – Mrs. Phyllis King (née Mudford, who competed at the Wimbledon Championships 1928–53), Mrs. Joan Hughesman (née Curry, Wimbledon 1939–60), Mrs. Joy Michelle (née Hibbert, Wimbledon 1947–57) and Mrs. Christine Janes (née Truman, Wimbledon 1957–74) – it also illuminates women’s experiences “on tour” before the coming of the open era in 1968. Reference is also made to player biographies published either in Britain or the US. These women and their contemporaries lived through interesting times for tennis – times in which important questions about class, gender and the female body were raised and grappled with.

‘A completely different world’: Women in tennis before and after the First World War When Phyllis Mudford was born in 1905, the appropriateness of women playing vigorous sport at all was still being established. While the ladies’ singles championship at Wimbledon had been inaugurated in 1884, women played under considerable physical and ideological restriction. They were routinely attired in straw hats secured by hat pins, tight bodices, long skirts over cumbersome undergarments and, invariably, boots (see Robertson 1981). They played a baseline game, since visible exertion was thought to be both unladylike and injurious to a woman’s health. Played thus, tennis was widely viewed as an appropriate sport for women as they could compete without putting unnecessary mental or physical strain on their bodies (Doherty & Doherty 1903). These notions were challenged, notably, by the formidable Dorothea Lambert Chambers, wife of a London merchant and seven times Wimbledon singles champion. Lambert Chambers encouraged female participation in sport and was confident about women’s abilities. She wrote in 1910: ‘Is the essential feature of a woman her weakness, just as the essential feature of a man is his strength, not merely physical, but mental and moral strength? I do not think so’

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(Chambers 1910, p.1). She wrote, however, against the grain of conventional male wisdom. In tennis, for example, the difference between the physical abilities of male and female players was stressed by the Doherty brothers, Reggie and Laurence, who dominated the British game in the early 1900s. They suggested that technical adaptations should be made by female players when serving due to their limited physical strength. As one of the brothers commented: ‘I do not believe in the overhead service [for women] and for this reason, unless an overhead service is distinctly severe it is ineffective and if a lady attains this necessary severity it is generally at the cost of her vital energy’ (Doherty & Doherty 1903, p.71–2). Moreover, while the overhead serve was portrayed as a technique that divided the abilities of the sexes, the volley was also discussed in coaching books as a shot that women would struggle physically to make. This perceived weakness is highlighted by Lambert Chambers and Dorothy Round in their coaching books (Round 1938). Lambert Chambers felt that volleying was too physically demanding for women and should only be used when playing doubles. In 1908, Lambert Chambers’ friend and doubles partner,Violet Pinckney, organised a ladies’ volleying league, whereby all players who entered a ladies’ doubles event were ‘obliged’ to volley (Chambers 1910). The membership of the village and suburban tennis clubs to which these women belonged was drawn from the middle and upper-middle classes. Many were from families that had large lawns on which to host tennis parties (Mason 1988). Maud Watson, who beat her sister Lilian in the first Wimbledon women’s singles final in 1884 and Dorothea Lambert Chambers were clergymen’s daughters and honed their skills in the rectory grounds (King & Starr 1988). Arthur Wallis Myers, a sports writer for the Daily Telegraph and the Daily Mail, characterised the confluence of gender and class in his overview of the early days of lawn tennis thus: Lawn tennis was first pursued on private English lawns by middle-aged people. Its original disciples… were men of part or whole leisure, and their womenfolk, praising Providence for providing an outdoor exercise more violent than croquet, found an athletic status equal to that of their lords. Small wonder they embraced it, first with curiosity and then with devotion. Croquet mallets were flung down and domestic lawns were bisected with nets; in some cases, where Nature interfered, noble oaks and elms were sacrificed (Myers 1930, p.25). Before the First World War tennis also provided women with a relatively safe environment to engage in physical activity and a space perhaps to challenge patriarchal ideology because it was widely acknowledged as a pastime suitable for both sexes. A turning point in the perception of women’s tennis came in 1919 when the French player Suzanne Lenglen made her debut at Wimbledon and won the first of six women’s singles finals. Lenglen was openly athletic, vigorous and competitive and she wore fashionable and loose-fitting tennis apparel (Wagg 2011). In a Wimbledon final widely rendered as the new order banishing the old, 20-year-old Lenglen beat Lambert Chambers, by then 41, in a tight match. However, this characterisation of the match does a disservice to Lambert Chambers; she had been one of a number of elite amateur women players at the turn of the twentieth century who had been unapologetic in their physicality. When explaining the essential requirements of an individual to play tennis Lambert Chambers (1910, p.9) was confident in the ability of women to compete. She stated: ‘It is not physical and brute strength that is wanted as much as scientific application – finesse, skill and delicacy of touch, all of which women are just as capable of exercising as men’. Phyllis Mudford King’s experience of tennis typified a world which, on the one hand was changing for women, but on the other insisted on the retention of pre-War social practices and the keeping up of appearances. She attended garden parties, many of which were held at her 184

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family home, where the women would play tennis in the afternoon and gentlemen would join them in the evening for mixed doubles. Speaking a little before her 100th birthday she recalled that it was: ‘A completely different world. I mean the girls didn’t immediately take up a career or anything like that; you really had a very lovely social leisurely life in my day’. However, for Phyllis, tennis was not simply a leisure activity. She enjoyed competing and was not shy of playing aggressively. In contrast, she remembers friends who were very worried with how they looked while competing: ‘I remember one of my partners saying that she’d far rather lose the point than not to make a graceful move. Well, I never felt that, you know’. Key to a player’s progression was the ability to self-finance in the game which in turn fostered social connections. Phyllis recalled that when she travelled ‘you paid your own expenses and very often you were offered hospitality and you stayed in a private house and stayed with people who entertained you in a normal way’. Also important was recognition by the Lawn Tennis Association (LTA). As each player began to play in more national tournaments, their successes were noted and the LTA recognised their ability to graduate to the international arena. Throughout the amateur era the LTA provided financial support to small teams of players (both men and women) to travel abroad and compete for Great Britain. Nevertheless, Phyllis was subject to an ostensibly strict amateur code which forbade payment for playing and the receiving of significant cash prizes, thus restricting the tennis circuit to women like herself who hailed from ‘comfortably off ’ families. Prizes were invariably tokens, to be spent in smart London stores. For example, Phyllis’ prize for winning the Wimbledon ladies’ doubles in 1931 was a gold medal and a £10 shopping voucher (around £475 at today’s value) which came with strict rules that stipulated that it could only be spent on luxury items, ‘not domestic appliances’. The LTA gave these vouchers as regular prizes at tournaments and when Phyllis’ combined winnings reached £130 worth of vouchers, she bought her first car, a Morris Minor, through the luxury department store Harrods and subsequent vouchers were used to buy a wooden garage for it. This system was designed principally to discourage commercialism, and if players did not maintain their amateur status, they would be rejected from all LTA approved tournaments and their careers as amateur players would be finished. When Phyllis was captain of the Wightman Cup team in 1938, she was offered free clothing from a commercial company, but this was against the LTA’s guidelines on amateurism. She recalled: ‘I was offered the most lovely lot of coats when I was captaining England the team. I was offered these lovely Jaeger coats but the LTA wouldn’t allow it. I phoned them and asked’. The LTA also provided moral guardians for female players overseas. When Phyllis travelled to the USA for the Wightman Cup (inaugurated 1923) there was after-dinner entertainment and dancing in the evenings and the teams’ activities were monitored by appointed chaperones, who accompanied women’s teams when they travelled abroad. At Wimbledon, royal patronage demanded that rules of etiquette were maintained. Thus, when Phyllis made her debut at the Championships in 1928, women were still expected to wear stockings when the Queen was present. Phyllis found this amusing — her favoured attire was more in keeping with the times. ‘You dress for the time you are living in’, she recalled, and for her first Wimbledon she wore a pleated knee-length white skirt, with matching white shirt and a coloured bandeau – as favoured by the influential Suzanne Lenglen who had retired from amateur tennis two years previously. By the 1930s ideas associated with the ‘modern woman’ were beginning to take hold among the English middle class and Phyllis described her attitudes towards appearance on the tennis court thus: ‘You didn’t care what you looked like’.This comment reflects the increasingly functional approach to clothing and sportswear adopted in British society during the decade (Skillen 2012). When Phyllis competed in the 1935 Wightman Cup match in Forest Hills, 185

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New York, she wore a white cotton sleeveless shirt and white skirt which hung below the knee, plimsolls and ankle socks (The Times 2 February 2006). During the interwar years, international competition, such as the Wightman Cup, brought players into contact with more assertive approaches, both to play and apparel – particularly among American women tennis players. Although Phyllis wore a skirt while competing, other players were more daring in their sporting attire and wore shorts. Tinling and Oxby (1963) suggest that the clothing of American player Alice Marble, who wore a jockey cap, crew neck t-shirt and brief shorts (six inches above the knee), reflected the emergent style of pre-War tennis players. Warren (1993) describes Marble’s choice of clothing as in keeping with her more aggressive, serve-and-volley game. Indeed, women’s tennis in the US arguably harboured more class and ideological division than in England. Marble is a case in point: a working-class girl whose mother was a single parent for most of her childhood, in her early teens Marble had preferred boxing and baseball, and is reputed to have been steered toward tennis by an older brother, anxious that she embrace a more ‘feminine’ sport. Like other leading American players, she had learned to play on public courts in San Francisco. Billy Jean King, whom she later coached, described her as ‘a picture of unrestrained athleticism’ (International Tennis Hall of Fame 2016). On both sides of the Atlantic women playing tennis in shorts might be perceived as more masculine when compared with players competing in skirts or dresses. Shorts for women could, therefore, still be highly controversial in the early 1930s – indeed shorts for men were not commonly worn until after the Second World War (Horwood 2006). Warren (1993) notes that when Henry “Bunny” Austin wore shorts for the very first time on the Wimbledon centre court (1933), his choice of clothing was considered outrageous. Accordingly, it is unsurprising that Helen Jacobs was forbidden to wear shorts in the Wightman Cup match of 1933 by the non-playing captain and founder of the event, Hazel Hotchkiss Wightman; while ‘the British Wightman Cup team turned up in dashing shorts instead of skirts and were criticised by all sorts of people as a result’ (Truman 1961, p.78). By 1934, wearing shorts at the Wightman Cup was depicted in some newspapers, such as the English tabloid Daily Sketch, as a ‘battle of British modesty versus American masculinity’ wherein that year it was the British players who competed in ‘modest skirts’ and the Americans played in ‘brief shorts’ (Horwood 2000, p.12). After the Second World War, the Americans began to dominate tennis tournaments. Moreover, different attitudes to amateurism, both between nationalities and between genders, began to emerge. It is to these issues, through the testimonies of Joan Hughesman and Joy Michelle, that attention now turns.

‘Having a marvellous time’: tennis during the 1950s Joan Hughesman and Joy Michelle played most of their tennis in the 1950s. Their recollections of that time suggest more than anything a widening of the paradigm in which British female tennis was initially framed – that is, in a world of well-to-do sociability where tennis was often secondary to the pleasures of parties and travel. During the 1950s young women such as these, privately educated and waiting for marriage, could easily have their experiences and social horizons widened through tennis. They played at home and abroad, and they had fun. They recall, in particular, the fun. Joan was born in 1919. She attended a private boarding school in Torquay in Devon in England’s West Country and was introduced there to a range of sports including cricket, hockey, netball and tennis. Joan’s games mistress recognised her talent and played tennis with her every lunch break. ‘And once I found tennis, I won a racket by being the best in my age, at about 14’. Joan spent her school holidays playing tennis at the Palace Hotel in Torquay. Games’ mistresses 186

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at private schools (who had been growing steadily in number since the turn of the twentieth century) feature strongly in the development of women’s sport in Britain (Fletcher 1984). In the case of tennis, so do hotels; many had courts, especially on the French Riviera, and staged regular competitions. Joan’s tennis career was assisted by the support of the LTA and, as was often the case for young British women tennis players of the time, financial assistance from her parents. LTA regulations on amateurism did not preclude her receiving free tennis rackets from Dunlop. On the continent the amateur rules were extremely relaxed in comparison to Britain. Joan described how the prizes, specifically in France, contradicted the amateur code: ‘I remember winning. In France they gave mostly perfume for prizes, and quite openly they gave you money too.They [the French association] didn’t quibble about it.They gave you the money. In Germany it was all cameras, velvet goods and very nice things’. She perceived tennis on the Riviera before the War as primarily social: ‘I think it was one big party, with tea dances and socialising and the King of Sweden used to be there’ (King Gustaf V of Sweden was a tennis enthusiast and well known on the international circuit). ‘So we lived well’, recalled Joan, ‘and if we were lucky we scraped by. Mind you, the men were making money because they knew how to play the system, but not many women, we didn’t know enough about it. They [the men] knew how to play the system’. The Welsh aristocrat and leading Olympian, Lord Aberdare, discussed national differences in amateur rules in his 1959 book, The Story of Lawn Tennis. Although his findings offered little insight into women’s stories, his analysis of men’s tennis details the growth of professionalism in the amateur game. He explained that in Australia the usual system was to have a first-class amateur working for a firm of racket or ball manufacturers and they played in local tournaments, known as sales tournaments, which promoted the company during the off season. The Lawn Tennis Association of Australia (LTAA) also used “alternative” methods to keep their top amateur players from turning professional. When Frank Sedgman, the Australian Champion of 1949 and 1950, threatened to turn professional in 1951 the LTAA raised £5,473 as a wedding present to induce him to remain amateur as they felt they needed him for their Davis Cup team (Aberdare 1959). Although enticed to play the tournament in 1951, he still turned professional at the end of 1952 having won both Wimbledon and the American Championships. Aberdare suggested that the American rules of amateurism were strict on paper, yet leading amateur players could make a living out of the game by receiving expenses that covered costs plus some profit. He notes that American player Bobby Riggs usually received £250 for a week’s tournament and all expenses paid.There was a similar system in Europe, but if players did not reach the final round of a tournament their expenses were reduced. Ann Haydon Jones, a leading light in British women’s tennis at the time and winner of three Grand Slams (the French Open 1961, 1966 and Wimbledon 1969) noted: One or two [women] players had themselves better organised … particularly Maria [Bueno of Brazil] and Darlene [Hard of the USA]. In fact, wherever I went they negotiated such high expenses that there was little left for anyone else. At the time they were better players, had bigger names and consequently were better drawing cards for the tournaments concerned. Everyone did their own negotiations and this was a responsibility I could have done without… For the same tournaments I would receive considerably less yet often beat either Maria or Darlene or both. (Jones 1971, p.98) Coming from a wealthy background meant that Joy Hibbert could finance a tennis lifestyle – her father was a blanket manufacturer and she was privately educated at boarding school before 187

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attending finishing school in Marlow, a wealthy Buckinghamshire town in north-west London. Joy learned first-hand the strict status hierarchies of British society at this time:‘Because being in business, you didn’t know the top set because they didn’t have anything to do with business people. And the lower people my father wouldn’t entertain, you know, so it was a curious existence really in those days, there were all these levels of society’. In a Wimbledon career that spanned ten years, her most successful tournament in 1951 saw her reach the last 16 of the mixed doubles with an American partner, Gene Garrett. It is fair to say that Joy particularly enjoyed the social side of tennis. Every year she hosted a cocktail party at her flat in Putney on the last Friday during the Championships; all the top players would come, including many who were competing the following day. Travelling and playing in Europe was special too and a chance to escape the ‘austerity’ measures in post-war Britain. Joy remembered ‘travelling around in an open car, eating lovely food. There was no food in England and here we were, having a marvellous time’. Players competing on the European circuit were ‘treated like princes and princesses’. At the French and Italian Championships, parties were hosted by the mayor and Joy went out every night.While competing in Paris, she would attend the fashion shows, and when she competed in Monte Carlo she stayed at the exclusive hotel, the Metropole. Perhaps as Joy Hibbert’s attendance at the Paris fashion show indicates, some tennis women of this generation sometimes found it hard to balance their sporting ambitions with their aspirations to femininity. In 1949, for example, former US No.1 Pauline Betz explained how frailty in a woman was a characteristic that she had once hoped to achieve: ‘In the past I had always longed to be thin, rather emaciated, glamorous and weak-looking female, for whom people would open doors, carry packages, inquire solicitously if I weren’t too tiny to play tennis’ (Betz 1949, p.123–4). Joan Hughesman also mentioned how the appearance of other players was rated by journalists and the LTA selectors as more important than tennis ability within national team selection. Joan described her opponent, Betty Hilton, during the Wightman Cup trials of 1946: She was lovely looking, she was a bit like, oh I don’t know, but she had lovely strokes, she looked like a player, it’s very important… Well it is important, you know, it’s nice to look pretty. I would love to be able to and a good stroke player [sic] but it wasn’t me. Decades on, such judgements on feminine appearance clearly continued to strike a chord with Joan.

The last of the English Roses: Angela Mortimer, Christine Truman and their time Phyllis King, Joan Hughesman and Joy Hibbert were all from the social world of the British middle class. It was assumed that they would complete their education and progress to marriage via introductions gained in social situations such as sport – and tennis clubs were, from the beginning, viewed as an acceptable environment to meet potential husbands (Holt 1990, p.127). In keeping with this, they were encouraged by their parents to get involved in tennis with the specific purpose of introducing them to eligible men of appropriate social standing. Top level tennis afforded them an enjoyable interlude – travel, good food, parties and exclusive hotels. ‘I would have had to have been born a multi-millionairess to have gone where I have been and seen all I have seen without my tennis racket as a universal passport’ wrote Christine Truman, when still only 19 (Truman 1961, p.25). Due to the younger age of marriage and the raising of the school leaving age to 15 from 1947 onwards, many women viewed work as something to do for a few years between school 188

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and marriage (Bruley 1999). Phyllis, Joan and Joy were under no financial pressure to gain employment following school and playing on the amateur tennis circuit became a substitute for work, seen by their families as an ideal pastime. Angela Mortimer, who dominated British women’s tennis in the late 1950s and early 1960s, followed the same route.When she left school in 1948, aged 16, she had to wait two years before being eligible to enrol at Physical Education (PE) College. During those two years she focussed on tennis and enrolled on a preliminary shorthand and typing course only to keep her mother happy. Angela never progressed beyond the basics of the typing course and did not go to PE College; she stated: ‘I lived only for tennis. I had my own plan for the future’ (Mortimer 1962, p.35). Unlike Phyllis, Joan and Joy, instead of being guided towards tennis by a parent or a games mistress, Angela actively sought the game out by herself. She describes how, at the age of 15, she saved the bus fare for the two-hour, 40-mile journey from Plymouth to Torquay in order to gate-crash a coaching session advertised for 12-year olds only. She told her mother ‘I’m going to become a first-class tennis player’. Her mother replied with what sounds like benevolent condescension: ‘Have a nice day, then, dear. Don’t be late home’. She then, at the behest of the not entirely sympathetic coach, practised for hours on her own, ‘hitting tennis balls against the wall’ (Mortimer 1962, p.14–9). For her, tennis was not a pleasant interlude between school and marriage, it was an assertion of the self: I had just outgrown my mother and her chestnut hair was becoming streaked with grey. I left her reminiscing over her youth. My mother’s teens were very gay years, and her constant worry was that I wasn’t having such a good time as she enjoyed. I couldn’t explain to her the difference in our concepts of tennis. (Mortimer 1962, p.15). Other negotiations had to do with competitiveness and the athletic body. Neither Phyllis, Joan nor Joy had any re-collection of specific training for tennis other than general physical training which included running and stretching. Angela, by contrast, travelled forty miles to seek a coach, knowing that he might try to refuse her – as indeed he did. She wanted simply to play tennis and to do it well. She drew the line, however, at competitiveness – a trait not then widely accepted in the middle-class, amateur female: 'I have always been rebellious and independent’, she wrote; As number one tennis player in England, I was more rebellious than ever because I was not allowed to be independent. It was in my nature to rebel against having to try and win. I wanted to play my own game, for my own enjoyment, relying entirely on myself, blaming myself if I lost, and congratulating myself if I won. (Mortimer 1962, p.138). A philosophy such as this one was becoming more and more difficult to sustain as the 1950s wore on. Tennis, like cricket and football, had been seen as intrinsically British, a gift to the world by British imperialists and entrepreneurs. After the Second World War, however, British power tellingly faced new adversaries on the world stage, such as the US, whose President had instructed Britain to withdraw her forces from the Suez Canal in 1956, marking what many saw as the twilight of the British Empire (Newsinger 2013) and the rising resistance of subject peoples in the Soviet Bloc. These new threats to British hegemony were being played out in sport too – for example, with the West Indies’ first defeat of England at cricket (at Lords in 1950) and the first loss of the England football team to foreign opposition on home soil (Hungary, then 189

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under the political control of the Soviet Union, at Wembley in 1953). In tennis, the rise of the US was most keenly felt, but women in British tennis were still just about holding their own: as a British sports writer noted wryly in The Independent, ‘When ladies’ tennis really was a game for the fair and gentle, the British stood a chance. Between 1955 and 1961, six Grand Slam titles went their way, three of them to a slight Devonian named Angela Mortimer’ (Culley 1994). Another one of those titles had gone to Christine Truman at the French Championships in 1959. Like Mortimer, she transcended the experiences and expectations of British female tennis players. From a tennis family – her parents had met at the local tennis club and there was a tennis court in the garden of her home – Christine took tennis very seriously. Although as a teenager she went out with boys and was engaged at 21, she was annoyed when her practice partners wanted to chat with friends court-side and was bemused when her sister Isabel threw in a few double faults just to end a game quickly and meet her ‘date’ (Russell 2015). Truman was also aware at an early age of the taken-for-granted lack of physical strength in female players. She had difficulty getting practice partners at her local club: ‘I would always go round to Monkham’s Club on Saturday mornings and play with whoever was there. But my diary says “Betty got tired so we stopped”. That sort of thing was always happening’ (Truman 1961, p.13). Growing up she was stronger than her contemporaries, nevertheless the women from the British suburbs generally struggled to compete with their counterparts from black and working-class America. She described, for instance, what it was like to play against Althea Gibson, the African-American daughter of sharecroppers from South Carolina, who won the French Open in 1956. Aged 16 Truman was beaten by Gibson, the eventual winner, in the Wimbledon semi-final of 1957, and recalled how Althea ‘serving and smashing with the power of a man player had me flustered and fumbling’ (1961, p.97).Truman was inclined to see women’s apparent lack of strength as a fact of life and foresaw no role for women (by which she appears to have meant British women) on the professional circuit, then organised by the American tennis entrepreneur Jack Kramer: I cannot imagine that there will be any future for a woman in the type of professional entertainment presented by Mr. Kramer and his colleagues. We have just not got the stamina for such exhausting work, neither have most of us [women] the sort of mentality to accept sport as a full-time paid occupation. (Truman 1961, p.26) The relative aggression and competitiveness of players such as Althea Gibson and Alice Marble provoked (often approving) comment to the effect that they ‘hit like a man’. This, however, was a challenge to prevailing notions of gender. Schoenfeld, for instance, shows that Althea had to balance an athletic identity on-court with a feminine identity off-court: ‘In her Fred Perry polo shirts on court, [Althea] was often mistaken for a man, yet when crooning ballads at Wimbledon ball in make-up and evening dress; she was a portrait of femininity’ (2004, p.10). Of Gibson and Marble, he declared: ‘their body language was masculine since they played tennis like men … yet they would wear silk dresses when warranted” (Schoenfeld 2004, p.57). Marble he described as: ‘Blonde and trim, the picture of femininity but she played the game like a man. She socialised like a man too, drinking and smoking with impunity (Schoenfeld 2004, p.22). But not every player on the women’s circuit was comfortable with this juxtaposition. Mortimer wrote: All the time at the back of my mind was the ordeal of the final dinner and dance. Slowly I dressed in my blue satin, and, trying to appear as natural as possible, strolled into the dininghall… I had never felt so awkward in my life. I had become so used to a tennis shirt and 190

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shorts, that I felt I might fall on my nose at any minute, with the stiff satin rustling round my ankles. (Mortimer 1962, p.40) To a degree, and to the satisfaction of many of the women involved, these problems of mandatory femininity were at least salved by the West End dress designer Teddy Tinling. In 1949, Tinling was asked by the American Gertrude Augusta ‘Gussy’ Moran to design her clothes for Wimbledon. She told him: ‘I’m strictly feminine and colour is the essence of my life’, which obliged him to navigate between the tradition of all-white apparel at Wimbledon and Moran’s passion for colour (Tinling & Oxby 1963, p.40). He initially designed a dress of soft rayon jersey, trimmed with white satin and in seeking to fulfil Moran’s requirements added an edging of fine lace to her underwear which caused a great scandal. Although Moran’s outfit was all white, the lace trimming was perceived as too sensational for Wimbledon. Tinling and Oxby (1963, p.43) described the underwear as ‘tantalising’ and ‘compellingly seductive’ and, thus, the media sexualisation of the female tennis player was born. Teddy Tinling found favour with a range of women players, many of whom did not share Moran’s flamboyance. For example, he designed both Truman’s and Mortimer’s outfits for the 1961 final but found Angela too stubborn to wear a dress. ‘I felt more comfortable in shorts’, she asserted. ‘Especially on a windy day, I wanted no distractions’ (cited in Chadband 2011). Although Tinling had been prevented from continuing as a Wimbledon host by the AELTC after the outcry over Moran’s outfit (and would not be invited back into the fold until 1982), thereafter he was hugely influential on the presentation of female tennis players. In 1970, he became official designer on the US-led Virginia Slims women’s tour and so bridged the gap between the world of amateur tennis and the new professional era. As such, he can be understood as an incredibly influential figure in the presentation of the women’s game to the public and the world’s media. As far as British tennis was concerned, the 1961 women’s singles final at Wimbledon, in which Angela Mortimer beat an injured Christine Truman, may be seen as the beginning of the end for the long-established tradition of middle-class femininity in the game. By then more pragmatic British players were coming onto the scene, such as Ann Jones. Three years older than Truman, she was a significant player on the circuit and, ultimately, one who became more explicitly concerned about the disparities between prize money paid to male and female players. Unlike Christine, she had no qualm about the possibility of women tennis players providing professional entertainment – and being rewarded for it. Indeed, Jones won the Women’s Singles title at Wimbledon in 1969 – the year after the tournament had admitted professionals. Thereafter the ‘English Roses’ would scarcely feature; the last symbolic link to that tradition was seen in 1977 when Virginia Wade, another clergyman’s daughter (born in Bournemouth in 1945), was the last English woman to appear in the final and win it – not as an amateur, but as a professional player.

Conclusion Gender ideology clearly influenced women tennis players during the twentieth century, since being a female had a marked impact on their experiences while travelling, competing and training on the amateur circuit. In particular, beliefs about the female body (as frail) initially worked to constrain women’s participation in tennis, but they challenged these ideals through their training routines and their physical displays of athleticism while competing. The female players of the amateur era played a significant role in generating a wider recognition of tennis as a sport 191

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for women with much public appeal. Closely tied to this appeal was their appearance and choice of clothing. Indeed, the appearance of elite amateur women players at Wimbledon arguably contributed to the sense that they were conforming to gender expectations and, in turn, this led to a greater acceptance of them as players and the growth of tennis as a sport suitable for women. That said, testimonies obtained from those who played during the decades of the mid-twentieth century indicate that they did not envy the burgeoning commercial success and merchandised womanhood of their successors. Rather, their comments revealed that they cherished the time when comparatively carefree tennis enabled them to meet people, see the world and, through playing the game they loved, were able to be themselves by establishing their athletic identity.

Note 1 Janine van Someren ‘Women’s Sporting Lives: A biographical study of elite amateur tennis players at Wimbledon’ (Unpublished PhD, 2010) School of Education, University of Southampton. Unless otherwise attributed, all quotations in this chapter are taken from this thesis.

References Aberdare, L. (1959) The Story of Lawn Tennis. London: Stanley Paul. Betz, P. (1949) Wings on My Tennis Shoes. London: Sampson Low. Bruley, S. (1999) Women in Britain since 1900. Basingstoke: Macmillan Press Limited. Chadband, I. (2011, 20 June) Wimbledon 2011: Charming Grandmas Christine Truman Janes and Mortimer Barrett Relive the Game of Their Lives. Daily Telegraph Chambers, D.L. (1910) Lawn Tennis for Ladies. London: Methuen. Culley, J. (1994, 18 January) Where Are They Now?: Angela Mortimer. The Independent Doherty, R.F. & Doherty, H.L. (1903) R.F. and H.L. Doherty on Lawn Tennis. London: Lawn Tennis Office. Fletcher, S. (1984) Women First: The Female Tradition in English Physical Education, 1880–1980. London: Athlone. Henderson, J. & O’Donnell, M. (2001, 8 July) Triumphing Over Prejudice. The Guardian Holt, Richard (1990) Sport and the British: A Modern History. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Horwood, C. (2002) Dressing like a Champion:Women’s Tennis Wear in Interwar England. In Breward, C., Conekin, B. & Cox, C., The Englishness of English Dress (pp.45–60), Oxford: Berg. International Tennis Hall of Fame (2016) Alice Marble (Career Biography). Available at: https​://ww​w.ten​ nisfa​me.co​m/hal​l-of-​famer​s/ind​uctee​s/ali​ce-ma​rble/​ (accessed 04 February 2018) King, B.J. & Starr, C. (1988) We Have Come A Long Way:The Story of Women’s Tennis. London: McGraw-Hill. Mason, T. (1988) Sport in Britain. London: Faber and Faber. Mortimer, A. (1962) My Waiting Game. London: Frederick Muller. Myers, A. Wallis (1930) Lawn Tennis: It’s Principles and Practice. London: Seeley, Service and Co. Newsinger, J. (2013) The Blood Never Dried: A People’s History of the British Empire. London: Bookmarks. Robertson, M. (1981) Wimbledon: Centre Court of the Game. London: British Broadcasting Corporation. Round, D. (1938) Tennis for Girls. Hitchin: James Nisbet. Russell, S. (2015, 27 June) Suffolk Tennis Ace Christine Truman Remembers the Day she Contested Wimbledon Final. East Anglian Daily Times. Available at: http:​//www​.eadt​.co.u​k/ea-​life/​suffo​lk-te​nnis-​ ace-c​hrist​ine-t​ruman​-reme​mbers​-the-​day-s​he-co​ntest​ed-wi​mbled​on-fi​nal-1​-4127​978 (accessed 21 June 2017) Schoenfeld, B. (2004) The Match: Althea Gibson and Angela Buxton. New York: HarperCollins Publishers. Skillen, F. (2012) ‘Woman and the Sport Fetish’ Modernity, Consumerism and Sports Participation in InterWar Britain, International Journal of the History of Sport, 29(5), 750–65. Tinling, T. & Robert O. (1963) White Ladies. London: Stanley Paul. Truman, C. (& Wheeler, K., editor) (1961) Tennis Today. London: Arthur Barker. Wagg, S. (2011) Her Dainty Strength: Suzanne Lenglen, Wimbledon and the Coming of Female Sport Celebrity. In Wagg, S. (ed.), Myths and Milestones in the History of Sport Basingstoke: Palgrave. Warren, V. (1993) Tennis Fashions – Over 100 Years of Costume Change. London: Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Museum. 192

19 Beyond the “Kournikova phenomenon” Race and beauty in a “colorblind” culture Helen Ditouras

In 2010, I wrote a chapter in David Baggett’s edited anthology Tennis and Philosophy exploring Russian-born tennis star Anna Kournikova’s extraordinary rise to success during the 1990s into the 2000s, despite her less than exemplary athletic achievements.1 Although Kournikova initially won crowds over with her outstanding performance as a junior athlete, her eventual decline in the world of tennis hardly tainted her status or popularity. Instead, as a result of the massive media attention, numerous advertising endorsements with Adidas, Charles-Schwab and Lycos (among many others), and much-reported romance with Latin sensation Enrique Englesias, Kournikova transformed herself into a high-profile celebrity praised for her alluring sex appeal and coveted beauty. In fact, according to People magazine, Kournikova herself has been quoted unabashedly admitting, ‘I’m beautiful, famous and gorgeous’ – hardly a surprising comment from the tennis star who has repeatedly secured the title of ‘50 Most Beautiful People’ for several years (1998, p.121). Moreover, in 2002, FHM Magazine also noted Kournikova as one of the ‘100 Sexiest Women in the World’, and in 2004, Sports Illustrated featured Kournikova as one of the top models in the infamous Swimsuit Issue. Nonetheless, Kournikova’s rise to fame has not been met without criticism, and some critics have scoffed at the cultural obsession with the Russian beauty. Union Tribune sports journalist Tim Sullivan expressed such disdain for Kournikova in a 2002 article, where he commented ‘She’s gorgeous by the standards of professional tennis, which is like saying Tony Danza is a great actor for a guy who should be bagging groceries’. In the same article, Sullivan also referred to former cyclist and author Laura Robinson who similarly shared his views regarding Kournikova’s shortcomings in her recent book Black Tights:Women, Sport and Sexuality. Robinson stated,‘Anna Kournikova will never make it as an athlete because she puts so much time into being a sex fantasy. Good athletes train two to three times a day and have little time for anything else’ (cited in Sullivan 2002). So, if Kournikova’s image as a sex symbol and beauty extraordinaire is somewhat contested and critiqued, how can we explain the widespread phenomenon of Anna mania that dominated the tennis scene? In my previous chapter within Baggett’s Tennis and Philosophy, I also considered the thriving career of Serena Williams as an interesting point of contrast. A media darling herself, Williams was no stranger to the glare of publicity and sexual objectification. Yet while Kournikova was often revered for her beauty, that is as measured against conventional Western 193

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standards, Williams, also of striking appearance and attractive, and far more successful as a tennis professional, was seldom complimented for her “beauty” in white, male-dominated mainstream media. Sullivan referred to this obvious disparity in his attempt to describe the “Kournikova Phenomenon”. While conducting an internet search on Kournikova and Williams, he found 43 Kournikova websites, including ‘Adorable Anna Kournikova’ and ‘Anna Kournikova – the Goddess of Tennis’ (among other similar titles), but in his search for Williams, ‘the world’s topranked player – turned up only ten sites, none of them predicated on her appearance’ (Sullivan 2002).While further exploring Sullivan’s analysis, I also addressed why Venus, sister of Serena and also an accomplished tennis player, was generally left out of the “beauty” spotlight. I attempted to reveal the numerous racist suppositions regarding beauty in America, and the mainstream media’s unethical practice of sexual objectification and color-casting of celebrities, tennis athletes in particular. I also argued that the “Kournikova phenomenon” manifested due to the over-saturated media portrayal of white, blond-haired celebrities who have historically defined mainstream standards of beauty. Here, I further explore the role of beauty in the space of professional tennis, with reference to Anna Kournikova and her Russian compatriot Maria Sharapova, who have been granted the “beauty” torch on their way to tennis stardom. However, as Serena Williams has dominated the world of tennis, her beauty and body remain facets of fascination for the media, even as they are relentlessly mediated within the frameworks of sexism and racism.Whereas Kournikova’s hypervisibility helped reinforce her sexual objectification in the media, a different kind of visibility has followed Serena Williams, one that Canadian scholar, Delia Douglas, refers to as a ‘commentary on surveillance’ in her own exploration of the Williams’ sisters (2012, p.127–45). Moreover, the complexity of this media surveillance is heightened when couched within the prevailing notion that we live in a “colorblind” culture – a culture where race no longer matters. Therefore, in this chapter, I expand upon the relationship between beauty, racism and the media in relation to women in tennis.

Sexual objectification and tennis stardom: a recap Anna Kournikova’s rise to fame has had plenty to do with her ability to market herself as a sexual commodity. Her sexy cameo in the Enrique Inglesias music video Escape (2001), as well as her appearance in the 2004 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue marked Kournikova’s cross-over from a tennis star to an emerging sex symbol. Kournikova’s highly publicized rise to sexual stardom was especially noted by her famous former coach Nick Bollettieri in his statement, ‘I don’t think all the attention she’s getting is based on her as a player’ (1998, p.121). Thus, Kournikova came to represent the power of sexual objectification that many young, female celebrities apparently covet and attempt to achieve. In the world of professional sports, where women are already underrepresented, the diversion away from the female athletic body may prove more damaging, regardless of any new-found media visibility. Former tennis star Billy Jean King reflected on the social importance of her notorious 1973 “Battle of the Sexes” match against male tennis pro Bobby Riggs in her intimate essay “Always on the Cusp”. She noted, ‘The only problem for me is that I think everybody else in the world – Bobby included – had more fun with that match than I did. Men’s tennis would not suffer if Bobby lost, so he had nothing to lose’ (King 1999, p.174). Here, King revealed the stakes for women in tennis prior to the popular glamorization of the profession, a la Kournikova. Earlier feminist critic Jane English noted the challenges women in sports face and the gains that few women have been able to achieve: ‘The pride and self-respect gained from witnessing a woman athlete who is not only the best woman but the very best athlete is much greater’ (1978, p.275). In the last few decades, the battle of the sexes 194

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led by tennis pioneers such as Billie Jean King has arguably been replaced with the battle of the beauties, which has undoubtedly changed the way people think about women in tennis. Having paved the way for other celebrity tennis divas, Kournikova was replaced by Maria Sharapova. Like her Russian counterpart, Sharapova has been eager to bask in the celebrity limelight, but has explicitly separated herself from the “Kournikova phenomenon”, by observing ‘You can’t compare us. People seem to forget that Anna isn’t in the picture anymore. It’s Maria time now’ (Fein 2005, p.81). Kournikova and Sharapova have not, however, been the only tennis pros to profit from sexual objectification via the media. Serena and Venus Williams have also appeared scantily clad in the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issues; Serena in the 2003 and 2004 issues, and Venus in the 2005 issue. Yet Serena’s participation in the Sports Illustrated spreads seemed tame in comparison to the nude photo of her in Jane Magazine, which I will return to momentarily. Although the Williams sisters have been hailed more for their athletic competence than their physical beauty, their endorsement with one of North America’s leading beauty companies, Avon, further aligned them with the world of marketing as opposed to the world of professional sports (Thompson 2003, p.16). In fact, Serena Williams made sports history in 2001 when she signed the contract for the most lucrative endorsement ever. As noted in Jet magazine: ‘a five-year endorsement contract with Reebok International for $40 million – the richest such contract for any female athlete’ (2001, p.51). However, in 2015, when Serena Williams ranked number two in endorsement money, second to Maria Sharapova, a Twitter “firestorm” ignited, when ESPN sports reporter Darren Rovell insisted that Sharapova’s triumph had ‘nothing to do with racism’ (Zirm 2015). In opposition, Bomani Jones, Rovell’s colleague, went on record to say that ‘to ignore race when it comes to the perception of either of the Williams sisters is illogical’ (Zirm 2015). Moreover, Bloomberg Today released data that encapsulated gendered perceptions surrounding the visibility of both players, concluding that Sharapova ‘appeals much more to male sports fans while Serena has a much stronger appeal to female sports fans, despite 67 percent of the US’s population being familiar with Williams as oppose [sic] to just 37 with Sharapova’ (Zirm 2015). Given that visual representations of women in the media have often been framed by a dominant male gaze, the preference for Sharapova, who embodies the white, mainstream ideal of feminine beauty, does not surprise. Moreover, while she is identified as a less familiar figure than Williams overall, she nonetheless escapes the invisibility that is often inflicted upon minority women. As Kournikova and Sharapova, among other white tennis stars, remain visible in the mediascape and lauded for their sexuality and beauty, the Williams sisters experience a different kind of sexual objectification; one that McKay and Johnson (2008, p.492) describe as “pornographic eroticism”, whereby sexuality is constructed as the primary characteristic of the person represented. They contend that female African American athletes pose a specific kind of threat to gender and racial hierarchies, and the Williams sisters have experienced this backlash first hand. They explain: Hyper-muscularity as both a new social phenomenon and a denigrating stereotype is especially evident in sport, which as embodied in the past the “natural” superiority of men in contrast to the ‘otherness’ of female athletes as objects of ridicule, weakness, inferiority, decoration, passivity, and as erotically desirable yet transgressive, but which is now searching for new ways to disparage the powerful and therefore “uppity” African American sportswomen. (McKay & Johnson 2008, p.492) The muscular physiques of both Venus and Serena, in addition to their outstanding athletic prowess, has resulted in the media’s longstanding preoccupation with both sisters. While this 195

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kind of lens can be applied to all professional female athletes in the media, McKay and Johnson highlight the unique role this plays in the representation of the Williams sisters because race further complicates what is already a discriminatory issue. Both sisters’ bodies are construed within public discourse in ways which harken back to historically racist suppositions rooted in slavery, colonialism and exhibition, which McKay and Johnson go on to define as ‘ethnographic grotesquerie’ (2008, p.493). Examples noted include the South African woman labeled the ‘Hottentot Venus’ and European explorers’ writings about Africa that depicted African women’s bodies as mythic and monstrous.

What’s race gotta do with it? Tennis at Indian Wells With Serena more recently in the spotlight due to her phenomenal achievement of winning 23 grand slam titles, it is easy to forget that it was Venus Williams who first gained notoriety in the 1990s for her aggressive competitiveness and tennis expertise. Hailed as the “ghetto Cinderella”, she was raised together with her sister in Compton, an area known for violence and turmoil, during the early 1980s. Her father, Richard Williams, described Compton as a ‘city where AK-47s, drugs, PCP, ice and welfare checks are more prevalent than anywhere else in the world’ (cited in Phillips 1999, p.147). In spite of such obstacles, the Williams sisters have spent more than two decades making tennis history – a considerable feat for not only women in tennis, but black women in particular. In the 1999 US Open, Serena Williams defeated Martina Hingis and became the first African American female to win the championship since Althea Gibson’s victory in 1958. After her victory, Williams referenced Gibson’s landmark win, as cited in The Right Set: It’s really amazing for me to have an opportunity to be compared to a player as great as Althea Gibson. One of her best friends told me she (Gibson) wanted to see another African-American win a Slam before her time is up. I’m so excited I had a chance to accomplish that while she’s still alive. (1999, p.51) Both sisters have helped cultivate black spectatorship in tennis which has traditionally been followed by white audiences. As noted in Jet Magazine, ‘With their trademark beads in their cornrowed hair and striking on-court clothes, they have made tennis hip for today’s generation’ (2001, p.32). Nevertheless, in 2001, a small yet powerful backlash was launched against the sisters. New York sportscaster Sid Rosenberg was fired after referring to Venus Williams as an ‘animal’, and said that “she and sister Serena had a better chance of posing nude for National Geographic than Playboy” (Jet 2001, p.32). After apologizing on air, Rosenberg was re-hired by Don Imus, a shockjock who caused controversy in 2007 when he referred to the Rutgers University women’s basketball team as ‘nappy-headed hos’, inciting a media storm among sportscasters, sports fans and the public alike. Associated Press writer Deepti Hajela described the impact of Imus’s comment in relation to America’s racist past: “The pain goes back to slavery. Whites saw blacks’ natural hair as a negative attribute, a contrast to the European standard of ‘ideal’ beauty. As a result, even blacks started to look down on their own natural features” (Hajela 2007, 12 April). In addition to Rosenberg’s racist remarks in March of 2001, the Williams sisters unexpectedly came face-to-face with an incident that surpassed the racist sentiments expressed by Rosenberg and Imus. On 15 March 2001, the Williams sisters were scheduled to play in the semifinals at Indian Wells, California. However, when Venus suddenly withdrew from her listed semifinal 196

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only minutes before the match, she was met with an angry, booing crowd. Two days later, when Serena rallied in the final against Belgium’s Kim Clijsters at Indian Wells, she too suffered the backlash of Venus’s withdrawal. The crowd continued to boo Serena throughout the entire match (Spencer 2004, p.115–32). Moreover, when Venus and her father Richard arrived in the stadium to spectate, Richard declared that ‘a dozen fans in the stands used racial slurs’, and that the episode was marked by ‘evil’ on the part of the crowd (Spencer 2004, p.115–32). Thirteen years after the infamous event, Serena Williams remarked upon her personal growth in Time Magazine (2015, p.17), ‘A few months ago, when Russian official Shamil Tarpischev made racist and sexist remarks about Venus and me, the WTA and the USTA immediately condemned him. It reminded me how far the sport has come, and how far I’ve come too’. In an attempt to contextualize the crowd’s response at Indian Wells, tennis scholar Nancy Spencer examined two important factors: scientific racism, in particular, the ‘obsession with Black athletic bodies’ and ‘commodity racism’ (2004, p.115–32). In response to the first factor, Spencer noted that the ‘construction of naturally Black sporting bodies’ is predicated on ‘a common assumption of the innate physicality of the Black body’ (2004, p.124), which also helped to explain the obsession to Michael Jordan’s physicality. Like Jordan, and more recently basketball superstar LeBron James, the Williams sisters have often been noted in the media for their “innate” physical superiority and aggressiveness – a noteworthy contrast to the reporting of Kournikova’s “innate” beauty. Specifically, during her teenage years, journalist Bud Collins compared Venus to an “impala” in terms of her physical agility and both sisters have been described as “muscular” with a “raw talent”. According to Chris Evert, this has made it difficult for ‘women who aren’t Amazons’ to successfully compete against them (cited in Spencer 2004). Hence, the broad disparity between the representation of Kournikova (as an ideal model of feminine beauty) and the Williams sisters (as muscular, aggressive and therefore transgressive figures) are important aspects of the color-casting that I propose have been perpetuated especially via the media in respect of these three athletes. According to Spencer, the second factor, commodity racism, ‘operates to commodify Black culture in much the same way that commodity feminism works through the marketing of commodities to reflect the connection between femininity and feminism’, as evident in consumer products such as ‘Hanes hose, Nike shoes, and Esprit’ where the products themselves come to ‘stand for, and are made equivalent to feminist goals of independence and professional success’ (2004, p.123). With regard to commodity racism, Spencer also recalls the work of literary critic Anne McClintock whose analysis of mid-19th century advertising, in particular, the Pears soap campaign, revealed the racist underpinnings of commodity advertising. The advertisement, which featured two children, one black and one white, who both emerge after their baths to reveal a “whitened body” implies that the ‘Pears soap product has transformed the Black child’s body’ (Spencer 2004, p.123). In analyzing the Victorian cult of domesticity that sought to promote domestic products such as Pears soap and others while reinforcing the ideological imperialism of the British Empire, McClintock concluded that, ‘Victorian advertising took explicit shape around the reinvention of racial difference’; thus, commodity racism became distinct from scientific racism in ‘its capacity to expand beyond the literate, propertied elite through the marketing of commodity spectacle’ (McClintock 1998, cited in Spencer 2004, pp.124–5). Whereas the commodity of soap once served to mark the racial differences between blacks and whites, according to Spencer, the marketing of hip-hop culture has come to define the new commodity racism for the 21st century. Ellis Cashmore explored this commodification in his text The Black Culture Industry, and in relation to hip hop, noted, ‘Any residual menace still lurking in African American practices and pursuits has been domesticated, leaving a Black culture capable of being adapted, refined, mass-produced and marketed. Whites not only appreciate 197

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Black culture: they buy it’ (Cashmore 1997, p.1). Therefore, the success of Michael Jordan is worth reiterating because his alleged “innate” ability – like the Williams sisters – was not the only feature that contributed to his super-stardom. The commodification of Black culture and more precisely, Black athletes, also led to his extraordinary success – as it did for Tiger Woods and more recently, Lebron James. The enormous popularity of hip-hop culture has also contributed to the dissemination of commodity racism, especially via the marketing of black athletes and other black celebrities. Like Venus, Serena Williams has basked in the hip-hop spotlight as evidenced by her numerous appearances in black magazines such as Ebony and Jet, and her appearance in both rapper Memphis Bleek’s Do My video (2001) featuring Jay Z, and rapper Common’s hip-hop video ‘I Want You’ (2007). Moreover, in 2005, the sisters launched their own reality show, Venus & Serena: For Real, a massive move forward in the spectrum of media visibility. But even this would prove tame in comparison to the world-wide presence Serena would subsequently achieve. According to Forbes (Badenhausen 2016), she is currently one of tennis’ biggest female stars on social media. From her daily musings to posting selfies on Instagram, Serena even used social media to announce her engagement to Reddit’s co-founder, Alexis Ohanian (Bailey 2016) and more recently to announce the birth of her daughter (Sportsnet 2017). Williams has seemingly surpassed the visibility that Kournikova and others could ever achieve – especially within the platform of social media.Yet even as she stakes her claim in cyberspace as a powerful, omnipresent woman, the effects of racism continue to impact her representation in the context of media and beauty.

Who’s the fairest of them all? “Beauty and the Beast of whiteness” I now return to my initial assertion that the media’s fascination with Anna Kournikova and her beauty is a phenomenon that warrants further interrogation – especially with regard to the way in which her physical appearance was/is taken as symbolic of a Western aesthetic of beauty. Within the scope of this chapter I have revisited the “Kournikova phenomenon” via the role that the media plays in sexually objectifying young, attractive female athletes (specifically Kournikova, Sharapova and the Williams sisters). In doing so, the racial dynamics at work in the representation of both Williams sisters and the challenges they have encountered in their remarkable rise to the top in comparison to Kournikova – whose decline in tennis did little to stifle her fame and notoriety – have been underscored. I have concluded that Western historical constructions of beauty have played an important role in the proliferation of the “Kournikova phenomenon”, and subsequently resulted in a media color-casting where white, blond-haired celebrities have dominated the beauty spotlight. In exploring the historical connection between racism and beauty, Ama Oforiwaa Aduonum described the “damaging” effects of representation on black women: The black woman’s dark skin and curly hair are directly opposed to the Western aesthetic of beauty. … She must have light skin and long hair, traits that continue to define a female as beautiful and desirable in the white imagination. (2004, p.280) Aduonum’s reference to hair and beauty is interesting, especially in light of the fact that early in their careers the Williams sisters both carried off braided and beaded cornrowed hairstyles as a trademark look on court. Although typical styling for women of color, they received much media attention for it. Off the court, they also appeared in a “Got Milk” ad with their beaded 198

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braids. In an analysis of it, critic Donna Daniels noted, ‘This time the beads are white, a nice contrast to their black outfits and skin’ (cited in Spencer 2004, p.122). Mainstream media has typically championed white, blond-haired females in the hierarchy of beauty and representation. Hollywood icons such as Rita Hayworth and Marilyn Monroe (among others) came to define beauty for women, not only in the US but internationally too. Nevertheless, it is common knowledge that both Hayworth and Monroe underwent a radical transformation from their dark-haired “roots”, and Hispanic beauty Margarita Carmen Cansino not only dyed her hair from brown to blond, but in an effort to erase her ethnic appearance underwent electrolysis to lift her hairline. Although ethnic women and women of color have recently gained a higher profile in the beauty spotlight, their increasing media visibility has depended upon their conformity to white, mainstream notions of beauty. One such example is Jennifer Lopez, who first appeared as a dancing Latina in the serial program In Living Color. In her early years, Lopez wore her dark, curly hair short and cropped; she also appeared to be at least 20 pounds heavier. Her almost overnight makeover occurred after her success in the biopic Selena (1997), where she received critical acclaim for her portrayal of (and uncanny resemblance to) murdered Latin pop star, Selena Quintanilla-Perez. Upon the release of her 1999 debut album On the 6, it was a thinner, blond-highlighted and straightened-haired Lopez who captivated American audiences. For African American women, the media fascination with exotic, ethnic-looking women has not necessarily worked to their advantage: the “fairest of them all,” in other words, lighterskinned women, have ranked second highest in the media’s color-caste system of representation whereas darker-skinned women, like Venus Williams, have ranked on the lower end. International superstars like Beyonce and Mariah Carey have dominated the US media with their outstanding talent and sustained success in the music industry, but it is important to note that they also dominate the beauty spotlight.Whether in pursuit of Beyonce’s relationship status with Jay Z, or Carey’s sizzling romance with back-up dancer Bryan Tanaka, both women are prime-time commodities in the lucrative world of celebrity gossip and media limelight. Another light-skinned African American musician, Alicia Keys, took the media by storm in 2016 when she began to appear in public without wearing makeup (for example, see Izadi 2016). Having decided to reject the constraints imposed on women by the makeup industry and the larger beauty industry, Keys was surprisingly met with affirmation from fans and critics all over social media with her #NoMakeUp pledge. Post after post described how beautiful the 35-year-old singer looked, and how in fact, the no-makeup transformation resulted in a younger than ever looking Keys. At no point was she ridiculed or attacked for this radical point of departure. Moreover, the public shaming that usually follows such mainstream rejections seemed altogether absent. However, as some fans noted on social media, it is easy to reject makeup when you are already beautiful – like Alicia Keys. The examples above simply illustrate that some of the most media-spotlighted African American stars continue to be light-skinned women. With regard to the Williams sisters, Serena has been noted more for her sex appeal/beauty (as evidenced by her nude photoshoot in Jane) than her darker-skinned sister, who instead, has been praised more for her athletic ability. Interestingly, however, both have roughly the same muscular physique and only differ by the shade of their skin tone. Historically, it has been shown that light-skinned African American women were coveted for their exotic beauty and were the subject of literary and cinematic discourses.Yet, with their exceptional beauty came a “darker,” unwanted burden – the burden of racism. The figure which most effectively expresses this dynamic is the “tragic mulatta”, the offspring of a black mother and a white slave master who suffered a tragic fate on account of her mixed-blood heritage. According to Pilgrim (2000), the myth of the tragic mulatto can be traced back to the 1840s in the short stories of Lydia Maria 199

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Child. The Quadroons (1842) and Slavery’s Pleasant Homes (1843); both featured a female character whose real tragedy remained in the fact that because of her mother’s lack of disclosure, she believed herself to be white, and therefore, free: ‘Her heart was pure, her manners impeccable, her language polished, and her face beautiful. Her father died; her ‘negro blood’ discovered, she was remanded to slavery, deserted by her White lover, and died a victim of slavery and White male violence’ (Pilgrim 2000). The tragic mulatta has been a persistent subject of fascination for US audiences, surfacing in the literature of African American authors such as Nella Larson, Walter Mosley and Toni Morrison. In 2001, Halle Berry won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her portrayal of the ultimate tragic mulatta, Leticia Musgrove, in Marc Forster’s harrowing drama, Monster’s Ball. It was the first Academy Award for best actress ever given to an African American actress. In her essay Beauty and the Beast of Whiteness: Teaching Race and Gender, Kim Hall examined a series of Renaissance texts to “deconstruct” whiteness in relation to beauty, race and morality. Hall examined the world of Elizabethan England and the symbolic importance behind the representation of whiteness. She also explored the function of Hollywood as an arbiter of morality via the art of cinematography. According to Hall, film critic Richard Dyer noted how ‘lighting works to associate certain film stars with whiteness in a way that marks them as morally and aesthetically superior’. Many portraits of [Tudor Queen] Elizabeth likewise established her as ‘the source of light’ and stress the ‘intrinsic transcendent superiority of the color white’ (Hall 1996, p.466). This was especially evident in Classical Hollywood’s film noir genre whose narratives of violence, corruption and transgressive sexuality were linked to the “blackness” of the film’s anti-heroes and duplicitous femme fatales (Lott 1997, p.542–66). Therefore, it is evident that literature and cinema have both played a role in mediating a hierarchy on the basis of race and representation, which goes well beyond a simplistic understanding of white skin being culturally constructed and received as more beautiful than black skin. Moreover, as Hall (1996, p.466) notes for the Renaissance literary canon, a ‘Western value system that equates skin color with moral qualities’ has also been perpetuated. To return to the representation of women tennis stars, the discourse of beauty in relation to Anna Kournikova must consequently be examined via its distant and more recent historical formation. As contemporary with the Williams sisters, she received an extraordinary amount of media adoration – despite her decline as a tennis star – while they not only sustained their achievements, but to this day perform at the top of the game. It is difficult to disassociate the focus on Kournikova’s attributed beauty from the media discourses which simultaneously engaged race to reassert the Williams sisters’ Black identity as essentially “other”. It is only within this racist dynamic that a figure such as Kournikova can, firstly, attain traction and, secondly, continue to thrive well beyond her viability as a professional tennis player. Arguably then, her success has been dependent upon her representation in relation to the Williams sisters. Furthermore, with the rise of Maria Sharapova as the somewhat “new” Kournikova, the transfer of visibility to another white tennis star has appeared almost seamless. However, regarding Serena Williams who has been proactive in taking the power back in relation to her own visibility, racist reflections resurfaced in the blogosphere. Specifically, the backlash that resulted from her nude photo in Jane Magazine, as substantiated by the racist remarks in the popular blog Whudat, confirmed that in some ways, racist standards of beauty, despite the inclusion of women of color in the representational spectrum, still exist.

Conclusion: back-shots and backlashes ‘With a pair of silver Moschino pumps and flowers keeping it mysterious, Serena Williams struck a sexy little backshot’ reads the caption directly above Williams’s nude photo from Jane 200

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in Whudat.com, a popular hip-hop news and entertainment blog. Jane’s July 2007 issue featured semi-nude photos of Serena Williams, Eva Mendes and Joss Stone, among others, which quickly captured the attention of the media. Shortly after release of the issue, smaller online publications in addition to Whudat also used her nude photo, including Women’s Tennis Blog, which featured an article entitled ‘Serena Williams poses nude for Jane Magazine + hits Hollywood party scene’. While the tennis blog briefly discussed the photo and recent whereabouts of Williams, the commentary accompanying the Whudat post on release of the photo was startlingly different. Although a few Whudat followers commended Williams for her sexy photo, others launched a racist attack comparing her, at best, to male athlete Barry Bonds, and, at worst, to an ape. On the positive side, one comment read, ‘You are proof that we as black women are absolutely beautiful and perfectly made, contrary to popular belief ’, thereby validating Williams as a strong, attractive role model for African American women. On the negative side, blogger comments included the following: ‘I don’t care for National Geographic photography. I think this Bantu has a hormone problem’. Sadly, there were a plethora of such condescending and demeaning remarks that relied upon grotesque racial stereotypes. Moreover, in reference to Serena’s lack of attractiveness, one blogger stated, ‘Kournikova had a beautiful face, nice slim/tones [sic] body with playboy curves’. Again, interesting to note is not only the comparison between Anna and Serena, but rather the evocation of “beauty” to describe the blond tennis star.While the earlier African American blogger clearly alluded to Serena’s beauty, she was sure to mention that her assertion was “contrary to popular belief ”, indicating that mainstream media has repeatedly failed to attribute this value to a diversity of African American women. My final comments in relation to Anna Kournikova and Serena Williams help to summarize the argument I have endeavored to make throughout this chapter – namely, that a color caste system exists in the world of mainstream media, and Kournikova (among several other white female celebrities) has managed to reap the benefits of this racist practice.The claim that the “Kournikova phenomenon” exists solely because of her undeniable beauty is fallacious. Connecting Kournikova (and more recently, Maria Sharapova) to the Williams sisters has highlighted inconsistencies in media coverage, including social media commentary. In fact, at the hands of the media-scape, the performances of Serena and Venus as tennis players and stars have routinely been coupled with the dismantling of their beauty and bodily power. This stands as a direct contradiction to the fantasy that continues to permeate conventional wisdom, especially in American society. At the helm of this contradiction remains the framework of sexism and racism. Therefore, in order to make sense of the interplay between them which impacts conditions of visibility, an exploration of the relationship between sports, gender, race and the media is still essential.

Note 1 Baggett’s anthology was primarily focused upon analyzing philosophical concepts in relation to the sport of tennis. In this new updated chapter, the focus shifts from philosophy to a broader social analysis of race and beauty.

References Aduonum, A. (2004) BUWUMU: Redefining Black Beauty and Emancipating the Hottentot Venus in the Work of Oforiwaa Aduonum, Women’s Studies, 33(3), 279–98. Badenhausen, K. (2016) Serena Williams Tops Sharapova as the World’s Highest Paid-Female Athlete. FORBES. Available at: https​://ww​w.for​bes.c​om/si​tes/k​urtba​denha​usen/​2016/​06/06​/sere​na-to​ps-sh​ arapo​va-as​-the-​world​s-hig​hest-​paid-​femal​e-ath​lete/​ (accessed 24 October 2017) 201

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Baggett, D. (ed.) (2010) Tennis and Philosophy:What the Racket is All About. Kentucky: University Press. Bailey, R. (2016) Serena Williams Uses Social Media Site Reddit to Announce Her Engagement to its Co-Founder. THE42. Available at: http:​//www​.the4​2.ie/​seren​a-wil​liams​-enga​gemen​t-316​4209-​ Dec20​16/ (accessed 24 October 2017) Cashmore, E. (1997) The Black Culture Industry. London: Routledge. Douglas, D. (2012) To Be Young, Gifted, Black and Female: A Mediation on the Cultural Politics at Play in Representations of Venus and Serena Williams. Sociology of Sport Online. Available at: http:​//www​.tenn​ isfor​um.co​m/12-​gener​al-me​ssage​s/119​439-d​octor​al-th​esis-​siste​r s-wi​lliam​s-art​icle-​has-b​een-p​asted​ .html​(accessed 24 October 2017) English, J. (1978) Sex Equality in Sports, Philosophy and Public Affairs, 7(3), 275. Fein, P. (2005) You Can Quote Me on That: Greatest Tennis Quips, Insights and Zingers. Virginia: Potomac Books. Flory, D. (2008) Philosophy, Black Film, Film Noir. Pennsylvania: Penn State University Press. Hajela, D. (2007, 12 April) Don Imus’ Nappy Remark Has Long, Hurtful History in Describing AfricanAmerican Hair. Associated Press. Available at: http:​//leg​acy.s​andie​gouni​ontri​bune.​com/n​ews/n​ation​ /2007​0412-​1500-​nappy​hair.​html (accessed 23 October 2017) Hall, K. (1996) Beauty and the Beast of Whiteness:Teaching Race and Gender, Shakespeare Quarterly, 47(4), 461–75. Inglesias, E. (2001) Escape. Available at: https​://ww​w.you​tube.​com/w​atch?​v=9mQ​JaXwG​Plg (accessed 23 October 2017) Izadi, E. (2016, 22 August) Why Alicia Keys isn’t wearing makeup on ‘The Voice’. The Washington Post (online). Jet, (2001, 9 July) Fired White Sportscaster Apologizes for Remarks about Venus and Serena Williams; Gets Rehired, 100(4), 32. Jet, (2001, 8 July) Venus Williams Signs Richest Endorsement Contract Ever for Female Athlete, 99(4), 51. King, B.J (1999) Always on the Cusp. In C. Phillips (ed.), The Right Set: A Tennis Anthology. New York: Vintage. Lott, E. (1997) The Whiteness of Film Noir, American Literary History, 9(3), 542–66. McKay, J. & Johnson, H. (2008) Pornographic Eroticism and Sexual Grotesquerie in Representations of African American Sportswomen, Social Identities, 14(4), 491–504. Phillips, C. (ed.) (1999) The Right Set: A Tennis Anthology. New York:Vintage. Pilgrim, D. (2000) The Tragic Mulatto Myth. Jim Crow Museum of Racist Memorabilia. Available at: http:// www.ferris.edu/jimcrow/mulatto/ (accessed 23 October 2017) ‘Serena Williams Takes it Off in JANE Magazine’ (2007, 21 July) WHUDAT. Available at: http:​//www​. whud ​ a t.co ​ m /new​ s blur​ b s/mo​ re/se​ rena_​ w illi​ a ms_t​ a kes_​ i t_of​ f _in_​ j ane_​ m agaz​ i ne_1​ 6 8072​ 1 071 (accessed 23 October 2017) Spencer, N. (2004) Sister Act VI: Venus and Serena at Indian Wells: “Sincere Fictions” and White Racism, Journal of Sport and Social Issues, 28(2), 115–32. SPORTSNET (2017, 13 September) Serena Williams Announces Baby’s Birth on Instagram. SPORTSNET. Available at: http:​//www​.spor​tsnet​.ca/t​ennis​/sere​na-wi​lliam​s-ann​ounce​s-bab​ys-bi​rth-i​nstag​ram/ (accessed 23 October 2017) Sullivan, T. (2002, 30 July) Beauty is as Beauty Does, and Anna K. Doesn’t. San Diego Union Tribune. ‘The 50 Most Beautiful People in the World’ (1998, 5 November) People, 49(18). Thompson, S. (2003) Avon Targets Black Sales Reps, Advertising Age, 74(35), 16. Women’s Tennis Blog, (2007, 24 July) Serena Williams Poses Nude for JANE Magazine + Hits Hollywood Party Scene. Women’s Tennis Blog. Available at: http:​//www​.wome​nsten​nisbl​og.co​m/200​7/07/​24/se​ rena-​willi​ams-p​oses-​nude-​for-j​ane-m​agazi​ne-hi​ts-ho​llywo​od-pa​rty-s​cene (accessed 23 October 2017) You Can Go Back:The Tennis Star Explains Why She Will Return to a Haunting Place (2015, 16 February) TIME, 185(5), 17. Zirm, J. (2015) Darren Rovell Says Racism has Nothing to do with Serena Williams Being No.2 in Endorsement Money, Sets off Twitter Firestorm. COMPLEX. Available at: http:​//www​.comp​lex.c​ om/sp​orts/​2015/​08/da​r ren-​rovel​l-say​s-rac​ism-n​ot-a-​f acto​r-in-​seren​a-wil​liams​-endo​rseme​nt-mo​ney (accessed 23 October 2017)

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20 Making work out of play The troubling gender performances of Bill Tilden Nathan Titman1

In March of 2016, a panel responsible for approving historical markers in the state of Pennsylvania rejected, in a four-to-one vote, a proposal to erect a memorial for the seven-time national tennis champion, Bill Tilden. The memorial, supported by a group of Philadelphian sports enthusiasts who armed themselves with letters from tennis clubs, star professional athletes and historians, would have stood on the grounds of the Germantown Cricket Club, located very near Tilden’s childhood home. Comments from the panelists indicate that any artifact of veneration for Tilden – a man who was one of the most dominant athletes in the twentieth century – will not materialize any time soon. While the committee acknowledged that Tilden’s athletic prowess was “unquestioned” a majority of the members could not rationalize the commemoration of a man whose private and public histories have been erased by his association with sexual misconduct (De Groot 2016). Tilden’s criminal convictions – for “contributing to the delinquency of a minor” in 1946 and a probation violation three years after – rapidly led to ostracism from the athletic and showbusiness worlds in which he had previously played a vibrant and very public role. The relatively rare media coverage of Tilden since then typically frames his life story as a tragic descent into shame and self-defeat. For instance, at the beginning of the 2009 US Open, the New York Times printed an article contending that Tilden’s tennis had remained ‘overshadowed by his vices’. The headline placed the blame for this erasure squarely on its subject – in the end, Tilden was ‘Defeated Only By Himself ’ (Crouse 2009, p.F5). The history that Tilden’s life seems to offer – one structured by shame, isolation, defeat – reflects themes that have more or less haunted queer narratives for nearly a century. A comparison between his star status through the early 1940s and his silenced public memory after his arrests provides a revealing shorthand history of male sexual identities in the United States – one that illuminates the stigmatizations resulting, in part, from the increasingly widespread equation of “homosexuality” with pathology in the postwar United States. Analyzing his playing style and attitudes about the tennis culture he inhabited and shaped, this chapter attempts to complicate accounts of Tilden’s career that separate his athletic performances from his self-expression in terms of gender and sexuality. Moving mostly chronologically through Tilden’s life, I examine contemporary sports journalism and his own writing to both contextualize his emergence as a celebrity and illuminate the density of the gendered and sexual meanings he embodied. Tennis – rather than a simple cover for, or sublimation of, 203

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his sexual desires – allowed Tilden significant agency in fashioning a public life that countered modern demands placed on similarly situated white men.

The terpsichorean Tilden and amateur tennis Bill Tilden’s early life did not necessarily signal future athletic prowess. He was born in 1893 in Overleigh – the family mansion purchased by his father who was a prominent businessman and important figure in Philadelphia Republican politics. Tilden’s mother – who lost three of Tilden’s older siblings to diphtheria – remained convinced that young Bill was sickly and weak throughout his childhood, and took pains to safeguard him from potential harm. He quickly learned from her that women were the sources of potential venereal disease, and even his later sexual experiences reflected an unenthusiastic attitude about physical contact with other adults (Deford 1975). He did not appear to be discouraged from his sporting endeavors, however, and the fact that Overleigh stood less than 300 yards from the main gates of the Germantown Cricket Club ensured that Tilden could enjoy all the privileges of gentility in his athletic pursuits (Baltzell 1995). Tilden perfected his tennis game at a time when the increasing popularity of the sport spurred significant changes to its classed and gendered meanings. After tennis initially gained favor among the upper classes in England and, subsequently, the United States, the sport placed its male participants in a precarious position with regard to gender. On the one hand, early boosters celebrated tennis for its promotion of self-confidence and hearty exercise among players – something not always present in the team sports that elite males favored (Heathcote et al. 1890, p.85). On the other hand, observers in the late nineteenth century sometimes cautioned men against playing tennis, arguing that it lacked the vigor necessary for healthy male development. The fact that women could participate in “lawn” tennis as early as the 1870s helped account for the sport’s initial popularity, yet the occasional intermingling of the sexes on tennis courts suggested to some that the sport might not be sufficiently robust for men (Voss 1985, p.2). By the 1920s, however, commentators began valorizing tennis as a perfect activity to add vitality to a class of white American men whose sedate professional lives compromised their masculine worth. For instance, George Whiteside Hillyard (1925) – once the secretary of the All England Lawn Tennis Club – saw tennis as an antidote to the drawbacks of living in the early twentiethcentury leisure class, as well as a motivating force in pushing men toward success and vigorous productivity in the modern workplace. However, the sport’s American governing body – then known as the Unites States Lawn Tennis Association (USLTA) – hampered the democratization of championship tennis by enforcing the amateur rule, which, at the most basic level, insisted that players compete in pursuit of personal glory rather than money. By the turn of the twentieth century, the very wealthy began constructing a class identity around their participation in leisure activities that had to remain useless – members of the upper class performed their elite status by playing sport for sport’s (and no other) sake (Mrozek 1983). Even as athletes in other sports began embracing professionalism, members of the USLTA clung to amateurism, thereby reinforcing a class and racial hegemony that guarded against working-class and immigrant populations who were increasingly adopting sport as a leisure activity (Cross 1990). In response to a growing sense of disempowerment in the face of mechanized labor and efficiency experts, working-class men helped transform leisure from a luxury enjoyed by a moneyed minority to a supposedly necessary antidote to the emasculating stresses of the workplace (Floyd 2009). As laborers turned to sport to be timed, officiated and measured in order to exhibit their masculinity, well-to-do male tennis players attempted to retain a measure of refinement in their athleticism. According to Robert J. Lake (2012), 204

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tennis mores, unlike those of sports like football and rugby, continued to favor aggression and competitiveness less than the exhibition of chivalrous “gentlemanly” conduct. Winning was important for male players, but not at the expense of sportsmanship and physical control. Through the 1920s, the members of the USLTA sought to ensure that tennis was not simply an expression of physical capabilities – it was an activity shared by men and women whose refinements separated them from the “rabble” who participated in and patronized supposedly cruder sports, such as boxing and baseball (Voss 1985). Though he possessed the blue-blooded lineage that characterized many of tennis’ early champions, Tilden found himself spellbound by an emergent West Coast style emphasizing speed and aggressive athleticism, and consciously countered the baseline poses that characterized the dominant aristocratic play he witnessed at East Coast country clubs during the decades of his youth. In his autobiography My Story, he commented on the most influential player with respect to perfecting his own tennis style. In the 1910s, Maurice McLoughlin led the California charge of less well-to-do players, and Tilden found himself drawn not only to the more aggressive approach he witnessed in McLoughlin’s matches, but also to the new model for male physicality that resulted. In his recollections of seeing McLoughlin play for the first time in 1909, in an exhibition against Bostonian Nathaniel N. Niles, Tilden conveyed the contrasts in tennis masculinities of the early twentieth century, favoring the ‘bedraggled’ and ‘disreputable’ persona of the former over the “old school tradition” of the latter (1948, p.31). In addition to his realization that variety and speed would eventually determine the champions of the sport, Tilden ascended to tennis dominance due to his ability to shirk the conventional demands of white bourgeois masculinity. At the age of 26, he had achieved some measure of success, reaching the national finals in consecutive years, but failing to seriously threaten the top American player, Bill Johnston. His biographer, Frank Deford, underscores the impracticality of his decision to continue playing tennis. ‘Any normal, twenty-six-year-old man with a family and a mortgage would have gone back to tending the store at this point’, but Tilden recommitted himself to the sport, relocating to Providence, Rhode Island in order to develop a more well-rounded game (1975, p.35–6). By 1920, at the age of 27, he was the national champion. Made at an age when most men were expected to have families and careers, his dedication to revamping his technique entailed a rejection of contemporary expectations about ideal, reproductive American masculinity. As historians such as George Chauncey have shown, the pursuit of ‘companionate marriage’ joined the attainment of a career profitable enough to support a family as crucial objectives in demonstrating gender and class status for middle-class men (1994, p.117). To some observers, however, Tilden excelled precisely because of his decision to not define himself according to home and office life. According to an article in American Lawn Tennis, ‘Geniuses for the most part do not successively marry, settle down, raise a family and live on to a harmless anecdotage. And Tilden is a genius’ (Stillman 1931, p.686). Even if Tilden never identified as homosexual, then, his dedication to the game required and resulted from his existence outside prevailing gender and sexual norms of the 1920s. In the early twentieth century, compromised male autonomy in the workplace challenged previously stable meanings of “manhood” among white middle-class men, who consequently felt compelled to continually evince their worth through “masculine” physical comportment and economic productivity (Kimmel 2006, p.89). At the same time, evolving understandings of “normal” male sexuality altered the way that many white middle-class men perceived their social relations with other men. After developing complex and visible urban cultures, “fairies” became foils for American masculinity by embodying the feminine characteristics and passive sexual roles against which “normal” men felt compelled to define themselves (Chauncey 1994, p.12–3). As Anthony Rotundo has observed, close same-sex affiliations among men – once championed 205

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within Victorian culture – came under heightened surveillance as the “homosexual”, however ill-defined, emerged in the early twentieth century as ‘the defining opposite of manhood’ (1993, p.278–80). While it was not until the 1930s that the heterosexual/homosexual binary began replacing the division of “fairies” from “normal men” as the primary criteria for categorizing sexual identities, the white middle class generally adopted “homosexual” as a descriptive term considerably earlier than members of the working class (Chauncey 1994, p.13–4). Therefore, to bourgeois observers, a man’s distinct privileging of same-sex companions over marriage and domesticity could seem almost as incriminating as “fairy” effeminacy when classifying male sexuality. The standard life pattern for male tennis champions through the 1920s reflected contemporary masculine norms, as players typically competed for a few years, and then moved on to marriage and a non-athletic profession. While the highly publicized marriages of other famous players such as Ellsworth Vines consolidated their white masculine identities (Hynson 1936), Tilden cultivated a career distinguished by mobility, artistry and theatricality – three qualities that could effectively associate him with categories of sexual difference in the 1920s. Because the heterosexual/homosexual binary had not fully developed in medical or popular discourse, the 1920s craving for sport celebrities enabled him to embody the role of an athletic “artist” while evading complete stigmatization. For his part, Tilden took the label of “artist” seriously. ‘Like the actor’, he observed, ‘the athlete lives by public performances, exhibits himself in the public eye, thrives on public applause. The difference… is that actors make a play out of work whereas athletes make work out of play’ (1948, p.280). A sense of drama remained essential; he was both criticized and admired for the extent to which he could toy with opponents, keeping matches close only to end them in dominating fashion by exploiting obvious weaknesses in his rivals’ games. Even at the peak of his popularity as an amateur player, he often left spectators exasperated by needing to fall behind in matches in order to play his best tennis (Editorial 1920). Winning, at times, was less crucial than being right. Some would vigorously applaud while others virulently criticized his habit of throwing, or “chucking”, points after he thought he unfairly benefited from a linesman’s (supposedly incorrect) call (The Tilden-Anderson Match 1923, p.462). Tilden’s peculiarities drew considerable debate from observers, who frequently attributed his authoritativeness to a desire to perfect his athletic performance. Correcting calls, throwing points and glaring at linesmen might be construed as ‘simple courtesy made… to adjust an error that would have marred the fairness and justice of a game, in a word, its artistic perfection’ (Riviera Season Dominated by Tilden 1930, p.5). By manipulating the score, insisting on the accuracy of his own calls and performing his disdain regarding the behaviors of officials and his opponents,Tilden ensured that tennis and theater remained inextricably linked. His theatrical approach to tennis athleticism and competition aligned Tilden with contemporary queer celebrity culture. I use the term “queer” here not to indicate how such figures were defined by mass audiences, or how they understood their own sexuality – instead, I deploy it as shorthand to signify non-normative gender and sexual expressivity (Warner 1993, p.xxvi). The fantasy worlds Tilden associated with theater and Hollywood were often his refuges from the stifling regulations of the USLTA. By forging friendships with theater professionals – many of them gay or lesbian – Tilden joined a network of artists engaged in projects that proposed alternatives to social norms while still enjoying mainstream approval (Tilden 1938). Laurence Senelick has illuminated the ways in which theater has historically remained both a conventional institution and a “haven” for marginalized individuals who turn to it as a rare means of expression (2002, p.38). Tilden made several forays into acting at the height of his fame, appearing in three Broadway productions in 1926, as well as the 1927 silent film The Music Master. His 206

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sexuality seemed to haunt certain productions, with reviewers writing jabs about his unconvincing acting in love scenes and his involvement in some unbearably stereotypical representations of “Aw chee” boyhood (Deford 1975).Yet his roles occasionally allowed him to perform according to his most prominent sexual desires; he was not averse to roles that suggested male same-sex attraction. He appeared as Dracula in a traveling company, and other plays paired him with child actors who embodied the ideal of American boyhood he so coveted (Tilden 1948). While no evidence exists of any sexual relationships with the theater personalities with whom he collaborated,Tilden’s stage ventures afforded access to one of the few social worlds that allowed for queer expression in the early twentieth century. Tilden based his own star persona, in part, on his associations with contemporary female celebrities. He favored glamorous women who exuded wit and personality, and his autobiographies are filled with recollections of meeting (and overhearing the barbs of) Talullah Bankhead, Katherine Hepburn and Greta Garbo, among others. He frequently expressed an awareness of his favorite stars attending his matches, and a desire to meet them afterwards (Deford 1975). Appreciation for the personae of prima donnas – their theatricality, abrasiveness and preoccupation with aesthetics – informed his own attempts to entertain audiences during his tennis performances. The figure of the diva, as John M. Clum has argued, provided gay men in preStonewall America with images of women who acted out against a status quo that reflected the interests of heterosexual males. In this way, Tilden exhibited an appreciation for ‘the diva mythology of performance’, an appreciation for ‘fierce act[s] of will in the face of… personal unhappiness’ (1999, p.138). The flamboyance and volatility that audiences often observed in Tilden actually originated in part from his fascination with a model of public celebrity performance that was marked as distinctly feminine. The comparisons that observers made between Tilden’s athleticism and the dance performances of Vaclav Nijinsky further underscore the queerness of Tilden’s public persona. Player Manuel Alonso’s claim that watching Tilden’s footwork ‘was like seeing Nijinsky dance across the net’ underscores the gender ambivalence of Tilden’s athleticism (quoted in Deford 1975, p.102). As Kevin Kopelson has argued, Nijinsky – by combining artistic gestures with athletic mastery – offered observers of his performances a measure of both grace and strength in a single body, thereby defying contemporary gender distinctions. European audiences recognized an ‘unmarked female impersonation’ from Nijinsky, ‘a titillating transgender performance not designed to be seen as such, not predicated on a costume change and not intended to enable the performer to pass as a woman’ (1997, p.38). By making correlations between Tilden’s movements and dance, observers placed him in a category in which the body rid itself of the constrictions of gender conformity through performance. Like Nijinksy, Tilden frequently received the label of artistic ‘genius’ – ‘a masculine classification that’, according to Kopelson, ‘paradoxically, authorizes men to express typically feminine emotions’ – helping to account for the extent to which his body remained uncooperative with respect to the expectations of white bourgeois masculinity (1997, p.66). In the floridly written sports columns of the 1920s, Tilden’s movement also stood in stark contrast to the more utilitarian approach of many of his prominent peers. Commentators frequently imagined his matches as contestations between his own transcendent abilities and the mechanized attack of his opponents – as one Wimbledon commentator claimed, ‘[h]is wonderful play is the product, not of a nerveless machine, but of a sensitive instrument strung to its highest pitch by the calls of a great event’ (Liddell-Hart 1921, p.214–5). Even in a loss to French player Rene Lacoste, the latter was the equivalent of ‘a machine against a god of the courts; and just as Jove might have dashed himself vainly against the rocks of Olympus, so Tilden was unable to find a flaw in the armor of his opponent’ (Rene Lacoste Wins American Title for 207

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Second Time 1927, p.440). In the context of a 1920s American athletic culture that valorized the machine-like ground strokes of rivals such as Bill Johnston, Tilden represented an unpredictable and unfettered aesthetic alternative. According to one observer, ‘Tilden is nearly always doing stunts with the ball – and rarely are two successive shots alike. … He is as certain to do the unlooked-for as Johnston is to do the obvious’ (Frey 1921, p.240). The spectacle of Tilden’s varied shots often rendered his opponents’ focus on technique dull by comparison. ‘Tilden has the lightness and quickness of footwork and stroke play of a tiger, with all its feline grace and swift, paralyzing blows’, noted a Wimbledon spectator, while his opponent ‘reminds one of the well-oiled, rhythmic, if not artistic, working of a steam hammer or the piston rod of a steamship, as one sees it when gazing at the engine room’ (Liddell-Hart 1920, p.265–6). In terms of both his movement and his rejection of a career and family life that would have signaled conventional white male accomplishment, Tilden’s sporting body offered visual challenges to the logic that measured masculinity according to performed efficiency and heterosexuality.

“Peter Pan” Tilden: a professional showman Tilden’s decision to turn professional in 1931 not only constituted a radical departure from the amateur ideal in tennis; it also facilitated the continuance of Tilden’s non-normative approach to making a living. He was the first major male player to make this transition, and the professional tour provided him with new opportunities to evade gendered economic and romantic norms. Male tennis professionals enjoyed considerable privacy during professional barnstorming tours; as long as they committed themselves to their best tennis and to putting on a good show, organizers did not seem to care about what they did during off-court hours (Barnes 1935). Professionalism removed Tilden from the regulations of the USLTA bureaucracy and the increasingly vigilant surveillance of homosexuality in America – in the late 1930s, Tilden did not shy away from including a rotation of chosen ball boys in his touring entourage, often riding alone with the selected lads in his own vehicle, separate from the other tour personnel (Deford 1975). Journalists of the era rarely remarked on Tilden’s love life, and as his professional career progressed, Tilden made few pains to disguise his interest in the companionship of adolescent boys. In many respects, Tilden’s professional matches constituted a means of re-performing his earlier exercises of youthful, chivalric male athleticism. He wished to shed the restraints of amateurism placed upon him by the USLTA, asserting that ‘My tennis in the future will be purely personal’ (Tilden 1929, pp.619–20). While Tilden claimed that his decision to turn professional resulted from his desire to make (and receive payment for) instructional films in Hollywood, changes to his behavior on and off the court suggest that this choice was made in part to allow for shifts in his gender performance.While descriptions of Tilden’s physicality in the early 1920s documented free movement and adaptability, by the end of the decade he was playing the role of laboring veteran to a new generation. Also with age, came a more noticeably effeminate persona: vocal affectations – particularly a vaguely British accent – and more flamboyant gestures (Deford 1975). As George Chauncey (1994) has argued, gay men in this period adopted ways of behaving and speaking that expressed their self-identification as feminized males and, in so doing, attained more visibility for themselves as homosexuals. As age rendered the ideal of embodying American boyhood increasingly illusory,Tilden utilized physical expressions that in their gender upheavals could signal specific sexual desires. Turning professional placed Tilden firmly within the realm of show business; audiences purchased tickets expecting to be dazzled by physical displays, even without the ongoing tension of tournaments. Tilden’s professional debut at Madison Square Garden on 18 February 1931 208

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drew 15,000 fans, and headline matchups in subsequent years brought in equally large numbers (Tilden 1948).These professional performances, however, were not always satisfying or convincing, as spectators occasionally accused Tilden of letting up during matches. One attendee of a Tilden Tour stop in Grand Rapids, Michigan, ‘could not help thinking… that [Tilden] had something in reserve at all times and that he could win any time he wished, but as a good showman he wanted the match to be as close as possible’ (Boldwood 1931, p.8). The same aversion to conventional “masculine” work (and reproductive heterosexuality) that marked his ascendance to “genius” now appeared alienating to some tennis fans. ‘It was tennis, tennis, tennis with Tilden’, according to American Lawn Tennis. ‘Girls, other sports, studies, were as far divorced from Bill as the two poles’. By comparison, Ellsworth Vines, Tilden’s most prominent professional opponent in the early 1930s, ‘seemed more human. He had financial worries, … he fell in love; studies at school bothered him; he sat on a high stool and worked and he was an all-around good fellow’ (Tennis is the Game 1932, p.53).Whether allowing his opponents to make matches more competitive or reminding spectators that his dominance in the 1920s resulted, in part, from the lack of regular work and other conventionally “masculine” concerns in his life, Tilden garnered criticisms from observers who believed they were not witnessing sport in its purest, most demanding form. Many fans, while appreciative of his continued dedication, could not help but wonder what drove a middle-aged man to continue subjecting himself to the grind of physically demanding competition. Editorials in the April 1937 edition of American Lawn Tennis expressed embarrassment over recent appearances of a then 44-year-old Tilden taking on younger opponents. Commentators often located Tilden’s inadequacy in his physicality, bemoaning that ‘it will be only legs and shoulders and chin and no longer the drives which clip the lines, the acing volleys and the thundering cannonballs’ from then on (Potter 1937, p.19).Yet Tilden’s mere appearance on courts all over the world, still competing against the sport’s best players, drew commentary about his unprecedented longevity. Observers frequently applauded the ability of “Peter Pan Tilden” to play competitively at an age when a vast majority of stars had stepped away from the sport (Blein 1937, p.12). While remaining in the amateur ranks would have both subjected his body to more intense punishments from regular tournament play and underscored his differences with respect to boyish amateur physicality, professional exhibitions allowed spectators to temporarily conjure memories of the years when a spritely Tilden dominated the sport. Tilden could remain fairly secure in expressing an aesthetic queerness, but his furtive experiences with physical intimacy would eventually result in his fall from favor in public opinion. Evidence suggests that Tilden’s attitude toward sex remained diffident throughout his life. According to court testimony, he reported two sexual episodes with women, only one of which involved intercourse. At the age of ten, he had regular sexual encounters for five or six years with another boy, followed by ‘the same kind of a relationship’ with a classmate at the University of Pennsylvania. In general, his same-sex sexual encounters were, in Deford’s terms, ‘immature’ in nature; he would usually ‘fondle the… partner, and then masturbate himself afterwards, in private’ (1975, p.211). On November 23 1946, police encountered Tilden in his car with a 14-year-old boy, who reported that Tilden had touched him. Tilden pled guilty to contributing to the delinquency of a minor and served nine months in a minimum-security prison. The responses to Tilden’s arrest – both his own and those of journalists – reflect the solidification of the homosexual/heterosexual binary in the postwar United States. The New York Times made no reference to his arrest, and printed a five-paragraph description of his sentencing in January of 1947. Tilden’s hometown paper, the Philadelphia Inquirer, did not cover either the arrest or the sentencing. While this media silence might reflect Tilden’s diluted celebrity status in the 1940s, it also suggests a general 209

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reticence to address the topic of “deviant” male sexualities. Tilden’s chapter-length narration of his arrest and imprisonment in My Story attempts to both rationalize his behavior and shirk the mantle of immorality. He describes sport as instrumental in fostering intense, though not altogether shameful, relationships between men who had been trained to pursue ideal physiques and intimate body contact with male teammates and opponents. At the same time, Tilden portrays himself, in keeping with contemporary medical literature on homosexuality, as the victim of a psychological condition, struggling to overcome a debilitating illness. As John Carvalho and Mike Milford (2013) have contended, these two distinct explanations illuminate Tilden’s contradictory attempts to portray his behavior as both an understandable result of otherwise healthy homo-social athletic endeavors and a pitiable malady that required urgent rehabilitation. Whether this explanation expresses Tilden’s actual inconsistent understanding of his desires, or a savvy, disingenuous attempt to procure public reverence and sympathy (or both), it reflects transitions in popular understandings of male same-sex intimacy. The Victorian-era privileging of intense bonds between men as crucial means of masculine socialization was, by the 1940s, rapidly eroding as a result of the medical stigmatization of “the homosexual” – one who sought same-sex companionship too fervently. By the close of the decade, the taint of homosexual desire, exacerbated by sexual contact with minors, effectively relegated Tilden to pariah status. In January of 1949, he was arrested again after being discovered with a minor. When police attempted to take him into custody a short time after, they found a 17-year-old boy in his company, leading to a conviction and prison sentence for violating probation (Carvalho & Milford 2013).

Conclusion A longtime smoker,Tilden died in his Los Angeles apartment in 1953 at the age of 60.The sportswriters who covered his amateur career never acknowledged (or possibly even recognized) his sexual desires, though some anecdotal accounts suggest that USLTA officials had long been aware of Tilden’s sexuality; after some of Tilden’s writings about tennis events appeared in print, the USLTA puzzlingly refused to show leniency when censuring their top player for allegedly violating amateur rules, possibly constituting attempts to limit the public presence of an athlete who evaded sexual norms (Fisher 2009). It was only after his arrests in the 1940s that his private life effectively marginalized his athletic accomplishments in public memory. Within a Pennsylvania sporting culture still reeling from the conviction of Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky for molesting several boys, the controversy that Tilden’s sexuality continues to generate should hardly be surprising. His athletic dominance has not proven compelling enough to garner universal embrace among tennis enthusiasts or those invested in queer historical reclamation. As the Germantown memorial controversy suggests, his legacy remains uncertain.Yet by examining how observers once interpreted his body and athletic performance, and how he thought of his own participation in modern celebrity sport culture, we can gain an appreciation for a period in tennis history that allowed Tilden a measure of agency in crafting a highly visible persona that thwarted expectations for white bourgeois men, while also endearing him, for a time, to millions. Analyses of how his theatricality and embodied artistry functioned within and against contemporary gender norms suggest that desire and sexuality held the potential to shape sporting culture of the 1920s and 1930s in general, and the gendered and classed history of tennis in particular.

Note 1 Portions of this chapter were previously published in the article:Taking Punishment Gladly: Bill Tilden’s Performances of the Unruly Male Body (2014) Journal of Sport History, 41(3), 447–66. 210

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References Baltzell, E.D. (1995) Sporting Gentlemen: Men’s Tennis from the Age of Honor to the Cult of the Superstar. New York: Free Press. Barnes, B. (1935) Barnstorming in Europe, Racquet, 2(11), 18–19, 37. Blein, M. (1937) Paris Chit-Chat, American Lawn Tennis, 31(4), 12. Boldwood, C.W. (1931) In T. T. T. at Grand Rapids, American Lawn Tennis, 25(12), 8. Carvalho, J. & Milford, M. (2013) “One Knows That This Condition Exists”: An Analysis of Tennis Champion Bill Tilden’s Apology for His Homosexuality Sport in History, 33(4), 554–67. Chauncey, G. (1994) Gay New York: Gender, Urban Culture, and the Making of the Gay Male World, 1890–1940. New York: BasicBooks. Clum, J. (1999) Something for the Boys: Musical Theater and Gay Culture. New York: St. Martin’s Press. Cross, G. (1990) A Social History of Leisure since 1600. State College, PA:Venture Publishing. Crouse, K. (2009, 30 August) Bill Tilden: A Tennis Star Defeated Only by Himself. The New York Times. De Groot, K. (2016, 28 April) Bill Tilden: A US Tennis Hero, But With a Morals Clause. Associated Press. Available at: http://bigstory.ap.org/article/ 3cb5f​9a635​40420​489a7​1f970​a1746​77/bi​ll-ti​lden-​us-te​ nnis-​hero-​moral​s-cla​use (accessed January 2017) Deford, F. (1975) Big Bill Tilden:The Triumphs and the Tragedy. New York: Simon and Schuster. Editorial (1920, August 1) American Lawn Tennis, 14(6), 278. Fisher, J.M. (2009) A Terrible Splendor: Three Extraordinary Men, a World Poised for War, and the Greatest Tennis Match Ever Played. New York: Crown Publishers. Floyd, K. (2009) The Reification of Desire: Toward a Queer Marxism. Minneapolis: University of Minneapolis Press. Frey, A.H. (1921) Concerning Form, American Lawn Tennis, 15(5), 240. Heathcote, J., Pleydell-Bouverie, E. & Ainger, A. (1890) Tennis. London: Longmans, Green, and Company. Hillyard, G.W. (1925) Forty Years of First Class Lawn Tennis. London: Williams and Norgate. Kimmel, M. (2006) Manhood in America: A Cultural History, second edition. New York: Oxford University Press. Kopelson, K. (1997) The Queer Afterlife of Vaslav Nijinsky. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Hynson, R. C. (1936) A Problem, American Lawn Tennis, 30(10), 22. Lake, R.J. (2012) Gender and Etiquette in British Lawn Tennis 1870–1939: A Case Study of “Mixed Doubles”, The International Journal of the History of Sport, 29(5), 691–710. Liddell-Hart, B.H. (1920) English Championship Story Concluded, American Lawn Tennis, 14(6), 263–7. Liddell-Hart, B.H. (1921) Story of 1921 English Championships, American Lawn Tennis, 15(5), 204–15. Mrozek, D. (1983) Sport and American Mentality, 1880–1910. Knoxville: The University of Tennessee Press. Potter, E.C., Jr. (1937) Father William Throws the Torch, American Lawn Tennis, 31(3), 19. Rene Lacoste Wins American Title for Second Time (1927) American Lawn Tennis, 21(9), 439–50. Riviera Season Dominated by Tilden (1930) American Lawn Tennis, 24(1), 5. Rotundo, E.A. (1993) American Manhood:Transformations in Masculinity from the Revolution to the Modern Era. New York: BasicBooks. Senelick, L. (2002) The Queer Root of Theater. In Solomon, A. & Minwalla, F. (eds.), The Queerest Art: Essays on Lesbian and Gay Theater (pp.21–39), New York: New York University Press. Stillman, E. (1931) Tilden The Artist, American Lawn Tennis, 24(13), 686. Tennis is the Game (1932) American Lawn Tennis, 26(9), 53. Tilden, W.T., II (1929) My Tenth Anniversary, American Lawn Tennis, 23(12), 619–20. Tilden, W.T. (1938) Aces, Places and Faults. London: Robert Hale Limited. Tilden, W.T. (1948) My Story: A Champion’s Memoirs. New York: Hellman, Williams & Co. The Tilden-Anderson Match (1923) American Lawn Tennis, 17(9), 462. Voss, A. (1985) Tilden and Tennis in the Twenties. New York: The Whitston Publishing Company. Warner, M. (1993) Fear of a Queer Planet: Queer Politics and Social Theory. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

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21 Your racquet should do the talking Masculinity and top-class tennis, 1930s to the early twenty-first century Stephen Wagg1

This chapter explores the changes in typical masculinity expressed on the world’s elite tennis courts, chiefly by American and Australian players, between the 1930s and the time of writing. In summary, it examines: the forging of a gentlemanly ethic on the tennis circuits of two ostensibly egalitarian sport cultures; the challenges to that ethic which followed the abandonment of the professional-amateur distinction in 1968; and the reconstitution of that ethic in the late twentieth and early twenty-first century. It closes with some brief comments about coaching and masculinity in the television age.

Keeping it all in: tennis, manhood and self restraint In a recent book that was part biography and part a remembrance of his father, the writer Duncan Hamilton wrote eloquently of the archetypal masculine qualities that characterised the workingclass tradition in which he grew up: his father and the men he knew were, he remembered, stoic, self-reliant, self-effacing and emotionally reticent (Hamilton 2012, p.29). These traits were, of course, not confined to working-class males, but they had subtly different social meanings according to the social class of the person concerned. In the upper and middle-class male they might instead denote rationality and the shunning of sentimental judgments; in the working-class man they might signify fortitude and the capacity to endure often oppressive employment conditions – a capacity, it should be added, often unacknowledged in working-class women. Until the end of the 1950s, this masculinity was de rigeur (Whannel 2002, p.94–100), although breaches of the male sporting ethic might be treated differently according to class: for example, in association football, for most of its history a predominantly working-class game, a footballer who throws a punch can expect automatic banishment from the field of play, while more middle-class rugby union players are likely to be told simply to cool down. In tennis before the 1960s the dominant male code called for emotional restraint. Players were expected to accept umpiring decisions and line calls without question and neither to sulk in defeat nor exult in victory: in the oft-repeated words of the British imperialist poet Rudyard Kipling, ‘If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster/ And treat those two impostors just the same […] you’ll be a Man, my son!’.2 While these gentlemanly ideals were associated principally with Englishmen and with British amateurism, versions of them flourished in both the US and Australia, cultures on the face of it more egalitarian, more 212

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commercialised, more competitive and less disposed to deference than Britain’s. Yet, as other essays in this book make clear, the amateur ethic thrived in the tennis cultures of both countries and similar expectations of masculinity were correspondingly invoked. Historically the hub of the US tennis scene was in southern California. The men who thrived on the California tennis circuit were often from working-class homes. Don Budge, for example, who came to the University of California, Berkeley, in 1933 and won all four of the major international tournaments six years later, was the son of a Scottish professional footballer.3 The father of future Wimbledon champion Jack Kramer, who came to Los Angeles as a teenager in the late 1930s, was a blue collar worker on the Union Pacific Railroad (Kramer & Deford 1979;Shapiro 2009, p.14). Ricardo “Pancho” Gonzales’ father worked as a house painter, also in Los Angeles (Rice 1959, p.33). These biographies were not unusual and the players concerned benefited from a sponsored mobility into the elite clubs. Many had been noticed playing on public courts. For instance, Budge Patty (b. Arkansas, 1924) was seen playing on public courts in Los Angeles as a child by coach Bill Weissbuch.Weissbuch was also coach to wealthy Hollywood film actors, such as Robert Taylor and Barbara Stanwyck, who were happy to finance a programme for the development of junior tennis players (Patty 1951, p.9–14, 26).This development was supervised by Perry T. Jones, who ran both the Los Angeles Tennis Club and the Southern California Tennis Association either side of the Second World War. Jones administered a system of patronage. The American sociologist E. Digby Baltzell (1995, p.234–5) describes Jones as a snob, acutely aware of the status rivalry between the movie colony and the old wealth socialites in Los Angeles ruling circles. Anglophile gentlemanliness was highly valued in these circles. According to another writer, Jones ran the L.A. Tennis Club about the way Ivan the Terrible ran Russia. And the L.A. Tennis Club, in a sense, ran tennis. … He arranged for society to play host to big-time tennis. Perry wasn’t rich. He just knew everybody who was. He made them think it was their duty to support tennis. … You couldn’t throw tantrums in Jones’ day. You got paid under the table or under a bridge, but you didn’t get paid at all if Jones didn’t vouch for you, approve of you. Tennis was a citadel of hypocrisy, so Jones was right at home. When you went to a tournament, you had to stay at the home of a rich sponsor.You couldn’t afford a hotel. (Murray 1991, n.p) Jones’ despotism notwithstanding, this system tended to produce a more egalitarian version of the European gentlemanly ideal. In Britain and Europe, gifted young male tennis players were recruited via private clubs rather than public courts, but otherwise the fabric of patronage was similarly constituted: most players maintained their court decorum and their amateur status, partly so as to retain their eligibility for the Davis Cup (founded in 1900), their expenses (that is, their means of subsistence) and their friendly relations with their patrons among the great and the good of Californian society. Many, in any event, happily espoused the gentlemanly ideals. A book about Donald Budge, for example, drips with praise for the humility of its subject: Walter L. Pate, USLTA committee man and US Davis Cup captain, paid tribute to a ‘modest, considerate, perfect sportsman’ (Pate 1951, p.14). ‘There must be something inherently fine’, wrote Allison Danzig of The New York Times in the same volume, ‘about a game which turns out a specimen of young manhood who is not only a great champion, but has all the qualities that make for first-class citizenship’ (Danzig 1951, p.44). Patty professed to play tennis for fun (Patty 1951, p.35). And of Pasedena-born Ellsworth Vines, who won Wimbledon in 1932, Fred Perry said: ‘‘Ellsworth behaves like a sportsman after drinking the heady wine of victory or the dregs of defeat’ (cited in Flink 1994).This did not, of course, mean that all the upwardly mobile young tennis males of California during this period observed the same unvarying on-court chivalry 213

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– Gonzales, for example, who came under Jones’ tutelage as a boy in the early 1940s, was known throughout his long career for his temper tantrums (Flink 1995) – but the gentlemanly code remained the yardstick against which they were all judged. A similar social pattern obtained in Australia, a society governed and culturally dominated until the 1960s by an anglophile elite (see, for example, Jamrozik 2004).Writing in the early 1980s,Ted Tinling, a close observer of the international tennis scene in the mid-twentieth century, observed that ‘Australian men players have projected an admirable blend of sportsmanship and virility’ (Tinling 1983, p.163). This sportsmanship was incubated under the stewardship of Sir Norman Brookes, wealthy son of an English immigrant, who was President of the Lawn Tennis Association of Australia between 1926 and 1955 and, along with his chief lieutenant Australian Davis Cup captain Harry Hopman, dominated Australian tennis during that period. Brookes had been the first non-British male to win Wimbledon (in 1907) and the Brookes family, whose wealth was in gold mining and manufacture, were prominent high society figures in Melbourne and were close to the British royal family (Tinling 1983, p.163–4). As in the USA, there were opportunities, under the Brookes-Hopman regime, for Australian boys of comparatively humble origins to play elite tennis, and the 1950s threw up some eminent examples: Frank Sedgman (born Mont Albert, Melbourne, 1927), Ken Rosewall and Lewis Hoad (both born in Sydney, 1934). Rosewall was the son of a grocer (Kirshenbaum 1972) and Hoad’s father was an electrician, working on the city’s trams (Trengrove 1994). Rosewall, in a long career (1951–78), was known for his undemonstrative court demeanour. Likewise, in 2007, fellow Australian tennis champion Neale Fraser described Sedgman, whose father had been a factory night watchman (Reed 2014, p.18) as a very aggressive and attacking player [who] set a trend for good player behaviour. […] We played to win, we played hard but we never complained about injuries. We just went about our business and we never disputed line calls or had tantrums or anything like that. (Webb 2007) But perhaps the most unambiguous symbol of egalitarian on-court male sportsmanship to emerge in Australia during this period was Rod Laver, born in Rockhampton, Queensland, in 1938. Laver’s recent memoir fully embraces a specifically Australian version of honourable, postwar tennis masculinity: it lauds stoicism, equal opportunity and male modesty. ‘If you lived in Australia in the ‘40s and ‘50s, those golden, more innocent times before the public tennis courts that were ubiquitous on Australia’s rural and suburban blocks were banished by houses, flats, offices, parking lots, factories and shopping malls, tennis was what you played’ (Laver & Writer 2014, p.1). Moreover, Laver, in a perfect evocation of the Australian national myth of self-reliance, was born in the bush and learned his stoicism in part from his cattleman father, who ‘like most bushies [was] a tough, hard bloke who treated his own farm injuries (mainly because there was no hospital handy)’ (p.2). At a young age, Laver received what appears to have been a standard moral education from itinerant tennis coach Charlie Hollis. Hollis told Laver to remember that he was representing his home town and his nation: He said I should try to be like Gentleman Jack Crawford, the Australian champion of the 1930s, a fine player who fell agonisingly short of a Grand Slam, and was admired for his sportsmanship and generosity to opponents, his classy manners and, by wearing a longsleeved white cotton shirt and long cotton slacks when he played, his sartorial elegance. (p.19) Crawford was the son of a prosperous New South Wales farmer, but he too bore the stamp of rural self-reliance: his gentlemanliness was a token of the individual and not of his class, the 214

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family tennis court was homemade and he had never had a formal tennis lesson (Baltzell 1995, p.265–6; Regan 2014). Similarly, Hopman told his young charges that Australia should be represented on the tennis court by ‘fine young men’, stressing that, if they wanted ‘to throw racquets on the ground and swear and not do what you’re told, then opportunities won’t go your way’ (Laver & Writer 2014, p.22). Laver stressed the egalitarian nature of this national project: Unlike in some other countries where tennis was regarded as a hobby for the privileged, something to be squeezed in between the more important pursuits of university study and climbing the employment ladder, in Australia playing full-time tennis was a perfectly acceptable career. (p.50) He contrasted ‘the modest, understated approach to sport adopted by Australians back then’ with ‘the brash and boastful ways of the Americans’ (p.61). Thus, somewhat more egalitarian versions of the archetypal British gentlemanly tennis masculinity were forged in the United States and Australia during the middle decades of the twentieth century. This took place via a regime of sponsored mobility and strict amateurism administered by national associations and Anglophile elites: indeed Baltzell (1995, p.383) refers to Wimbledon as the ‘last bastion’ of what he calls ‘this Anglo-American ideal’ of sportsmanlike tennis masculinity.

Grunts, bounces: the coming of the “roughneck era” There is bound to be an element of rose-tinted retrospection in these accounts. For players like Budge and Sedgman to be singled out as exemplars of on-court chivalry, there had, logically, to be players who fell short of realising the egalitarian, gentlemanly ideals and, perhaps, others who rejected them altogether. Ricardo Gonzales was known throughout his long career (the mid–1940s to the mid–1970s) for his on-court combustibility, although he would frequently be viewed through the racist lens that saddled him with a “Latin temperament”. But Gonzales was not alone. American Gardnar Mulloy, who played in the 1940s and 1950s, had frequent contretemps with tournament officials – notably at the French Open and at Wimbledon in 1952 and the following year in a match against Australian Rex Hartwig at London’s Queen’s Club, during which he threw his racket at a line judge. ‘I’m the world’s worst sport’, he wrote in 1959. ‘Every time I lose it kills me’ (Mulloy 1959, p.139–41, 157–8; Robins 1973, p.126). Lew Hoad (career 1951–66), described by Laver as taking ‘his wins and losses with a grain of salt’ (Laver & Writer 2014, p.42), is said nevertheless to have once told a Wimbledon umpire to ‘get your ears washed out’ (Robins 1973, p.182), and even his venerating biographers admit that, in 1954, Hoad’s ‘bad temper on court shocked his now legion of fans who remembered only the laughing happy-golucky player of the previous year’ (Hodgson & Jones 2001, p.91). Moreover, in December 1956 the Montreal Gazette commented that the chances of the US winning the Davis Cup might be enhanced because Hoad was in one of his ‘petulant moods’. The same year, American Vic Seixas was booed by the crowd at Wimbledon (something at the time seen as without precedent) when he threw down his racket in a match against Ken Rosewall (Rosewall & Naughton 2012, p.87–8). Gradually, the ghosted memoirs of leading male tennis players began openly to challenge the British-derived myth of on-court sportsmanship. When a young man loses a tennis match, wrote Mulloy in 1959, how do you think he feels? Not an hour after the match but at the very moment he sees his opponent’s winning drive clip the baseline? The emotional let-down in some players 215

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is such that it leaves them empty, dazed, drained of feeling. A few take it with that desired philosophical calm. But some explode, say and do things better left undone and unsaid. Regrettable! And in Britain unforgiveable. (Mulloy 1959, p.163–4) Welsh player Mike Davies expressed similar sentiments in his autobiography Tennis Rebel in 1962: ‘When I succeeded I took it as my due, sure that I’d earned it by my own efforts. When I lost I was literally furious. Not with my opponent but with myself ’ (Davies 1962, p.16). Such players were frequently censured both by the national associations and by the tennis writers of the popular press – Davies, for instance, was castigated for bad sportsmanship by the right-wing Daily Mail (Davies 1962, p.25) – but cultural history was, apparently, on their side. One factor in the erosion of traditional tennis-court masculinity was trends in popular culture, which, after the Second World War and via television, tennis would soon become. The film performances of popular screen actors Marlon Brando and James Dean in the 1950s held out new and immediately influential portrayals of masculinity – anguished, mumbling male characters dealing openly with emotional difficulties. As veteran journalist Ray Connolly wrote of Dean: ‘That scene in East Of Eden,4 when he breaks down in tears with Raymond Massey… men just didn’t do that then.We all related to him’ (Short List 2011). Indeed, writing about Dean in 2014, the writer India Ross hailed the ‘birth of modern masculinity’. ‘Dean was a new kind of man. His characters cried and struggled and screamed in frustration at the blurry world they had to live in. They were awkward and uncertain’ (Ross 2014).

Tiger juices: tennis masculinity in the Open Era If Mulloy, Hoad and Davies were pale on-court echoes of Dean, subsequent decades of elite tennis threw up more dramatic departures from the established codes of sportsmanlike and emotionally reticent masculinity. These departures follow the inauguration of the “Open Era”, merging the professional and amateur circuits, in 1968. For example, the flamboyant Romanian player Ilie Nastase turned professional the following year and soon established a reputation for on-court misdemeanour. By 1975, according to his biographer, Nastase (winner of the US Open in 1972 and the French Open the following year, when he was ranked No.1 in the world) ‘had already been involved in three highly publicised furores’. In June of that year, in a match in Canada and after disputing a line decision he visibly stopped trying, allowing his opponent, Manuel Orantes, to win easily. That summer, also in Canada, he told a spectator to ‘Go fuck yourself ’ (Evans 1978, p.174–5). In 1978, during a match at the Sherman Oaks club in Houston, Texas, he told a female spectator ‘If you don’t shut up… I’m going to shit in your hat’ (Nastase & Beckerman 2004, p.214). Nastase’s contemporary, Jimmy Connors, a working-class American from Illinois, turned professional in 1972 and won the Wimbledon, the Australian and US Opens two years later. Connors, too, had an aggressive on-court demeanour, being apt to wag his finger at opponents. Baltzell, a tennis traditionalist, grumbled that, in addition to ‘continual clowning, use of obscene language and obscene body gestures, and his general rudeness’, Connors ‘was the first tennis player to use the “grunt” and the first to bounce the ball interminably before serving’ (1995, p.353). Far from suppressing emotion, Connors used it as fuel – his game, he said later, ran on rage, or ‘tiger juices’, which his coach (who was also his mother) advised him to keep flowing (Connors 2013, p.15). The most notable and influential players to confront traditional masculine tennis mores, however, have been the Americans John McEnroe (born in 1959 and several times winner both 216

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of Wimbledon and the US Open) and Andre Agassi (born in 1970, and winner of all four major single titles in the 1990s). McEnroe regularly challenged decisions on court and his altercation with umpire Edward James during a Round One match at Wimbledon against Tom Gullikson, during which he screamed ‘Man, you cannot be serious’ at James, is probably the most remembered moment in tennis history, earning him the soubriquet ‘Superbrat’ in the British tabloid press (McEnroe & Kaplan 2002, p.133–5). Agassi became known as a young man to be graceless in victory, as, for example, in a Davis Cup match against Argentina’s Martin Jaite in Buenos Aires in 1988: ‘Leading 6-2, 6-2, 4-0, but trailing 0-40, an indefensibly insensitive Agassi loudly shouted over to [Nick] Bollettieri: ‘Hey, Nick, watch this’. He then caught Jaite’s next serve in his hand like a cricketer, thereby conceding the point to Jaite as if to say, ‘Since you can’t win by your own efforts, here, have this game on me’ (Philip 1994, p.96). Several factors explain what Baltzell (1995, p.344) described dismissively as the coming of the ‘roughneck era’. First, the coming of Open Tennis removed aspiring young tennis males from the tutelage and overall supervision of their national associations. It is notable that Connors, for instance, refused initially to play in the Davis Cup for the US and eventually represented them only for one year. They therefore lost both their access to sponsored mobility, courtesy of the more patrician elements of country’s ruling class, but also the national focus of their endeavours. These associations had imposed a strict regime, and resentment of this regime has been increasingly acknowledged in the time since it was imposed. Hopman, as Frank Sedgman revealed recently, imposed fines for such things as table manners (Reed 2014, p.28) and Australian Davis Cup players of the 1950s had to pay for their own lunch and travel by public transport. Perceptively, one of Ken Rosewall’s biographers suggests that the ‘fire and determination’ that the otherwise impassive Rosewall showed on court represented a suppression and rechannelling of the player’s anger at Hopman’s bullying: he discerned in Rosewall a ‘repressed violence which erupted in the fastest reflexes I have ever seen on a tennis court, including Connors and Borg of today' (Rowley, with Rosewall 1976, p.38, 41 & 56).5 Second, the moral education imparted to previous generations was in many cases replaced by a hothouse training regime in which victory (and the spoils thereof) was the sole objective. Connors’ mother, who coached him, was the epitome of American rags-to-riches striving, having waited at tables to boost the family budget and shouted constant encouragement during his matches (Connors 2013, p.51). Agassi, the son of an (Iranian) immigrant, had grown up in Las Vegas, gambling capital of the US and a city of hotels and neon signs with no manufacturing or industrial history and none of the social pretension associated with America’s east-coast elite. Vegas is a monument to consumer capitalism, a city for making (or losing) money. Agassi was schooled to make money from tennis and this took place in largely closed environments in which there was an intolerance of failure. His father, recognising his tennis ability, had subjected him to an intensive tennis training regime from the age of seven, making him hit 2,500 balls a day and yelling at him as he did so; he was then sent to the training camp in Florida established in 1978 by tennis coach-entrepreneur Nick Bollettieri. Agassi wrote later: ‘People like to call the Bollettieri Academy a boot camp, but it’s really a glorified prison camp. And not all that glorified’ (Agassi 2009, p.27–31, 74). Third, and extending this point, in the Open Era the stewardship of tennis passed to a section of America’s commercial elite that dealt routinely with the public. Baltzell attributes the loss of the gentlemanly tennis ethic to the decline of America’s upper class – a process consummated, he suggests, in 1949 with the end of Harry Truman’s first term as President; he correspondingly deplores the Reagan-Bush era as ‘vulgar’ (Baltzell 1995, p.221). This argument is difficult to sustain: Ronald Reagan and (his Vice President) George H.W. Bush did not begin their administration until 1981, by which time Baltzell’s ‘roughnecks’ had long since begun their angry 217

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remonstrations with tennis umpires around the world – besides which, social changes are not reducible to who is, or is not, occupying the White House at the time. The point here is that Baltzell’s patrician upper class dominated the top professions of law,Wall Street high finance and diplomacy. Invariably their “old money” had been made through overseas investment, for example in the Chinese opium trade (Bradley 2015, p.13–35). They did not, in general, deal directly with a mass public. Professional tennis, on the other hand, was dominated by businessmen such as Lamar Hunt, whose family wealth had been generated in the Texas oilfields, but who, as promoters, were concerned with giving the public what they wanted. In this regard, some passion and the occasional altercation might not go amiss: it ‘sold tickets’. ‘In a public figure’, Mike Davies had remarked in 1962, ‘temperament has a credit side in that it can be a drawing card. How many concert halls have been filled because of the unpredictable, explosive genius of Maria Callas … To deprive people like these of their right to be temperamental is to take away their character and talent’ (Davies 1962, p.52). Fourth, not only could tantrums and altercations enhance elite tennis as a spectacle, they became a consideration in the pursuit of winning.These behaviours may, or may not, be thought to smooth the path to victory but, increasingly, the vocabulary of motive in which these matters were discussed stressed expediency, and not gentlemanliness. Reflecting 20 years later on his on-court eruptions, McEnroe said: On the way up, I noticed that the better I got, and the more money I made (for myself and for the events that were selling tickets and television rights), the more that linesmen, umpires, referees, and tournament organisers had to put up with from me … things seemed to be under my control when I got on that court. (McEnroe & Kaplan 2002, p.93) By contrast, the Swede, Bjorn Borg, McEnroe’s chief rival, ‘decided that getting upset on court only lessened his chances of winning’: he therefore maintained is i magen - ‘ice in the heart’ (Signor 2011, p.73–4). Interestingly, McEnroe reflected that ‘I never acted like a jerk when I played Borg’ (McEnroe & Kaplan 2002, p.120–1). Finally, the “roughnecks” availed themselves of the rhetoric of meritocracy and social inclusion to rationalise their on-court anger. McEnroe, in particular, saw himself as the standard bearer of a populist insurgency, bringing to uptight, paternalist tennis the same demotic and expressive capitalist mores that, in the US and elsewhere, already embraced other popular sports and entertainments: Where money and publicity meet, there’s always excitement, but good behaviour is rarely part of the mix. … In some ways, I was the personification of that excitement. … I thought tennis had had enough of manners. To me “manners” meant sleeping linesmen at Wimbledon, and bowing and curtseying to rich people with hereditary titles who didn’t pay any taxes. Manners meant tennis clubs that demanded you wear white clothes, and cost too much money to join, and excluded blacks and Jews and God knows who else. Manners meant the hush-hush atmosphere at tennis matches, where excitement of any kind was frowned upon. (McEnroe & Kaplan 2002, p.91) Similarly, Ilie Nastase was at pains to point out that the Houston club, where he had threatened to defecate into the hat of a female member, was ‘the sort of club’ that barred blacks and Jews (Nastase & Beckerman 2004, p.214). 218

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Rapprochement: the new tennis masculinity Initially, and expectably, the tennis press called upon the gentlemen of yesteryear to chastise the bad-tempered upstarts of the present. In 1988, for example, with Jimmy Connors on the point of equalling his record of 102 Open matches, fellow American and former Wimbledon (1953) and US Open champion (1954) Vic Seixas was asked to comment on Connors: I’m not saying in our day we were goody-goody, that isn’t the word. But there wasn’t the vehemence and extent of acting. Players of my era would relate more today to the Australians and Swedes. In style, I guess McEnroe played the way we all played, serve and volley. I’m not too enamored of other styles. But, that’s all we had in common with McEnroe. Borg is the perfect example. People say it’s colorful to behave otherwise, that you can’t play without that kind of spirit they (Connors and McEnroe) had. Here was Borg, absolutely flapless on the court and one of the greatest players of all time. (cited in Harris 1988) In time, though, the elite tennis world and its publicists have united around an adjusted masculinity.Tennis is now a global industry with a global economy of nearly $6 billion (Francesconi 2015) and television is at its heart. Tennis is a staple of the satellite sports channels and 2003 saw the inauguration of the specialist 24-hour Tennis Channel, whose audience by 2015 was ‘the most affluent among all ad-supported television networks’ (Business Wire 2015). This has had at least two major implications for tennis masculinity. One is that audiences such as these attract major sponsors (among the current sponsors of the US Open, for example, are two Wall Street banks – J.P. Morgan and Chase, both sponsors since 1982 – IBM and Emirates airlines) who do not want to be seen endorsing angry confrontations with authority or the taunting of opponents. The other is that sports channels, especially those dedicated to one sport, and the ancillary sport media (magazines, book publishers and websites) cannot survive on the sport alone; they need to generate material about a sport’s heritage and its leading personnel.Thus, the Tennis Channel describes itself as a ‘multimedia destination’ which reports ‘both the professional sport and tennis lifestyle’.6 In the new global pantheon of tennis celebrity, therefore, the perceived properties, both past and the present, of all prominent tennis males have become commodities. McEnroe, for instance, has become the prodigal son of international tennis, a jovial fixture in the commentary box at every major international tournament; his tirade of 1981 is now, literally, his trademark – he has published two volumes of memoir, whose titles both contain the word ‘serious’.7 Andre Agassi, often credited with having made tennis accessible to the punk generation, retired in 2006 to a blizzard of tributes, many citing his marketing assets. US player Andy Roddick, for example, said: ‘He’s obviously one of the best ever but I think what makes him so different is his crossover appeal. He was able to take tennis to a totally different demographic, create interest in tennis at all times’.8 But not only have the mellowed stormy petrels of the 1970s and 1980s been forgiven and rehabilitated, the undemonstrative tennis males of the 1950s and 1960s have also been brought back to centre stage. At 77 years old ,Ken Rosewall produced an autobiography (Rosewall & Naughton 2012), and a biography of Frank Sedgman (by then 86 years old) was published two years later (Reed 2014). But, again, the best example here is Rod Laver. Laver played as an amateur between 1956 and 1963 and as a professional from 1963 until his retirement in 1977. In 2000, the venue for the Australian Open in Flinders Park, Melbourne, was renamed the Rod Laver Arena and in 2013, by which time he was 75, he produced a copious autobiography of 398 pages.9 The foreword to this book was written by Swiss tennis star Roger Federer who expressed deep admiration for its subject: ‘Rod retired from the circuit just a few years before 219

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I was born so I never witnessed his exquisite skills live. I have watched film of him playing in finals and was mesmerised by his all-round game and incomparable court coverage. Rod seemed to have no weaknesses and, while always a true sportsman on court, he was also a man of steely determination, and was incredibly strong under pressure’; he also pays tribute to Laver’s ‘endearing humility’ (Federer 2014, p.ix & xi). Although long resident in the US, Laver has in recent years been perpetually rediscovered in his home country. In 2016, an article in the Sunshine Coast Daily declared him ‘a national treasure’, reminding readers of his humble origins in cattle country and his many trophies: ‘All this while playing the game with one of those heavy wooden rackets and for bugger-all prize money - compared to today anyway’. The writer adds that Laver had class too. He was pretty much the left-handed ‘60s version of Roger Federer, or probably better: Even Federer continually bows to his greatness. The Swiss master broke down in tears when his idol presented the 2006 Australian Open trophy to him. That’s more than respect. That’s adulation. (Mayberry 2016) Federer also paid fulsome public tribute to Rosewall in 2016: ‘What Ken did is just incredible’, he said, ‘I certainly look up to him and what he did gives me hope that if I remain healthy, I can play for many years to come’ (cited by Clarey 2016). There are some important clues here to the construction and packaging of on- (and off-) court masculinity in contemporary elite tennis. The surviving veterans of the transition to open tennis have been appropriated as symbols of a masculine order of the game.They are invoked now as touchstones and as patriarchs in this regard. The expression of their ‘steely determination’ in the pursuit of victory – usually expressed through regular fist-pumping – is now a standard and acceptable expression of emotion. Indeed, in the established rituals of television-tennis the camera invariably picks out the fist-pumper’s support team of coaches and advisors in the crowd, who are themselves fist-pumping in response.This support team is, equally invariably, all male and attired in baseball caps and dark glasses.Together they represent masculine rationality and the winning mentality.This implicit gender order received some affirmation in the widespread surprise expressed at the appointment by British player Andy Murray of a female coach in 2014.This coincided with a dip in Murray’s form and, as Tim Lewis of The Observer commented the following year, When Andy Murray was crushed 6-0, 6-1 by Roger Federer at the World Tour Finals in London last November, the omens looked bad for his coach, Amélie Mauresmo. Experts agreed that his perverse experiment of employing an adviser who was French and, more troublingly, a woman had spectacularly backfired. (Lewis 2015) Tears, however, are no longer a betrayal of masculinity. A tearful tennis victor is now more likely to be hailed as ‘not afraid to show his emotions’ than rebuked for breaching some code of male reticence.When (multimillionaire) Andy Murray won the Olympic gold medal in the men’s singles in Rio in 2016, both he and his opponent (Argentinian Juan Martin Del Potro) became tearful. This triggered a discussion in the BBC commentary box of ‘the apparent increase in displays of emotion from male tennis players in recent years’, during which commentator Paul Hand declared the behaviour ‘not macho’. The comment provoked a storm of complaints on Twitter (Blair 2016). Certainly, a return to the court, arms aloft, once victory has been achieved, is now expected. But tantrums are not. One of the few contemporary male players to indulge 220

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in them – Greek-Australian Nick Kyrgios – is regarded not as a latter-day James Dean, but as immature and, on occasion, ridiculous. ‘Nick’s young and maybe doesn’t realise what he is doing sometimes. He’s playing with emotion’, said Laver in 2015. ‘That’s certainly something that he needs to grow out of ’ Kyrgios should ‘just let his racquet do the talking and win matches’.10

Notes 1 Thanks to Robert McNicol, librarian at the Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Museum, for his kind assistance. 2 From Kipling’s poem ‘If ’. See Rudyard Kipling (1910) Rewards and Fairies (New York: Doubleday, Page & Company). 3 Professional footballers were, generally speaking, from working-class homes. Their pay usually was around that of a skilled tradesman. See Russell (1997, 92–5). 4 Based on the 1952 novel of the same title by John Steinbeck; the Warner Brothers film directed by Elia Kazan was released in 1955. 5 In 2017 a feature film about this rivalry was released by Scandinavian film makers. Called Borg vs McEnroe. It was billed as being ‘about rage and how Borg and McEnroe channelled it in different ways’. See Aftab (2017). 6 See Tennis Channel http://tennischannel.com/about (accessed 10 September 2017). 7 J. McEnroe and J. Kaplan (2002) Serious: The Autobiography (London: Time Warner) issued in the US as You Cannot be Serious; and John McEnroe (2017) But Seriously (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson). 8 ‘Stars pay tribute to Agassi’ http:​//new​s.bbc​.co.u​k/spo​rt1/h​i/ten​nis/5​11354​8.stm​ (Accessed 10 September 2017). 9 See: Laver and Writer (2014). 10 Rod Laver, the latest to weigh in on the Nick Kyrgios debate (2015, 11 July) Available at: http:​//www​ .news​.com.​au/sp​ort/t​ennis​/wimb​ledon​/rod-​laver​-the-​lates​t-to-​weigh​-in-o​n-the​-nick​-kyrg ​ios-d​ ebate​/news​-stor​y/622​076e2​7c3e8​83743​6bbe3​665a0​0e28 (accessed 11 September 2017).

References Aftab, K. (2017, 22 September) Court on Camera: How SW19’s Greatest Rivalry was Restaged, The I, 39. Baltzell, E. Digby (1995) Sporting Gentlemen: Men’s Tennis from the Age of Honor to the Cult of the Superstar. New York: The Free Press. Blair, O. (2016, 16 August) Rio 2016: BBC Commentator Criticised for Calling Andy Murray's Tears “Not Macho”. The Independent. Bradley, J. (2015) The China Mirage. New York: Little, Brown and Co. Business Wire (2015, 26 May) Tennis Channel is No. 1 Affluent Ad-Supported Network on Television. Business Wire. Available at: http:​//www​.busi​nessw​ire.c​om/ne​ws/ho​me/20​15052​60058​39/en​/Tenn​ is-Ch​annel​-No.-​1-Aff​l uent​-Ad-S​uppor​ted-N​etwor​k (accessed 10 September 2017) Clarey, C. (2016, 23 January) Federer Is Aging Gracefully, but Australian Ken Rosewall Set the Standard. The New York Times. Connors, J. (2013) The Outsider. London: Bantam Press. Danzig, A. (1951) The Story of J. Donald Budge. In Donald Budge, J., Budge on Tennis (pp.15–44), London: Jarrolds. Davies, M. (1962) Tennis Rebel. London: Stanley Paul. Evans, R. (1978) Nastase. London: Coronet Books. Federer, R. (2014) Foreword in Laver, R. & Writer, L., Rod Laver: An Autobiogrpahy. London: Allen & Unwin. Flink, S. (1994, 22 March) Obituary: Ellsworth Vines. The Independent. Flink, S. (1995, 4 July) Obituary: Pancho Gonzales. The Independent. Francesconi, P. (2015) 2015 State of the Industry. Hilton Head Island, South Carolina: Tennis Industry Association. Available at: http:​//www​.tenn​isind​ustry​.org/​cms/i​ndex.​cfm/r​esear​ch/in​dustr​y-das​hboar​ d/ (accessed 10 September 2017) Hamilton, D. (2012) The Footballer Who Could Fly. London: Century. Harris, L. (1988) Vic Seixas Considers Jimmy Connors No Marvel for Having… United Press International. Available at: http:​//www​.upi.​com/A​rchiv​es/19​88/09​/07/V​ic-Se​ixas-​consi​ders-​Jimmy​-Conn​ors-n​ o-mar​vel-f​or-ha​ving/​26745​89608​000/ (accessed 10 September 2017) 221

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Hodgson, L. & Joes, D. (2001) Golden Boy:The Life and Times of Lew Hoad. Peterborough: DSM Publications. Jamrozik, A. (2004) The Chains of Colonial Inheritance: Searching for Identity in a Subservient Nation. Sydney: University of South Wales Press. Kirshenbaum, J. (1972, 1 July) Just A Decent Bloke. Sports Illustrated. Kramer, J. with Deford, F. (1979) The Game: My Forty Years in Tennis. New York: G.P Putnam’s Sons. Laver, R. with Writer, L. (2014) Rod Laver: An Autobiography. London: Allen & Unwin. Lewis,T. (2015, 28 June) Amélie Mauresmo:The Coach Who Made Andy Murray Mint Again. The Observer. Mayberry, V. (2016, 17 January) Rod Laver: Why He’s a National Treasure. Sunshine Coast Daily. Available at: https​://ww​w.sun​shine​coast​daily​.com.​au/ne​ws/ro​d-lav​er-qu​eensl​and-l​egend​s/287​6213/​ (accessed 11 September 2017) McEnroe, J. with Kaplan, J. (2002) Serious:The Autobiography. London: Time Warner. Murray, J. (1991, 9 July) They Just Took Over Over There. LA Times. Nastase, I. with Beckerman, D. (2004) Mr Nastase. London: Collins Willow. Pate, W.L. (1951) Introduction. In Donald Budge, J., Budge on Tennis. London: Jarrolds. Patty, B. (1951) Tennis My Way. London: Hutchinson. Philip, R. (1994) Agassi:The Fall and Rise of the Enfant Terrible of Tennis. London: Bloomsbury. Reed, R. (2014) Game, Sedge and Match:The Frank Sedgman Story. Seaford,Victoria: Bas Publishing. Regan, K. (2014) Crawford, John Herbert (Jack) (1908–1991). Australian Dictionary of Biography. Available at: http:​//adb​.anu.​edu.a​u/bio​graph​y/cra​wford​-john​-herb​ert-j​ack-1​7495 (accessed 07 September 2017) Rice, C. (1959) Man with a Racket:The Autobiography of Pancho Gonzales. New York: A S Barnes and Co. Robins, G. (1973) Wimbledon:The Hidden Drama. Newton Abbott: David and Charles. Ross, I. (2014, 17 April) James Dean and the birth of modern masculinity. New Statesman. Rosewall, K, with Naughton, R. (2012) Muscles: The Story of Ken Rosewall. Richmond, Victoria: Slattery Media Group. Russell, D. (1997) Football and the English. Preston: Carnegie Publishing. Shapiro, T.R. (2009, 14 September) Jack Kramer, 88, Dies; Wimbledon Champion Helped Found Tennis Pro Organization. Washington Post. Short List (2011) Why is James Dean a Cultural Icon? Short List. Available at: http:​//www​.shor​tlist​.com/​ news/​why-i​s-jam​es-de​an-a-​cultu​ral-i​con#a​rt (accessed 08 September 2017) Temper Display by Lew Hoad Raises Hopes of US Cuppers (1956, 19 December) Montreal Gazette. Tignor, S. (2011) High Strung: Bjorn Borg, John McEnroe and the Untold Story of Tennis’s Fiercest Rivalry. London: Harper Collins. Tinling, T. (1983) Sixty Years in Tennis. London: Sidgwick and Jackson. Trengrove, A. (1994, 4 July) Obituary: Lew Hoad. The Independent. Webb, C. (2007, 26 October) Past Hurts Forgotten, A Tennis Champion Celebrates. The Age. Available at: http:​//www​.thea​ge.co​m.au/​news/​tenni​s/pas​t-hur​ts-fo​rgott​en-a-​tenni​s-cha​mpion​-cele​brate​s/200​ 7/10/​25/11​92941​24349​3.htm​l%3Fs​_cid=​rss_s​port (accessed 06 September 2017) Whannel, G. (2002) Media Sport Stars: Masculinities and Moralities. London: Routledge.

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22 “You’ve come a long way baby” but when will you get to deuce? The media (re)presentation of women‘s tennis in the post Open Era John Vincent

Virginia Slims cigarettes sponsored the women’s breakaway professional tour in the early 1970s. They promoted their sponsorship through commodity feminism, appearing to embrace the empowering liberal feminist movement of the time with what now seems a dated and patronizing slogan,“you’ve come a long way baby”. However, the implication of this slogan that female professional tennis players had arrived and were on their way to achieving equality with their male peers was premature. Indeed, ever since tennis was founded in Victorian-era England, it has been steeped in a patriarchal ideology that has served to promote traditional beliefs about gender identity (Lake 2015). Reflecting this, despite the global popularity of women’s professional tennis, a plethora of studies found that media coverage of female tennis players has mirrored traditional beliefs about gender (Quayle 2017). In this chapter, a brief socio-historical overview is provided of women’s professional tennis in the ‘Open Era’, before outlining consistent themes from the extant contemporary literature about the print, electronic, online and social media coverage of female tennis players over the last four decades. The thesis of this chapter about the media (re)presentation of female professional tennis players is that even though they have made important strides towards achieving equality, they will not be able to attain this until they are defined by the media primarily through their tennis skills and athleticism rather than how they conform or resist conventional notions of femininity, or as philosopher and gender theorist Judith Butler put it, how they perform or ‘do gender’ (Butler 2006).

Women’s professional tennis – a brief socio-historical context The inception of the modern game of tennis dates back to the mid-1870s when Major Walter Clopton Wingfield and John Moyer Heathcote codified and popularized the rules and etiquette for the modern game of tennis for predominately socially elite, white gentlemen, at least in part to overcome the feminizing effects of industrialization and reinforce the ideology of their

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‘natural superiority’ over class- and race-subordinated groups of men and women. Indeed, the early history of women’s tennis was largely defined by orthodox gender ideology that produced structural and social inequities that accorded women’s tennis a secondary status (Lake 2015).The initial inequities female tennis players encountered in ‘the male dominated, identified, and centered’ (Coakley 2017) tennis organizations consisted of exclusion and restriction. As an example, the inaugural Wimbledon tournament in 1877 did not include a women’s singles competition. Women were not included until 1884 and the first women’s tournament consisted of 13 women playing tennis in long-sleeved, long-skirted dresses that restricted their mobility (Atkin 1981). Reflecting residual Victorian beliefs that women are too physically delicate and psychologically fragile to over-exert themselves playing a best-of-five-set match, as their male peers do, female tennis players competing at Wimbledon play best-of-three set matches. Until recently, the shorter duration of women’s matches at Wimbledon and the perception that the WTA has less depth than the men’s tour was used to justify the inequitable prize money (Flake et al. 2013). The order of play and the selection of who plays on the prestigious “show courts” has also disadvantaged female tennis players competing in the modern era. The tradition at most tournaments is that the men’s singles final is preceded by the women’s singles final, which is played on the penultimate day, almost as if it were an appetizer. Although the elite female players that compete in Grand Slams now receive equal pay, female tennis players still earn significantly less than their male peers in the less visible, lower tier tournaments on the professional circuit (Flake et al. 2013). Gender identity, like all socially constructed identities including race, ethnicity and nationality, is not fixed, but evolves and is subjected to continual shaping which can either reinforce or challenge dominant ideologies (Connell 2005). Reflecting shifting gender power relations in society, second-wave feminism emerged from the social revolution of the 1960s and advocated for greater freedom and opportunities. As the post-1968 ‘Open Era’ of tennis professionalization emerged, women tennis pioneers including Gladys Heldman, publisher of World Tennis magazine, and players Billie Jean King and Rosie Casals fought hard for equitable opportunities. Serving as a spokesperson for the emerging worldwide professional tennis tour, King leveraged the success of the pioneering, breakaway Virginia Slims Tour to establish the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) in 1973. Her much heralded straight-sets (6-4, 6-3, 6-3) victory over Bobby Riggs before an estimated crowd of over 30,000 in the Houston Astrodome in the ‘Battle of the Sexes’ match was viewed by an estimated 90 million global television audience and held more than just symbolic significance. Her victory was regarded as a watershed moment, legitimizing and paving the way for the public embrace of women’s professional tennis (Spencer 2000). The ‘Open Era’, which heralded in professionalism, replaced the under-the-table payments of the previous era of ‘shamateurism’ with transparent prize-money allocations. A seminal moment was Billie Jean King’s success in achieving equal prize money for female tennis players at the 1973 US Open (Spencer 2000). Gradually, greater prize money and commercial endorsement opportunities opened up for the top professional female players. Reflecting this, in 1977 Chris Evert became the first female tennis player to earn a million dollars as the annual prize money in women’s tennis increased exponentially (Lake 2015). Despite progress towards pay equity, female tennis players still encounter blatant sexism and a recent example occurred at the 2016 Indian Wells Open. Before the women’s final between Victoria Azarenka and Serena Williams, tournament organizer Raymond Moore stated: In my next life when I come back I want to be someone in the WTA, because they ride on the coattails of the men. They don’t make any decisions and they are lucky. They are very, 224

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very lucky. If I was a lady player, I’d go down every night on my knees and thank God that Roger Federer and Rafa Nadal were born, because they have carried this sport. (cited in Rothenberg 2016) Serena Williams responded: There’s only one way to interpret that. Get on your knees, which is offensive enough, and thank a man? We, as women, have come a long way.We shouldn’t have to drop to our knees at any point. (cited in Rothenberg 2016) Rothenberg (2016), reporting in The New York Times, noted how Moore created a further stir by saying the women’s game was poised for success in the future with ‘very attractive prospects’, like Eugenie Bouchard and Garbiñe Muguruza, whom he later clarified were ‘physically attractive and competitively attractive’. If this example of sexism at the highest levels of tennis was not bad enough, it needs to be acknowledged that the WTA’s own marketing has framed players through their glamour, fashion, and sex appeal, which has garnered mixed responses. Yip (2016) noted how the tagline “Girls just want to have fun” in the WTA’s 2003 campaign undermined the female tennis players efforts be taken seriously as athletes. Another tagline, “They may not cook, but they sure can serve”, was criticized for evoking a traditional women’s role and household duty, and most recently the Strong is Beautiful campaign paradoxically emphasized many of the female tennis players’ heterosexual femininity with sexualized images on their website (Fink 2015, p.338). Since 1974, the WTA has achieved many milestones on the journey toward gender equity. The four Grand Slam tournaments, which normally attract the top-ranked 128 female and male players in the world to compete in their respected sex-segregated singles competitions, attract television ratings and Internet viewership that are ‘essentially equal, and in some cases higher for women than men’ (Flake et al. 2013 p.374). The four Grand Slams now offer equal prize money, with Wimbledon being the last to provide equal pay in 2007 (Flake et al. 2013). Since the early 2000s, many elite female tennis players such as Martina Hingis, Angelique Kerber, Anna Kournikova, Maria Sharapova, Caroline Wozniacki and Serena and Venus Williams, have broken the commercial endorsements “glass ceiling” and have received tournament earnings and endorsement contracts comparable to their male counterparts (Bandenhussen 2017). Maria Sharapova, who won Wimbledon as a 17-year-old in 2004, was widely considered by many to be the WTA’s “It Girl” and reflecting her feminine appeal signed the most lucrative female tennis players contract ever, when she extended her deal with Nike for $70 million in 2010. Sharapova was estimated by Forbes to have been the highest paid female athlete for a decade, before her positive drug test in March 2016 resulted in her being banned (Vincent & Hill 2018). In 2017, female tennis players dominated Forbes list of the highest paid female athletes, with Serena Williams ($27 million) in first place, Angelique Kerber ($12.6 million) in second place, and eight of the top ten coming from tennis (Bandenhussen 2017). Thus, given the global commercial and media appeal of female tennis players, one might expect equitable and balanced media coverage.

Media coverage of women’s tennis in the Open Era The media plays a major role in (re)producing, reinforcing or challenging societal understandings of gender identity in sport. During the last four decades, many studies have investigated the 225

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media coverage of tennis and have generally found that women’s professional tennis matches receive a more equitable amount of coverage compared to many other women’s professional sports (Crossman et al. 2007; Flake et al. 2013; Kian & Clavio 2011;Vincent, et al. 2003). However, often the type of coverage devoted to female tennis players is not consonant with their athletic performance and achievements (Biscomb & Matheson 2017). Although the civil rights and feminist movements have increased opportunities for women in sport, journalism remains a predominately male-dominated profession, in a culture where the mainstream paradigm suggests that sport, masculinity and corporate culture co-exist in a symbiotic relationship (Biscomb & Matheson 2017). Numerous studies have noted how the male-dominated sport media professions often subordinate female tennis as the “other” event through a myriad of production and journalistic techniques (Coakley 2017).The media often juxtapose positive and negative narratives, which send ambivalent, mixed messages that serve to undermine female tennis players’ achievements (Bruce 2016). Coverage of female tennis players is also frequently narrated with socially constructed sex-role stereotypes, which define sportswomen primarily through their gendered identity as a daughter, wife or girlfriend, often at the expense of their athletic identity, which appears to be secondary (GodoyPressland 2013). Media discourses frequently serve to undermine female tennis players’ sporting prowess and achievements, reverting instead to the use of outdated denigrating tropes, trivialization, infantilization and sexualization (Bernstein 2002). Generally, narratives about female tennis players have afforded them a secondary status in the shadow of celebratory discourses about male tennis players’ skill, power and athleticism. An example noted by Chase (2013) writing for USA Today was how when Andy Murray won Wimbledon in 2013, many headlines noted how he become the first British player to win in 77 years. Chase observed how the journalistic conventions of reporting men and women’s tennis separately and “keeping the headlines short and punchy” meant that Virginia Wade’s victory in 1977 was erased from history for any readers that just read the headlines. It is also worth noting that Angela Mortimer and Ann Jones, who were both British and won Wimbledon in 1961 and 1969, respectively, were completely ignored.

Heterosexual honeys and sporting Lolitas Although media discourses and images of strong, independent sportswomen have been reported, paradoxically the media have reserved greater coverage for those that have a heterosexually feminine appearance. Researchers have found many instances where media narratives and images have focused on female tennis player’s gender identity role and their conformance to accepted, white, heterosexual, hyper-feminine ideals (Harris & Clayton 2002; Hills & Kennedy 2006). In the early 2000s, Anna Kournikova and Maria Sharapova (re)presented an exaggerated white, heterosexual femininity that was normalized and privileged in media narratives and images, while simultaneously being exploited, sexually objectified and commodified in endorsements and advertisements. Female tennis players who are sexually objectified to provide excitement and arousal in media narratives and images undermine all female players’ athleticism, by encouraging readers and viewers to focus on performance-irrelevant aspects that devalue and trivialize female tennis players and serve to perpetrate traditional gender ideology, masculine hegemony and heterosexism (Yip 2016). Anna Kournikova, the embodiment of exaggerated, white, heterosexual femininity, received saturated media coverage in the early 2000s. During the 2000 Championships at Wimbledon, images of Kournikova in a Berlei sports bra were plastered on billboards everywhere under 226

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the headline “Only the Balls Should Bounce”. Vincent et al. (2007) described how although Kournikova was eliminated in the second round of the ladies’ singles event, she ‘was portrayed as a kind of sporting Lolita’ in voyeuristic British newspaper articles (p.289). The explicitly sexualized nature of the coverage in the popular ‘red top’ newspapers, such as The Sun, included a full page posed photograph of Kournikova wearing a bikini under the dismissive headline “So, who cares if she can play tennis?” This undermined her legitimacy as a tennis player and the authors concluded that the coverage ‘made it hard to see how Kournikova was empowered by her physical appearance, other than in purely financial terms’ (p.289). The sexualization of female tennis players in the media often occurs in almost binary opposition to the hegemonic masculinity that frames most narratives and images of male players and the sexual ambiguity of some female tennis players (Stevenson 2002).Thus, female tennis players walk a fine line in their performance of gender and athleticism. They are frequently denigrated and trivialized and not taken seriously as athletes if they appear too successful in capitalizing on their hyper-feminine appearance. However, they also face criticism and censure if they deviate too far from accepted notions of femininity (Toffoletti & Thorpe 2018). Female athletes that do not conform to heterosexual femininity are often deemed deviant, are marginalized and ridiculed, and lose commercial endorsement opportunities (Sartore & Cunningham 2009). Illustrating this, in the late 1970s and early 1980s, media narratives about Chris Evert, who conformed to heterosexual femininity, portrayed her as America’s sweetheart and a heroine, in contrast to her tennis rival, Martina Navratilova, who was subjected to pejorative discourses that framed her in the role of the villain because of her muscular physical appearance, aggressive serve-and-volley style of play and sexual orientation, which challenged traditional gender ideology (Howard 2005; Spencer 2003). In 1981, when Martina Navratilova announced she was gay, almost overnight she lost all of her commercial endorsement contracts and it was not until six years after she had retired that she received an endorsement contract with Subaru. Analysis of the media portrayal of the 1999 Australian Open framed Amelie Mauresmo in deviant ‘outsider’ narratives because of her openly lesbian lifestyle, androgynous, muscular appearance and unfeminine clothes that were devoid of feminine signifiers or accoutrements, which disrupted accepted binary notions of masculinity and femininity (Stevenson 2002). These types of media narratives, Griffin (1982, p.254) suggests, encourage many lesbian sportswomen to remain in the closet and ‘to engage in the protective camouflage of feminine drag’.

‘Dependent, fragile, flowers’ Studies of the media coverage of female tennis players have often found that journalists have focused on players’ social and personal lives and portrayed them as psychologically fragile and vulnerable, struggling hard to control their emotions and self-doubt, and relying on stable, strong fathers, male mentors or coaching figures for emotional support (Vincent 2004). This recurring theme appeared in Yip’s (2016) analysis of the ESPN.com and the Australian Open’s official website coverage of the 2015 tournament, which revealed: female players family members appeared more frequently and their motivation and successes were consistently connected to important males in their lives. This carries the possible implication that females are dependent on others and their athletic ability is attributed, at least partly, to their family or other successful relationships, subverting their images as professional athletes. (p.11) 227

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When race and national identity enter Historically, female African American athletes have been framed outside dominant discourses of acceptable femininity (hooks 1994). Hills and Kennedy (2009) described how ‘sporting bodies… are never only gendered, they are infused with meanings relating to multiple intersecting relations of power’ (p.117). Female athletes of color from working-class backgrounds, or whose physical body or sexual orientation differs from normative embodiment or dominant notions of white, heterosexual femininity are frequently constructed in media accounts as the ‘other’ (Douglas 2012). Reflecting this, numerous media accounts have critiqued how Serena and Venus William’s physical appearance and behavior deviates from accepted Eurocentric notions of femininity and deportment (Hills & Kennedy 2006; Schultz 2005; Spencer 2004). Toffoletti and Thorpe (2018) described how when Serena Williams won her second “Serena Slam” (winning all four Grand Slams in a row), social media trolls criticized her femininity, complaining she was too muscular and aggressive and that she was “built like a man” (p.22). Throughout their tennis careers, media narratives about Serena and Venus Williams have often portrayed them as “natural athletes”, which has served to re-inscribe disempowering racist stereotypes that they rely on their athleticism rather than their own agency, work ethic, intelligence and tactical savvy to succeed. In the predominantly privileged, homogeneous, white space of Wimbledon, British newspaper narratives focused on the “Amazonian” physicality of the Williams sisters and were imbued with racial and class prejudice (Vincent 2004). References about the Williams sisters’ working-class background and the assertive, “eccentric” behavior of their father was framed in a way that contrasted with the deportment and deferential behavior expected by the British lawn tennis establishment and reinforced the notion of them as deviant ‘outsiders’ who didn’t quite know their place (Vincent et al. 2007). More recently, in the 2009 US Open, when Serena Williams protested a call and launched into a verbal confrontation with the line judge and umpire, she was roundly criticized in the media because female players are not expected to engage in verbal confrontations with umpires and line judges. Billie Jean King countered, pointing out the media’s hypocrisy thus You see … (male) players go absolutely ape, and people move on with them. They don’t want to seem to move on with Serena. They think it’s kind of funny sometimes with the guys. They never think it’s funny with women. (cited in Baird & Major 2012) Several sport media scholars (see Biscomb & Matheson 2017; Crossman et al. 2007; Vincent & Crossman 2009, 2012; Wensing & Bruce 2003) have provided evidence that when female athletes represent their countries in mega international sporting events, such as the Olympic Games and Grand Slam tennis tournaments, their gendered identity is, at least in part, subsumed by their national identity. They become ‘patriots at play’ for the ‘imagined community’ of readers and viewers in an era when national identity politics has become more prominent because of heightened sensitivities to the disruptive forces of globalization. Reflecting this, Stevenson (2002) described how the media covering the 1999 Australian Open framed Martina Hingis positively because, even though she is Swiss, she had a home in Melbourne.Vincent and Crossman (2009) described how selected Australian newspaper narratives about Alicia Molik defied the usual gendered rhetoric found in mediated accounts of female tennis players and defined Molik through her South Australian identity, her athletic agency and ability, and her self-belief, courage and control.

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Stereotyping by omission Illustrating how media narratives about the WTA remain gendered to this day, a controversial sexist incident took place at the 2015 Australian Open before a large global television audience. Serena Williams and Eugenie Bouchard were both asked to give the crowd a twirl and show off their outfits after their victories by Ian Cohen, a commentator conducting post-match interviews (Whithnall 2015). This incident generated a furor on social media and became known globally as “Twirlgate”. Critics, including Billie Jean King, lamented the incident which embarrassed the players and essentially objectified them for the male gaze. King was quoted by a Press Association Report (2015) opining ‘This is truly sexist. If you ask the women, you have to ask the guys to twirl as well. … Let’s focus on competition and accomplishments of both genders and not our looks’. The “Twirlgate” incident, which took place in the early rounds, meant the 2015 Australian Open became an interesting tournament to analyze. A comparison of the Eurosport broadcast television coverage of the women and men’s singles semi-final and final matches revealed some changes in the media commentary (Quayle, et al. 2017). In stark contrast to the commentator’s ‘powerful and godlike commentary’ about the ‘gladiatorial and superhuman’ (p.10–1) male tennis players’ bodies, physical characteristics, and athleticism, which were rhetorically described drawing on liberal use of martial metaphors, there was almost a complete absence of commentary and discussion about the female tennis players’ bodies or physicality. Instead, in the aftermath of the “Twirlgate” controversy, narratives about the female players focused on the “aesthetic beauty” of their games, which served to subordinate them to the power of the men’s games.The absence of commentary discussing the women’s bodies or physicality was in contrast to previous findings in traditional media formats that found coverage of female tennis players highlighted their feminine, physical appearance (see Kennedy 2001, Vincent & Crossman 2007). Quayle et al. (2017) concluded that this finding suggested that women’s bodies and physicality had become taboo, which made it ‘a meaningful marker of stereotyping by omission’ (p.17). The authors’ described how stereotyping by omission reproduced gendered commentary and suggested: Creating a single spectacle for men’s and women’s tennis matches: consciously using the same adjectives, metaphors and narratives to describe players and produce narrative interest, and discussing the bodies of men and women equally and specifically, but aesthetically non-evaluatively, and only in so far as discussion is relevant to technical features of the game. (Quayle et al. 2017, p.17)

Online media An increasing number of sports fans receive their information from the Internet. Although research examining online sports coverage of tennis is in its infancy, several scholars suggested that digital online formats, which have fewer space restrictions, could facilitate more equitable and balanced coverage of female tennis players (Bruce 2016; Kian & Clavio 2011). However, the results of several early studies have not indicated more equitable or balanced coverage (Fink 2015). Illustrating this, an analysis of how three online sites framed their coverage of the 2007 US Open found that female tennis players received less coverage than their male peers (Kian & Clavio (2011). Similarly, Coche’s (2012) content analysis of ESPN Online during the 2012 Australian Open revealed fewer reports devoted to female players compared with their male peers. Yip’s (2016) recent analysis of the Australian Open’s official tournament website and

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ESPN’s website coverage of the 2015 Australian Open found that there was a relatively equitable amount of coverage of female and male tennis players competing in the singles competitions. However, comparisons revealed that both websites reverted to more gender stereotyped portrayals of the female tennis players, which served to detract from their athleticism.

Social media In recent years social media has transformed communications with user-generated content, which can be shared, edited and commented on in real-time interactions by followers. Social media platforms offer transformational, self-empowering opportunities for professional female tennis players to bypass and supplement traditional media communication mediums’ outmoded and stereotyped depictions of gender power relations by articulating and framing their unique identities, athletic personas, perspectives and experiences through their own words, narratives, and images (Toffoletti & Thorpe 2018). Most professional female tennis players use social media platforms to connect with their fans. Reflecting their global appeal and popularity, in early 2016, Maria Sharapova had 15 million Facebook “likes”, 1.96 million Twitter followers and 1.2 million Instagram followers, while Serena Williams had four million Facebook “likes”, six million Twitter followers and 2.7 million Instagram followers (Toffoletti & Thorpe 2018). These instantaneous digital communication forums provide them with almost unlimited opportunities to creatively communicate unique content, including behind the scenes insights, “selfie” photographs and videos, as well as sharing personal anecdotes, opinions and perspectives. This can foster a sense of intimacy and interaction with followers and generate favorable impressions, as they cultivate their own personal brand and generate sponsorship activation opportunities (Lebel & Danylchuk 2012). Despite its transformational potential, one of the pioneering studies comparing female and male tennis players’ use of Twitter during the 2011 US Open tournament found that male tennis players had significantly more followers and enjoyed greater influence than their female peers (Lebel & Danylchuk 2012). Toffoletti and Thorpe’s (2018) analysis of Maria Sharapova and Serena Williams’s self-presentation through Facebook, Instagram and Twitter found they communicated accessibility and friendliness to followers. Even when they were subjected to criticism and distasteful comments, they adopted non-confrontational approaches, preferring to use humor to avoid and deflect disagreement. Toffoletti and Thorpe (2018, p.20) concluded that the sportswomen with the largest social media followings tend to be those who are less controversial or political, and do not explicitly challenge gender norms or the long-standing associations between maleness and sport … and willingly celebrate a sporty and heterosexy, fashionable femininity. However, Toffoletti and Thorpe (2018) also found that both Sharapova and Williams embraced the transformational and empowering opportunities provided by Twitter to communicate their unique versions of post-feminist body-positive affirmations through “Love Your Body” (LYB) discourses, while creating an intimacy and authenticity through selfdisclosure of personal anecdotes and “selfie” shots. Both navigated the tensions implicit in their athletic and feminine identities by posting a mixture of sport action and posed photographs, which seemed designed to recast their ‘heterosexual femininity as feisty, sassy and sexually agentic’ (p.26); this was self-empowering and congruent with their athleticism and branded personas. 230

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Conclusion Although studies have shown that female tennis players receive an almost equitable amount of media coverage, as Bernstein (2002) argued at the beginning of the new millennium, ‘it is not time for a victory lap’ because, overwhelmingly the coverage of female tennis players has defined them through their gender rather than their athletic role, which has served to perpetuate masculine hegemony and dichotomized gender practices. Drawing on a tennis metaphor, more recently Yip (2016) concluded that objective analyses of mediated representations of female and male tennis players would have to conclude: ‘advantage men’ (p.12). Bruce (2015) lamented that despite decades of advocacy in the sports media, the coverage of sportswomen has generally showed little improvement. Although Biscomb and Matheson’s (2017) analyses of four decades of British newspaper coverage of summer sport found examples that demonstrated an ‘emerging maturity’ in providing responsible coverage in recent years (p.18), they also found many instances of narratives that focused on female tennis players’ hyper-feminine appearances. They cited the following example about 2014 Wimbledon finalist Eugenie Bouchard: ‘The 5ft 10ins Montreal-born star has won legions of admirers with her supermodel looks, megawatt smile, blistering tennis and sense of humour’ (Daily Express 4 July 2014). Cooky et al. (2015) also detected contemporary shifts towards more responsible coverage of female athletes with less overt sexism in recent years, but noted that sportswomen are still portrayed subtly in different ways to men. Drawing from cultural studies and third wave feminist perspectives, Bruce (2016) discussed how media representations are complex and polysemic, containing layers of meaning that can be decoded in different ways in diverse cultural and socio-historical contexts. Reflecting on the cultural studies argument that new enunciations derive from and revise current narratives, she noted the contemporary re-emergence of strong and beautiful women archetypes in popular culture, with Wonder Woman being just one example. Bruce (2016) suggested that current changes in how female athletes are (re)imagined in popular culture have occurred in the more open online and social mediascape that has made it possible to recast sportswomen’s self-definition and embrace of both their femininity and athleticism discourses as empowering rather than sexually objectifying. However, despite changing social attitudes that contest the marginalization and sexualization of female athletes, a “sex sells mantra” still seems ingrained in the commodified sport-media-commercial nexus. At times, it seems that in an almost formulaic fashion, the media reverts to this strategy in narratives and images of female tennis players, even though it serves to detract from readers’ and viewers’ perceptions of their skills and athleticism.Thus, in the post Open Era, professional female tennis players may have come a long way, but it is difficult to conclude that they have got to deuce.

References Atkin, R. (1981) The Book of Wimbledon. London: Heinemann/Quixote Press. Baird, M. & Major, M. (directors) (2012) Venus and Serena (Motion Picture) Bandenhussen, K. (2017) The World's Highest-Paid Female Athletes 2015. Forbes. Available at: https​ ://ww ​ w.for ​ b es.c ​ o m/si ​ t es/k ​ u rtba ​ d enha ​ u sen/ ​ 2 017/ ​ 0 8/14 ​ / the- ​ h ighe ​ s t-pa ​ i d-fe ​ m ale- ​ a thle ​ t es 2017/#d60ed893d0bf (accessed April 2018) Bernstein, A. (2002) Is it Time for a Victory Lap? Changes in Media Cerage of Women in Sport, International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 37(3–4), 415–28. Biscomb, K. & Matheson, H. (2017) Are the Times Changing Enough? Print Media Trends Across Four Decades, International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 1–23, (online first) Bruce, T. (2015) Assessing the Sociology of Sport. On Media and Representations of Sports Women, International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 50(4–5), 380–4. 231

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Bruce, T. (2016) New Rules for New Times: Sportswomen and Media Representation in the Third Wave, Sex Roles, 74, 361–76. Butler, J. (2006) Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. New York: Routledge. Chase, C. (2013) If a British Woman Won ’77 Wimbledon, Why is Murray First Winner since ’36? USA Today. Available at: https​://ft​w.usa​today​.com/​2013/​07/an​dy-mu​r ray-​virgi​nia-w​ade-f​i rst-​brit-​wimbl​ edon (accessed April 2018) Coakley, J. (2017) Sport in Society: Issues and Controversies (12th Ed.). New York: McGraw-Hill Education. Coche, R. (2012) Is ESPN Really the Women’s Sports Network? A Content Analysis of ESPN’s Internet Coverage of the Australian Open, Electronic News, 7(2), 72–88. Connell, R.W. (2005) Masculinities. Cambridge: Polity Press. Cooky, C. Messner, M.A. & Musto, M. (2015) ‘It’s Dude Time!’: A Quarter Century of Excluding Women’s Sports in Televised News and Highlights Shows, Communication and Sport, 3, 261–87. Crossman, J., Vincent, J. & Speed, H. (2007) ‘The Times They Are A-changin’. Gender Comparisons in Three National Newspapers of the 2004 Wimbledon Championships, International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 42(1), 27–40. Douglas, D. (2012) Venus, Serena, and the Inconspicuous Consumption of Blackness: A Commentary on Surveillance, Race Talk, and New Racism(s), Journal of Black Studies, 43, 127–145. Fink, J.S. (2015) Female Athletes, Women’s Sports and the Sports Media Commercial Complex: Have we really ‘come a long way baby?’, Sport Management Review, 18, 331–42. Flake, C.R., Dufur, M.J. & Moore, E.L. (2013) Advantage Men: The Sex Pay Gap in Professional Tennis, International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 48(3), 366–76. Godoy-Pressland, A. (2013) The Weekend as a Male Entity: How Sunday Newspaper Sports Reporting Centres Around Male Activities, Interests and Language (2008 and 2009), Leisure Studies, 32(2), 183–92. Griffin, P. (1982) Changing the Game: Homophobia, Sexism and Lesbians in Sport, Quest, 44, 251–65. Harris, J. & Clayton, B. (2002) Femininity, Masculinity, Physicality and the English Tabloid Press, International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 37(3–4), 397–413. Hills, L. & Kennedy, E. (2006) Space Invaders at Wimbledon: Televised Sport and Deterritorialization, Sociology of Sport Journal, 23, 419–37. Hills, L. & Kennedy, E. (2009) Double Trouble: Kelly Holmes, Intersectionality and Unstable Narratives of Olympic Heroism in the British Media. In Markula, P. (ed.), Olympic Women and the Media (pp.112–31), New York: Palgrave MacMillan. hooks, b. (1994) Feminism Inside:Toward a Black Body Politic. In Golden,T. (ed.), Black Male: Representations of Masculinity in Contemporary American Art (pp.127–40), New York: Whitney Museum of Art. Howard, J. (2005) The Rivals. Chris Evert vs. Martina Navratilova:Their Epic Duels and Extraordinary Friendship. New York: Broadway. Kennedy, E. (2001) She Wants to be a Sledgehammer? Tennis Femininities on British Television, Journal of Sport & Social Issues, 25(1), 56–72. Kian, E.M. & Clavio, G. (2011) A Comparison of Online Media and Traditional Newspaper Coverage of the Men’s and Women’s US Open Tennis Tournaments, Journal of Sports Media, 6, 55–84. Lake, R.J. (2015) A Social History of Tennis in Britain. London: Routledge. Lebel, K. & Danylchuk, K. (2012) How Tweet it is: A Gendered Analysis of Professional Tennis Players’ SelfPresentation on Twitter, International Journal of Sport Communication, 5, 461–80. Press Association Report (2015) Billie Jean King Accuses Interviewer of Being 'Truly Sexist' After Asking Eugenie Bouchard and Serena Williams to Twirl. Daily Mail. Available at: http:​//www​.dail​ymail​.co.u​ k/spo​rt/te​nnis/​artic​le-29​22570​/Bill​ie-Je​an-Ki​ng-ac​cuses​-inte​rview​er truly​-sexi​st-as​king-​Eugen​ie-Bo​ uchar​d-Ser​ena-W​illia​ms-tw​irl.h​tml#i​xzz5B​is8GO​Xb (accessed April 2018) Quayle, M. et al. (2017) Stereotyping by Omission and Commission: Creating Distinctive Gendered Spectacles in the Televised Coverage of the 2015 Australian Open Men’s and Women’s Tennis Singles Semi-finals and Finals, International Review for the Sociology of Sport, (online first) Rothenberg, B. (2016) Anger After Official Says WTA Players Ride on ‘Coattails’ of Men. New York Times. Available at: https​://ww​w.nyt​imes.​com/2​016/0​3/21/​sport​s/ten​nis/v​ictor​ia-az​arenk​a-ups​ets-s​erena​ -will​iams-​at-in​dian-​wells​.html​ (accessed April 2018) Sartore, M.L. & Cunningham, G.B. (2009) Gender, Sexual Prejudice, and Sport Participation: Implications for Sexual Minorities, Sex Roles, 60, 100–13. Schultz, J. (2005) Reading the Catsuit: Serena Williams and the Production of Blackness at the 2002 US Open, Journal of Sport and Social Issues, 29, 338–57.

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Spencer, N.E. (2000) Reading Between the Lines: A Discursive Analysis of the Billie Jean King vs. Bobby Riggs ‘Battle of the Sexes’, Sociology of Sport Journal, 17, 386–402. Spencer, N.E. (2003) America’s Sweetheart and “Czech-mate”: A Discursive Analysis of the EvertNavratilova Rivalry, Journal of Sport & Social Issues, 27(1), 18–37. Spencer, N.E. (2004) Sister Act VI:Venus and Serena at Indian Wells: “Sincere fictions” and White Racism, Journal of Sport & Social Issues, 28(2), 115–35. Stevenson, D. (2002) Women, Sport, and Globalization. Competing Discourses of Sexuality and the Nation, Journal of Sport and Social Issues, 26(2), 209–25. Toffoletti, K. & Thorpe, H. (2018) Female Athletes’ Self-Representation on Social Media: A Feminist Analysis of Neoliberal Marketing Strategies in “Economies of Visibility”, Feminism & Psychology, 28(1), 11–32. Vincent, J. (2004) Game, Sex, and Match: The Construction of Gender in British Newspaper Coverage of the 2000 Wimbledon Championships, Sociology of Sport Journal, 21(4), 435–56. Vincent, J. & Crossman, J. (2007) Champions, a Celebrity Crossover, and a Capitulator: The Construction of Gender in Broadsheet Newspapers’ Narratives about Selected Competitors During “The Championships” at Wimbledon, International Journal of Sport Communication, 1(1), 78–102. Vincent. J. & Crossman J. (2009) ‘Alicia in Wonderland’ at the ‘Little Lleyton Open’: Selected Australian Newspapers’ Narratives about Alicia Molik and Lleyton Hewitt at the Centennial Australian Open, Qualitative Research in Sport and Exercise, 1(3), 258–78. Vincent, J. & Crossman, J. (2012) Patriots at Play: An Analysis of the Newspaper Coverage of the Gold Medal Contenders in Men's and Women's Ice Hockey at the 2010 Winter Olympic Games, International Journal of Sport Communication, 5, 87–108. Vincent, J. & Hill, J. S. (2018) Maria Sharapova: Can the WTA's Former "It Girl" Rebound from Her Failed Drug Test? In Lee, J. (ed.), Branded: Branding in Sport Business (2nd ed) (pp. 259–72), Durham, NC: Carolina Academic Press. Vincent, J., Imwold, C., Johnson, J.T. & Massey C.D. (2003) Newspaper Coverage of Female Athletes Competing in Selected Sports in the Centennial Olympic Games, Women in Sport and Physical Activity Journal, 12(1), 1–21. Vincent, J., Pederson, P., Whisenant, W. & Massey, C.D. (2007) Analyzing the Print Media Coverage of Professional Tennis Players: British Newspaper Narratives About Female Competitors in the Wimbledon Championships, International Journal of Sport Management and Marketing, 2(3), 281–300. Wensing, M.H. & Bruce, T. (2003) Bending the Rules: Media Representations of Gender During an International Sporting Event, International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 38, 387–96. Withnall, A. (2015) Eugenie Bouchard Asked to 'Give Us a Twirl' by Male Presenter Sparking New Australian Open Tennis Sexism Row. Independent. Available at: https​://ww​w.ind​epend​ent.c​o.uk/​sport​ /tenn​is/eu​genie​-bouc​hard-​asked​-to-g ​ive-u​s-a-t​wirl-​by-ma​le-pr​esent​er-sp​arkin​g-new​-aust​ralia​n-ope​ n-ten​nis-9​99422​6.htm​l (accessed April 2018) Yip, A. (2016) Deuce or Advantage? Examining Gender Bias in Online Coverage of Professional Tennis, International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 1–16, (online first)

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23 Veiled hyper-sexualization Deciphering Strong is Beautiful as collective identity in the WTA’s global ad campaign Travis R. Bell and Janelle Applequist

In terms of media exposure of women’s professional sports, the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) can be discussed as a rare example that receives significant coverage (Bernstein 2002, p.423). As a governing body, the WTA has comparable power to the men’s Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) in securing televised match coverage, player earnings and generating a high profile for the women’s game more generally. Given the audience reach and following of women’s tennis, it would make sense that the power of athleticism, sport and training be emphasized when covering these players. However, unlike most of their male counterparts, female tennis players are often hyper-sexualized by outside advertising companies and sponsors. This hyper-sexualization via advertising, an extremely lucrative and influential industry, arguably accounts for female tennis players occupying eight of Forbes’ top ten highest earning female athletes in 2016.1 While sexuality and gender are prominent in most forms of advertising, it is important to also look at micro-level occurrences and how these are central to female athleticism and its representation in the media (Sherry et al. 2016, p.303). Sex in advertising typically situates models in decorative poses and often in provocative positions, with female models highlighting cleavage or the body through minimal or tight-fitting clothes (Reichert 2003, p.33). Whether to flirt with the male gaze or highlight athleticism, companies pay millions of dollars for players such as Maria Sharapova and Serena Williams to promote products. Rather than combating this image, in 2011 the WTA joined the sexual promotion when it unveiled its Strong is Beautiful advertising campaign, featuring 38 established and up-and-coming players wielding tennis rackets while dressed in the equivalent of evening wear or halter tops (Women’s Tennis Blog 2011). This chapter provides a textual analysis of the individual images featured in the ad campaign. It addresses the question: is the message conveyed pretty and powerful or provocative and promiscuous? The case study explores how female tennis players’ bodies are objectified by the WTA through the connotative and denotative meanings contained within the images of those players selected to represent it. What is the denotative meaning produced by the literal text Strong is Beautiful that accompanies each image? Additionally, the analysis examines the connotative meaning embedded within the collection of images through colors used, posed body

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positions and attire.This chapter explores the relevant literature for sex in advertising and media representation of female athletes, while outlining textual analysis as a method and explicating themes from the collective images. A more thorough, detailed analysis of one individual image deciphers its meaning (Fowles 1996, p.167). The chapter concludes with an interpretation of the tensions between athleticism, femininity and sexualization embedded within the Strong is Beautiful advertising campaign.

Sex in advertising Marketing efforts provide authenticity and brand recognition through repetitive placement of images for consumers. Regardless of the business, the goal is to get noticed and have consumers resonate with imagery that influences a purchase. Within successful marketing strategies, images drive specific advertising campaigns.While written text can support or provide additional layers of complexity in individual messages, what is important is the meaning embedded within the image and the representation it provides (Bell 2001, p.13). Advertisements can capture a single moment or mobilize a collection of images to provide a holistic sense of what a brand represents. Sex in advertising is one of many strategies employed to sell products and increase brand recognition. A direct connection between sexual advertisements and celebrities drives sales and increases viewership (Lambiase 2003, p.58).Within sexualized advertising, written text can carry an innocent meaning when it is expressed independently; however, when a sexual image coincides this innocence can be lost (Reichert 2003, p.37). Advertisements featuring photographs that are posed and constructed with culturally accepted forms of attractiveness drive the message through a variety of camera angles, lighting strategies and innuendos that produce a freeze frame to appeal to visual senses. Goffman (1979, p.11) explains that photographs ‘represent a rather significant social invention’ that can choreograph a specific meaning to generate publicity that is beyond an individual’s own representation. Photographs are constructed for either a private or public purpose. Private images are intended for an individual’s social circle to be shared and memorialized within that group, whereas public photographs are intended for a wider audience to provide appeal, often through pervasive mediated distribution that constructs a public identity for consumption (Bissell 2010, p.38). In this sense, it can be argued that photographs are synonymous with advertisements. Specific to sex in advertising, the newly formed identity discussed above is no longer limited to legacy media, as the online space affords an unlimited mode of distribution for public representation of celebrities.

Media representation of female athletes Sport is one form of celebrity culture fueled heavily by media representation via advertising. These images produce a constant negotiation of identity that is interpreted, contested and reinterpreted through a complex web of storytelling (Billing & Hundley 2010, p.5). In the US, the case of female athlete representation is an evolutionary story – from access via Title IX legislation through battles for equal pay, to challenges of commodification of femininity and sexuality – including a push to ‘move past compromised thinking’ (Hall & Oglesby 2016, p.271) that separate treatment of girls and boys in sport from adolescence through professional and international competition. Nevertheless, notions of masculinity and femininity are still deeply rooted in sport and persist through the equation of men’s performance with speed and strength, while women’s performance is still often defined by references to beauty and grace. Differential representations within media are also apparent; these range from substantially less 235

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media coverage for female athletes, comparisons of sporting accomplishments to male athletes, emphasis given to perceived heterosexual athletes and sexualization (Bruce 2016, p.365–6). Any of these discursive strategies ‘trivializes a sportswoman’s accomplishments… to sexualize a woman and thus objectify her’ (Duncan 2006, p.243). These gendered representations result in a social function often produced and circulated through media and advertisements that do not reflect reality (Goffman 1979, p.17). Conventional sexualization of Caucasian female tennis players and the significance of body portrayal is persistent through various forms of representation and not necessarily related to achievement in the game. For example, despite never winning a singles title, Anna Kournikova garnered millions of endorsement dollars based on her physical appearance (Daniels & Wartena 2011, p.570), whereas Serena Williams holds nearly every tennis record in the sport’s history and ranks near the top of endorsement deals annually, yet her body is a focus of much debate because of her race and physique (Hall & Oglesby 2016, p.271). Lumpkin (2007, p.31) identified female tennis players as more likely to appear on the cover of Sports Illustrated than any other female athlete. They appear regularly in the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issues and ESPN’s The Body Issue, which Cranmer et al. (2014, p.145) determine reinforce the focus on sexualization over athleticism.These mediated representations perpetuate the stereotypes of beauty and grace entrenched in women’s sport.

The Strong is Beautiful advertising campaign The WTA is uniquely positioned, along with the Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA), because although athletes compete individually, as governing bodies they can create their own respective identity and brand beyond a traditional team sport structure. Where the WTA differs from the LPGA is through an explicit commitment to achieving equality of treatment between male and female players (for example, in media exposure and compensation). Additionally, the LPGA has struggled to maintain schedule continuity and global marketing opportunities outside of Asia for its elite players and, notably, it also turned to sexualized representation of them in its 2011 marketing campaign (Fink 2012, p.50). Strong is Beautiful launched as a global advertising campaign in May 2011 following an 18-month rebranding of the WTA. The core campaign spanned digital, print and television across 80 international markets. Photographer Dewey Nicks was the inspiration after he produced images for a cover feature in the New York Times magazine. Goodby, Silverstein & Partners coordinated the campaign and originated the Strong is Beautiful tagline. According to a WTA press release, the campaign was ‘designed to support the WTA’s efforts to establish a deeper engagement with fans around the world and to promote both the sport’s next generation of players along with current established names.’2 The campaign included two main visual elements: firstly, seven 30-second video vignettes telling individual narrative stories of desire, motherhood, nationalism and overcoming adversity. These videos were included as television commercials and promoted across digital platforms. Secondly, 38 still photographic images, 36 of which feature individual WTA players, appeared with the campaign’s tagline. The other two images featured doubles teams3 and although interesting were not included in the analysis to ensure consistent comparisons and thematic synergy for the purposes of this chapter. While the video vignettes provide depth to the campaign, the still photographs are the focus of this specific research. From watching behind the scenes videos of the campaign’s production, players participated in action shots, hitting tennis balls covered in a light powder to create an appearance of the ball exploding for the camera.4 The powdered explosions were included in 12 of the 36 individual images, which result in an altered 236

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photograph that in a few instances situate the player as a distorted focus in the image. These photographs do not influence the overall context of the message embedded within the ad campaign but provide an extra layer of interest within the textual analysis. The 36 individual images vary in color scheme, position of the athlete in the image frame, pose of the athlete and attire worn by the athlete. While the WTA advertisements were globally distributed, it was constructed and produced within a Western ideology of advertising.Therefore, advertisements offer a deep-rooted point of analysis that can reveal hidden meanings embedded within protocols constructed by American culture. To contextualize the meaning within individual and collective images in this campaign, Fowles’ (1996, p.168) deciphering is used to uncover ‘layers of signification’ within the advertisements. The research question driving this study is how do the individual images within the Strong is Beautiful campaign function to produce a collective identity for professional women tennis players?

Method Deciphering advertisements requires a textual analysis method known as visual semiotics. Barthes (1972, p.45–7) outlines three semiotic levels within messages: linguistic, denotative and connotative. First, linguistic messages are produced by written text in an advertisement. Second, the denotative meaning is generated by the photograph, image or symbols included in the advertisement. Third, the connotative meaning results in ‘imagined communication’ (Fowles 1996, p.169) that produce consistent themes or ideas embedded within the overall construction of the advertising images. Each of these semiotic levels are discussed in the following section. Denotation is relatively unproblematic in that a single image produces different meanings for individuals based on recognition. For example, who is depicted in the image? What is the person doing? What are they wearing? This level of interpretation can be influenced by knowledge of the individual or the company for whom the advertisement is developed. Connotation includes the concepts and values produced through ideological representation for what people stand for through the image (van Leeuwen 2001, p.96). Barthes (1972, p.123) referred to connotation as representing ‘myths’ with two intentions: first, to condense collective representation into single entities and, second, to legitimate and empower the status quo. Two significant connotative carriers are poses and objects produced through specific photographic techniques (van Leeuwen 2001, p.97-8). Deciphering meaning within the Strong is Beautiful campaign was a collaborative effort. Each of the 36 individual images were obtained through the WTA website where they were available for download as desktop wallpaper.5 Each author examined the individual images to explore themes embedded within the collective campaign.The authors discussed these themes to determine consistency. These themes provide the denotative ideas outlined in the following section that are discussed through three concepts associated with denotation: categorization, distancing and text (van Leeuwen 2001, p.96). Next, a textual analysis of the Caroline Wozniacki image within the campaign was conducted using 23 specific guidelines (Fowles 1996, p.168). Wozniacki was selected for her significant place in tennis and popular culture by 2012. Wozniacki finished each of the two preceding years (2010-2011) as the WTA’s top-ranked player. Therefore, she was perceived as a highly marketable athlete for women’s tennis. Regarding popular culture, Wozniacki dated the topranked golfer in the world, Rory McIlroy, and appeared alongside him in the supplementary Strong is Beautiful Celebrity Campaign launched by the WTA in August 2012. Therefore, her globally prominent position provided an ideal mix of tennis strength with perceived beauty to 237

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appropriate and embed within a single advertisement as part of the larger campaign and thereby enabled the breaking down of the linguistic presence, denoted imagery and connotative meanings inherent in advertisements (Barthes 1972, p.113).

Thematic analysis of the Strong is Beautiful advertising campaign Strong is Beautiful constructs a collective image of women’s professional tennis players that is simultaneously empowering and contradictory. Each individual image can provide different meanings; however, the goal of this analysis is to identify a level of generality encompassed across the entire campaign regarding three primary concepts. First, categorization is discussed by three appearance characteristics of the collective images: hair style, attire and color scheme. Second, distancing within the images is discussed through two primary photographic frames: long/ medium-long shots (includes legs) and medium/close-up shots (waist up).Third, the campaign’s written text is discussed for its role in the empowering/contradictory dichotomy.

Categorization Players are positioned in mostly traditional action poses for photographs that would regularly appear in mass media representations of tennis players. Every player has a tennis racket in their individual image. Twenty-four of the athletes have dark hair, 12 are posed in the backhand position, and two are left-handed (Kvitova; Safarova). However, only seven of the photographs include a tennis ball, which focuses attention on the player more than the activity. Therefore, hair style of the players, attire worn and varying colors used across the campaign provide insight regarding appearance of the individual, not the athlete. Hair style is intriguing across the entire campaign because it is not conducive to the tennis player as typically seen on the court. Only three players have short hair (Kuznetsova; Na; Schiavone), which is not surprising considering the dominant on-court performances by American and European athletes who favor longer hair. Of the 33 players with at least shoulder length hair, only two (Jankovic; Watson) have their hair pulled back, which is a traditional appearance for tennis players in competition that often includes a visor or head band. Otherwise, the studio technique of air blowing toward the athletes in action keeps the hair from their face and avoids distraction from the player’s appearance. Regarding hair style, the overall tone of the advertising campaign does not therefore align with the ‘normal’ appearance of a tennis player. The irony centers around the players’ attire.The images intend to emphasize these women as “strong” tennis players, yet only four of the outfits could realistically be worn while playing tennis. A few outfits expose midriffs, which has become more acceptable on-court attire but is not overly common. Most outfits in the campaign include dresses or tops with straps more suited to an afternoon lunch at the beach or a formal evening event rather than any tennis-related competition. Analysis reveals that the overall campaign wants to highlight the ‘beauty’ appeal of these players beyond the strength required to play world-class tennis, simply because the attire so clearly removes the focus on the athlete and emphasizes their body and feminine features in a more traditional sexualized approach to advertising. The colors in the campaign are difficult to generalize but a few dominant colors and approaches emerge. The prominent colors for the women’s outfits are black (ten), yellow (five), pink (four), red (four) and blue (three). These are significant as blue, red and yellow are primary colors intended to “pop” off the image in photography. The other two, black and pink, can be interpreted as providing a contrast of dominance and femininity, respectively. These choices of outfit colors provide insight into the intentional use of color to highlight the tension in Strong 238

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is Beautiful, that is, whether to emphasize strength or beauty, even though the tagline implies the co-existence of both.The background colors are more neutral with minimal to no illumination, in order to maintain focus on the player.Where light is used for the background, it often reflects off the powder created from the racket hitting the explosive ball, helps generate space in the image and produces a somewhat angelic glow around the athlete.

Distancing Distancing is a photographic strategy that influences reception of individuality (van Leeuwen 2001, p.96). Shot variation dictates the visual distance between the individual in and the viewer of the image. Thus, a long shot includes the entire body in a static image; a medium/long shot includes most of the body with some portion below the waist; a medium shot crops the image at an individual’s waist; and a close-up includes shoulders and head only. Distancing influences context of the overall ad campaign, especially when comparing long/medium-long shots versus medium/close-ups. Across the 36 images, distancing influences the differences embedded within the campaign name. Images framed as long/medium-long emphasize power and strength as athletes are posed in action, often with defined leg muscles or aggressive facial expressions typically associated with on-court images, thus deemphasizing the individual players and focusing on the physical act of tennis (Clijsters; Mattek-Sands). Conversely, medium/close-up images include only a portion of the tennis racket, which decreases the athletic action and focuses more on the individual’s appearance and features (Cibulkova; Radwanska).These images rarely include any look of physical exertion and appear to emphasize the beauty embedded within the campaign. Distancing therefore serves a discernable strategy within the collective images.

Written text The text STRONG IS BEAUTIFUL appears across the middle of each image within the campaign, but two shift the text slightly below center to avoid covering a player’s face (Cornet; Pavlyuchenkova). The text is in all capital letters in a soft gray color scheme. The font is subtle enough to avoid dominating the image but is prominent enough to stand out on each image. The use of text and images together can caption a specific ‘type’ but can also serve to contradict the type proposed through advertisements (van Leeuwen 2001, p.96). Such was the incongruous challenge for the WTA campaign in pairing the concepts of strength and beauty. The use of strength and beauty highlights an ideological tension for women’s professional tennis players. Fitness and stamina are paramount to success on the demanding WTA tour, which typify strength. It is impossible to reach the pinnacle of tennis without this attribute. Physical appearance or perceived beauty is not a requisite component of a professional athlete. However, the public persona of a female professional athlete is mostly predicated on appearance, and that produces and reifies an incompatibility between athleticism and femininity produced by mediated sexualization (Baroffio-Bota & Banet-Weiser 2006, p.487). Strong is Beautiful serves as a mediated struggle for co-existence.

Textual analysis of the Caroline Wozniacki ad The overall campaign signals the tension of how to portray a WTA athlete. To further explicate the themes of the ad campaign, this chapter now turns to textual analysis of a single image featuring Caroline Wozniacki.Textual analysis allows for more detailed descriptions of data, aiming 239

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to further deconstruct signifying elements that may influence the meaning-making processes for audience members (Applequist 2016, p.80).This analysis encompasses 23 attributes to discuss the context and reach of the ad, the visual appearance and its implications.

Context for the ad There were various intended audiences for this ad and its overall campaign evident by a reach of 80 markets. First and foremost, the purpose of this ad was to increase awareness of and support for the WTA. Upon further analysis, however, the ad was clearly meant for two specific female audiences: the athlete and the feminine consumer. It is important to note that the same message is repeated across all images associated with the campaign, providing consistency and repetition. By incorporating the capitalized text STRONG IS BEAUTIFUL across the entire image of Wozniacki, while at the same time accounting for the feminized details of the athlete’s fashion and appearance, the WTA is sending a dual message. Being strong and athletic has increasingly become equated with beauty (and is now a primary focus in the advertising industry aimed at obtaining female consumers), but the message conveyed by the WTA campaign is also that only those deemed beautiful by Western standards can be strong, seeing that the femininity apparent in this ad is used in all others for the campaign (for example, in modes of dress, accessories, use of make-up, hair style). In this sense, the ad becomes about more than just garnering support for the WTA and its athletes; embedded within it are messages that all women can identify with – strength and beauty are not only associated with sport, but very much a part of Western consumer culture. The goal, then, for this specific ad is to have the audience member recognize themselves in Wozniacki, a form of interpellation whereby both the cultures of sport and beauty are promoted (Althusser 1970, p.24).

Looking at the ad Photography was chosen for this advertisement, as the singular image presents a limited number of modalities for the viewer. The ad is carefully composed, with Wozniacki’s face and body acting as the central focus. The composition is two-dimensional, with Wozniacki acting as the prominent large figure raising her somewhat foregrounded tennis racket as if to hit the ball. The strength of this composition is reinforced by the all-caps typeface across the body, reading STRONG IS BEAUTIFUL in light gray letters. There are two prominent tones in the ad, as Wozniacki is wearing a black mini dress with a background composed of only a deep red color, signifying passion (Elliot & Niesta 2008, p.1151). This duotone reflects a strong mood for the ad that emits strength and boldness, yet at the same time plays with subtle hints of feminized sexuality. Wozniacki’s body has been carefully positioned, accentuating her figure and face, which includes her neck tilted upward, better exposing her face. It is apparent that she is wearing make-up, as signified by highlights on her eyelids and lip gloss. Her hair is loose and flowing around her, accentuated by long dangling earrings. A bright white light is positioned behind Wozniacki’s head, illuminating her face and drawing the consumer to her physical appearance. She is swinging her racket with her right hand, as her left arm is obliquely crossed over the chest with the hand placed in a feminine position, highlighting the large watch she is wearing. Upon further inspection, the watch so prominently placed in the middle of the advertisement is a Rolex, the company that sponsors Wozniacki and features her on its webpage (Rolex 2017). The focal point for this ad is Wozniacki as female model, not athlete. Signifiers present in the ad include Wozniacki’s body, hair, watch and the tagline. In this sense, femininity and sexuality 240

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are being commodified in a way that virtually ignores the presence of sport, yet contributes to idealized interpretations of female beauty veiled via strength. The background of the ad is plain, further demanding the audience to focus on the female body. Although written text is prominently displayed across the entire ad, important to note is the impossibility to read the text without focusing on Wozniacki’s body, which is clothed in a tight, spaghetti-strap black dress, leaving significant portions of skin exposed for the audience. Unfortunately, the use of athlete as subject – while removing the true depiction of sport or athleticism – in advertising is all too common. In a study analyzing images of teen women playing sports in magazines, only seven percent featured women authentically engaged in any physical activity (Daniels 2009, p.20). Consistent with Daniels’ (2009) research, the studio location used for Wozniacki’s ad detaches tennis from her athletic world, thus making it appear designed purely as a beauty advertisement. The undefined space also lends itself to the idealization of individuality, as Wozniacki is shown alone and not in the presence of fans, coaches or opponents. She is positioned in a way that makes the audience assume she is in control, but at the same time the depicted scene offers openings for various audience members to make meaning. For women viewing the ad, they may identify with the concept that “strong is beautiful” because it is a statement that virtually any individual could personalize, for example, by thinking of ways in which your strength makes you an attractive person to yourself and others. Yet, the visual components of the ad still bring the female viewer back to the idea that ‘strong is beautiful,’ but only if one is already seemingly attractive to begin with according to conventional Western standards that emphasize thin bodies, long hair and make-up (Frith et al. 2005, p.57). Although the ad positioned Wozniacki in what seems to be an unconventional gender role (via the notion of strength), it still does so alongside the important component of ‘beauty’, a term that all women understand the pressures of too well (Fowles 1996, p.177). For male viewers, this ad uses the conventional device of drawing on sex appeal to garner attention. The slightly open lips and soft expression present can be associated with beauty, and while the athlete is perceived as strong, she is not so strong as to come off as intimidating. This facial expression is interesting, as the positioning of her mouth lacks any portrayal of emotion. Yet, if Wozniacki were to have just hit the ball as can be inferred from the ad, she would likely have a more animated and aggressive facial expression. Female attractiveness is therefore central to this ad, both from the perspective of the female and male consumer. This is consistent with previous research showing that health advice featured in women’s media materials often emphasize appearance of the body over its competency or health (Aubrey 2010, p.56; Aubrey & Hahn 2016, p.499). Ideal female consumers of this ad would want to emulate the athlete’s beauty and strength, while male consumers would see her attractiveness and sexuality as ways of overpowering the image to diminish any threat of overt female strength. The major theme in this ad is the notion that traditional forms of femininity can be challenged in a way that opens discourse to include inner traits of strength, athleticism and determination. Upon closer analysis, however, beauty takes precedence and what is featured is a sense of pseudo-strength, whereby this form of advertising does not challenge but rather further perpetuates the need for women to be attractive at all costs regardless of their professional achievements.

Conclusion The major dilemma within the Strong is Beautiful campaign is that each of the 36 individuals who participated in it were contracted to the WTA. Unlike an external company attempting to capitalize on appearance or success of an individual athlete to promote a product, the WTA 241

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is the primary beneficiary of these collective ads. Instead of promoting women’s tennis via athletic events, the WTA in 2011 chose to follow the financially effective advertising model of product endorsement (Fink et al. 2004, p.363) which de-emphasizes the legitimacy of female athleticism (Bernstein 2002, p.422). The WTA digital campaign had the potential to empower female athletes (LaVoi & Calhoun 2014, p.327), as ‘strong and competitive and aggressive and outspoken’ (Crouse 2013, p.239). Unfortunately, the campaign reifies the struggle for female athletes to justify their respective athletic credentials that should be validated solely by success on the court, not in the studio. The connotative problems embedded within the overall campaign and discussed specifically through the Wozniacki ad have not been resolved since the Strong is Beautiful campaign and may not be any time soon. In keeping with the general thrust of the campaign, the ad featuring Wozniacki attempts to address and fight against already apparent beauty standards promoted by the advertising industry, which consistently pressures women to look a certain way. Therefore, the Wozniacki ad, and all others within the Strong is Beautiful campaign, serves as a countercultural form of advertising, where the model presents an image that is not often enough promoted (strength in women). Yet, the femininity present still fits into a form of fixed dialogue already dominant in advertising more generally (Scott & Cloud 2008, p.15). Serena Williams, who was also featured in Strong is Beautiful, is arguably the greatest tennis player of all time regardless of gender. She transcends her sport with an approach that combines power, grace and style with a demeanor that switches between anger, frustration, determination and joy. Williams is described as akin to Muhammad Ali for her activist approach to equity in women’s sports and social issues affecting black Americans (Zirin 2015), and is controversially racialized in media through her appearance and attire on the court (Schultz 2005, p.338). In 2015, she won 53 of her 56 matches and three grand slam championships. For her tennis achievements, Williams earned the Sports Illustrated Sportsperson of the Year award and was duly featured on the magazine’s cover. She wore a black outfit that fully exposed her legs complete with black high heels; her left leg flexed with the heel on the floor; and her right leg draped casually over the arm of a seat resembling a royal throne. To avert and approve the sexualized pose, Sports Illustrated tweeted, ‘The cover? Serena’s idea, intended to express her own ideal of femininity, strength & power’ (Sports Illustrated 2015). Coming four years after the WTA campaign, it perhaps better reflects what the WTA had in mind for the Strong is Beautiful campaign: namely, one that would redefine the definition of strength and beauty within women’s tennis. In the globalized, yet often contradictory gender discourses prevalent in new media and the myriad prospects it affords to disseminate them (Bruce 2016, p.372), the debate of empowerment as signified by strength versus exploitation as signified by sexualization masquerading as beauty, remains to be fully played out in the public domain, either for or by women’s professional tennis players.

Notes 1 Serena Williams topped Forbes’ 2016 list of the world’s highest-paid female athletes. Williams earned $28.9 million. Maria Sharapova ranked second despite a 15-month suspension that began in March. Agnieszka Radwanska ranked fifth followed by Caroline Wozniacki, Garbine Mugaruza, Ana Ivanovic, Victoria Azarenka and Eugenie Bouchard who rounded out the top 10. Full list available at https​://ww​ w.for​bes.c​om/pi​cture​s/mli​45ffm​ff/th​e-wor​lds-h​ighes​t-pai​d/#17​5bc87​b610e​ 2 Original WTA link no longer available.Verbatim Press Release available at: http:​//www​.jann​aludl​ow.co​ .uk/T​ennis​/Stro​ng_Be​autif​ul.ht​ml (Accessed July 2017). 3 Gisela Dulko and Flavia Pennetta are one of the two doubles teams featured. They are each included as part of the 36 individual images. Kvӗta Peschke and Katarina Srebotnik are the other doubles team. 242

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4 The behind-the-scenes video is available at: https​://ww​w.you​tube.​com/w​atch?​v=fUe​uEfHw​ muU&list=PL7BFFD4DBEFBF730C 5 Images are no longer available for download. However, the full list of players included in the Strong is Beautiful campaign is available at: http:​//www​.wtat​ennis​.com/​news/​stron​g-bea​utifu​l-wal​lpape​r-dow​ nload​s (accessed 20 September 2016).

References Althusser, L. (1970) Lenin and Philosophy, and Other Essays (trans. Brewster, B.). New York: Monthly Review Press. Applequist, J. (2016) Broadcast Pharmaceutical Advertising in the United States: Primetime Pill Pushers. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books. Aubrey, J. S. (2010) Looking Good Versus Feeling Good: An Investigation of Media Frames of Health Advice and their Effects on Women’s Body-Related Perceptions, Sex Roles, 63(1), 50–63. Aubrey, J. S. & Hahn, R. (2016) Health Versus Appearance Versus Body Competence: A Content Analysis Investigating Frames of Health Advice in Women’s Health Magazines, Journal of Health Communication: International Perspectives, 21(5), 496–503. Baroffio-Bota, D. & Banet-Weiser, S. (2006) Women, Team Sports, and the WNBA: Playing Like a Girl. in Raney, A.A. and Bryant, J. (eds.), Handbook of Sports and Media (pp.485–500), Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Eribaum Associates. Barthes, R. (1972) Mythologies (trans. Lavers, A.). New York: The Noonday Press. Bell, P. (2001) Content Analysis of Visual Images. In van Leeuwen,T. & Jewitt, C. (eds.), Handbook of Visual Analysis (pp.13–34), Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Bernstein, A. (2002) Is it Time for a Victory Lap? Changes in the Media Coverage of Women in Sport, International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 37(3–4), 415–28. Billings, A.C. & Hundley, H.L. (2010) Examining identity in sports media. In Hundley, H.L. & Billings, A.C. (eds.), Examining Identity in Sports Media (pp.1–15), Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Bissell, K.L. (2010) Exploring the Influence of Mediated Beauty: Competitive Female Athletes’ Perceptions of Ideal Beauty in Athletes and Other Women. In Hundley, H.L. & Billings, A.C. (eds.), Examining Identity in Sports Media (pp.37–63), Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Bruce, T. (2016) New Rules for New Times: Sportswomen and Media Representation in the Third Wave, Sex Roles, 74(7–8), 361–76. Cranmer, G.A., Brann, M. & Bowman, N.D. (2014) Male Athletes, Female Aesthetics: The Continued Ambivalence Toward Female Athletes. In ESPN’s The Body Issue, International Journal of Sport Communication, 7(2), 145–65. Crouse, K. (2013) Why Female Athletes Remain on Sport’s Periphery, Communication & Sport, 1(3), 237–40. Daniels, E. A. (2009) The Invisibility of Women Athletes in Magazines for Teen Girls, Women in Sport and Physical Activity Journal, 18, 14–24. Daniels, E.A. & Wartena, H. (2011) Athlete or Sex Symbol: What Boys Think of Media Representations of Female Athletes, Sex Roles, 65(7–8), 566–79. Duncan, M.C. (2006) Gender Warriors in Sport:Women and the Media. In Raney, A.A. & Bryant, J. (eds.), Handbook of Sports and Media (pp.231–52), Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Eribaum Associates. Elliot, A.J. & Niesta, D. (2008) Romantic Red: Red Enhances Men’s Attraction to Women, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 95(5), 1150–64. Fink, J.S. (2012) Homophobia and the Marketing of Female Athletes and Women’s Sport. In Cunningham, G.B. (ed.), Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity in Sport: Essays from Activists, Coaches, and Scholars (pp.49–60), College Station, TX: Center for Sport Management Research and Educatio. Fink, J.S., Cunningham, G.B. & Kensicky, L.J. (2004) Using Athletes as Endorsers to Sell Women’s Sport: Attractiveness vs. Expertise, Journal of Sport Management, 18, 350–367. Fowles, J. (1996) Advertising and Popular Culture. Thousand Oaks: CA, Sage. Frith, K., Shaw, P. & Cheng, H. (2005) The Construction of Beauty: A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Women’s Magazine Advertising, Journal of Communication, 55(1), 56–70. Hall, R.L. & Oglesby, C.A. (2016) Stepping Through the Looking Glass: The Future for Women in Sport, Sex Roles, 74(7–8), 271–4. Lambaise, J. (2003) Codes of Online Sexuality: Celebrity, Gender and Marketing on the Web, Sexuality and Culture, 7(3), 57–78. 243

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LaVoi, N.M & Calhoun, A.S. (2014) Digital Media and Women’s Sport: An Old View on “New” Media? In Billings, A.C. & Hardin, M. (eds.), Routledge Handbook of Sport and New Media (pp.320–30), New York: Routledge. Lumpkin, A. (2007) A Descriptive Analysis of Race/Ethnicity and Sex of Individuals Appearing on the Covers of Sports Illustrated in the 1990s, The Physical Educator, 64(1), 29–37. Reichert, T. (2003) The Erotic History of Advertising. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books. Rolex (2017) Rolex And Tennis. Available at: https​://ww​w.rol​ex.co​m/rol​ex-an​d-spo​rts/t​ennis​.html​ (accessed July 2017) Schultz, J. (2005) Reading the Catsuit: Serena Williams and the Production of Blackness at the 2002 U.S. Open, Journal of Sport and Social Issues, 29(3), 338–57. Scott, J. A & Cloud, N. E (2008) Reaffirming the Ideal: A Focus Group Analysis of the Campaign for Real Beauty, Advertising & Society Review, 9(4). Sherry, E., Osborne, A. & Nicholson M. (2016) Images of Sports Women: A Review, Sex Roles, 74(7–8), 299–309. Sports Illustrated (2015, 15 December) The Cover? Serena’s Idea, Intended to Express Her Own Ideal of Femininity, Strength & Power. @SINow. van Leeuwen, T. (2001) Semiotics and Iconography. In van Leeuwen, T. & Jewitt, C. (eds.), The Handbook of Visual Analysis (pp.92–118), London: Sage. Women’s Tennis Blog (2011) Strength, Beauty and Women’s Tennis Players. Available at: http:​//www​.wome​ nsten​nisbl​og.co​m/201​1/05/​14/st​rengt​h-bea​uty-a​nd-wo​mens-​tenni​s-pla​yers/​ (accessed July 2017) WTA (2012). The Strong is Beautiful Celebrity Campaign. Available at: http:​//www​.wtat​ennis​.com/​news/​ stron​g-bea​utifu​l-cel​ebrit​y-cam​paign​ (accessed July 2017) Zirin, D. (2015, 14 July) Serena Williams is Today’s Muhammad Ali. The Nation. Available at: https​://ww​ w.the​natio​n.com​/arti​cle/s​erena​-will​iams-​is-to​days-​muham​mad-a​li/ (accessed Dec. 2016)

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24 Warriors of the court Richard “Pancho” González, Rosie Casals and the history of US Latino/as in tennis José M. Alamillo

In the 1970s, Chicano activist Bill Molina called a San Diego city official to ask why there were no tennis courts in Barrio Logan, a Mexican neighborhood in downtown San Diego.The city official bluntly responded: ‘Chicanos do not play tennis’ (personal correspondence, 1 July 2013). Such a comment reflects a popular stereotype that US Latino/as do not play tennis. While most people could identify top-ranked players in recent years from Spain and South America, such as Rafael Nadal, Gustavo Kuerten and David Nalbandian, Latino/as in the United States are still underrepresented in professional tennis (Kaufman 2009). Unlike Latin American players who learn tennis in their home country, Latino/as who are born or raised in the US encounter different racial, gender and class obstacles. According to the Pew Research Center (2016), Latinos make up 57 million or 17 percent of the US population, but their numbers in American tennis remains staggering low. This chapter uncovers the untold story of Latino/as in tennis, from the amateur ranks to collegiate and professional level. It focuses on the struggles and achievements of Latino/as in tennis from the early 1900s to the contemporary era. First, I will discuss the early history of Latino/a participation with an emphasis on how class, race and gender intersected to influence the life trajectory of Latino/a tennis players before World War II. Second, I will focus on the post-World War II career of the Mexican American Richard “Pancho” González who emerged from the Los Angeles public tennis courts to become a national tennis champion, but despite his athletic success, he remained an “outsider” in tennis. Third, I will show the impact of González’s legacy in tennis by helping to integrate the sport and encourage more racial minorities to play. One of these was Rosemary “Rosie” Casals, a working-class child of Central American immigrants in San Francisco who dominated women’s doubles play for years and fought for women’s equality in tennis. Fourth, another part of González legacy was introducing tennis to Latino/a youth in the US. He inspired Chicano activists from 1974 to 1984 to organize the annual La Raza Tennis Tournament in San Diego, which became the first all-Latino tennis tournament recognized by the United States Tennis Association (USTA).

Stepping onto the court The modern game of tennis was exported from Great Britain to the US in the 1870s and within two decades became a popular form of outdoor recreation, especially in warmer regions that 245

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made year-round play possible. Tennis remained an exclusive private-school and country-club sport for the wealthy throughout the early 20th century, but after World War I American cities began building tennis courts in public parks, and public schools opened up the sport to working-class and racial-minority populations. In the 1930s, the New Deal public works programs built tennis courts throughout the US that helped further popularize the game to the masses. Los Angeles had 56 public parks courts on the eve of the 1932 Olympic Games, with Griffith Park and Exposition Park hosting tournaments and leagues (Yeomans 1987). ‘Exposition Park was where I learned my tennis’, recalled Richard “Pancho” González; ‘It wasn’t as swanky as the Los Angeles Tennis Club’ (cited in: Rice 1959, p.25). The eight hardsurfaced courts and tennis shop at Exposition Park became a sanctuary for González where he found a racially mixed group of friends that supported and encouraged his tennis development. Latino/as were generally denied access to the exclusive, white, predominantly upper-class Los Angeles Tennis Club (LATC), unless they showed extraordinary talent. When González was invited to compete in LATC tennis tournaments, he faced acts of mundane racism, recalling: ‘I found not one familiar face as I started for the locker room. No one smiled at me. No one even talked to me’ (cited in: Rice 1959, p.25). Similarly, Ruben Carriedo, a Mexican-American tennis player from San Diego’s Barrio Logan, was invited to play at La Jolla Beach & Tennis Club, and white members asked him to “bring them a coke” because he was mistaken for a Mexican food server (Garcia 2014). These subtle acts of racism did not discourage Latino/as from stepping onto the courts, though. Instead, they formed their own amateur tennis clubs and tournaments, to create a cultural space that was familiar and resourceful, and to reaffirm a sense of cultural identity and belonging. On November 3, 1939 a group of Mexican Americans organized the Mexican Tennis Club to ‘promote tennis among youth of both sexes from the Mexican colony of Los Angeles’ (Makanazo 1939, p.4) The club received sponsorship from the Mexican Athletic Association of Southern California (MAASC) and the Los Angeles Park and Recreation Department to organize Sunday practices at Echo Park Playground (Alamillo 2010). Within a year, the club grew to 90 members and arranged exhibition matches with tennis clubs from Mexicali and Tijuana, Mexico. The Mexican tennis club forged a transnational relationship with Mexico’s Davis Cup team, to participate in its annual tennis tournament at Griffith Park. To raise money, the club’s female members organized Latin themed dances and solicited funds and donations from Hollywood celebrities, including film actor and tennis player Gilbert Roland (born Luis Alonso in Juarez, Mexico), who provided a singles trophy and helped publicize the annual Mexican tennis tournament of Los Angeles. Women’s singles and doubles competitions were also part of the tournament, even though sportswriters spent more ink describing their physicality rather than technique. Although tennis was considered socially acceptable for women, they were not taken seriously, and received less prize money and were discouraged from making tennis a career (Emery 1990). Another Latino tennis club was comprised of middle-class professionals who worked for Latin America consulate and embassy offices in New York City. The Hispano Tennis Club was one of most active tennis clubs, founded by a group of middle-class Colombians in 1927 at West Side Tennis Club of Forest Hills, the original site of the US National Tennis Championships. Their aim was to promote tennis among the ‘Spanish speaking people of New York City’ (Laverde 1947, p.32). The publisher of the Colombian newspaper donated the Copa Mundo al Día trophy at their first tournament, which attracted 64 participants, mostly middle-class professionals representing Latin America and Spain. At the end of the 1946 season ,the Hispano Tennis Club had to vacate the West Side Tennis club and lease their own tennis facility in Whitestone, Queens, where they organized the Inter-American Invitational Tournament to 246

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promote goodwill between the US and Latin America. Many Latin American tennis players participated in this tournament that lasted until the late 1950s, including Enrique Buse from Peru, Eduardo Gonzales from Colombia, Ricardo Balbiers from Chile, Arturo Cano from Bolivia and Francisco “Pancho” Segura from Ecuador. The Hispano Tennis Club was more than a recreational outlet, but was an important Latino organization in New York City that co-founded the Comisión de Escrutinio, a pan-Latino commission that organized fund-raising dances for important community events (Abreu 2016). These tennis clubs and tournaments played a significant role in developing future Latino/a tennis professionals. World War II had an enormous impact on Latinos, not only serving in the US military but also taking advantage of the G.I. Bill to pursue higher education. Born to Mexican immigrant parents in Los Angeles, Robert “Bobby” Perez joined the US Navy and conducted several tours in Europe before returning to attend the University of Southern California (USC) on a tennis scholarship. While earning a degree in journalism, he played No.1 singles and doubles helping USC win two national championships and became the first USC Latino athlete to earn a letterman jacket for four years. Perez also wrote for the Los Angeles Daily News and American Lawn Tennis (Perez 1950). Perez was nicknamed “El Puma” for his speed and cunning style of play; because he was 5’6” with a mediocre serve, he had to develop an all-court game (Cohen 1976). Bobby Perez helped George Toley, men’s tennis coach from 1954 to 1980, to recruit Mexican tennis players Pancho Contreras and Joaquin Reyes to USC who later won the 1955 NCAA doubles title and sparked “USC’s Latin American Connection” (Toley 2009). After USC, he played competitive tennis for five years, becoming one of the top-ranked doubles players in the country until he retired in 1955 to raise a family with his wife, Helen Pastall Perez, a former fifth-ranked tennis player (Killion 1988). Perez became the CBS Vice President of National Sales in their New York office and after retirement he returned to tennis as men’s college tennis coach. He also played mixed doubles with his wife, whom he considered one of the best female players between 1946 and 1955, and continues to make a case for her selection into the International Tennis Hall of Fame (Canfield 2006). Another college tennis star was Francisco “Pancho” Segura who was born in Guayaquil, Ecuador to a poor family with nine children, and suffered from malaria and other childhood illnesses (Seebohm 2009). When his father worked as a caretaker of the local tennis club, Segura became a ball boy and at the age of seven started playing tennis. Ten years later he won several titles in Latin America and, with the help the Ecuadorian government, attended the University of Miami on a tennis scholarship. Despite learning a new language and culture, Segura won three consecutive US intercollegiate titles (1943–5) and several US titles before turning professional in 1947. Segura was considered an “Ambassador of Good Will for Latin America” for helping to popularize the sport throughout Latin America through his tournament play and benefit matches (Rojas 1944). Despite his short size, he developed a powerful two-hand forehand combined with fast foot-work that earned him the world-number-one position from 1950 to 1952. During the 1950s, Segura joined Jack Kramer’s professional tour barnstorming across the world with Richard González. As the only dark-skinned Latinos on the pro tour, “Big Pancho” and “Little Pancho” became close friends and traveling companions, and sometimes paired up against the “gringos” in doubles competition (Seebohm 2009).

Richard “Pancho” Gonzalez and postwar American tennis Tennis remains a powerful vehicle for the construction of gender difference. It has a longstanding reputation as a “sissy sport”, which has stirred Latino males toward other perceptively “manlier” sports. González initially felt the same about tennis, especially compared to basketball 247

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and football, until he learned how tough it really was as an individual sport, admitting: ‘Tennis is different.You go it alone. No help from anybody’ (cited in: Rice 1959, p.40). He prided himself in making the sport more masculine, like John McEnroe, Jimmy Connors and Ilie Nastase, with his aggressive playing style, physical intimidation of opponents and outspoken behavior towards officials and fans (Lake 2015).The masculinity of González however must be understood within the racialized nature of tennis as a social institution that has privileged white male identity and authority (Alamillo 2014; Bodo 1995; Djata 2006). The first slight came in the nickname “Pancho”, which Richard and his mother considered racist. Chuck Pate, a former high school tennis coach, gave Richard the nickname even though it was typically used for persons named Francisco. During the 20th century, “Pancho” was often used in a derogatory way towards Mexican males considered rebellious and combative. The Spanish language press preferred using his birth name “Ricardo”. La Opinion newspaper proclaimed: ‘It is those Los Angeles sports editors and tennis officials that call him “Pancho”, but to us he is known as Ricardo Gonzalez’ (Garcia 1950, p.4). Despite his objections to the nickname, Richard reluctantly tolerated it for promotional and publicity purposes. Growing up in a working-class Mexican-American family, González trained exclusively on public courts and, despite being barred from junior tournaments, still managed to win back-to-back national titles (1948 and 1949). He might have won more if he had not turned professional so early. Grand Slam tournaments were reserved for amateurs only, so González joined the pro tour and barnstormed across the globe to support his family. He dominated, winning 124 ATP professional tournaments and holding the (unofficial) world-numberone ranking from 1952 to 1961. His self-confidence resembled the heavyweight boxer Muhammad Ali. ‘I’ll play any one of them any day of the week, and I’ll bet on myself ’, declared González to the Los Angeles Times, before adding: ‘I’m willing to play them any place, any time, and for whatever they want – if they dare’ (‘Gonzales Claims He’s Still Best’ 1963). When the Open Era arrived in 1968, González was 40 years old and was inducted into the International Hall of Fame. He could not sit on the sidelines for long, so returned to play in Grand Slam tournaments. On 25 June 1969, González defeated Charlie Pasarell in one of the longest and most memorable matches in Wimbledon history, which lasted five hours and 20 minutes with 112 games. After retiring in 1974, González accepted a coaching job at Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas, and on July 4 1994 he died of stomach cancer. It was his competitive zeal and longevity of his playing career that makes him a strong candidate for one of the greatest players of his era. Despite his athletic achievements, González struggled to gain recognition by the tennis establishment and sports media. After winning the 1948 US Championships, the New York Times wrote of González: ‘the rankest outsider of modern times sits on the tennis throne’ (Danzig 1948, p.29). His “outsider” status provided the fierce determination to defend his title in 1949 and prove to the tennis establishment that he belonged. ‘There were problems that existed; feeling like you were out of place’, confessed González, ‘but it never bothered me basically because as long as I could play tennis none of the other stuff mattered’ (cited in: Zbar 1986, p.16). He was a fighter both on and off court, as he admitted to Life Magazine: ‘I’ve always fought, because I’ve always been pushed around’ (cited in: Smith 1969, p.77). González was very media savvy and defended himself against the English-language print media’s racialized and gendered constructions of him as a “bad boy” of tennis (Alamillo 2009). He admitted: I read the write ups. Every guy does, no matter how earnestly some might tell you that they don’t. But ever since the time of my suspension for playing hooky, when some writers 248

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branded me as anything from a “juvenile delinquent” to “Public Enemy No.1”, I stopped believing everything I read in the papers. (Rice 1959, p.53) In contrast, the Spanish-language print media portrayed him as a sports star and role model for Mexican-American youth. He was considered a national hero in Mexico, so much that government officials sought for him to represent their country in the Davis Cup. González’s image changed during the 1950s as he became a professional tennis player, a husband and father of three children, and a US Davis Cup team member. During the height of the Cold War, the American press portrayed González as an American success story in an attempt to defuse (Soviet/Eastern Bloc) criticism of racism in the United States. After his death, his family members sought to honor his legacy and gain more recognition from the tennis world. Richard’s younger brother Ralph co-wrote an article for the LA-based OYE Magazine, calling out the mainstream sports media and tennis associations for their ‘apparent Pancho amnesia’ (Teetor & Gonzales 1994, p.25). He accused the Southern California Tennis Association of unfairly lumping Pancho Segura with his older brother as the “Two Panchos” in their list of 100 most influential tennis people of the 20th century. He cited historical evidence of González treatment by the tennis pro tour led by Jack Kramer: a 1959 tennis program cover with his actual image altered to a light-skinned, blond-haired tennis player to ‘make him more acceptable to the county club crowds’ (Teetor & Gonzales 1994, p.29). The “whitening” of González was partially based on a long-lasting feud with Kramer about money and cultural differences. Despite attempts to distort his public image, González fought to maintain and reclaim his own ethnic identity. He remained bilingual, speaking both English and Spanish, and in the 1970s changed his name back to the original “Gonzalez” from “Gonzales”, which was an “Americanized” version given to Richard’s father upon arrival in the US by immigration officials (Gonzales 1998, p.107). To correct the historical amnesia, Ralph worked with Danny Haro to produce a documentary, Pancho González: Warrior of the Court that tells the story of ‘his struggle to become the first American Latino sports superstar’ (Rodriguez 2006, p.72). The use of the Aztec warrior imagery in the documentary was purposeful, according to Haro, because González ‘represented the warrior spirit. The battle of tennis was ingrained in himself and in his battle against society’ (Rodriguez 2006, p.73). The documentary also makes a strong argument for González’s role in breaking the color barrier in tennis, before Althea Gibson and Arthur Ashe. In 2012, Pancho’s son Dan and nephew Gregory sought to keep his memory alive by founding the Richard “Pancho” González Youth Foundation to promote tennis and education in poor immigrant Latino communities.

The emergence of Rosemary “Rosie” Casals The Open Era in tennis arrived in April 1968 allowing both amateurs and professionals to compete together, thus improving the quality of tennis, expanding the sport’s global popularity and helping players earn prize money and endorsements. Open competition triggered a “tennis boom” during the 1970s, reflected in the expansion of public tennis courts, tennis instruction and tournament broadcasting. According to industry figures, tennis participation increased in the US from ten million in 1970 to 29 million in 1976 (Wind 1979). The Open Era also emerged at the height of the American civil rights and women’s rights movements that inspired young black and Latino/a men and women to use sports to prove themselves as equals on the playing field. A prominent civil rights activist and supporter of the civil rights movement, Arthur 249

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Ashe, won the first US Open in 1968, signaling a new “openness” for sport, and inspiring disadvantaged youth. In his memoir, Ashe recalled González as an inspiration: he ‘was not only the best player in the world but also an outsider, like me’ (Ashe & Rampersad 1993, p.5). González also inspired Rosemary Casals who overcame racial, gender, sexuality and class barriers to make it in the tennis world of the 1960s and 1970s. The second wave of the feminist movement advocated for women’s equality in sports through the passage of Title IX in 1972, which guaranteed females equal access to education and athletics. A year later, Billie Jean King defeated Bobby Rights in the “Battle of the Sexes” tennis match that changed how Americans viewed the sporting woman (Ware 2011). However, women of color remained marginalized within this wave of the feminism and women’s sports in the 1970s. It is in this context that Casals emerged as a rebel within tennis. Born 16 September 1948 in San Francisco to working-class immigrant parents from El Salvador, Casals began playing at Golden Gate’s public courts at the age of nine. ‘The other kids had nice tennis clothes, nice rackets, nice white shoes and came in Cadillacs’, she told People Magazine; ‘I felt stigmatized because we were poor’ (cited in: McCall 1982, p.85). Like González, Casals was marked as outsider due to her working-class status and ethnic identity, but she also faced gender barriers. Casals rebelled against hetero-normative conventions in professional tennis by having an “open” lesbian relationship with Connie Spooner, the head trainer of the Women’s Tennis Association.1 Casals developed her own fashion style, rejecting traditional white attire for bright-colored clothing and bandanas. Despite the delicate sounding nicknames of “Rosie” and “Rosebud”, she was a fierce fighter on and off the court (Jacobs 1976). At 5’2”, Casals made up for her size by developing an aggressive playing style. Casals became a top-ranked junior reaching the US Open semi-finals at 17 years of age then teamed up with Billie Jean King in 1967 to win numerous doubles titles. When she and King discovered that the Pacific Southwest Open awarded the men’s champion $12,500 compared to $1,500 for the women’s champion, they threatened to boycott the tournament if their demands were not met. Alongside equal prize money, they also demanded more media attention and equal access to the show-courts. When their demands were ignored, Casals and King organized their own rival women’s tournament to be held at the same time as the Pacific Southwest Open. She later helped devise and develop the Virginia Slims tour, with King and others, and World Team Tennis, both which helped to expand the sport’s popularity. During her career, Casals won 11 singles and 112 doubles titles and in 1996 was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame. She remains active in tennis as the president of Sportswomen, Inc., an organization that promotes charity tennis events that provides scholarships for juniors and organizations in underserved Latino communities. In 2014 a new, 7,000foot tennis center at Cal State Los Angeles was named after her and Pancho González to honor their remarkable athletic achievements, alongside their commitment to uplifting Latino communities. Speaking to student-athletes, Casals announced: ‘Both Pancho and I came from the Latino background and the wrong side of the tracks… And against all odds; our roads led us to center court at Wimbledon’ (cited in: V   uong 2014, p.1).

González’ Legacy through the La Raza Tennis Association Richard “Pancho” González not only inspired other Latino/a tennis players, but also Latino/a and African-American youth in Southern California during the tennis boom, holding tennis clinics at his Malibu ranch. ‘Young boys need support – just like I did once’, admitted González: 250

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When you’re of Mexican and Spanish descent very often you don’t get off to a good start. It’s like running the 100-yard dash and being forced to give a two-yard handicap.The Latin kids and kids from the East Side don’t get the promotion they need.They need encouragement. You’ve got make tennis available to these kids. That’s why we haven’t got any good Latin players in Los Angeles. (cited in: Rice 1959, p.202) González understood how institutional racism denied athletic opportunities for Latino/as, so he used his celebrity status to promote Latino tennis tournaments. La Raza Tennis Classic became the largest Latino tennis tournaments in America recognized by the USTA, yet it has received little mention in tennis history (Iber et al. 2011). This tournament was organized by the La Raza Tennis Association (LRTA), whose mission was to ‘foster and develop the game of tennis in San Diego County, to encourage development and participation of promising young players of the Spanish-Speaking Community’ (Molina 1976, p.30). In 1974, Chicano activists, Bill Molina, Gus Chavez and Vic Villapando, were upset about the lack of tennis courts in Mexican-American communities in San Diego, so they took action to ‘expand the interest and enjoyment in the game of tennis among the Chicano community and help develop the young tennis talent’ (Molina 1976, p.31.). The reason often given was that Latinos were athletically unfit to play tennis. ‘I got started with this whole thing because I heard people say that Chicanos didn’t play the game, that they couldn’t play’, Molina recalled; ‘It wasn’t the first time I heard something about what Chicanos couldn’t do. And I wanted to put a tournament to show that wasn’t true’ (cited in: Kozub 1977, p.100). The LRTA used the term “La Raza” to express cultural pride and mobilize Latino/as into collective action. Mexican philosopher José Vasconcelos coined the term ‘La Raza Cósmica’ in his 1925 book to capture the mestizo character of Latin America, and decades later became popularized in the Chicano civil rights movement (Navarro 1998; Ortiz 2007; Vasconcelos 1925). The term is intended to be inclusive of all ethnicities, and according to Molina, ‘I’ve never turned down anyone who wanted to join, yet… we had Mexican-Americans, whites, Blacks, Asians – it was the most integrated tournament I’ve ever seen’ (cited in: Kozub 1977, p.100). The LRTA was conceived as an outreach program under the Comprehensive Educational Services, Inc., a non-profit organization that aimed to prevent Latino youth from dropping out of school and encouraging them to seek higher education. For the LRTA, tennis helped them ‘to not only realize their highest potential in the sport, but to also utilize their skill to obtain a college education’ (Molina 1974). Latino youth could develop their athletic talent as well as receive academic counseling, and potentially earn a college/university tennis scholarship. For this reason, every tournament included a junior boys’ and girls’ singles and doubles competition as well as adult men’s and women’s singles and doubles. The first tournament in 1974 attracted 86 participants and by 1978, the tournaments attracted 700 participants. At this time, however, the tournament faced financial challenges because of Proposition 13, the 1978 landmark bill passed by California voters that limited property taxes. After Proposition 13, community colleges received less state funding so, as a knock-on effect, they were forced to charge non-profit organizations for using tennis facilities (Wesch 1978). This new fee system severely affected the LRTA’s ability to find courts so they had to limit entries and cancel some divisions. Despite these challenges, the LRTA continued to find private sponsors and promote the tournament abroad. In 1978, the tournament changed its name to the La Raza International Tennis Classic to reflect its international dimension with new entries from Mexico and Brazil (Valdez 1978, p.43). Several months before the 1974 tournament, Richard “Pancho” González appeared in a promotional television broadcast and conducted interviews with newspaper reporters to help boost 251

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attendance at the event. In a special promotional pamphlet to be distributed at the tournament, González outlined several reasons why Latino/as should play tennis, which included the lack of importance being tall and the opportunities to attain college scholarships (Villalpando 1974). He also urged young players to pay attention to the mental aspects of the game: ‘If I went on the court thinking that I was a minority. I would automatically psych myself out of winning’ (cited in:Villalpando 1974, p.5).This advice resembles the “imposter syndrome” or fear-of-failure phenomenon that often affects women and people of color in male- or white-dominated organizations or institutions (Steele 2010). For young Latinos, the La Raza Tennis (LRT) tournaments helped some of them earn a college scholarship and enter the professional tennis world. One such junior was 17-yearold Angel Lopez, who grew up in San Diego’s Mexican community of Logan Heights, but never knew that Latinos played tennis until he learned about Pancho González and Pancho Segura in high school. Inspired by them, Lopez started playing tennis and then won the 1974 singles title at the LRT tournament (personal correspondence, 7 September 2009). Declaring him the ‘community’s up and coming tennis star’, the LRTA helped pay his travel expenses to tournaments and private lessons with Pancho Segura at La Costa Resort in Carlsbad (Molina 1976). Lopez recalled one occasion when security officers denied him entry at the exclusive tennis resort because they did not believe he was being coached by Segura. Lopez earned a tennis scholarship to the University of Arizona and then competed professionally for several years. Upon retirement, he returned home to coach junior players as tennis director at San Diego Tennis & Racquet Club, and has coached top professionals including Alexandra Stevenson, Kelly Jones, Alejandro Hernandez and Zina Garrison. At the 2004 Indian Wells Tennis Tournament, Lopez was recognized for his long-standing service to the Southern California’s Hispanic youth and was named to the USTA National Hispanic Participation Task Force Committee (Sidhu 2004). Lopez continues to work with Latino/a youth through his Angel Lopez Tennis Academy by offering free clinics and awarding $1,000 college scholarships to graduating seniors. The LRT tournaments also faced challenges in encouraging more Latina participation. As Bill Molina explained, ‘We want Chicano women to play this sport too, but there is a different attitude about girls and athletics in a traditional Chicano home’ (cited in: Kozub 1977, p.100), which is typically based on rigid gender roles that discourages sport participation and pushes them to become wives and mothers. In 1975, the LRTA had to eliminate the women’s open division for lack of entries (Grant 1975), but, the following year, actively recruited more female players by encouraging the entire family to attend. One of these juniors was Angelica Gavaldón, who started playing tennis at six years old in Tijuana, Mexico. After her family moved to San Diego, she started competing in local junior tournaments, including the LRT tournament. At 13, Gavaldón earned a number-three national ranking for players 16 years and under, and three years later, in 1990, beat top-ranked Gigi Fernandez en route to becoming the youngest ever Australian Open quarter-finalist. Gavaldón reached the Australian Open quarter-finals again in 1995, earning a world ranking of 36. Apart from her powerful baseline ground-strokes, Gavaldón also brought a distinct Latina style to the game by wearing large hoop earrings and bright red lipstick. Because of her ‘exotic, South American look’, she was compared to the Argentinean Gabriela Sabatini (Freeman 1990), which demonstrates how Latina athletes are sexualized for their physical features, while ignoring their athletic talent. For this reason Latina athletes, according to Katherine Jamieson (2004, p.3), are ‘engaged in a process of resisting subjectivities that seek to classify them in particularly limited racialized, classed, gendered, and sexualized ways’. 252

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Conclusion In light of the increasing number of Spaniard and Latin-American players in professional tennis, the near absence of American-born Latino/as is intriguing. Class, racial and gender barriers have often intersected to keep them from entering the sport. One notable exception was Richard “Pancho” González, who grew up playing on public courts and overcame multiple barriers to become a one of the all-time greats. González believed in the importance of democratizing the sport and introducing tennis to the underprivileged Latino community by holding tennis clinics and promoting amateur tournaments. San Diego’s LRT tournament, from 1974 to 1984, emerged during the tennis boom and Chicano civil rights movement, and became culturally important as it intentionally targeted the development of young Latino/as, and helped them earn college scholarships. Rosemary Casals also opened the doors for Latinas and women of color in tennis. While American Latino/as will continue to break down barriers in tennis, identifying and developing young Latino/a talent remains a big challenge for the USTA.

Note 1 When same-sex marriage became legal in 2014 they tied the knot on a cruise ship (Goolsby 2015).

References Abreu, C. (2016) Rhythms of Race: Cuban Musicians and the Making of Latino New York City and Miami, 1940–1960. Chapel Hill, NC: UNC Press. Alamillo, J.M. (2009) Richard ‘Pancho’ Gonzalez, Race and the Print Media in Postwar Tennis America, International Journal of the History of Sport, 26(7), 947–65. Alamillo, J.M. (2010) Playing across Borders:Transnational Sports and Identities in Southern California and Mexico, 1930–1945, Pacific Historical Review, 79(3), 384–5. Alamillo, J.M. (2014) ‘Bad Boy’ of Tennis: Richard ‘Pancho’ Gonzalez, Racialized Masculinity and the Print Media in Postwar America. In Iber, J. (ed.), More Than Just Peloteros: Sport and US Latino Communities (pp.121–43), Lubbock, TX: Texas Tech University Press. Ashe, A. & Rampersad, A. (1993) Days of Grace, A Memoir. New York: Ballantine. Bodo, P. (1995) The Courts of Babylon: Tales of Greed and Glory in a Harsh New World of Professional Tennis. New York: Scribner. Canfield, O. (2006, 17 January) Helen Perez Belongs in Tennis Hall of Fame. Hartford Courant, B3. Cohen, J. (1977, 28 January) Helen, Bob Perez Stage Comebacks. Los Angeles Times, E7. Danzig, A. (1948, 20 September) Gonzales, Mrs. DuPont Capture U.S.Tennis Singles Titles. New York Times, 29. Djata, S. (2006) Blacks at the Net: Black Achievement in the History of Tennis. New York: Syracuse University Press. Emery, L. (1990) From Social Pastime to Serious Sport:Women’s Tennis in Southern California in the Late 19th and Early 20th Centuries. The Californians. Nov./Dec., 38–42. Freeman, J. (1990, 14 March) Gavaldón Signs Deal with Agent. Diego Tribune, D5. Garcia, M. (2014, 6 September) The History of Neighborhood House in Logan Heights: Two Generations of Carriedos and Tennis Comes to the Barrio. San Diego Free Press. Garcia, R. (1950, 24 May) Ricardo Gonzalez. La Opinión, 4. Gonzales Claims He’s Still Best (1963, 29 June) Los Angeles Times, A3. Gonzales, D. (1998) Richard “Pancho” Gonzalez Tennis Champion. Springfield, NJ: Enslow. Goolsby, D. (2015, 2 April) Tennis Hall of Famer Rosie Casals is a Game Changer. Desert Sun. Grant, M. (1975, 19 July) Boost Tennis in Barrio: Tourney Has Big Goal. San Diego Union, C6. Iber, J., Samuel, R., Alamillo, J.M. & de León, A. (2011) Latinos in U.S. Sport: A History of Isolation, Cultural Identity and Acceptance. Champaign, IL: Human Kinetics. Jacobs, L. (1976) Rosemary Casals:The Rebel Rosebud. St. Paul, MN: EMC Corp. Jamieson, K. (2003) Occupying a Middle Space: Toward a Mestiza Sports Studies, Sociology of Sport Journal, 15(4),1–15. 253

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Kaufman, M. (2009, 5 September) Hispanic-American void in tennis troubling. Miami Herald, A1. Killion, A. (1988, 21 May) This Time, Bobby Perez May Keep His Loyalty for USC under His Hat. Los Angeles Times, C3. Kozub, L. (1977, 29 May) La Raza Tennis Tournament Extends Beyond Chicano Community. San Diego Union, C4. Lake, R. (2015) The ‘Bad Boys’ of Tennis: Shifting Gender and Social Class Relations in the Era of Nastase, Connors, and McEnroe, Journal of Sport History, 42(1), 179–99. Laverde, M. (1947) The Hispano Tennis Club, American Lawn Tennis, 41(4), 32. Liberti, R. (2017) Rebel with a Racket: Rosie Casals. In Liberti, R. & Smith, M. (eds.), San Francisco Bay Area Sports: Golden Gate Athletics, Recreation and Community. Fayetteville, AR: University of Arkansas Press. Makanazo, J. (1939, 5 November) Nombraron Su Mesa Directiva Los Tenistas. La Opinión, 5. Makanazo, J. (1940, 3 November) El Club Mexicano de Tennis Celebra Su Aniversario Hoy. La Opinión, 5. McCall, C. (1982) Why is Tennis Maverick Casals Really Rosie? She’s Starting a New Tour for Stars Over 30 People Magazine, 17(21), 85. Molina, B, (1974) La Raza Tennis Association Pamphlet. San Diego: LRTA. Molina, B. (1976, 30 April) 1976 Southwestern U.S. La Raza Tennis Tournament. La Luz, 30-1. Navarro, A. (1998) La Raza Unida: A Chicano Challenge to the U.S. Two-Party Dictatorship. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. Ortiz, I. (2007) Si Se Puede!: Chicana/a Activism in San Diego at Century’s End. In Griswold del Castillo, R. (ed.), Chicano San Diego: Cultural Space and the Struggle for Justice, Tucson, AZ: University of Arizona Press. Perez, R.H. (1950) Helen Perez: Ranked at Five, She’s Aiming Higher! American Lawn Tennis, 3(44), 4–5. Pew Research Center (2016, 8 September) Key Facts about how the Hispanic Population is Changing. Available at: http:​//www​.pewr​esear​ch.or​g/fac​t-tan​k/201​6/09/​08/ke​y-fac​ts-ab​out-h​ow-th​e-u-s​-hisp​ anic-​popul​ation​-is-c​hangi​ng/ Rice, C. (1959) Man with a Racket:The Autobiography of Pancho Gonzales. New York: A.S. Barnes & Co. Rodriguez, M. (2006) Courting a Warrior, Hispanic, 19(11), 72. Rojas, A. (1944) Francisco (Pancho) Segura, American Lawn Tennis, 38(5), 22. Seebohm, C. (2009) Little Pancho: The Life of Tennis Legend Pancho Segura. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press. Sidhu, J.F. (2004, 26 March) Bazan, Lopez and Other Southern Californians Honored at Pacific Life Open. La Prensa San Diego, 2. Smith, M. (1969, 12 September) This Old Pro is Just Too Mean to Quit. Life Magazine, 77. Steele, C. (2010) Whistling Vivaldi And Other Clues to How Stereotypes Affect Us. New York: W.W. Norton. Teetor, P. & Gonzales, R. (1994) ¡Viva Pancho! Oye, 1(2), 25. Toley, G. (2009) The Golden Age of College Tennis: A USC Coach’s Unique Influence on the Game. Los Angeles: The America’s Group. Valdez, M. (1978) 1978  La Raza International Tennis Classic, Somos, 1(2), 43. Vasconcelos, J. (1925) La Raza Cósmica. Mexico City: Mexico DF. Villalpando, V. (1974, April) Chicano Pro Speaks: Gonzales Encourages Latinos to Compete. Community College Consortium, 5. Vuong, Z. (2014, 5 June) Cat State LA breaks ground on Rosie Casals/Pancho Gonzales Tennis Center. Pasadena Star News, 1. Ware, S. (2011) Game, Set, Match: Billie Jean King and the Revolution in Women’s Sports. Chapel Hill, NC: UNC Press. Wesch, H, (1978, 23 June) La Raza Net Tourney Runs Afoul of Prop. 13. San Diego Union, D6. Wind, H.W. (1979) Game, Set, and Match:The Tennis Boom of the 1960s and 1970s. New York: E.P. Dutton. Zbar, J. (1978) Pancho Gonzalez – Pioneering Champion, Vista Magazine, 8(8), 16.

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25 Historical changes in playing styles and behavioural etiquette in tennis Reflecting broader shifts in social class and gender relations Robert J. Lake

This chapter illuminates changes in prevailing playing styles and norms of behavioural etiquette for male and female players, from the emergence of lawn tennis in the 1870s until the post-Second World War period. Playing styles and etiquette were closely connected expressions of bodily control and deportment. While developments in both can be identified with key players, the specific influence of the amateur ideal as well as shifts in class and gender relations impacted discussions about on-court conduct before 1939. The increasing visibility of professional players during the post-war years, which culminated in the “Open” era from 1968, arguably marked a step-change, as male and female players responded to the demands of an increasingly commercialized game.

Early playing styles and etiquette as reflections of class values and amateurism Of the very first group of players to learn lawn tennis, most derived their styles from the wellestablished racket sports of Real Tennis and racquets. In both games, given the shape and features of the court – indoor games, with playing areas confined by walls – the use of chops, cuts and slices was a customary feature and important tactic.To hit the ball too strongly or without accuracy left clear openings for opponents to score. So, with these tactics imbedded in the psyche of these players, it is unsurprising that after moving to the lawn game they also tended to hit with spin and slice, and avoided big, heavy ground strokes. Interestingly, when “true” lawn tennis styles emerged that were not initially influenced by other racket sports, norms of behavioural etiquette for players centred on self-restraint. This approach was consistent with the amateur ideology as derived from the English public schools, whereby “sportsmanship” became the expectation; honesty, generosity, integrity, magnanimity and overt restraint in both victory and defeat – including not taking undue advantage of players’ misfortunes – prevailed (Holt 1989). As part of the process of emerging playing styles during the 1870s and 1880s, these same “amateur” behavioural expectations are apparent in discussions of how, when and even if to play new strokes and shots. 255

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Spencer Gore, winner of the inaugural 1877 Wimbledon Championships, endured public criticism because he volleyed opponents’ cuts and screws before they had taken effect (Baddeley 1895). Similarly, the Earl of Cavan, who became LTA President in 1897, recalled of his earlier playing days that his ‘character as a gentleman … [was] called into question by more than one man with whom I stood in otherwise friendly relationship’, because of his inclination to volley (Lawn Tennis 19 May 1897, p.39). Given the volley’s purpose was to deliberately win the point rather than sustain a rally, its increasingly widespread employment perhaps signalled an unwelcome shift toward over-competitiveness, meaning its use was considered both “unsporting” and vulgar (Lake 2011). The development of the volley into an aggressive and effective shot was facilitated in part through changes in court design. In particular, lowering the height of the net allowed players to hit the ball harder, and it also privileged those with height, reach and athleticism.1 Also, as lawn tennis grew in popularity, companies with an expressed interest in designing and producing rackets and balls began to establish themselves. In a short space of time, the latest technologies were applied to make balls travel faster and truer through the air, make strings more durable and make rackets able to withstand greater force. These technological improvements facilitated the acceleration of game-play, giving players greater confidence to hit harder and with greater accuracy. Thus, lawn tennis quite rapidly progressed from a game of gentle “pat-ball” to a sport of lively shot-making. However, while playing styles changed noticeably as an outcome of these developments, the sport’s prevailing behavioural etiquette progressed more slowly. Throughout the Victorian era and into the Edwardian period, lawn tennis remained chiefly a preserve of elite society, and this was true for almost all geographical regions (Baltzell 1995; Lake 2015a). One’s involvement in lawn tennis reflected social position, through playing, having membership of an exclusive club, holding an important administrative position and, crucially, through on-court behaviour. When new shots like the volley were attempted, therefore, they had to be executed in the right “spirit” and, moreover, to be accepted en masse as appropriate, they had to be both embraced and utilized by the highest status players. As a means to counteract the overwhelming influence of the volley, top players like Frank Hadow and John Hartley – Wimbledon singles champions in 1878 and 1879/1880, respectively – utilized the lob to force volleyers to the baseline, but again this brought criticism. According to Ritchie (1910, p.59), such shots showed a ‘poverty of resource’, alluding to the fact that lobbing was not considered to be a highly skilled shot and made for “unattractive” tennis (Baddeley 1895; Heathcote 1890). W.M. Brownlee (1889, p.141) was another who expressed his opposition: ‘I have seen one or two players collapse when lobbing was introduced, alleging that they had come to play lawn tennis, not pitch and toss’. The lob gave way to the overhead smash, cultivated by brothers Ernest and William Renshaw, though it apparently ‘frightened the life out of opponents’ (Haylett & Evans 1989, p.18). Expressing the perceived importance of self-control in play, Heathcote (1890, p.236) argued of the overhead smash: ‘Such violence is seldom necessary’, while Dwight (1886, p.35) considered it ‘an amusement that should be strictly confined to exhibition matches’. This skill, quite naturally, also extended to the serve: from once being simply a means to put the ball in play and ‘naturally of the under-hand species’, overhead serving became a weapon in itself, forcing opponents to develop equally forceful ground-strokes in return (Baddeley 1895, p.14). Throughout the 1890s, there were widespread calls for its temperance and even abolition, as it ‘interferes with the real pleasure of a friendly game’, makes long rallies ‘impossible’, discourages ‘many men who are not bad hands at the game’, and ‘drives women off the ground’ (The Standard cited in: Pastime 26 July 1893, p.50). Even some elite-level players opposed hard serving. Writing a year after his first and only Wimbledon singles victory, the Irishman H.S. Mahony proposed amendments 256

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to the foot-fault rule as a means of ensuring that the serve-and-volley game did not ‘spoil’ the arguably more attractive base-line style (Pastime 19 May 1897, p.38).While opinions were always divided, aggressive play was argued as something to be controlled closely, to avert the emergence of vulgar styles built on, as Gore (1890, p.290) described it, ‘nothing but brute force and ignorance’. Nevertheless, the importance of leading players like the Renshaws in making more aggressive and forceful playing styles more acceptable is clear. The Renshaw brothers dominated the sport in the 1880s, winning 18 All England singles, doubles and mixed-doubles championships between them. They also popularized a style of assertive, attacking tennis that was hitherto unseen in Britain.William, in particular,‘took the ball early and hit it hard’. Barrett and Little (2006, p.7) assert that he transformed the defensive cut and slice of the vicarage lawn into the modern style’. More conservative players lamented this development and The Times (18 September 1891, p.10) observed that lawn tennis ‘has become altogether too paralysing for ordinary folk. Years ago … the ball was gently spooned over the net’. Now, with more aggressive strokes like the volley and overhead smash, ‘it has drifted into the hands of trained athletes, whom moderate players hesitate to face, for their one object seems to be to kill the ball or, failing that, their opponent’. Such viewpoints increasingly represented a minority opinion, however, as most enthusiasts welcomed efforts to advance lawn tennis away from its ‘tame’ or ‘effete’ stigma, which authors later acknowledged (Miles 1903, p.83; Myers 1903, p.113). Held up as exemplary amateur sportsmen, the Renshaws played with modesty and respect, and with an effortless style and grace that implied ‘natural ability, and thus superiority over those who had to expend effort’ (Collins 2009, p.34).This makes an interesting comparison to Herbert Lawford, the 1887 Wimbledon Singles champion, whose style was effective in practice [but] theoretically incorrect. … [His] strokes, though powerful, are without that grace and delicacy which are among the chief attractions of the game; and whose execution is diametrically opposed to that which is generally accepted as correct. … [His] powerful hitting … detracts much from the game as a spectacle. (Pastime 13 July 1887, p.126) Thus, it seems the Renshaws’ collective success as innovators had as much to do with their “gentlemanly” behaviour as their triumphant play. This point alone reinforces the strength and dominance of amateurism as a set of both moral and behavioural codes influencing the trajectory of developing playing styles and etiquette.

Early playing styles and etiquette as gendered constructs Playing styles and etiquette norms differed for male and female players in the sport’s earliest decades. While men were pushing the boundaries of aggressive play, women were merely striving for opportunities to play, and it was typically men who advised women on how to do so, through written instructional-guides or as coaching-professionals. The gendered dimension of tennis stretched beyond discrimination in clubs/associations, and into on-court playing styles and etiquette (Lake 2015a; Wilson 2014). Victorian women were generally physically inhibited by their outfits, which were often corseted if not also heavy and cumbersome, and thus entirely inappropriate for anything beyond mildly strenuous activity (Park 1989). While young upper-middle-class women were permitted to play games, they were not supposed to take them too seriously. Rather, they were expected to appear as immaculate ornaments of beauty, reflecting familial wealth and respectability (Hargreaves 1985). Thus, leaping, running, diving and lunging on a tennis court was 257

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not considered “becoming”, nor was strenuous physical activity for girls generally considered safe. Young women at garden parties and in clubs therefore typically adopted roles that merely extended domestic duties (Lake 2012). Attitudes regarding women’s physical inadequacies or unsuitability for sport were clearly reflected in instructional-guides, which recommended appropriate playing styles and etiquette for them. Before 1914, these guides typically had a separate chapter devoted to women’s play as it was considered “naturally” different to men’s. In these, authors often discouraged women from learning certain strokes. Regarding the serve, Brownlee (1889, p.146) recommended for women the “under-hand” variety, because serving overhead ‘tires her very much’; indeed, ‘the wisdom of ladies serving overhead has always been questioned’. President and first Chairman of the All England Lawn Tennis Club (AELTC), H.W.W. Wilberforce (1890, p.269) called the sight of women serving overhead ‘a mere caricature of a man’s service’. Even Lottie Dod (1890, p.313), who famously pioneered looser and more comfortable clothing for women en route to becoming the 1887 Wimbledon singles champion, was less than supportive here: It is doubtful whether ladies gain anything by serving overhand. In the majority of cases they expend a good deal of strength ... therefore, unless exceptionally good, and performed without undue exertion, I do think ladies’ over-hand service is a great waste of strength. Arguments rooted in taken-for-granted natural biological/physiological differences between the sexes underpinned the assumed incapability of women performing the volley and backhand, as well as their overall movement around the court (see Wilberforce 1890, p.266). Psychological/ intellectual differences were also assumed, as women apparently were, for example, apt to ‘lose their heads’ with a twist serve (Wilberforce 1890, p.267) and, according to Dod (1890, p.307), initially thought incapable of learning tennis scoring. For these reasons, women’s play was typically less dynamic than men’s, and women’s doubles matches especially were considered tedious affairs. In 1885, the AELTC rejected a proposal to introduce a ladies’ doubles championship, because they believed ‘it would not represent serious competitive tennis’, and many female players agreed that the typical arrangement of four heavily clad, physically inhibited women rooted to the baseline represented ‘no more than a boring and interminable form of pat-ball’ (McCrone 1988, p.162). The tediousness of their contests factored into the United States Lawn Tennis Association’s decision to reduce the ladies' Challenge Round matches for the US National Championships in 1902 from best-of-five to best-of-three sets (Lake 2015a). Women’s inhibited playing styles naturally influenced appropriate behavioural etiquette, the gendered nature of which was seen most clearly in mixed-doubles tennis, where on-court responsibilities were typically conditioned by broader gender roles. Chivalric norms and rituals played out in interesting ways: early on, The Field (8 August 1874) recommended, ‘a lady should be allowed to refuse as many services as she likes’. It was also expected that men ask permission, or apologize after the act, for “poaching” his female partners’ balls, and to show restraint when hitting toward his female opponent (Lake 2012). Later, in prescribed tactics, men were urged to take the majority of shots and also the most challenging and “winning” shots. Dwight (1886, p.66) recommended that men ‘take more risk in volleying … because his partner is unable to do her share of the play’. Baddeley (1895, p.64) felt that women missed too many ‘easy volleys’ and urged them to ‘stay back and let him do the volleying, [so] he would make winning strokes’. On-court gender roles in the mixed game also advised women to play on the forehand (right) side, as men were supposedly naturally more adept at the backhand stroke. Wilberforce (1890, p.266) suggested: ‘The efforts of most [women] to take a back-hander result in nothing more 258

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than a graceful scoop’, and Baddeley (1895, p.65) lamented the backhand was ‘the weak spot of nearly every lady’. In the years immediately preceding the First World War, there was some clear evidence of change in the conditions of play and associated etiquette for female players. For example, Myers (1912, p.142–3) noted how the underhand service had been replaced by the overhead serve among elite-level players, and it was acknowledged that the best females like Dorothea Lambert Chambers now volleyed well enough to challenge prejudiced views of female frailty. However, it was not until the inter-war period, and through the exploits of leading players, that most women began to play, or indeed began to think themselves capable of playing, more of an all-court game. These developments were most certainly a reflection of women’s emancipation in wider society, as a likely outcome of the suffragette movement and changing gender expectations brought about by women’s shifting workplace roles during the war.

Inter-war developments Lawn tennis was characterized in the inter-war period with rapid and noticeable advances in playing styles for both men and women, though arguably by the beginning of the Second World War the latter progressed further, moving closer toward men in more freely demonstrating their skills and abilities. Of huge consequence were the outcomes of the first-wave feminist movement and the shifting social positions of women on the home-front during the First World War effort, where many assumptions of physical frailty were shed as women, especially from the middle class, increasingly occupied positions of responsibility and undertook tasks requiring more than moderate physical exertion (Woollacott 1994). By the early/mid-1920s, the leading male players, including the Americans Bill Johnston and Bill Tilden and later the “Four Musketeers” from France (Jacques Brugnon, Rene Lacoste, Henri Cochet and Jean Borotra), helped challenge the persistent “namby-pamby” image of tennis through their play (Parke 1920, p.92). Tilden’s “cannonball” service was the most powerful seen to date and notoriously difficult to return, and while the prevailing code of behavioural etiquette still conditioned play along the lines of self-restraint, this was subject to different interpretations, particularly as a consequence of the sport’s internationalization and democratization, which invited new cultural influences from players from different nationalities and social backgrounds. In the early inter-war period, as tennis-playing nations were recovering from the First World War, the perceived importance and political significance of international sporting competitions increased considerably, and consequently the Davis Cup (founded in 1900) prospered (Smart 2007). Many of the earliest competitions were played out by British, American and Australasian teams only, with pre-war entries reaching a peak of just eight in 1913. During the 1920s – before the football World Cup emerged – the Davis Cup was exceeded only by the Olympic Games in terms of international importance, as the number of entries increased noticeably: in 1921, 13 nations competed; by 1928, this number had risen to 33. Such international growth invited new developments in terms of playing style and etiquette. In both Britain and the US, the sport also opened its doors to players of previously marginalized or excluded groups, namely the lower-middle class (Baltzell 1995; Lake 2015a). The inter-war period therefore witnessed an explosion in participation, with hundreds of new clubs being formed every year. In Britain alone, just over 1000 were affiliated to the LTA in the early 1920s, but by 1939, the number was over 3200. Paish (1996) noted of Surrey that the number increased from 70 to 200, and, regarding Nottinghamshire, Lusis (1998, p.30) wrote: ‘For every club that had closed there must have been at least ten new ones. By all accounts the demand 259

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for the game was insatiable’. With greater competition for new members, many of the older, established clubs removed some of their membership restrictions, while new clubs, keen to develop quickly, enforced less stringent terms of access (see Lake 2008).The increasing numbers of people playing was matched by the relative falling cost of tennis equipment, which was now increasingly mass-produced (Birley 1995). Two related outcomes of this process were the introduction of new playing styles and strokes, inevitably pioneered by the game’s star players like Bill Tilden and Suzanne Lenglen, and the relaxation of etiquette codes as the game spread downward through the social classes. Yet, as upper-middle-class administrators continued to exert control in most clubs and tournaments, their hegemonic ideals of amateurism still prevailed, and with that the primacy of sportsmanship and self-restrained play was sustained. An interesting exception in this scenario was the drop shot. Despite its subtleties, which only later were fully appreciated, initially it was considered a “cheap” shot, and the sense that it made opponents look foolish trumped the fact that it was played with great self-restraint, alongside being a thoughtful and tactical stroke. When first introduced in the early 1920s, spectators audibly voiced their objections, for example when Bill Tilden repeatedly and successfully used the drop shot against his opponents during Wimbledon of 1921. Lowe (1924, p.74) considered the ‘fuss of a few isolated spectators … most disconcerting to the player and uncalled for’. He advised: ‘Crowds must get it out of their heads that it is bad form to drop a ball over the net. It is one of the most delicate and “heady” strokes in the game’. Even so, the constraints on male players were never as strict as for their female counterparts, and while it seems numerous (male) authors adopted a more progressive view of women’s capabilities and worked to develop their play, others were less enthusiastic about supposed “advances” in the women’s game. So powerful were some of the messages put forward in instructional guides to, effectively, control women’s behaviour, that they brought at least partial agreement from some females. The leading American, Molla Mallory, advised girls to ‘learn to serve overhead’ and ‘acquire skill at volleying’ like the men, but reinforced prejudiced views of their physical inadequacies by suggesting that many ‘cannot move fast enough … or think quickly enough’, and ‘are weak in anticipation’ (LT&B 10 February 1923, p.839). Later, two-time Wimbledon singles champion Dorothy Round (1934, p.15), who developed an overhead service herself, still felt inclined to comment that developing the skill ‘when too young often spoils a girl’s service later on’. Despite the conservative stalwarts, most tennis writers and correspondents seemed to support changes to women’s play. Author and critic S. Powell Blackmore (1921, p.162), referee and handicapper Francis R. Burrow (1922, p.256; 1933, p.31), two-time Wimbledon Ladies’ Singles champion Kathleen ‘Kitty’ McKane (1925, p.98), and top-ten British player Mary Hardwick (1937, p.44) all agreed that girls should acquire an overhead service, recognizing it as a powerful weapon of attack rather than simply a means to put the ball in play. If progress for female players could be personified through the actions and accomplishments of a single individual, then Suzanne Lenglen would be that person. Her incredible success, being virtually unbeatable from 1919 to 1926, was matched by her aggressive yet refined playing style and her charisma. In her play, she was often described as elegant, but also attractive and ‘awe-inspiring’;‘volcanic in action’ and ‘like a hungry man sitting down to dinner … keen for the struggle, eager for action’ (LT&B 12 November 1921, p.545). Her first Wimbledon singles victory in 1919 against the aging but dominant Englishwoman Dorothea Lambert Chambers marked the beginning of a new era in women’s tennis, as LT&B (10 July 1919, p.178) conveyed: Never has such tennis been seen in a ladies’ single. There were a great many people who would never have believed such tennis could be played by women. … Neither player showed the slightest trace of the old traditional womanly weaknesses. 260

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A Daily Mail correspondent agreed that it was ‘the greatest display by women in the history of the game’ (7 July 1919, p.4). The dominant narrative of the match represented the triumph of the “new” over the “old”; that is, Lenglen’s lively, vivacious play in her loose-fitting, calflength frock reflected the independent “new woman” or 1920s “flapper” (Schultz 2014), while Chambers represented ‘the epitome of Edwardian backwardness and a supposedly conservative pre-war sporting culture’, with her more conventional dress, demeanour and playing style (Gilbert 2011, p.188). Existing at the forefront of the profound changes for women throughout this period, reflecting greater independence, sexual freedom and shifting parameters of respectable femininity, Lenglen’s achievements not only put a spotlight onto women’s tennis, but also likely inspired millions of young women to develop their play. Not only was she more aggressive and relentless on court, but also less swayed by conventional gender roles in mixed doubles. Given her comprehensive repertoire of strokes, she was known to adopt the traditionally male position (left-hand side) as chief antagonist (Lake 2015a). During a match with the numberone-ranked Frenchman William Laurentz, in which Lenglen took charge and poached many of his volleys and smashes, LT&B (3 July 1919, p.150) commented, tongue-in-cheek: ‘The amusement was heightened by the fact that he proved very disobedient’. Lenglen’s playing style was so forthright, and the code of etiquette with which she played so progressive, that instructional guides had to be re-written; no longer did authors write or include a separate section on women’s play. In defence of this change, Crawley (1922, p.48) described the tone of these ‘old-fashioned’ sections as ‘either flippant or compassionate, a relic of the primitive male view of women’. Aitken (1924, p.42) agreed: ‘Women no longer need a book on lawn tennis to themselves; they play in the same style as men’. Not all authors concurred. While Lenglen and other elite-level players were exceptions, recreational players continued to be instructed to respect traditional gender roles. Beamish and Beamish (1924, p.76–7) suggested: ‘The man … is expected to play more shots from every part of the court’ including most of the lobs, overheads and volleys, while Ritchie (1928, p.70) recommended that female players ‘attend to weak over-head shots, sideline drives and dead straight balls, leaving everything else to her partner’. Obviously not a great believer in the value of mixed doubles for men, retired army officer-turned-coaching-professional, Major Rendall, considered the mixed game a poor substitute for “real” tennis: [A woman] has not the physical strength to keep up the tussle, stroke for stroke, of a rally in which the man is urging forth his full, untempered force. Thus, it happens that a man does not bang a ball at a woman as hard as he can when the tennis calls for it. Instead, he either softens his shot, or he sends it elsewhere. In this case, ‘the male is under restraint [and] … strokes that would be true tennis must be sacrificed because they may not properly be played against a woman’; thus, the inclusion of women ‘inevitably lowers the standard’ (Rendall 1926, p.132–3). Moreover, one LT&B columnist opined, quite disparagingly, that women were ‘hopelessly caught’ when it came to speed, were at a ‘very great disadvantage’ in service, and ‘hopelessly inferior’ at volleying (5 January 1924, p.918). Such assumptions about women’s physical/bodily capabilities expressed through playing styles and behavioural etiquette served to sustain their subordination both on and off court. The ways they played or were expected to play were far from innocuous, but tied into the very fabric of gendered norms and ideologies, and presented in unspoken but powerful ways. Into the post-war period, changes in playing styles and behavioural etiquette continued to be conditioned by broader social, economic and political developments. The continued erosion of 261

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amateur ideals, which led in 1968 to the emergence of “open tennis” and subsequent rampant commercialization, was particularly important, as was the emergence of second-wave feminism, which impacted upon behavioural ideals and on-court gender roles for men and women.

Post-war developments Into the post-war period, as tennis continued to attract more players from modest backgrounds, amateur authorities fought desperately to control the sport’s growth and its players’ actions. Professional tours had been running in America since 1926 and by the 1950s were not only economically viable and publicly acceptable, but also very enticing for top amateur players.2 Those who remained amateur were often induced by lucrative under-the-table payments, and really throughout the 1950s and 1960s it was clear that the balance of power between players and officials was tipping toward the former (Hart 1985). Recognizing their commodity value, star players made greater demands from tournament officials, and also pushed the boundaries of acceptable behaviour. Incidents of on-court behavioural transgressions were more frequent, involved more players and became increasingly normalized. Bob Falkenburg enacted numerous “delay tactics” – returning out serves, repeatedly tying his shoelaces, requesting new balls, having protracted conversations with officials and play-acting with injuries – en route to his first and only Wimbledon title in 1948. This irked many of the local spectators, officials and reporters, to say nothing of his opponents (see LT&B 15 August 1948, p.528). Some players suffered suspensions, like Americans Earl Cochell, for using physical intimidation and bad language in the 1951 US National Championships, and Chuck McKinley, for losing his temper during the 1960 Davis Cup Inter-Zone Final. Others were publicly reprimanded, like the young British squad players who received written complaints in 1967 from spectators and an ‘angry hotelier’ after showing bad manners at a French tournament; LT&B (May 1967, p.150) remarked: ‘certainly the old tradition of good British sportsmanship was not enhanced’. Despite efforts from both British and American associations, incidents of bad behaviour from male players continued to escalate throughout the post-war period (Lake 2015b). Female players seemingly upheld the requisite standards of on-court etiquette to a higher degree, but into the 1960s the women’s liberation movement challenged the conventional wisdom of traditional gender roles and behavioural norms, and certainly inspired in some women greater rebelliousness, both on and off court.While key figures like Billie Jean King, Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova articulated differing levels of commitment to the broader feminist movement, each pushed women’s tennis to a much higher level culturally, economically and, particularly in the case of King, politically. Further shedding their inhibitions, the leading female players trained harder and attained greater physical fitness and strength than had hitherto been acceptable for their predecessors. In so doing they managed to bring men’s and women’s playing standards much closer together. Partly as an outcome of the greater rewards they eventually secured for themselves, their willingness to push their own bodies further led to fundamental changes to the dominant forms of female play, and to their expressed behavioural etiquette, as seen by the greater level of overt competitiveness with which the best female players of the time approached the sport (Lichtenstein 1974; Mewshaw 1993). Advances for women, broadly contextualized within the feminist movement, also coincided with the advent of the Open era in 1968, which may have impacted on the behaviour of some male players, who felt threatened by the encroachment of females into their domain. While attempting simultaneously to carve out a more secure space for themselves, and to counter sustained criticisms of tennis as a “sissy” sport, players like Ilie Năstase, Jimmy Connors and John 262

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McEnroe challenged traditional behavioural etiquette with their unsportsmanlike conduct and brazen, ruthless competitiveness (Lake 2015b; Wilson 2014). Unrelenting and aggressive playing styles matched these players’ personalities, and at this point the established codes of behaviour were on the verge of being superseded by new ethics inspired by the pursuit of victory and financial gain (Baltzell 1995). Certainly, the change in behaviour seen among these players was impacted also by the emergence of consumerist, neo-liberal, free-market philosophies within the sport’s commercialization and commodification. By allowing themselves to be marketed as “bad boys”, these players essentially employed “corporate logic” through their win-at-all-costs actions, with the result that they all prospered from their increasingly outrageous on-court behavioural transgressions in ways that female players could not, given the resilience of gender expectations in tennis. McEnroe, in particular, successfully tapped into the clever branding of companies like Nike, which sought an edgier, more youthful corporate identity (Adams 2003). Tennis authorities, and the newly emerging player agencies, were keen to preserve the traditions of sportsmanship, partly in order to hold tennis above other sports, but also to protect themselves against potential negative repercussions from behavioural misdemeanours. In the mid-1980s, ProServ added a “goodwill” paragraph to new contracts that simply read: ‘As a highly visible athlete you have the responsibility to set an example, to be involved in various causes, and to give your time to charity at different times throughout each year’ (cited in Feinstein 1991, p.132).While demanding good behaviour, they somewhat ironically also recognized the importance of players having “personalities” that made them more interesting and sellable commodities (Bodo 1995; Feinstein 1991). Thus, the outcome of this process was the greater exertion of control over players’ actions but also, as Wilson (2014) opined, the homogenization of playing styles and personalities to the detriment of the sport’s overall interest.

Conclusion This chapter has broadly illuminated changes in prevailing playing styles and norms of behavioural etiquette for male and female players, from the emergence of lawn tennis in the 1870s until the post-Second World War period, contextualized within broader shifts in class and gender relations and, more specifically, the erosion of amateurism as a part-outcome of the sport’s internationalization, professionalization and commercialization. It is intended that this analysis will help to highlight the importance of critical discussions of the gendered body in tennis, and how assumptions that underpin what it can do and how it should be viewed, displayed and conceptualized are rooted deeply in societal structures.

Notes 1 At the first Wimbledon Championships in 1877, the height of the net at the sides was 5ft., but was lowered by 1882 to 3ft. 6in. at the sides and 3ft. in the centre. 2 Of the 15 male players who reached world number-one ranking from 1946 to 1967, ten turned professional.

References Adams, T. (2003) On Being John McEnroe. London:Yellow Jersey Press. Aitken, A. (1924) Lawn Tennis for Public Courts Players. London: Methuen. Baddeley, W. (1895) Lawn Tennis. London: George Routledge & Sons. Baltzell, E.D. (1995) Sporting Gentlemen: Men's Tennis from the Age of Honor to the Cult of the Superstar. New York: Free Press. 263

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Barrett, J. & Little, A. (2006) Wimbledon Gentlemen's Singles Champions 1877–2005. London: Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Museum. Beamish, A.E. & Beamish, W.G. (1924) Lawn Tennis for Ladies. London: Mills & Boon. Birley, D. (1995) Playing the Game: Sport and British Society 1910–45. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Blackmore, S.P. (1921) Lawn Tennis Up-To-Date. London: Methuen. Bodo, P. (1995) The Courts of Babylon: Tales of Greed and Glory in the Harsh New World of Professional Tennis. New York: Scribner. Brownlee, W.M. (1889) Lawn Tennis. Bristol: J.W. Arrowsmith. Burrow, F.R. (1922) Lawn Tennis:The World Game of Today. London: Hodder and Stoughton. Burrow, F.R. (1933) Lawn Tennis: How to Succeed. London: Evans Brothers Ltd. Collins, T. (2009) A Social History of English Rugby Union. London: Routledge. Crawley., A. E. (1922) Lawn Tennis Do’s and Don’ts. London: Methuen. Dod, L. (1890) Chapter by Lottie Dod. In Duke of Beaufort, K. & Watson, A., Tennis: Lawn Tennis: Rackets: Fives. London: Longmans, Green & Co. Dwight, J. (1886) Lawn Tennis. London: Pastime. Feinstein, J. (1991) Hard Courts: Real Life on the Professional Tennis Tours. New York:Villard Books. Gilbert, D. (2011) The Vicar's Daughter and the Goddess of Tennis: Cultural Geographies of Sporting Femininity and Bodily Practices in Edwardian Suburbia. Cultural Geographies, 18, 187–207. Gore, S. (1890) Chapter by Spencer Gore. In Duke of Beaufort, K. & Watson, A., Tennis: Lawn Tennis: Rackets: Fives. London, Longmans: Green & Co. Hardwick, M. (1937) Lawn Tennis for Women. London: Blackie & Son Ltd. Hargreaves, J. (1985) "Playing like Gentlemen While Behaving like Ladies": Contradictory Features of the Formative Years of Women’s Sport, British Journal of Sports History, 2(1), 40–52. Hart, S. (1985) Once a Champion: Legendary Tennis Stars Revisited. New York: Dodd, Mead. Haylett, J. & Evans, R. (1989) The Illustrated Encyclopaedia of World Tennis. Basingstoke: Automobile Association. Heathcote, C. (1890) Sports and Pastimes:Tennis. London: Longmans, Green and Co. Holt, R. (1989) Sport and the British. Oxford: Clarendon. Lake, R.J. (2008) Social Exclusion in British Tennis: A History of Privilege and Prejudice. London: Unpublished PhD Dissertation, Brunel University. Lake, R.J. (2011) Social Class, Etiquette and Behavioural Restraint in British Lawn Tennis: 1870–1939, International Journal of the History of Sport, 28(6), 876–94. Lake, R.J. (2012) Gender and Etiquette in ‘Mixed Doubles’ Lawn Tennis 1870–1939, International Journal of the History of Sport, 29(5), 691–710. Lake, R.J. (2015a) A Social History of Tennis in Britain. London: Routledge. Lake, R.J. (2015b) The “Bad Boys” of Tennis: Shifting Gender and Social Class Relations in the Era of Nastase, Connors and McEnroe, Journal of Sport History, 42(2), 179–99. Lichtenstein, G. (1974) A Long Way Baby: Behind the Scenes in Women’s Pro Tennis. New York: Morrow. Lowe, G. (1924) Gordon Lowe on Lawn Tennis. London: Hutchinson & Co. Lusis, A. (1998) Tennis in Robin Hood's County: The Story of Tennis Clubs in Nottinghamshire. Nottingham: The Author. McCrone, K. (1988) Sport and the Physical Emancipation of English Women 1870–1914. London: Routledge. McKane, K. (1925) Lawn Tennis: How to Improve Your Game. London: Ward, Lock and Co. Ltd. Mewshaw, M. (1993) Ladies of the Court: Grace and Disgrace of the Women's Tennis Circuit. New York: Crown. Miles, E. (1903) Lawn Tennis. In Doherty, R.F. & Doherty, H.L., R. F. & H. L. Doherty on Lawn Tennis. London: Lawn Tennis. Myers, A.W. (1903) Lawn Tennis at Home and Abroad. London: George Newnes Ltd. Myers, A.W. (1912) The Complete Lawn Tennis Player. London: Methuen & Co., Ltd. Paish, G.L. (1996) Surrey County Lawn Tennis Association: The First 100 Years. Brockham, Surrey: Taylor Lambert Advertising. Park, J. (1989) Sport, Dress Reform and the Physical Emancipation of Women in Victorian England: A Reappraisal, International Journal of the History of Sport, 6(1), 10–30. Parke, J.C. (1920) How to Play Lawn Tennis: A Book of Practical Instruction. London: Messrs. Ewart, Seymour and Co., Ltd. Rendall, J. (1926) Lawn Tennis: A Method of Acquiring Proficiency. London: Cassell and Co. Ritchie, M.J. (1910) Text Book of Lawn Tennis. London: Health and Strength Ltd. 264

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Ritchie, M.J. (1928) Lawn Tennis:The Modern Game. London: Athletic Publications. Schultz, J. (2014) Qualifying Times: Points of Change in US Women's Sport. Champagne, IL: University of Illinois Press. Smart, B. (2007) Not Playing Around: Global Capitalism, Modern Sport and Consumer Culture, Global Networks, 7(2), 113–34. Round, D. (1934) Modern Lawn Tennis. London: George Newnes Ltd. Wilberforce, H. (1890) Lawn Tennis. In Duke of Beaufort, K. & Watson, A., Tennis: Lawn Tennis: Rackets: Fives. London: Longmans, Green & Co. Wilson, E. (2014) Love Game: A History of Tennis, from Victorian Pastime to Global Phenomenon. London: Serpent's Tail. Woollacott, A. (1994) On Her Their Lives Depend: Munitions Workers in the Great War. Berkeley: University of California Press.

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26 The seductions of modern tennis Technical invention, social practice, literary discourse Alexis Tadie1

In A Social History of Tennis in Britain, Robert J. Lake argued for the importance of tennis in the social fabric of Britain, suggesting modes of understanding changes in British society through the prism of the evolution of tennis. He underlined the importance of tennis as a global sport, one whose changes and evolutions have an effect beyond Britain, the initial focus of his investigation. While real tennis had been an important element in the civilising process and in the distinction of the courtly nobility, Lake showed the emergence of lawn tennis to take place in an ‘environment of upper-class status insecurity, middle-class social aspiration and within a broadened framework of appropriate gentlemanly conduct and budding female emancipation’ (Lake 2015, p.16). In so doing he offered a history of tennis which gives pride of place to the contested definition of the amateur and hence to the complex behavioural etiquette that governed tennis from its inception. He outlined the precarious status of tennis in the nineteenth century, when competing sports could be indulged in by the upper-middle class. The uncertainties over the existence of tennis, the negotiations over rules, sizes of court, height of net or fabrication of the balls are part of the story of the birth of tennis, and the present chapter hopes to contribute to this understanding. I argue that the emergence of lawn tennis as a sport central to British society, and later as a global sport, is also partly the consequence of the interest it generated in literature and the arts. The appropriation of the new game by authors or painters no doubt reflected the importance acquired by the game, but it also contributed to its social and cultural definition. Although the present essay deals chiefly with modern tennis, its focus is on discourses around tennis, on the negotiations which surrounded its birth, and on cultural investigations of the seductions of the game, in particular on the literary definitions of tennis.

Out of the box By contrast with the long and obscure history of real tennis, lawn tennis appears to have a rather clear-cut history. Like Athena, it came out of the box, all equipped with tools and rules. On 23 February 1874, Major Walter Clopton Wingfield, an officer in the British army, patented a New and Improved Court for Playing the Ancient Game of Tennis, which led him to produce a boxed set to play the game. Under the name of Sphairistiké (Greek for “playing ball”), the box contained: 266

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rubber balls imported from Germany, a net, poles, court markers, four rackets and an instruction manual. It looked roughly like a croquet set, and was no doubt aimed at the same public, as the fate of croquet and the dwindling numbers of croquet clubs indicates. The balls were made of rubber, without the familiar fluff that adorns them nowadays, and were made possible by the invention and generalisation of vulcanisation, a process elaborated by Charles Goodyear and refined by Thomas Hancock in the middle of the nineteenth century. The development of the mechanical lawn-mower, patented by Edwin Budding and John Ferrabee and perfected by Alexander Shanks,2 can also be seen as an important step in the development of lawn tennis – as, indeed, of golf. Along with the box, Wingfield produced two booklets, The Book of the Game (1873) and The Major’s Game of Lawn Tennis (1874). They spell out the rules as well as his conception of the game. The Major’s Game of Lawn Tennis is dedicated to “the party assembled at Nantclwyd, in December 1873” (Wingfield 2010, p.44). It starts with a brief historical perspective to justify the name that he chose: ‘The Game of Tennis may be traced back to the days of the ancient Greeks, under the name of sphairistikè’. But he has no real interest in this history, as he feels the game has died out because of its complexities and the expense of erecting courts. For Wingfield, practicality, convenience and the inclusion of women are the main points of his invention. One of the reasons for the appeal of the game, and, as we shall see, one of the cultural characteristics of this new pastime, is the possibility for ladies to join in.Wingfield’s rhetoric encompasses existing sports (real tennis as well as croquet and racquets) in order to promote the superiority of his own invention. The presentation is followed by six simple rules, mostly derived from racquets, and by the indication that the game has been, both, tested ‘at several Country Houses during the past few months’ (Wingfield 2010, p.50) and protected by a patent. Some useful hints on how to play the game close the text. The birth of tennis over a relatively short period of time enables us to witness the emergence of the components of a new game. Wingfield’s invention is first and foremost technical. It relies on objects, on pieces of equipment, on a concern for physical details turned into practicalities – the tennis ball is made of rubber, which makes it far easier to use outside than the traditional tennis ball, the architecture of the tennis court has been replaced by a few pegs on a croquet ground and the box itself is the emblem of this eminently portable game. A certain amount of uncertainty over the types of rackets and balls to be used inevitably surrounded the beginnings of the game, as is apparent from questions and contributions to the most important forum for such discussions, The Field. In response to a query in the columns of the periodical, Wingfield answers: the game of lawn tennis is played with a bat manufactured by Jeffries and Mallings, which is a cross between a tennis and a racquet bat. The ball is very light, and will stand any damp, as it is made of indiarubber [sic], hollow; they are got from Germany. (The Field 4 April 1874, p.333). But only in 1875 are strict regulations for the balls introduced. In the meantime, a certain amount of uncertainty, and indeed negotiation, surrounded the nature of the balls that should be used. The Major suggests that convenience and speed of setting up and of learning are the strengths of this game. He insists that ‘the merest tyro can learn it in five minutes sufficiently well for all practical purposes’, while the court can be prepared in no time, especially if a croquet ground is at hand: ‘On any ground where Croquet is played, a perfect “Lawn Tennis Court” could be put up in five minutes after the arrival of the box (containing the game)’ (Wingfield 2010, p.47).The 267

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shape of the court was originally that of the hour-glass, and instructions as well as dimensions (20 yards by ten) on how to set it up are given in the book, while a brush is included in the box so as to mark the lines. In this insistence on technical details, lawn tennis proved to be both the true descendant of real tennis, at the same time as it was trying to simplify the complexities of its ancestor. Real tennis was indeed equally, and perhaps even more, reliant on technical knowledge: the court was itself a work of architecture, and the preparation of the ball or of the racket were processes of complex craftsmanship.3 Wingfield’s invention was also a legal one as befits a sport, which is defined by its rules. Over a period of four years, from the publication of Wingfield’s booklets, to the meetings of the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) commission in 1875 and the Wimbledon commission in 1877, the rules of lawn tennis as we know them today were negotiated and all but finalised. Lawn tennis was the object of transactions to establish its governing principles (or rules). It required institutions and legal principles to vouchsafe for its existence: first a patent, issued to Wingfield, then the MCC, to whom the game had been entrusted, finally the All England Croquet Club. Eventually, in 1888, the Lawn Tennis Association was founded in order to exert control over the organisation of competitive tennis, seven years after the United States Lawn Tennis Association had been established. The shape of the court was for instance the object of many transactions and corrections. Until the commission established its dimensions, tennis was played on courts which varied greatly in shape, size and length.Wingfield insisted on retaining the hour-glass shape, while early experimenters emphasised the importance of the quadrangle shape to diminish the potential for lucky shots. The surface also varied for a number of years. Lawn was naturally the most widespread, which enabled tennis to be played on croquet grounds as well as on cricket pitches, but correspondents to The Field testify to a certain amount of experimenting with the surface, ranging from cinders to gravel, to asphalt. The committee of the MCC and later the Wimbledon commission also agreed on the rules, a great number of which are still in force today – the manner of scoring was switched from racquets, a system which Wingfield had favoured, to that of real tennis, which has been retained to this day. Only the height of the net and the distance of the service line were the object of revisions until about 1882. Again, the years following Wingfield’s invention offer regular interventions into the nature of the rules, the complexities of service, or even questioning the need for specific rules: ‘We are threatened with “books of rules” of this game, in which it appears to myself and others that no rules are required but the rules of raquets [sic], which are very simple, and understood by five out of every ten men that play it’ (The Field 22 August 1874, p.220). Competing versions of tennis were put forward, such as ‘Germains lawn tennis’, proposed by John H. Hale (The Field 24 October 1874, p.435). Other clubs, such as Prince’s, also challenged the rules laid out by the MCC. In the colonies, tennis caught on at an early date, and even if the correspondents appeared sometimes to be at a loss as to the exact nature of the game, they did not hesitate to suggest improvements to the rules: ‘I send copies, writes one correspondent, of new rules for lawn tennis as introduced by me with great success in both Madras and at Allahabad’ (The Field 21 June 1876, p.724). While another, on the Malabar coast, explains their own variations on the size and shape of the court (The Field 24 October 1874, p.435). So the establishment of firm rules sought to put an end to the debates. These rules were not widely available while modifications were still being introduced in the following years, which explains the anxieties of such correspondents as the Essex tyro who wrote in April 1878: Can anyone say when the new rules are coming out? The grass is growing and the ground is drying. We may hope to be playing regularly in two or three weeks. In the meantime we 268

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want to be measuring out our courts and buying nets, &c.; but till the rules are out we are paralysed. (The Field 20 April 1878, p.482) The fact is that Wingfield’s invention was at first not played by the book, but was adapted in various country houses, using different types of rackets, different sizes of courts, as implied by various letters to The Field, suggesting various improvements and alterations to the game of Sphairistiké. Wingfield’s invention, finally, was a commercial one, and as such, required a certain amount of publicity. The Field, the foremost journal for outdoor activities, recommended the game to its readers, published Wingfield’s rules and carried regular advertisements for the boxed set. Other magazines and journals advertised the sport. It seems that between July 1874 and June 1875 more than 1,000 tennis sets, commercialised by a number of companies, were sold. This did not go without some reluctance on the part of the new enthusiasts. Wingfield himself, who had been keen to protect his invention immediately after its release and commercialisation, lost partial interest in the game and did not renew his patent in 1877. But the number of clubs around the country rose in dramatic fashion in the ten years following Wingfield’s patent, testifying as much to the social as well as to the sportive appeal of the new game.4

Field tennis, pelota, Sphairisitkè and lawn tennis The transactions around the new game of lawn tennis testify to the continuities with, and departures from, the game of real tennis, but also to the engagement with other games such as racquets. At the same time, these debates offer an interesting glimpse into the constitution of a game (addressed originally in The Field under the category of “pastimes”) into a fully-fledged sport. Whereas other sports took a number of years to be codified and to come into official existence, lawn tennis, in part through the skills of Wingfield, achieved a more permanent status in just over four years. But the story is obviously more complicated. Lawn tennis was not just born one day in 1874, having emerged from the death of real tennis. At least since the eighteenth century, there had been references to tennis being played out in the open, under the name of ‘field tennis’:William Hickey reports in his memoirs: The game we played was an invention of our own called Field Tennis, which afforded noble exercise… Our regular meetings were two days in each week, when we assembled at one o’clock, at two sat down to dinner, consisting of capital stewed grigs (…) The field, which was of sixteen acres in extent, was kept in as high order and smooth as a bowling green… Besides our regular days some of the members met every evening during the summer months to have a little Field Tennis. 5 (Hickey 1913–25, p.72) Later in the century, the Sporting Magazine reported on ‘Field-tennis [which] threatens, e’er long, to bowl out cricket’ (Sporting Magazine 1793 (vol. II), p.371). Donald Walker’s Games and Sports refers to the game of ‘long or open tennis’, which is played in the open air, ‘upon ground rolled and arranged for the purpose’ (Walker 1837, p.298). And a reader of The Field wrote with further antecedents to Wingfield’s game: …allow me to state that the game of lawn tennis was played more than ten years ago, at Ancrum, Sir William Scott’s place, in Roxburghshire; and, without wishing to detract from 269

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the credit due to those who have recently rendered the game more popular, it can hardly be considered a new invention. (The Field 19 December 1874, p.614). The greatest counter-claim to the originality of Wingfield’s invention came from Edgbaston, where Harry Gem and Augurio Perera were said to have been playing a version of tennis on lawn since the 1860s. It seems that they started experimenting on Perera’s own croquet lawn, in 1859, with a game that they called “pelota”. a name given, no doubt, both as a reference to Perera’s knowledge of the Basque pelota – Perera was originally from Spain – and to the origins of real tennis. Their court was rectangular, measuring 30 yards by 12, and the net was four foot high. When they both moved to Leamington Spa in 1872, together with Frederick Haynes and Arthur Tomkins they founded the Leamington Lawn Tennis Club, arguably the first in the world, which started holding an annual tournament in 1874. Gem sent notice of his game to The Field, together with a picture of the court he used,6 but he did not patent it nor tried to commercialise it. Recently, a revisionist movement around Harry Gem has been taking place in order to restore his true place in the history of tennis. A charity has been established, under the title “The Harry Gem Project”, whose aims include: ‘To publicise his role as the originator, with his friend JBA Perera, of lawn tennis here in Birmingham and the creator of the world’s first lawn tennis club in Leamington Spa in 1874 and which survived for less than twenty years’.7 What is of interest is of course not to try and decide who, between Gem and Wingfield, or perhaps Hickey or Hale, or other anonymous eighteenth-century or nineteenth-century players has the privilege of having invented the game. On the one hand, it is quite clear that the history of tennis is not linear and that any narrative has to recover and include the various attempts at adapting existing racket and ball games to local conditions – lawn tennis emerged from these competing endeavours. On the other hand, the lingering desire for an inventor, for an older version, or for an origin, is part and parcel of that history. It is sometimes motivated by other concerns – the Gem and Perera supporters aim to promote the local history of Birmingham, and specifically that of the Edgbaston Archery & Lawn Tennis Society. It is perhaps also the case that Wingfield was acknowledged as the inventor of lawn tennis because not very much was known about other attempts to devise such a game – although he proved, at first, better than others at commercialising his invention. But it is also the case that sports generate cults, a phenomenon apparent not only in the competing narratives about the origin of tennis, but also in the preservation of the tombs of their inventors. Echoing the recovery of Wingfield’s tomb in the 1970s by his biographer, George Alexander, and its preservation by the Wimbledon museum, in May 2013 the Harry Gem Project recovered the memorial stone of Harry Gem’s tomb. The birth of modern tennis can therefore be read in several contexts, as a narrative of continuation or rebirth of real tennis, but also as a more complicated and slightly messier story, one which goes via Edgbaston and Leamington Spa through the MCC but certainly dates back to practices that were already extant in the eighteenth century, although with more limited impact. What was important, though, and noted in various periodicals and journals at the time, was the fact that the new sport enabled both ladies and gentlemen to join in an outdoors pastime (Holt 1989, p.126) – such was its craze that it ousted croquet and even badminton as the favoured relaxing games. The fact that it was the first game that enabled the participation of both sexes, and which indeed developed along these lines, is an important factor in the spread of its popularity; indeed, it developed first as a social occupation rather than as a sport, as a game to be played at garden parties. Clubs in particular were places where issues of class, distinction, and gender could be articulated and negotiated. Of course, this did not go without tensions, with tennis being initially seen both as a ladies game and as beyond the capabilities of women, as a 270

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place where womanliness was reinforced at the same time as women were portrayed as too weak for the strain of sports, with mixed doubles for instance displaying ‘the uneasy balance between competitiveness on court and the chivalry that men were expected to demonstrate toward females’ (Lake 2012, p.705; cf. Wilson 2014, chapter 6).

Obscenities Tennis became rather quickly an intense, competitive game, as exemplified by the success of the Wimbledon Championships, and of other tournaments that were organised with regularity from the late 1870s. But it also developed as an occasion for garden parties among the gentry, as a pastime in which the leisured classes, both male and female, could indulge. These two strands of modern tennis have grown side by side, occasionally overlapping but by and large developing almost as two different sports. Like such sports as cricket, tennis has developed two cultures, one which focuses on the sporting achievements, on records, titles and cups (at international as well as at club level), and one which concentrates on the social occasion, on men and women sharing the same pastime, on the seductions of “the love game”. The social dimension of tennis, the game rather than the sport, as it were, quickly became a topic for “social” or “genre” paintings. The first to seize on the opportunity was possibly John Lavery, who painted The Tennis Party in 1885, at a gathering in the McBride family’s house, followed by a number of other works in the same spirit. The painting brings together elements that contribute to the social occasion. The setting is quite clearly that of a private estate; the trees screen the scene away from the outside world; the setting generates a sophisticated pastoral which combines the quiet seclusion of a garden with the elaborate dress of spectators and players. Tennis connected with a culture of fashion that was being transformed in the period. The social dimension of the game is conveyed by the spectators, who display various degrees of involvement on all sides of the court. The mixed doubles in progress embodies the social and sportive interactions generated by the new game. An interesting emphasis on technique, on the gesture of the lady player, must be noted, possibly brought about by Lavery’s use of photography. It can be seen as a form of fête galante adapted to the goût du jour. Across the Channel, such paintings as La Partie de tennis (1882) by Jacques-Emile Blanche, his own Déjeuner sur l’herbe, connect similarly with the importance of tennis in the culture of leisure and of fashion, even though the game forms the background rather than the foreground of the painting (see Sumner 2011). After the First World War, George Bellows in America was to pursue the same theme in paintings such as Tennis at Newport (The Metropolitan Museum of Art) and Tennis Tournament (private collection), which were painted in 1919; he produced a further two paintings with the same titles in 1920 (private collection; National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.). Such paintings, at one level, reflect the importance of the game in social gatherings, but conversely they go some way towards defining a culture of tennis as an adequate subject for social and genre painting. The sense of social occasion afforded by the rise of tennis is reinforced and given focus in the literature of the time. Saki’s short story, “The Hedgehog,” conjures up in its opening sentences the same visual experience as that offered by Lavery: A “Mixed Double” of young people were contesting a game of lawn tennis at the Rectory garden party; for the past five-and-twenty years at least mixed doubles of young people had done exactly the same thing on exactly the same spot at about the same time of year. The young people changed and made way for others in the course of time, but very little else seemed to alter. (Saki 1980, p.474) 271

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The permanence of what had by then become a ritual is used by Saki to convey the neverchanging character of the upper classes, but he appears to be aware of the tension between sport and social occasion: ‘The present players were sufficiently conscious of the social nature of the occasion to be concerned about their clothes and appearance, and sufficiently sport-loving to be keen on the game’ (Saki 1980, p.474). The humour of the description takes in, just like in a Lavery painting, the compulsory presence of spectators: It was one of the accepted conditions of the Rectory garden party that four ladies, who usually knew very little about tennis and a great deal about the players, should sit at that particular spot and watch the game. It had also come to be almost a tradition that two ladies should be amiable, and that the other two should be Mrs Dole and Mrs Hutch-Mallard. (Saki 1980, p.474–5). The enduring presence and character of tennis brings about a use of the game in satirical contexts. Annabel, in one of the Reginald stories, is described as ‘a beauty and intellectually gifted; she never played tennis, and was reputed to have read Maeterlinck’s Life of the Bee. If you abstain from tennis and read Maeterlinck in a small country village, you are of necessity intellectual’ (Saki 1980, p.17). The growing presence of tennis as the favoured pastime of the leisured classes echoes its role in satirical writings. If at first a revised version of the pastoral characterises the game in its late Victorian and Edwardian incarnations, the craze for tennis, that upstart of a game, would by necessity threaten, not only cricket and croquet, but also golf. The Oldest Member of Wodehouse’s golf stories disapproves of tennis in no uncertain terms, and ‘his attitude towards exponents of the rival game had always resembled that of the early Christians towards the Ebionites’ (Wodehouse 2008, p.60). Things get complicated when Ambrose, the local medicine man, falls in love with a particular female tennis player, of whom the Oldest Member takes a dim view: ‘My dear Ambrose, I am sorry to give you pain, but Miss Tewkesbury is a tennis player. I have seen her with my own eyes leaping about the court shouting “Forty love”, ”Thirty all” and similar obscenities’. The scene of courtship takes place on the golf links, when Ambrose agrees to give a golf lesson to Evangeline Tewkesbury, who immediately offers to ‘“go and fetch my racquet”. “You don’t use a racquet”. “Then how do you get the ball over the net?” “There isn’t a net”. “No net. What a peculiar game”’. (Wodehouse 2008, p.73). Like golf, tennis is the occasion for Wodehouse’s approach to the frivolity of the upper classes. The social dimension of the game and its centrality in the proceedings of garden-parties afford a humorous entry point into the obsessions of that class and their priorities, as in the case of Wodehouse’s Bingo: Young Bingo, you see, is one of those fellows who, once their fingers close over the handle of a tennis racket, fall into a sort of trance in which nothing outside the radius of the lawn exists for them. If you came up to Bingo in the middle of a set and told him that panthers were devouring his best friend in the kitchen garden, he would look at you and say: “Oh, ah?” or words to that effect. (Wodehouse 1957, p.18) In a similar vein, a garden-party will develop around a game of tennis, in which Bertie Wooster seems to revel:‘What with my fast serve zipping sweetly over the net and the man of God utterly unable to cope with my slow bending return down the centre-line, I had for some little time been living, as it were, in another world’ (Wodehouse 1957, p.20). But of course, the “impending 272

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doom” of the story gathers over the bliss of the game of tennis at the same time as thunder and rain interrupt the proceedings. The passion aroused by tennis in the upper classes, who are rarely passionate, offers Wodehouse an entry point into the satire of this social group; it reveals the place that tennis came to occupy in the system of leisure; above all, it turns the sport into a literary motif and rejuvenates the articulation between tennis and pleasure, between courtship and game. In Love Among the Chickens, the narrator, in love with Phyllis, is challenged to a game of tennis by her suitor, Chase, a lieutenant in the Royal Navy: I had always been under the impression that lieutenants in the Royal Navy were not brilliant at tennis. I had met them at various houses, but they had never shone conspicuously. They had played an earnest, unobtrusive game, and generally seemed glad when it was over. Mr Chase was not of this sort. (Wodehouse 2011, p.103) Chase proceeds to destroy Garnet in their rubber, who reflects: “I felt a worm and no man. Phyllis, I thought, would probably judge my entire character from this exhibition. A man, she would reflect, who could be so feeble and miserable a failure at tennis, could not be good for much in any department of life” (Wodehouse 2011, p.103). The flirtation involved in the game, the humorous dimension of the sport, which combines the metaphors of love and life, builds on centuries of writings about tennis. Heiner Gillmeister has argued in favor of a long ancestry to the game of tennis, which he traces to the chivalric challenge of the medieval tournament (Gillmeister 1997, preface, p.84sq, and passim).Wodehouse and Saki, who used tennis as a literary and satirical motif, were drawing on the age-old associations of the game with chivalry and knightly tournaments. In the contest between Chase and Garnet,Wodehouse acknowledges the flirtation involved in the new developments of tennis, but he also rejuvenates a long tradition of using tennis as a metaphor for amorous encounters. The potential for courtly encounters around a game of tennis implies at one level that the game itself becomes second to the setting, or that it is an opportunity rather than an end in itself – which is why the game itself is rarely described. At another level, the social and elegant depictions of the game in Edwardian literature or in genre paintings offer possible developments, as was the case in courtly literature, along erotic lines (Gillmeister 1997, p.132). In Lolita, Nabokov reconnects with such tradition, emphasising at the same time the nature of the serve, the technical nature of the movement, and the eroticism to which it is linked: My Lolita had a way of raising her bent left knee at the ample and springy start of the service cycle when there would develop and hang in the sun for a second a vital web of balance between toed foot, pristine armpit, burnished arm and far back-flung racket, as she smiled up with gleaming teeth at the small globe suspended so high in the zenith of the powerful and graceful cosmos she had created for the express purpose of falling upon it with a clean resounding crack of her golden whip. It had, that serve of hers, beauty, directness, youth, a classical purity of trajectory, and was, despite its spanking pace, fairly easy to return, having as it did no twist or sting to its long elegant hop. (Nabokov 1980, p.230) In this scene where Humbert Humbert is for the last time absorbed in the contemplation of Lolita, the perfect equation between tennis and eroticism is balanced by the correspondence, 273

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underlined by the narrator, between tennis and writing: ‘Her overhead volley was related to her service as the envoy is to the ballade’ (Nabokov 1980, p.230). The poetics of tennis and the complexities of desire merge in this scene where the erotic potentialities of the game surface again, recalling the literary history of its ancestor, real tennis, as well as the social appearances of its Victorian and Edwardian birth. Such a contest, adumbrated over three pages of Lolita, comes to define the central metaphor of Lionel Shriver’s novel, Double Fault. It proceeds from the encounter between the two main characters on a tennis court; it develops the narrative potential of tennis, as tennis exchanges are gradually replaced by amorous and marital exchanges, and then confrontations; it investigates the passion generated by the game; it emphasises the sexual potential of the game, already present in fifteenth-century literature. Eric, the tennis player in Shriver’s novel, exclaims: Thrusting across the net – the ball is just a medium, a messenger of love and loathing all rolled up in one. That antagonism – you’re enemies but you need each other. Listen to the language! Long-body, sweet sport, throat of the racket. Dish and shank, stab and slice, punch and penetrate – it’s pornographic! (Shriver 2006, p.38)

Conclusion Whereas lawn tennis is born out of the perceived inadequacies of real tennis, a game that had become both difficult to organise in terms of buildings and irrelevant to the culture of the day, the continuities between real and lawn tennis were activated in the late nineteenth century and have endured ever since.This is apparent in the uses and celebrations of the game, in its potential for visual and literary disquisitions, in the attitudes generated by its place and growing importance in the culture of the time. The relationship between lawn tennis and amorous encounters is one that both stretches back to real tennis, beyond the Victorian period of its invention, and enables the further development of a literary trope. While the ‘paternalism’ and the ‘displays of chivalry’ (Lake 2015, p.35) apparent in mixed doubles in particular were condemned in certain parts as endangering the game, they also offered literature and the arts modes of integrating this new activity into a cultural system which led to revisiting and even redefining, for certain artists, the modes of engagement with a new public. It afforded Edwardian writers such as Saki and Wodehouse in particular new parameters in the satirical depiction of the upper classes, at the same time as they were rejuvenating past associations of tennis with amorous discourse. In turn, this new-found connection between tennis and chivalry found echoes in later explorations of tennis and eroticism – connections which have rarely been absent from the professional game itself, from Gussie Moran’s famous lace knickers designed by Ted Tinling for Wimbledon 1949 to Anna Kournikova’s success as a model. Tennis in literature, thus, does not simply reflect changes in the social fabric of the game, but participates in its definitions and perceptions.The frivolity of the early game of tennis, the potential for amorous encounters and competitions, and the suggestions of eroticism are all components of the sport which are, in part, defined through literature.

Notes 1 Various sections of this chapter have been reproduced from:Tadie, A. (2015).The Seductions of Modern Tennis: From Social Practice to Literary Discourse, Sport in History, 35(2), 271–95. 2 In 1842, however, Shanks registered his first patent for a lawnmower that could cut grass and roll the turf in one operation. See http:​//www​.oxfo​rddnb​.com/​view/​artic​le/50​034 (accessed 16 February 2017). 274

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3 See for instance Garsault. The author, who was a member of the French Académie des Sciences, obviously regarded his treatise as a scientific contribution – the style of the plates recalls the Encyclopédie and the title page refers to the arts and techniques investigated by the members of the Académie des sciences. 4 By 1900 there were about 300 clubs and by the late 1930s, according to Holt (1989, p.126), there were nearly 3,000 clubs affiliated to the LTA. 5 William Hickey was a lawyer in India, who wrote his memoirs on his return to England in the early nineteenth century; the activities he describes here are prior to his departure for India. 6 ‘The club has for its founder Mr Perera, a gentleman of Spanish family, and well known as a racquet player in the days of John Mitchell, George and Frank Erwood, Sam Young, and Patrick Divett (Lord Eglington’s marker). He first introduced the game fifteen years ago, and it has recently received the name of Pelota, a Spanish word adopted in compliment to its orginator, and signifying any game played with a ball’ (The Field 21 November 1874, p.563). 7 http:​//www​.theh​arryg​empro​ject.​co.uk​/abou​t/ (accessed 17 February 2017).

References Garsault, M. de. (1767) Art du Paumier-Raquetier, et de la Paume. Paris : chez Saillant & Nyon, chez Desaint. Gillmeister, H. (1997) Tennis: A Cultural History. London : Leicester University Press. Hickey, W. (1913–25) Memoirs (vol. 1). London: Hurst & Blackett. Holt, R. (1989) Sport and the British: A Modern History. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Lake, R.J. (2012) Gender and Etiquette in British Lawn Tennis 1870–1939: A Case Study of ‘Mixed Doubles’, The International Journal of the History of Sport, 29(5) 691–710. Lake, R.J. (2015) A Social History of Tennis in Britain. London: Routledge. Nabokov,V. (1980, 1955) Lolita. Harmondsworth: Penguin. Potter, J. (1994) Tennis and Oxford. Oxford: Oxford Unicorn Press. Saki (1980) Reginald’s Choir Treat. In Saki, The Complete Works of Saki (pp.16–8), London: The Bodley Head. Saki (1980) The Hedgehog. In Saki, The Complete Works of Saki (pp.474–9), London: The Bodley Head. Sumner, A. (ed.) (2011) Court on Canvas:Tennis in Art. Birmingham: Barber Institute of Fine Arts. Walker, D. (1837) Games and Sports. London: Thomas Hurst. Wilson, E. (2014) The Love Game. London: Serpent’s Tail. Wingfield, Major W.C. (2010, 1874) The Major's Game of Lawn Tennis. In John Barrett with a foreword by Tim Henman. The Original Rules of Tennis (pp.44-59), Oxford: The Bodleian Library. Wodehouse, P.G. (1957, 1930) Jeeves and the Impending Doom. In Wodehouse, P.G., Very Good Jeeves (pp.9–31), Harmondsworth: Penguin. Wodehouse, P.G. (2008, 1950) Up from the Depths. In Wodehouse, P.G., Nothing Serious (pp.59–73), London: Everyman. Wodehouse, P.G. (2011, 1906–21) Love Among the Chickens. London: Everyman.

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27 Understanding competitive tennis through literature and the visual arts Society, celebrity and aesthetics Alexis Tadie1

In the 1920s, the sculptor and artist Alexander Calder was beginning to experiment with sculptures, and in particular with wire sculptures. He produced a series of representations of artists such as Josephine Baker, and also created one of the great tennis player Helen Wills (1928). That year, Helen Wills won the French Open, Wimbledon and Forest Hills to add to her 1924 Olympic gold medal, her three previous Forest Hills victories as well as one previous Wimbledon – she was to win a further six titles at the All England Lawn Tennis Club. Indeed, Helen Wills stature and popularity were beginning to grow in the late 1920s, so that Calder’s sculpture is one of an established star and partakes of an investigation of celebrity to which Calder seems to have been attentive. The femininity of the body is also depicted in the short skirt – Suzanne Lenglen, whom Wills played only once, had recently started to transform the standards of womanhood – and in the general elegance of the movement. But even more than celebrity or bodily refinement, what Calder seems to be looking for in the tennis player is the sense of balance, with the player poised between moving forward and back, between momentum and restraint. While this may indeed correspond to Helen Wills’ style, it is tempting to see here a pre-figuration of the mobile constructions for which Calder was to become famous, as if Helen Wills looked forward to becoming a mobile sculpture in her own right. Calder’s sculpture encapsulates the social, feminine and athletic abilities of one of the great tennis players of all times. Wills’ fame was also enhanced by the painter Diego Rivera who featured her in a twostorey mural entitled ‘The Riches of California’ (1930),2 where she looms large over the riches of California, which include agriculture, industry, oil, etc. Helen Wills was indeed one of the first genuine stars of the tennis circuit and her representation in the arts included the front cover of Time magazine in 1926, of Vanity Fair in 1932 (a picture drawn by the Mexican artist Miguel Covarrubias) and of the Saturday Evening Post in 1933 (a portrait by the American painter Leopold Seyffert). She also became the model for John R. Tunis’ first novel, American Girl (Tunis 1930), published shortly after an essay in which he had unfavourably compared Wills to Tilden (Tunis 1929). This novel, which is critical of Wills, is perhaps best remembered today for its filmic adaptation by Ida Lupino, Hard, Fast and Beautiful (1951); the name of Helen Wills of course does not appear in this film, which was interestingly made the same year as Alfred 276

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Hitchock’s Strangers on a Train, also featuring a character who is a professional tennis player. Far from being a biopic of Helen Wills, Lupino’s film is a film noir, one where tennis brings together issues of ambition, corruption and possibly distraction from real life. These networks of representations invite ways of looking at tennis which complement the more frequent uses of tennis as exploration of social values. They signal an interest in the game as a competitive pursuit rather than as a social pastime, and in the complexities of stardom. While there have been a number of analyses of the social dimension of tennis (notably Lake 2015; see also Gillmeister 1998; Tadie 2015), little attention has been paid to its competitive aspects, although it attracted some attention from artists as early as the 1920s. This chapter will investigate the varied artistic approaches to competitive tennis. While cinema has often shown an interest in tennis as a social endeavour (Joseph Losey’s Accident, 1967; Woody Allen’s Match Point, 2005;Yves Robert’s two comedies, Un éléphant ça trompe énormément, 1976 and Nous irons tous au paradis, 1977), providing either a background or important scenes for the development of the plot, a number of films have also investigated the nature of competitive tennis, although perhaps not as frequently as a sport like boxing. Literature has sometimes turned to competitive tennis, the American novelist David Foster Wallace, himself an accomplished tennis player, being perhaps the most prominent. But competitive tennis also brings to the fore important social issues, such as gender and race, and the arts have sometimes approached these issues through the analysis of tennis – Serena Williams being for instance a major figure for the African-American poet Claudia Rankine.This chapter will therefore supplement existing analyses of tennis, showing how the inclusion of competitive tennis in the visual and literary arts transforms our perception of the sport while literature and the arts find in tennis means of addressing complex social and aesthetic issues. In the process this chapter will show how the arts of tennis have the ability to transform our perceptions of the sport.

Tennis in society In A Social History of Tennis in Britain, Robert J. Lake has charted the ways in which tennis, throughout its history, articulated social issues as well as political transformations – the decline of Britain, from imperial power to a more subdued role on the global scene, apparently went hand in hand with the absence of trophies won on the tennis courts (Lake 2015). Literature and the arts sometimes recorded these social interactions, gave them focus, but also discovered in tennis a new idiom. But while the social and cultural importance of tennis has been eloquently depicted by painters and novelists, the attention has focused on interactions between players rather than on physical exertion, on the (social) game rather than on the (competitive) sport. The continuity between both activities must of course be emphasised, but a consideration of tennis as a sport brings to the fore other issues, which the arts have sometimes appropriated to question and investigate society. Women tennis stars have, for instance, focused questions of femininity and relation to manhood, power and dominance. Helen Wills Moody was first hailed as the embodiment of grace on the tennis court, becoming the epitome of the “American girl”, an expression used for the title of John Tunis’ novel. But with her growing fame and annihilation of all opponents, she started to be criticised for being ‘a business woman upon the courts … a mechanical marvel reducing her adversaries to sawdust in as short a time as possible, asking no quarter and giving none. Business efficiency of the Twentieth Century translated into sport’ (Tunis 1929, p.169). Arguments about the appropriate playing style for women tennis players and the complex balance between their femininity and the muscular power of their games are of course still part of commentaries on the women’s game.3 277

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The issue of race also surfaces in competitive tennis. It was only in 1956 that a black player first won a major tennis title, when Althea Gibson won the French National Championships; she triumphed at Wimbledon in 1957 and 1958 as well as in the US National Championships at Forest Hills, the same year, in the context of the civil rights movement. Later stars of AfricanAmerican descent have included Arthur Ashe, MaliVai Washington and James Blake, while Zina Garrison and of course the Williams sisters have been the most prominent African-American champions in women’s tennis. Like in other sports, these stars have helped redefine ‘the boundaries of black sporting achievement and served to reshape those sports most associated with the old forms of racial exclusion’ (Carrington 2010, p.169). While issues of race in international tennis were obvious up until the end of apartheid in South Africa – in 1974 for instance, South Africa won the Davis Cup after India boycotted the final – it may be argued that they have not fully receded from view. In a recent piece for The New York Times (Rankine 2015, 25 August),4 the poet and essayist Claudia Rankine suggested that the prejudices attached to race are still present in tennis, even at the highest level. Rankine finds in Serena Williams traces of the necessity to overachieve when you are black (“black excellence”) as well as a resistance to discourses of racism: ‘For black people, there is an unspoken script that demands the humble absorption of racist assaults, no matter the scale, because whites need to believe that it’s no big deal. But Serena refuses to keep to that script’. She emphasises her humanity in victory as in anger, as well as her consciousness of belonging to a history of fighting against racism, of having ‘come out of a long line of African-Americans who battled for the right to be excellent in a such a space that attached its value to its whiteness and worked overtime to keep it segregated’ (Rankine 2015, 25 August). In her book of poetry, Citizens. An American Lyric, Rankine reveals Serena as the embodiment of a black person in a white world, transforming her status as tennis icon to a historical and poetic plane unknown to most journalists (Rankine 2014). Serena is the occasion for Rankine to write about race, to explore new modes of understanding the articulations between social status, stardom and race. Such necessity to retrieve the history of racism and of slavery surfaces as well in John McPhee’s Levels of the Game (McPhee 1969), which focuses on one match, the 1969 semi-final of the US Open between Clark Graebner and Arthur Ashe, reflecting on the connections and the contexts that made this match possible. In particular, he retraces Graebner’s social background as well as Ashe’s long family history out of slavery, going back to the eighteenth century and to the arrival of a ship carrying Africans to Virginia, showing that the player is the result of a long, painful and almost anonymous history. The complex histories of African-Americans, the physical remnants of slavery are part of American history and of the game that was played out in the Forest Hills Stadium, that day.What McPhee brings out in these long parentheses within the description of the match is the inscription of the game of tennis in the history of America, not only because it is what made it possible, but also because it bears the traces of events, aspirations and hopes and people crushed.

The specificities of competitive tennis Recent issues of match-fixing have involved players and umpires, more often on the lower rungs of the tennis circuit than in more prestigious venues.5 Such issues affect the game of tennis, evidently, but they are also the sign of wider corruptions in sport (football and cricket in particular) and in society. Complex issues of money engulfed the game of tennis until the late 1960s, because of the amateur status which prevented tennis players from earning significant sums of money through their trade, unless they joined the professional circuit – and were consequently banned from entering the prestigious tournaments. This is in particular one of the underlying 278

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tensions explored by Hard, Fast and Beautiful, where the heroine, Florence Farley, is oblivious to her mother’s scheming and acceptance of money and gifts, which endanger her amateur status. The relationship between parent and player, something which has become a cliché of the description of the careers of certain tennis stars, enables the film to construct and to explore family tensions (mother, daughter, estranged father), and to use tennis as a means of exacerbating the psychological conflicts characteristic of the film noir. In a more jocular way, the relationship between coach and player is also the subject of George Cukor’s Pat and Mike (1952). The film outlines the sports career of Pat (Katherine Hepburn), a proficient golf and tennis player. Her sporting achievements are first hampered by her fiancé’s presence at tournaments, resulting in the loss of all her tennis matches, but then enhanced by her coach, Mike (Spencer Tracy), who helps her fulfil her potential – the film suggests both a continuing career for Pat in sports, and romance between coach and player. While the film is notable for the inclusion of a number of professional sportspersons – in particular Gussie Moran, Donald Budge, and golfers Babe Didrikson Zaharias and Betty Hicks – it also builds a contrast between Pat’s feminine frailty when with her fiancé, and her athletic abilities fulfilled by Mike, who allows her to achieve her goals. The fact that a man coaches a woman to success transforms perceptions of the world of sport and of the status of women athletes. The film was made to showcase Hepburn’s athleticism but questions further the relationships between men and women in the world of sports as well as the burgeoning star system. The film also takes a glance at issues of corruption, when gamblers request Pat to lose a match. Unlike Hard, Fast and Beautiful, which ends with Florence giving up her career to marry her fiancé, Pat and Mike finds a middle ground from which personal and athletic fulfilment can coexist. Both films, produced within one year of each other, delineate conflicts inherent to the role of women in sports, and in particular in tennis where early perceptions insisted on femininity and amorous relations.6 They also use tennis to reflect more widely on the places reserved for women within the family circle as well as in society. They suggest complex constructions of stardom, especially when it comes to the possibility for women to embrace an individual career free from constraint. If such issues may seem to have evolved over the last half-century since these films were made, they still surface in such films as Richard Loncraine’s Wimbledon (2004), which pairs two players who are at opposite ends of their careers and of sporting success, and suggests that such tensions inherent to professional sports, perhaps to professional tennis, still require questioning within the realm of fiction (see Lieberman 2015, p.84-7). One of the main strands of the narrative organisation of David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest focuses on the Enfield Tennis Academy (ETA), a ‘USTA-accredited and pedagogically experimental tennis academy’ (Wallace 1996, p.64), which was set up by the late James Incandenza and subsequently administered by his half-brother-in-law Charles Tavis.The academy is set up along lines which recall such famous tennis camps as Nick Bolletieri’s. The training is organised by a German educator, Gerhardt Schtitt, who follows principles of sporting education reminiscent of late eighteenth-century disquisitions on sport, such as Johann Christoph Friedrich GutsMuths’s Gymnastik für die Jugend.7 With GutsMuths, physical training was seen as the fundamental mode of training of a social man, and Schtitt seems to be his direct heir: Schtitt was educated in pre-Unification Gymnasium under the rather Kanto-Hegelian idea that jr. athletics was basically just training for citizenship, that jr. athletics was about learning to sacrifice the hot narrow imperatives of the Self – the needs, the desires, the fears, the multiform cravings of the individual appetitive ill – to the larger imperatives of a team (OK, the State) and a set of delimiting rules (OK, the Law). (Wallace 1996, p.82–3) 279

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The philosophy of tennis becomes in the context of the ETA more than simply turning youngsters into tennis machines, more than a simple sport: ‘And then also, again, still, what are those boundaries, if they’re not baselines, that contain and direct its infinite expansion inward, that make tennis like chess on the run, beautiful and infinitely dense?’ (Wallace 1996, p.83) The tennis academy concentrates some of the main problems about professional tennis, issues of training, discipline and rebellion as well as of drugs and drug-control. While a number of tennis players such as Hal Incandenza indulge in recreational drugs, the prorectors (who are in charge of the administration of the academy) are also addicted to a number of substances (Wallace 1996, p.54). As a consequence of this widespread indulgence, drug-testing by the Organization of North American Nations Tennis Association’s Junior’s Division is the occasion for basic and organised cheating, where ‘clinically sterile urine’ is sold to the youth by the same 17-year-old, Michael Pemulis, who also provides night-time drugs. Like cyclists at the Tour de France or Russian athletes who seemed to have a variety of replacement samples of urine, the youth use ‘little conical-tipped Visine bottles of juvenile urine, bottles easily rendered discreet in underarm, sock or panty’ (Wallace 1996, p.152). So that the ETA works not only as the setting for part of the novel’s plot, but also connects the frailties of the world of professional tennis with issues that affect American society at large.

The challenge of competitive tennis: the art of description The pursuit of tennis as leisure led writers and painters and film-makers to focus on social and amorous interactions rather than on the nature of the game. Competitive tennis requires on the other hand from artists a more acute investigation of the technical and physical aspects of the sport. Cinema for instance has found different methods to deal with this issue. In Strangers on a Train, the description of the final played by the character of Guy led Alfred Hitchcock to mix close shots of Farley Granger apparently playing tennis with distant shots of professional matches – possibly at Forest Hills. In Pat and Mike, on the other hand, Katherine Hepburn insisted on playing both tennis and golf herself, while George Cukor enrolled Gussie Moran, a professional tennis player who was rather famous for her lace knickers designed by Ted Tinling, to play against her, thus lending the film a dose of verisimilitude in its portrayal of the professional game. At the same time, the depiction of matches relies on cinematic means, such as the translation of Pat’s anxieties which make her unable to play tennis, into either a very large, or a very small, racket which she cannot wield. While Pat and Mike, as well as Hard, Fast and Beautiful, concentrate on the careers of champions, some films weave the structure of a tennis match into the narrative of the film. Of course, all films about tennis outline the basic suspense inherent to sports – who will win the contest? But unlike a number of sports, say football or boxing, tennis is not played within a finite time frame, and therefore it affords different narrative potentialities, while, like all sports, providing narrative closure. Some films have used the nature of the tennis game to build suspense into the narrative, such as Strangers on a Train. The fact that Hitchcock, in adapting Patricia Highsmith’s novel, chose to turn Guy, who was an architect in the book, into a tennis player suggests an acute awareness of the possibilities afforded by the nature of the sport. The suspense of the latter part of the film is based on two parallel scenes – one in which Guy has to win his tennis match before, in the other scene, Bruno has had the chance to plant Guy’s cigarette lighter on the scene of the crime. The suspense of the tennis match – will Guy win? – is therefore displaced to include an exacerbated time dimension – will he win quickly enough? And the editing of the film, which alternates between the two scenes, conveying the sense of time passing with the late afternoon movement of the sun, enhances the suspense. 280

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Whereas cinema can find ways of showing competitive tennis in credible ways, the complexities of describing tennis matches are of a different nature in the literary text. Wallace draws on all the resources of narrative to describe for instance the movement of a player called John Wayne catching a lob: He comes around the side of the bounced ball’s second ascent the way you come up around the side of somebody you’re going to hurt, and he has to leave his feet and half-pirouette to get his side to the ball and whip his big right arm through it, catching it on the rise and slapping it down the line past the Port Washington boy, who’s played the percentages and followed a beauty of a lob up to net. (Wallace 1996, p.261) The continuity of movement is conveyed in the meandering sentence while the aggression of the passing-shot is transcribed in the comparison (‘the way you come up around’) and the motions of the player appearing in the ballet-like routine (‘he has to leave his feet and half-pirouette’). It is not only the movements of the players which literary language attempts to describe, but also the structure of a match. McPhee’s narrative is precisely articulated within the description of the 1968 Forest Hills semi-final.The whole book follows the match between Ashe and Graebner, in order to seek an understanding of the relationship between two players who have known each other since they were juniors. Wallace seems to use similar techniques of alternate editing, focusing for instance in and out of a match between Stice and Hal Incandenza in Infinite Jest, taking in the match as well as conversations between spectators and scenes further away from the match. But beyond the dynamics of match-playing, Wallace is able to characterise the style of play of different tennis players, both in fiction and in his journalism. The description of Federer’s play becomes also a reflection on the difficulty posed by such aesthetic endeavour: ‘You more have to come at the aesthetic stuff obliquely, to talk around it, or – as Aquinas did with his own ineffable subject – to try to define it in terms of what it is not’ (Wallace 2006, 20 August). And the essay on Federer, like Infinite Jest, suggests a more profound, metaphysical dimension of tennis.The Swiss player’s athleticism is not only analysed in terms of technique, a mode of description which is appropriate for journalism but cannot convey the reality of his game. It calls perhaps for an artist like Calder to convey the sense of balance and grace which is foremost visual. The aesthetic challenge of the writer is indeed to translate the experience of beauty, to understand the manifestation of genius: ‘Genius is not replicable. Inspiration, though, is contagious, and multiform – and even just to see, close up, power and aggression made vulnerable to beauty is to feel inspired and (in a fleeting, mortal way) reconciled’ (Wallace 2006, 20 August). Wallace was able thus to translate into prose the subtleties of tennis matches, the complexities of the shots, the aesthetic of the game, perhaps because he had been an accomplished tennis player himself. In his “road novel”, Je suis une aventure, Arno Bertina seems to acknowledge Wallace’s superior achievement, not only because the narrator mentions at the beginning of the novel a plan to go and interview Robert Pirsig, of The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance fame, with David Foster Wallace, a plan thwarted by Wallace’s untimely suicide; but also because the only way accurately to describe a tennis match, such as Federer vs Robin Söderling in the final of the French open,8 is to replace the description of a rally by a succession of drawings of the tennis court, with the trajectory of the ball and comic strip-like bubbles that comment on the shots. Je suis une aventure is also a homage to Wallace and to Federer, or perhaps to Wallace’s Federer. 281

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The fiction of tennis The French film critic, Serge Daney, was also a keen observer of tennis and wrote a regular column on the sport for the daily Libération in the 1980s. Re-reading today these vignettes or cameos defined by the limited length of the column throws us back to a different era of professional tennis. Part of the enduring interest of Daney’s columns lies in the perspective of the film critic – and it is appropriate that the cover of the volume collecting the essays should bear a still representing one of the most famous tennis players on screen, Jacques Tati’s Monsieur Hulot. Early on, Daney reflects on the transformation of tennis into a show (spectacle), through the advent of television and the emergence of the public as part of that show. Daney’s interest in cinema leads him to translate to the tennis court insights which were fashioned watching films, in particular the idea that films construct time. The lack of a predetermined time-frame for a tennis match, a dramatic feature exploited by film-makers as suggested above, leads Daney to reflect on the nature of the game from the point of view of duration, arguing that the length of tennis matches infuses them with dialectics. More specifically, he finds in tennis on clay and in the lengthy matches (although this was before the three-day drama of Isner-Mahut at Wimbledon, in 2010) a greater emphasis on time and hence on fiction: ‘This is the advantage of clay, the reason why I like this surface so much, more than others (but of course my point of view is that of an amateur of cinema, who prefers the static shot to the zoom), is that it generates fiction’ (Daney 1994, p.15).9 This intriguing comment suggests that tennis matches, in their construction and exploration of duration, not only evince a sense of drama but they place the spectator in a position equivalent to that of watching a film.Viewing at a distance (static shot rather than zoom), the spectator is confronted with the relationships between the players, the cross-perceptions we have of them, the games with time (from delaying tactics to the ability to “dig in”), the absorption into a universe both part of, and separate from, our world. This explains partly why tennis can contribute to the suspense of a film, in ways which are different from the simple expectation of the winner. It also goes some way towards illuminating the place of tennis in fiction. Bertina’s Je suis une aventure constructs a character who is both identical with, and different from, the great Swiss champion, Roger Federer. The narrative follows Federer – or rather, Rodgeur Fédérère, which emphasises the French pronunciation of the player’s name – at a moment when his career seemed on the wane. In 2008, Federer famously lost one of the greatest matches of tennis, the final of Wimbledon, to Rafael Nadal. The narrator of the novel is on his way to interview the tennis player, leading the narrative to articulate questions of celebrity, of longevity and an investigation into the nature of his exceptional talent. Like Wallace and others, Bertina reflects on the grace of Fédérère, on the contrast with Nadal or with Roddick, during the 2009 Wimbledon final, when Fédérère is described as the pilot of a glider, following the streams of air. The delicate yet resilient nature of his physique (until 2016, Federer had not missed a Grand Slam tournament for 18 years), the relaxed elegance of his style, the comparisons with other sportsmen (Zinedine Zidane, Mike Tyson) are a way for the reader to approach and yet to be denied an understanding of the tennis star. This is where the work of fiction, in Bertina’s narrative, is both essential and fanciful, constructing a character who explores different perspectives on tennis. At stake in this exuberant elaboration on Fédérère is his place in history, his dual endeavours, playing two matches at the same time, on two different tennis courts – one against Novak Djokovic, for instance, and another against the greats of tennis history: the Borgs, the Lendls and the Samprases. The whole novel is built on the idea of imperfect fit, between Federer and Fédérère, between the match that he is playing and his place in history, between himself and his wax statue, between his presence in and his absence from certain places, between the player 282

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and his appearances on television.The fictional elaboration of a tortured, philosophical Fédérère enables the novel to question the nature of a possible description of his game, as well as ideas of success, failure, place in history, stardom and their construction in the media. While Bertina investigates one figure to try and approach the meaning of professional tennis and in particular of celebrity,Wallace constructs the world of young, would-be professionals into a world where all of the aspects of the game are played out through passions, rivalries, doping, training and competition. At one level, the descriptions of tennis and of the tennis world of ETA have a fictional dimension which enables Wallace to raise complex issues about American society. At another level, the descriptions of tennis are consonant with essays such as his analysis of Federer’s style, in their understanding of the game from within, in their transcriptions of tennis practice or matches with the same focus on the nature of the shots and of the rallies, on the achievements of the player. Characteristically, the long sentence is one mode, for Wallace, of conveying to the reader the length and the dialogical nature of the rally. The work of (tennis) fiction in the novel connects with two other aspects of the narrative. The first is linked to the dimension of entertainment. The matrix of Infinite Jest is determined by an investigation of entertainment in the form of television and films and more specifically of James Incandenza’s mythical last film, The Entertainment, the viewing of which drains the viewers’ mental energy. It is also entitled Infinite Jest and is listed by most archivists as ‘unfinished, unseen’ (Wallace 1996, p.993). Similarities and connections with the world of tennis are woven into the narrative, not only because of the articulation of both around the Incandenza family, but also because the world of films and the world of tennis are similarly suffused with anxieties and paranoia. The second connection between tennis and the general spirit of the narrative is inscribed in the encyclopaedic nature of Infinite Jest. At one level, tennis fulfils one of the conditions for a novel to be considered as encyclopaedic (Mendelson 1976) – it gives a thorough description of a particular craft, a kind of tennisology.10 More generally it constructs the novel into a space where the reader must develop abilities to filter information to their maximum capacities (Letzer 2012). Tennis becomes in this way one of the thematic tools through which the reader circulates in a world of knowledge and information, serving both as a narrative end (one third of the action, roughly speaking, takes place at the ETA) and as the medium through which knowledge is apprehended, assimilated or discarded. Fictionalising competitive tennis leads Wallace to approach the world through tennis. It is through Wallace’s philosophy of style, an all-encompassing mode of narration, that the unity of tennis and the world is achieved.

Conclusion Competitive tennis generates a mode of representation which a literary and artistic approach must apprehend. Although the inscription of the sport in the contemporary world has social implications and enables writers and film-makers to address crucial issues such as coaching, doping, race or class, the specificities of the game impose on writers or film-makers an understanding of the game itself.The challenges of description in particular – of ekphrasis perhaps – demand an appropriate rendition of the nature of the strokes, of the rallies, even of whole matches. This challenge is solved differently by film-makers who can weave footage of professional players into the narrative and by writers who decompose the shots into the simplest components, slowing down perception in order to convey through the written word the nature of a shot (Arthur Ashe’s serve, Hal Incandenza’s drop shot).11 The suggestion by Daney that tennis creates fiction in its relationship to time further indicates ways of reading competitive tennis not simply as represented within the space of the text or on the screen, but as a mode of representation in itself, which constructs the sport into a mode of writing about the world. In their different ways, 283

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Bertina, who shapes his inquiry into celebrity around the imperfect fit between Federer and Fédérère, and Wallace, who builds the tennis academy of ETA, the training and the matches and life on the compound as modes of knowledge, both regard tennis as a cultural artefact which needs to be investigated in its own right and as a counterpoint to the standardised television culture of the sport which has become the norm. While Bertina undermines all types of television interviews and media-created stardom through the transformation of the Swiss tennis champion into an offspring of Prisig, Wallace takes literally his own pronouncement that ‘the truth is that TV tennis is to live tennis pretty much as video porn is to the felt reality of human love’ (Wallace 2006, 20 August). So that it is not only the different nature of the social pressures and demands which surround the game that differentiate tennis as leisure and tennis as competition, but the very nature of the sport, and its place in the structure of knowledge. In the arts of tennis as a leisure occupation, the game itself becomes a pretext for social intercourse and seductions of various natures. When viewed from the point of view of competitive sport, the arts of tennis have the ability to transform our perceptions of the sport and perhaps to teach us new ways of reading the game.

Notes 1 Various sections of this chapter have been reproduced previously, in: Tadie, A. (2018) The Arts of Competitive Tennis, International Journal of the History of Sport. DOI: 10.1080/09523367.2018.1464440. 2 Located at 155 Sansome St, in the Financial District of San Francisco. Rivera started from a sketch in sanguine chalk and pastel on paper.The sketch is kept in the Tate Gallery. See:Wills Moody (1937, p.185). 3 See Lake (2016); Schultz (2005). 4 Incidentally,Venus is curiously absent from the essay. 5 See http:​//www​.bbc.​co.uk​/spor​t/ten​nis/3​53192​02 (accessed 17 July 2017). 6 See Hargreaves (1994); Lake (2015). 7 Published in 1793, it was translated into English in 1800 as Gymnastics for Youth: or A Practical Guide to Healthful and Amusing Exercises for the Use of Schools. 8 This match also features in John Le Carré’s Our Kind of Traitor. 9 My translation. 10 The same could be said of other forms of knowledge in the novel, such as drugs. 11 See for instance, in the match against Stice: ‘Stice stood in the middle of the baseline awaiting pace and was helpless when Hal shortened the stroke and dribbled it at an angle cross-court barely clearing the net and distorted with backspin and falling into the half-meter of fair space the acuteness of the angle allowed’ (Wallace 1996, p.678).

References Bertina, A. (2012) Je suis une aventure. Paris :Verticales. Carrington, B. (2010) Race, Sport and Politics:The Sporting Black Diaspora. London: Sage. Daney, S. (1994) L’amateur de tennis. Paris: P.O.L. Gillmeister, H. (1998) Tennis: A Cultural History. Leicester: Leicester University Press. Hargreaves, J. (1994) Sporting Females: Critical Issues in the History and Sociology of Women's sports. London: Routledge. Lake, R.J. (2015) A Social History of Tennis in Britain. London: Routledge. Lake, R.J. (2016) “Guys Don’t Whale Away at the Women”: Etiquette and Gender Relations in Contemporary Mixed-Doubles Tennis, Sport in Society, 19(8–9), 1214–33. Letzler, D. (2012) Encyclopedic Novels and the Cruft of Fiction: Infinite Jest’s Endnotes, Studies in the Novel, 44(3), 304–24. Lieberman,V. (2015) Sports Heroines on Film: A Critical Study of Cinematic Women Athletes, Coaches and Owners. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company. McPhee, J. (1969, 1970) Levels of the Game. London: Macdonald. Mendelson, E. (1976 ),Encyclopedic Narrative: From Dante to Pynchon, MLN, 91(6), 1267–75. 284

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Rankine, C. (2014) Citizens. An American Lyric. Minneapolis: Graywolf Press. Rankine, C. (2015, 25 August) The Meaning of Serena Williams. New York Times. Available at: http:​//www​ .nyti​mes.c​om/20​15/08​/30/m​agazi​ne/th​e-mea​ning-​of-se​rena-​willi​ams.h​tml (accessed 5 July 2016) Schultz, J. (2005) Reading The Catsuit: Serena Williams and the Production of Blackness at the 2002 U.S. Open, Journal of Sport & Social Issues, 29(3), 338–57. Sumner, A. (ed.) (2011) Court on Canvas:Tennis in Art. London: Philip Wilson Publishers. Tadie, A. (2015) The Seductions of Modern Tennis: From Social Practice to Literary Discourse, Sport in History, 35(2), 271–95. Tunis, J.R. (1929, 2 October) Miss Wills and Mr. Tilden: a study in contrast, Outlook & Independent, 168–9, 198. Tunis, J.R. (1930) American Girl. New York: Brewer & Warren. Wallace, D.F. (1996, 2007) Infinite Jest. London: Abacus. Wallace, D.F. (2006, 20 August) Federer as Religious Experience. New York Times. Available at: http:​// www​.nyti​mes.c​om/20​06/08​/20/s​ports​/play​magaz​ine/2​0fede​rer.h​tml?_​r=0 (accessed 21 July 2016) Wills Moody, H. (1937) Fifteen-Thirty.The Story of a Tennis Player. New York and London: Charles Scribner’s Sons.

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28 The literature of tennis Jeffrey O. Segrave

As tennis reporter Jay Jennings concludes, ‘Tennis may not have the extensive contemporary bibliography of baseball as a subject of fiction and poetry, but its literary history is much longer and … more prestigious’ (1995, p.xv). Historically, references to tennis appear in the works of diarists like Samuel Pepys, playwrights such as William Shakespeare, dramatists including John Webster and Henry Porter, poets and poet dramatists like Ben Johnson and Geoffrey Chaucer and a philologist such as F.J. Furnivall. Among the modern literati whose work has featured tennis may be included John Betjeman, Vladimir Nabokov, Robert Pinsky, Irwin Shaw, John Updike and David Foster Wallace. Tennis also appears in contemporary mysteries by Harlan Cohen and Jeremy Potter and in plays such as Neil Simon’s California Suite and The Royal Tenenbaums by Wes Anderson and Owen Wilson. The purpose of this paper is to interrogate tennis literature and to uncover the literary and cultural meanings associated with the sport, to answer the question posed by the poet E.B. White: ‘What is the power’ of this sport, ‘To claim, as it does, the heart / What is this sudden / Access of love for the rich overcast of fall?’ (1981, p.106).While tennis literature conjures a wide variety of metaphors, including the theological, political and even military, ultimately I wish to argue that tennis is predominantly the sport of love – after all, as writer Adam Sexton notes, ‘at least once every game both players think “love”’ (2003, p.xvi) – and that because its heritage is more patrician than plebian, more country than city, more classic than modern, it is primarily depicted as a romantic, genteel and stylish sport more associated with the private, amateur and leisurely than the public, professional and commercial (Baltzell 1995; Gillmeister 1997) – and, perhaps, because we would like it to be that way. In image, at least, it still connotes garden parties Gatsbyesque in style. While tennis, in record, even if not in reality, remains historically a sport associated with the aristocracy and upper classes (Gillmeister 1997), of late it has migrated away from the lawns and country estates of the royal and privileged and travelled to the asphalt environment of the inner city; ‘the barbarians’, as the writer Caryl Phillips puts it, have ‘begun to gather inside the gates’ (1999, p.xi). These then are the two primary historical dimensions of tennis that will color this paper – tennis as a sport of kings and tennis as what the writer James Archibald calls the ‘the royal sport of the people’ (1892, p.376), an evolution that has caused recent tennis literature to address the issues that characterize contemporary big time, professionalized and corporatized 286

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tennis, a sport now played out on what tennis reporter Peter Bodo aptly describes as ‘the Courts of Babylon’ (1995, p.15). Given the capricious nature of human existence and the correlated hegemony of the established church in the medieval ages – the very era in which tennis had its origins – it is hardly surprising that some of the earliest references to tennis employed the sport as theological metaphor. In John Webster’s The Tragedy of the Duchess of Malfi (1623), Bosola uses tennis to deliver the fatalistic message that ‘We are meerely the Starres tennis-balls (strooke, and banded which way please them)’ (v. 4, p.54–5), and in Francis Quarles’s poem (1997), the microcosm of the tennis court serves as a metaphor for the macrocosm of the universe and the site of the cosmic struggle between God and Satan for the domination of the human soul. In the hands of William Shakespeare tennis serves as political metaphor. Looking for an excuse to attack France, King Henry finds one upon receipt of a gift from the Dauphin, a present of ‘tennis balls’, in fact an insult to the heroic king, an estimation of Henry’s maturity, or lack of it: ‘And tell the pleasant Prince this mock of his / Hath turned his balls into gunstones’ (1988, 1, ii, p.281–2). Beyond the political and theological though lies a more rudimentary ontological fact: simply put, tennis connotes sex. In style and deportment, and, more recently, as a result of their celebrity status, tennis players have become potent sex symbols. ‘Tennis is sexy’, Bodo rightly notes, ‘Bjorn Borg sexy, Anna Kournikova sexy’ (1995, p.xiv). The sexually attractive and alluring male tennis player remains a constant literary type throughout tennis literature, including Barry Hannah’s French Stewart, the ‘prettiest’ man on the court over whom ‘women anguished to conceive of his departure from a tournament’ (1994, p.67), Anne Lamott’s ‘impossibly handsome’ J. Peter Billings, ‘with his movie-star hair and long, tautly muscled body’ (1998, p.6), George Sklar’s (1952) Steve Kropa whose good looks, youth and vitality attract the attention of both women and men, and Michael Mewshaw’s superstar tennis player, Latif Fluss, who finds himself constantly surrounded by ‘Ingas and Ullas, Ebbas and Bibbis … bland bimbos provided by Scandinavian tournament directors’ (1986, p.13). Even more than their male counterparts, women tennis players are portrayed as eye-catching, captivating and tempting, sometimes mysterious and invariably the objects of sexual desire. On more than one occasion, the erotic female tennis player has served as a literary femme fatale, most obviously of course in Nabokov’s Lolita (1995). The ‘nymphet’ Lolita sexually arouses Humbert Humbert not only with her athleticism in swimming and dancing but especially with her tennis game which provokes in Humbert ‘an indescribable itch of rapture’ as he waxes besotted over her ‘white wide little-boy shorts, the slender waist, the apricot midriff … and those lovely gentle bones, and the smooth, downwardtapering back’ (p.230–1). The sexual trope becomes particularly exploitive in Lee Harrington’s The Fourth (2003), a short story about the pretty and attractive, tall and elegant American tri-athlete Gayle Brewster who naïvely accepts a live-on-site position as a sort of tennis au pair with the very wealthy British aristocrat Lord Rosscommon. Resurrecting her lost tennis game, she charms the Lord on the court, who equally charms her, and she enjoys the fruits of a luxurious and privileged life-style, even though the Lord’s personal assistant, Whitmore, ominously warns: ‘You know it’s not really about tennis. We don’t want Lindsay Davenport. We want Anna Kournikova’ (p.165). The language of tennis also lends itself to the word play of sex. The French poet Théophile de Viau cleverly employed the language of the tennis scoring system to denote escalating levels of sexual dalliance: If you kiss her, count fifteen, If you touch the bud, count thirty, 287

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If you capture the hill, Forty-five comes up. But if you enter the breach With what the lady needs, Remember well what I sing to you, You will win the game outright. (1622, 84v) In Double Fault (1997), Lionel Shriver addresses the issue even more bluntly; ‘tennis is like sex, isn’t it? … Listen to the language! Long-body, sweet spot, throat of the racket. Dish and shank, stab and slice, punch and penetrate – it’s pornographic! … Approach and hold, break, break back, stroke, regain position, and connect – it’s romantic’ (p.34). The overt sexualization of tennis aside, the tennis court has commonly been associated with the dalliances and flirtations of love. Because men and women compete together on the tennis court, either with each other or against each other, tennis has always served as salient romantic allegory, a sport at once titillating in dress and style, but also reminiscent of youth and sexual awakening. As the anonymous poet writes: At either end Holding opposing corners of the field A youth and a damsel did disport themselves In costume airy, mystic, and wonderful … ‘What is the game?’ I asked. They answered, ‘love’ ‘A pretty game,’ quoth I, ‘for a man and a maid’ (1995, p.342). Nor is love in tennis literature restricted solely to the traditional heterosexual relationship. In Douglas Dunn’s The Tennis Court (1995) and Rita Mae Brown’s Sudden Death (1983), tennis becomes the backdrop for lesbianism and in Edwin Fadiman’s The Professional (1973) the source of latent homo-eroticism. Not unsurprisingly the tennis court becomes more than a suitable site for the ancient sport of match-making, especially during the Victorian era when participation in tennis for young women was only deemed harmless when played within the confines of private estates and exclusive country clubs (McCrone 1988). Nowhere are the machinations and nuances of pre-nuptial match-making better displayed than in Suzanne Lenglen’s romantic novel, The Love Game: Being the Life of Marcelle Penrose (1926). Set in the world of early 20th century English garden parties, river boats, manor houses, stately meals, gambling on the French Riviera and swooning ladies, match-making in the hands of the matriarchal Lady Molton and her daughters is drenched with all the strategies and tactics of a well contested tennis match. Against the action on and around the ever-present tennis court, love and romance among Lenglen’s titled aristocrats and heiresses reverberate in a whirlwind of spurned proposals, engineered meetings, arranged marriages and unrequited love. It was indeed, as Lenglen writes, ‘a great game’ (p.112). Beyond the subtleties of match-making, the doubles court has long served as literary metaphor for marriage, a trope grounded in the notion that both tennis and marriage demand cooperation, mutual understanding and an appropriate sublimation of the individual ego for the sake of harmony and shared success. Marriage, writer Neil Isaacs notes, ‘is like finding a good doubles partner’ (1986, p.161). In both Isaacs’s short story, Match Points, and Robert Parker’s Love Forty (1975), mixed doubles serves as a therapy session for failing marriages and in Irwin Shaw’s short 288

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story, Mixed Doubles (1961), the game becomes a window into the very soul of marital relationships. Shaw’s poignant story revolves around Jane and Stewart Collins, a well-to-do couple who regularly play tennis in the country in order to escape from the city, the bonds of business and urban living. Stewart is ‘brown and dashing and handsome in his white clothes’ (p.227). Elegant and debonair on the courts, he dominates play, the net and his wife. But his jovial self-assurance soon gives way to a stream of self-rationalizing alibis as his game deteriorates under pressure. Jane, on the other hand, is everything Stewart is not – both on and off the tennis court. Her role on the court, like her role in life, is to be steady, un-heroic, undeviating and deferential. She plays the game ‘predictably and sensibly’ (p.229); she even dresses ‘sensibly’ (p.225). Even though Jane acknowledges that ‘marriage’, like tennis, is ‘an up-and-down affair’ (p.234), she still struggles to maintain her stoic, steadfast support of her histrionic spouse who inevitably double-faults on match point muttering, ‘The shadows … Late in the afternoon. It’s impossible to see the service line’ (p.236). ‘Yes, dear’, Jane obediently replies (p.236). Within Shaw’s narrative universe, mixed doubles symbolizes the traditional marital relationship and serves as a site for the affirmation of male power and privilege (Lake 2012; McCrone 1988). Perhaps the best allegorical use of tennis to plumb the depths and dynamics of love and marriage is portrayed in Lionel Shriver’s novel Double Fault (1997), a novel ‘not so much about tennis as marriage, a slightly different sport’ (Author’s Note). Shriver uses tennis to expose the pitfalls of the modern marriage, the marriage of an ‘industrious two career couple’ (p.221). The couple are Wilhemena Novinsky, Willy, wunderkind, ‘Wee-Willy-Wimbledon’ (p.8), and Eric Oberdorf, Princeton educated, multi-talented athlete. Willy and Eric are two internationally ranked and promising young tennis players, who meet on the tennis court, play against each other on the tennis court, fall in love, have passionate sex and say their vows, all on the tennis court; indeed ‘there ensued a courtship in every sense’ (p.38). But marital bliss soon gives way to an unhealthy competitiveness as both commit their lives to success on the pro circuit rather than to their relationship. In a desperate acknowledgement of the failure of their marriage,Willy aborts their unborn child, bearing witness to the price that both men and women pay in a marriage that celebrates performance over love and achievement over commitment. The literature of tennis also portrays familial relationships, especially father-son relationships. Here, sessions on the tennis court become ritual organizers of life, sacred enactments of family heritage and parental affection. In short stories by Roger Angell, Tennis (1950), Somerset Maugham, The Facts of Life (1940) and Emmeline Chang, Forty, Love (2003), father-son tennis interaction becomes a powerful bonding agent, one of the basic substrata of domestic and emotional life. In each of these stories, the tennis court also becomes the site for the performance of the inherent tensions in father-son relationships; often the game becomes too serious, the discipline too intense, the father too overbearing and demanding. On the other hand, for Billy Catlo, son of Robert Catlo, tennis serves in William Brinkley’s novel, Breakpoint (1978), as the site for redemption as Billy dedicates his career to avenging his father’s humiliating loss to the young, brash and heartless champion, Jack Tillotson. Mother-daughter relationships are less commonly portrayed in tennis literature. One exception, however, is Anne Lamott’s novel, Crooked Little Heart (1998), a novel that uses the machinations of junior tennis as a lens through which to explore the relationship between suburban California housewife Elizabeth Ferguson and her 13-year-old daughter, rising tennis star, Rosie. Unlike the fathers, who aggressively focus on winning, Elizabeth obsesses on her relationship with Rosie, ‘its harmonies, its ease’ (p.231). Ignorant of tennis tactics, strategies and training methods, Elizabeth personifies the traditional stage mother who is more concerned with Rosie’s welfare and behavior than her ranking and competitive success.

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Lamott’s novel is also one of the few pieces of literature that portrays father-daughter relationships, in this case presenting fathers as reflective of a new paternal breed, ‘the scary, aggressive tennis dad’ (Bodo 1995, p.83) who is invariably bent on control, exploitation and manipulation – both economic and emotional – and committed above all else to winning. As in Lamott’s imagination, women’s tennis today is too often the story of ambitious and greedy fathers, the story of the helicopter parent from hell. Finally, as an expression of perhaps the most exploitive type of tennis love is the now not uncommon incidence of coach-player sex (Mewshaw 1993, pp.187–96). Corrosive of both professional and emotional life, the coach-player sexual relationship is reflected in the contemporary literature of tennis. In Dalia Rabinovich’s Love (2003), the beautiful Sari recalls her early tennis playing days in Bogotá and her first teacher, Mauricio, the philandering ‘playboy’, as Sari’s mother rightly calls him (p.186). Spurned by Mauricio, who is hardly the marrying kind, Sari leaves Colombia for Cambridge, Massachusetts, where she marries Charlie instead. Forever unable to cast off the spell of her former coach, she realizes she is married to ‘a man she doesn’t love … a forced error. A mistake in her game’ (p.188). The emotional toll for the coachplayer relationship is equally evident in Shriver’s Double Fault (1997), where Willy and Max Upchurch, ex-world ranked, ex-Davis Cup player, and Willy’s coach at Sweetspot, ‘a School of Tennis’ (p.14), practice ‘schtuping’ (p.29) more than hitting. In the novel, Willy is 17. As Willy’s new boyfriend, Eric, judges Max: ‘Beyond statutory. A stand-up guy’ (p.29). In the face of her deteriorating marriage, Willy destructively returns to Max’s arms further contributing to her self-hatred and hastening the end of her already broken relationship with Eric. The changing sexual mores in tennis literature reflect a much broader evolution in the game itself. Once the pastime of an elite leisured class born of 19th-century industrial wealth, tennis today is a world-class competitive sport enjoyed by millions. Or, as Bodo more humorously puts it, tennis was once perceived as a ‘sissy’ sport played by aquiline-nosed opera buffs with names like Ellsworth dressed in classic tennis sweaters. In the Open era, the game molted into a glitzy variation of pro-wrestling, practiced by a bunch of rule-bending, fit-pitching, earringwearing babies who earned millions of dollars. (1994, p.184) In short, the game has been both democratized and commercialized, transformed by the same forces that during the 20th century molded other amateur sports into the mass mediated, superconsumerized, fully professionalized market spectacles we know today. Nowhere is the commercialization of tennis better characterized than in Michael Mewshaw’s novel Blackballed (1986), a hilarious, satirical exposé of the world of pro tennis told through the eyes of the lovable, although somewhat sleazy, agent, Eddie Brown and his superstar client, Latif Fluss. Mewshaw depicts a system that features ‘doped-up players, millions of bucks kicked back under the table, cooked figures in every accounting book, stacked tanked matches, matches orchestrated for TV time, phony winner-take-all events in Las Vegas’ (p.4) – not to mention ‘tax fraud, forgery, bribery, embezzlement, extortion – that’s the wonderful world of pro tennis’ (p.175). The associated commodification of the professional athlete is well portrayed in Fadiman’s The Professional (1973), as rags to riches tennis champion Pedro Riçon transforms himself into an inhuman and unbeatable engine, just like his ball machine, Miss Stiga. In the process, he becomes a ‘piece of property’ enmeshed in a ‘sea of contracts’ (p.244) and corporate duties.Trapped in a life of ‘desperate and uneasy effort’ he seeks relief from the ‘grinding routine of training’ (p.245) and the crushing loneliness of the competitive circuit. Sick and aging, he 290

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knowingly stages his final act of self-destruction in a three million dollar, winner-take-all gate against the ‘newest young phenom’ Mexican Manuel Rodriguiz. On match point, Pedro lays prostrate on the ground; ‘something burst in his chest’ (p.314). In a similarly biting novel, Infinite Jest (1996), David Foster Wallace lampoons junior tennis, specifically the ferociously competitive tennis academies that train elite level tennis players and the corporatized university athletic programs that recruit them. The main character of the novel is Hal Incandenza, an aspiring young tennis player seeking admission to the University of Arizona, a hotbed of intercollegiate sport. The problem is that while Hal boasts a high sectional ranking and an invitation to appear in the prestigious WhataBurger Southwest Junior Invitational, he also has a transcript that he admits ‘might have been dickied a bit’ (p.10). Despite the obvious weaknesses in his educational profile, not to mention a severely damaged psyche, young Hal is accepted into the college of his choice. Not only marketed and consumerized, tennis today is democratized too, played on both private and public courts, in both the suburban facilities of the middle class as well as on the urban playgrounds of the inner city. The game is increasingly becoming what tennis great Pancho Gonzales calls, ‘the people’s game’ (1959, p.171), an emergent reality well reflected in recent literature. Beryl Bainbridge’s Ben Lewis and Frobisher, for example, play on public pay-and-play courts that are ‘full of pot-holes and the net invariably wound too high’ (1987, p.33) and in Lars Gustafsson’s compelling romp through modern-day academe, the tennis court is located in a ‘run-down suburban park’ (1983, p.3), squeezed in between a public school and ‘a horrendous fruit and vegetable stand called Fred’s Vegetables’. Unlike the sartorial elegance of an earlier era, Gustafsson’s players don cut-off jeans and T-shirts ‘with funny slogans printed on them’ (p.3). The democratization of tennis is taken a step further in a spate of novels published in the 1970s which depict the seamy underbelly of a sport characterized by a rampant hedonism and driven by the ethic of success. Both Ralph Demers’ The Circuit (1976) and Peter Brennan’s Sudden Death (1978) follow the developmental antics – both on and off the court – of a group of diverse and promising proletarian players whose sybaritic lifestyle reflects a psychological and moral wasteland.Young, loud, impudent, dismissive of tennis traditions and disrespectful of sportsmanship, this ‘new breed’ of players places wanton sex ahead of genuine relationship, insult and mockery over civility and fair play, and winning ahead of everything. ‘No sport has so many unprofessional professionals’ (1978, p.154), William Brinkley’s sardonic broadcaster Chester Barney laments. And, indeed, one only has to think of the rise during the 1970s of the infamous “bad boys” of the game – Jimmy Connors, John McEnroe and Ilie Năstase (Lake 2015). While tennis may now be a game of the masses, the preponderance of tennis literature still evokes a bygone era when the sport epitomized patrician values and tastes and was played on the lush, verdant grounds of aristocratic manor houses, country estates and fashionable clubs, and in the colleges and universities that served as rite of passage to the social elite. Even in the murder mysteries of Agatha Christie, the tennis court serves as trope for an upper-class way of life, a vicarage-garden-party environment where proper etiquette is abided by on the court as well as off. As Gonzales recalls in his memoirs, ‘Not only did a player have to learn the book of social etiquette backwards, and grip a racket properly, he had to be able to lift a cup of tea without spilling a drop’ (1959, p.171). Tennis fiction still commonly plays out on royal estates, in high-profile cities and exclusive clubs, on the courts of ivy covered, brick-built colleges and universities, and at the homes and in the gardens of a social and political elite. Somerset Maugham’s (1940) Nicky Garnet plays in Monte Carlo and Lenglen’s (1926) Marcelle Penrose on the French Riviera; Ellen Gilchrist’s (2002) LeGrande MacGruder plays in the lavishly appointed New Orleans Lawn Tennis Club, Paul Theroux’s (1997) cast of characters at the exclusive Ayer Hitam Club in Malaysia, and 291

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Robert Sorrells’s (1989) rural well-to-do of Ickey Honey, in Punkin County, South Carolina, on the court in Hoke Warble’s Ickey Honey Country Club; Nicky Garnet plays for Cambridge, Lenglen’s Roy Molton for Oxford, Brad Leithauser’s ‘high school graduate’ for ‘the Big “H”, Harvard’ (1971, p.32), and both Shriver’s (1997) Eric Oberdorf and Ernest Hemingway’s (1996) Robert Cohn for Princeton. Tournaments thrive as social rituals that mark the calendars of the well-to-do and celebrate the upper-class way of life. Beneath the veneer of well-mannered civility however lies a seamier reality, a world of snobbery, racism, immorality and manipulation. Even in Lenglen’s romantic and quixotic novel, the women work to stage-manage relationships in mischievous and often insidious ways to ensure their future economic and emotional security. As Elinor Glyn cynically advises: ‘Marry the life you want to lead, because after a few years the man doesn’t matter’ (1926, p.146). In other works, the privileged lifestyle takes on more sinister dimensions. In Harrington’s The Fourth, the polite and congenial affability of the British social and political elite who congregate on and around the tennis court on Lord Rosscommon’s French Riviera estate belies a hedonistic lifestyle that promotes drunkenness, wanton destruction, sexual desire and vulgarity. In short stories by Paul Theroux, The Tennis Court (1997) and Ellen Gilchrist, In the Land of Dreamy Dreams (2002), the country club serves as metaphor for a class consciousness that begets discriminatory prejudices based on cultural hierarchy; in Theroux’s case the bigotry is racial and in Gilchrist’s case, religious. In Theroux’s short story British and American members of an exclusive Malaysian country club plot to oust the Japanese businessman, Shimura – ‘I didn’t fight the war so that those people could tell us how to run our club’, complains the hoity-toity British chair of the tennis committee (p.101) – and in Gilchrist’s short story the snooty LaGrande McGruder, imprisoned by her aristocratic southern heritage and family connections, is reduced to cheating to defeat the ‘little Jewish housewife’ (p.69), Roxanne Miller, ‘that goddam little new-rich Yankee bitch’ (60). Finally, tennis in literature serves as a litany of aging, a sporting ritual that marks the most important moments in life. Tennis is particularly poignant because it is a life-time sport, a sport played best by teenagers no doubt, but a sport that can be played well into old age. Tennis spans our existence. It accompanies our journey from birth to death. It marks the passage of time. As Emmeline Chang’s Michael muses as he sits with his aged father watching tennis on TV, ‘the ball bounces back and forth from one side to the other. Back and forth, like the ticking of a clock’ (2003, p.54). The heyday of tennis occurs during those carefree days when the body never aches and the promise is not dimmed: ‘Never forget’, the poet Brad Leithauser counsels a young tennis pro, ‘the world is yours’ (1971, p.35). Tennis is at its most aesthetic when played by the young – the Buenos and Goolagongs, Lavers and Federers – who glide effortlessly across the court, silent of step and graceful in movement, and who endow the sport with its distinctive kinesthetic beauty. ‘The dance and the game seemed one / To me’, writes poet John Heath-Stubbs (1988, p.342) But time, gravity and poor technique exact their toll. Injury gives way to infirmity, infirmity to old age, and with it the loss of skill, endurance and quickness. ‘Each year the court expands’, poet Paul Petrie writes, ‘the net moves back, the ball / hums by – with more spin’ (1969, p.58). But even if the body fails, the will endures, the passion remains, the competitive urge lives on: But nightly in dreams I see an old man playing in an empty court under the dim floodlights of the moon with a racket gone in the strings – 292

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no net, no ball, no game – and still playing to win. (p.59) Tennis also bears witness to the canonical events that comprise life, some that we ritualize, some that we ceremonialize, some that we celebrate in public, and others that we endure in silence and solitude. In two short stories, one by James Jones, The Tennis Game (1985), and the other by Jonathon Ames, Pubertas Agonistes (2001), tennis marks the transition to puberty. Not only does tennis stand on the threshold of childhood and adulthood, it attends the transition from single to married, and from married to divorced. The tennis court takes pride of place in two short stories about divorce, Separating by John Updike (1975), and Courtship by Rand Richards Cooper (2003). In Updike’s story, a dilapidated clay court lurks in the background as Richard and Joan inform their children of their crumbling marriage. Built a year earlier to signify their commitment, it now serves as a metaphor for their separation. The tennis court serves as a particularly poignant allegory for the passage of time in William Trevor’s nostalgic and touching short story, The Tennis Court (1975), a story full of pain and pathos set in the interwar years in rural England. Once the site of bustling tennis parties, ‘champagne and strawberries and cream’ (p.102), the court at Challacombe Manor in the post-war era is now in total disrepair, overgrown and untended, the grass ‘a yard high’ (p.101); ‘it’s not much of a tennis court, but it was once of course’ (p.94). In the end, tennis serves as the ultimate index of our decay, as the poet Galway Kinnell somewhat humorously recognizes: . . . among the pure right angles and unhesitating lines of this arena where every man grows old pursuing that repertoire of perfect shots, darkness already in his strokes, even in death cramps waving an arm back and forth to the disgust of the nurse (to whom the wife whispers, “Well, at least I always knew where he was!”); and smiling; and a few hours later found dead. (1980, p.28) In many ways, tennis is the perfect metaphor for life. As the long time New York Times writer George Vecsey notes, ‘tennis has it all – love, power, sex, money, violence, aggression, manipulation – the whole spectrum of human behavior’ (1995, p.xii). Therefore, tennis has been used in the language of warfare, business, politics and sex, and as trope for social class and etiquette; as allegory, it has accompanied the various stages of life and the ritual moments by which we measure the passing of time. While tennis has of late migrated into the ballyhooed world of show-biz and professional sport, most of the memorable stories and poems smack of another time, of a bygone era where deportment and sportsmanship mattered, when behavior and dress were determined by an unwritten code rather than legislated by a bureaucratic, official tome. Tennis literature certainly pays attention to the game of the Open era but it does so more as parody than celebration; it is cynical and bawdy, not commemorative and celebratory. I suspect most people would agree with Jennings who surmises that ‘most tennis fans and players bring a romantic, personal, classical notion to the game’ (1995, p.xiv). 293

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Ultimately, I would argue that tennis in literature is the most romantic sport; it is the sport of love, the sport that as metaphor, trope and allegory connects us to an idyll that harkens back to an earlier time. The abiding impression derived from the literature of tennis is of a sport that, while reflective of the machinations of the politician or the business executive and while sensitive to the excesses of the modern game with its mass spectatorial and participant appeal, alludes to and conjures still a romantic image of amorous adventures played out on grass courts far from the madding crowds on a late sunny summer evening. As the poet Margaret Avison notes, ‘Courts are’, indeed ‘for love and volley’ (1982, p.22).

References Ames, J. (2001) Pubertas Agonistes. In Ames, J. (ed.), What’s not to Love? The Adventures of a Mildly Perverted Young Writer (pp.3–16), New York:Vintage Books. Amis, M. (1995) The Information. New York: Harmony Books. Angell, R. (1950, 8 July) Tennis. The New Yorker, 24–6. Anonymous (1995) A Lawn-Tennisonian Idyll. In Jennings, J. (ed.), Tennis and the Meaning of Life: A Literary Anthology of the Game (pp.341–3), New York: Harcourt Brace & Co. Archibald, J. F. J. (1892) Lawn Tennis in California. Overland Monthly and Out West Magazine, XX(118), 363–76. Avison, M. (1982) Tennis. Winter Sun / The Dumbfounded: Poems, 1940–1966.Toronto, Ontario: McClelland and Stewart. Bainbridge, B. (1987) Beggars Would Ride. In B. Bainbridge, Mum and Mr. Armitage (pp. 31–9), New York: McGraw-Hill. Baltzell, E. D. (1995). Sporting Gentlemen: Men’s Tennis from the Age of Honor to the Cult of the Superstar. New York: Free Press. Bodo, P. (1995) The Courts of Babylon: Tales of Greed and Glory in the Harsh New World of Professional Tennis. New York: Scribner. Brennan, P. (1978) Sudden Death. New York: Jove Publications. Brinkley, W. (1978) Breakpoint. New York: William Morrow. Brown, R. M. (1983) Sudden Death. New York: Bantam Books. Chang, E. (2003) Forty, Love. In Sexton, A. (ed.), Love Stories: A Literary Companion to Tennis (pp.39–54), New York: Citadel Press Books. Cooper, R. R. (2003) Courtship. In Sexton, A. (ed.), Love Stories: A Literary Companion to Tennis (pp.198– 201), New York: Citadel Press Books. de Viau, T. (1622) Le Parnasse Satyrique. Paris: Bibliothèque Nationale, Manuscript n. a. fr. 4237, fol. 84 v. Demers, R. M. (1976) The Circuit. New York:Viking Press. Dunn, D. (1995) The Tennis Court. In Jennings, J. (ed.), Tennis and the Meaning of life: A Literary Anthology of the Game (pp.41–52), New York: Harcourt Brace & Co. Fadiman, E. (1973) The Professional. New York: David McKay Company. Furnivall, F. J., ed. (1895) The Three King’s Sons. Early English Text Society, e.s. 67, London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co. Gilchrist, E. (2002) In the Land of Dreamy Dreams. In Gilchrist, E., In the Land of Dreamy Dreams: Short Fiction (pp.60–71), Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press. Gillmeister, H. (1997). Tennis: A Cultural History. New York: New York University Press. Gonzales, P. (1959) Man with a Racket: An Autobiography of Pancho Gonzales. New York: A. S. Barnes. Gustafsson, L. The Tennis Players. Trans. Sandstroem,Y.L. New York: New Directions Books. Hannah, B. (1994) Return to Return. In Hannah, B. Airships (pp.67–96), New York: Grove Press. Harrington, L. (2003) The Fourth. In Sexton, A. (ed.), Love Stories: A Literary Companion to Tennis (pp.153– 84), New York: Citadel Press Books. Heath-Stubbs, J. (1988) Watching Tennis. In Heath-Stubbs, J., Collected Poems: 1943–1987 (pp.342), London: Carcanet . Hemmingway, E. (1996, [1926]) The Sun Also Rises. New York: Scribner. Isaacs, N. (1986) Match points, Arete:The Journal of Sport Literature, IV(1), 161–7. Jennings, J. (ed.) (1995) Tennis and the Meaning of Life: A Literary Anthology of the Game. New York: Harcourt Brace & Co. 294

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Jones, J. (1985) The Tennis Game. In Jones, J., The Ice Cream Headache, and Other Stories: The Short Fiction of James Jones (pp.197–211), New York: Dell Publishing Company. Kinnell, G. (1980) On the Tennis Court at Night. In Kinnell, G., Mortal Acts, Mortal Words (pp.28–9), Boston: Houghton Mifflin. Lake, R.J. (2012) Gender and Etiquette in ‘Mixed Doubles’ Lawn Tennis, 1970–1939, International Journal of the History of Sport, 29(5), 691–710. Lake, R.J. (2015) The “Bad Boys” of Tennis: Shifting Gender and Social Class Relations in the era of Năstase, Connors, and McEnroe, Journal of Sport History, 42(2), 179–99. Lamott, A. (1998) Crooked Little Heart. New York: Anchor Books. Leithauser, B. (1982) I.Tennis Instructor, 1971. Excerpted from the poem “Two Summer Jobs.” In Leithauser, B., Hundreds of Fireflies (pp.31–5), New York: Knopf. Lenglen, S. (1926) The Love Game: Being the Life of Marcelle Penrose. New York: Adelphi Company. Maugham,W. S. (1940) The Facts of Life. In Maugham,W.S., The Mixture as Before (pp.279–310), New York: Doubleday, Doran & Company. McCrone, K. E. (1988) Playing the Game: Sport and the Physical Emancipation of Women 1870–1914. London: Routledge. Mewshaw, M. (1986) Blackballed. New York: Atheneum. Mewshaw, M. (1993) Ladies of the Court: Grace and Disgrace on the Women’s Tour. New York: Crown. Nabokov,V. (1955, 1947) Lolita. New York:Vintage Books. Parker, R. (1975) Love Forty. New York: J. B. Lippincott. Petrie, P. J. (1969) The Old Pro’s Lament. In Petrie, P.J., From Under the Hill of Night: Poems (pp.58–9), Nashville:Vanderbilt University Press. Phillips, C. (ed.) (1999) The Right Set: A Tennis Anthology. New York:Vintage. Quarles, F. (1992) On a Tennis-Court. In Liston, W.T. (ed.), Francis Quarles’ Divine Fancies: A Critical Edition (pp.117–8), New York: Garland Publishing. Rabinovich, D. (2003) Love. In Sexton, A. (ed.), Love Stories: A Literary Companion to Tennis (pp.185–8), New York: Citadel Press Books. Sexton, A. (ed.) (2003) Love Stories: A Literary Companion to Tennis. New York: Citadel Press Books. Shakespeare, W. (1988, 1600?) King Henry. William Shakespeare: The Complete Works (pp.567–97), Oxford: Clarendon University Press. Shaw, I. (1961) Mixed Doubles. In Shaw, I., Selected Short Stories of Irwin Shaw (pp.225–36), New York: The Modern Library. Shriver, L. (1997) Double Fault. New York: Doubleday. Sklar, G. (1952) The Promising Young Men. New York: Signet Books. Sorrells, R. T. (1989) The Blacktop Champion of Ickey Honey. In Sorrells, R.T., The Blacktop Champion of Ickey Honey and Other Short Stories (pp.3–32), Fayetteville: University of Arkansas Press. Theroux, P. (1977) The Tennis Court. In Theroux, P., The Consul’s File (pp.101–9), Boston: Houghton Mifflin. Trevor, W. (1975) The Tennis Court. In Trevor, W., Angels at the Ritz and Other Short Stories (pp.93–104), London: The Bodley Head. Updike, J. (1975, 23 June) Separating. The New Yorker, 36–41. Vecsey, G. (1995) Forward. In Sexton, A. (ed.), Love Stories: A Literary Companion to Tennis (pp.xi–iv), New York: Harcourt Brace and Company. Wallace, D. F. (1996) Infinite Jest. Boston: Little, Brown & Co. Webster, J. (1964, 1623) The Duchess of Malfi. London: Methuen. White, E. B. (1981) The Tennis. In White, E.B., Poems and Sketches of E. B.White (pp.106), New York: Harper & Row.

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The Italian tennis historian Gianni Clerici once wrote that lawn tennis could be seen ‘as a work of art’ (Clerici 1976, p.36). The game has certainly continuously inspired professional artists as it has developed, within shifting social conditions, historical contexts and artistic movements internationally.This chapter highlights the artists who were initially drawn to this genteel sporting pastime of the upper/middle classes and those who gradually reflected the constantly changing game, as it transformed into a professional sport played at major tournaments in front of vast crowds internationally. There have been many challenges for artists searching to capture the graceful movement of the players on court; developments in the game, the fashions worn and the contexts in which it was played. Artists responded by adapting their portraiture, landscape, genre and still life paintings to include tennis, gradually becoming more imaginative and innovative. It went on to provide the focus for a wide range of artistic responses from sculpture and avant-garde prints to conceptual art. While some examples of tennis art are well known, other insightful responses to the game have been overlooked.This is in part because the reputations of the artists who painted the images have suffered but also due to issues of ownership past and present. Like the game itself, which has so often been viewed as exclusive, the majority of tennis art today is held in private collections and has not enjoyed the exposure or gravitas that museum ownership bestows. This chapter explores the breadth of artistic responses to an ever-changing game in different national contexts, focusing on European and American developments up until World War II. Though derived from earlier racket-and-ball games like real tennis and racquets, lawn tennis was said to have been invented by Harry Gem and J.B.A. Perera, who first experimented in Edgbaston, Birmingham in 1859 (Holland 2011). It was popularised beyond Britain with the help of Major Walter Clopton Wingfield’s Sphairistiké box-sets. Lawn tennis quickly spread throughout Europe, North America and the British Empire, and in each location, its art reflected national characteristics and artistic developments.

British tennis art, 1875–1945 The London Court Journal reported on 7 March 1874 that the new game of ‘Sphairistike or lawn tennis’ had been ‘tested at several country houses, and has been found full of healthy excitement, besides being capable of much scientific play’. The game was particularly suited for countryhouse gatherings, and tennis garden-parties quickly became part of the British social season. Tennis art has typically been defined by these popular early-Victorian sentimental images. A 296

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recent article in London’s Spectator (Dunn 2017, 8 July) refers to the ‘prettiness of the paintings and compositions the game of tennis has inspired’. With spectators of all ages, men and women playing together on the lawns of suburban villas or vicarages, the Victorian game provided new subjects for British artists. The earliest image of a young woman playing tennis is a watercolour Girl with a Ball, Stafford Lodge (1877), frustratingly by an unidentified artist with the monogram “E.R.”.1 It depicts a young woman about to serve underarm, the usual means of putting the ball in play before the advent of the harder over-arm serve. Women were encouraged to play tennis alongside men in mixed doubles, but their tight corsets, heavy dresses, hats and heels made it difficult for them to move about court effectively (Elks 2004).This young woman has a slightly shorter skirt suggesting she is under 16 years-of-age and able to show her ankles, therefore giving her more movement and a distinct advantage on court. In 1887, the young English player Lottie Dodd won Wimbledon at 15, in a shorter skirt. Many early tennis paintings were executed in Scotland. Jemima Blackburn produced the first recorded image of a female foursome, vigorously playing in front of mixed spectators, wearing tennis aprons to protect their day-dresses, in Tennis Match at Dalvey near Forres: Wedderburns vs Blackburns (1878).2 Painted in the grounds of the MacLeod family home, on the edge of the Scottish Highlands, it captures an already established annual tennis match between two uppermiddle-class Scottish families, with the young women appearing surprisingly energetic. The first example of an internationally exhibited tennis work was John Lavery’s iconic painting The Tennis Party (1885). This Scottish Impressionist work shows the Glaswegian MacBride family watching the younger members enjoying mixed doubles. It was exhibited in London in 1886, at the Royal Academy, then attracted a medal at the Paris Salon in 1888. It did not sell until 1890, however, when it was part of the Glasgow Boys contribution to the Munich Glasplast, and was acquired by the Bavarian government for a public collection in the Neue Pinakothek (Stevenson 2010). Thus, despite the popularity of tennis in Britain and France, Lavery’s masterpiece found no buyer until five years after it was painted, which art historian Francis Fowle (2005) has suggested may have been due to its Impressionist style. Other contemporary paintings are less familiar. Belgian Symbolist Fernand Khnopff produced his monumental frieze-like pastel Memories (Lawn Tennis) in 1889, the year he came to England and met the Pre-Raphaelite painter Burne-Jones. This composition took tennis art to new aesthetic levels. The work has a haunting quality with the isolated likenesses of the static

Image 29.1 John Lavery, The Tennis Party (1885) Aberdeen Art Gallery & Museums. 297

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and reflective figure of his sister Marguerite, repeated from different angles. Like Lavery’s The Tennis Party, Khnopff ’s Memories (Lawn Tennis) reached wide European audiences through exhibition, being shown at the Universal Exposition in Paris in 1889, where it was awarded a second class medal. The Dutch-Indonesian Symbolist Jan Theodoor Toorop visited London regularly, coming under the influence of Whistler, married an English wife and settled for a while. His Garden Surrey, Lawn Tennis (1890–1) also has a haunting quality, with three ghostly female figures on court, one lying apparently burying her head in the grass.3 Perhaps this work shows heartbreak on court? Both paintings were executed within a few years of Lavery’s The Tennis Party and yet neither are well-known in Britain today. After World War I, Lavery’s The Tennis Party was de-accessioned by Munich’s Neue Pinatock and was purchased by the British collector of Impressionists, Sir James Murray. He presented it to Aberdeen Art Gallery in 1926 at the height of the sport’s “golden age” and it has been regularly lent to exhibitions ever since (McConkey 2011). Another iconic Lavery tennis image of this period is the exhibition watercolour, A Rally (1885), at Kelvingrove, featuring Elizabeth MacBride from Cartbank in Glasgow, tightly corseted, hitting a backhand. It was easier of course for artists to paint ladies static with a racket than in action. Samuel Reid’s Scottish Girl (c.1887) shows a young woman wearing her brown tennis apron with large pockets for balls over her day-dress.4 Tennis aprons not only protected dresses from grass stains but the pockets assisted with the problem of restriction in bending down to pick up balls, once tightly corseted (Elks 2004). In contrast to these action paintings, the Hayllar sisters, Mary and Edith, reflected on domestic English middle-class life, as the daughters of a successful artist living in Berkshire. They captured scenes of everyday life, and were attracted to lawn tennis by the game’s social aspects, its association with romance and the opportunity to observe the perfect ingredients of a tennis tea. Mary Hayllar’s The Tennis Party (1880),5 and The Tennis Season (1881),6 alongside her sister Edith’s iconic A Summer Shower (1883), are all set at their family home, Castle Priory, in Berkshire.7 In Mary’s two paintings the game itself is distant, seen through windows, with the foreground details of a sumptuous tea or still life studies of rackets, squash

Image 29.2 Theodoor Toorop, Garden Party, Lawn Tennis (1890-91) Gemeente Museum, The Hague. 298

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and parasols, being the focus of the composition. Edith’s A Summer Shower highlights the tennis tea and the romance of a young couple who have sneaked away from chaperones, during a rain delay. Young Victorian women were chaperoned usually by a young aunt or family friend, but protocol for garden/tennis-parties was generally more relaxed than official evening occasions (Paterson 2008). A chaperone might well remove themselves a short distance to encourage a suitable match, as may be the case here. However, several paintings do show rather awkward looking single female figures with couples after tennis, such as John Scott’s After the Tennis Match (c.1885)8 and John Lavery’s The Tennis Match.9 The Hayllar sisters’ paintings were exhibited at the Royal Society of British Artists and the Royal Academy but they lived modest lives away from commercial art. On their marriages, both Edith and Mary ceased publicly exhibiting their works, which was not unusual for female artists at the time (Anderson 1996). The majority of their paintings are still privately owned but have been regularly lent to exhibitions and are therefore better known today. It is the social gatherings around the game that have provided the most fertile subjects for artists. Charles March Gere’s Tennis Party (1900), set in the garden of his own middle-class family home in Leamington Spa, brilliantly combines spectator interest and active court play. While clearly influenced by Lavery’s iconic Tennis Party in the elongated horizontal format, Gere takes a much lower viewpoint, inviting the onlooker to see the game as if they were a spectator themselves, sitting around in the foreground at the little “kursee” table. Romance is reflected in the inclusion of the artist’s sister Edith playing mixed-doubles with her future husband, the artist Harry Payne. From 1912, Charles Ponsonby Staple’s Newcastle Tennis Court, Col. Slacke’s Court also adopts the elongated format to include two courts in his small canvas.Two very similar versions of this work exist, both owned privately, suggesting a demand from guests for a memento of a weekend of tennis in Northern Ireland. Tennis parties were family affairs with children participating, both boys and girls. Depictions of children include the charming portrait of the artist’s sisters Alisa and Marjorie Hatton with a Racquet (c.1910) by Brian Hatton, a middle-class Herefordshire artist, who died in the Great War.10 Tennis parties and tournaments, including the Wimbledon Championships, ceased during war time, with players and artists signing up to serve their country. In 1922,Wimbledon re-located from Walpole Road to larger grounds just east of Wimbledon village, and a new Centre Court was built.The tournament experienced record visitor numbers and royal patronage continued. King George V and Queen Mary are seen in the Royal Box in Marjorie Watherston’s atmospheric large-scale The 1923 Ladies’ Wimbledon Singles Final which shows the French star Suzanne Lenglen in action, yet still focuses on romance in the foreground, with a well-dressed couple with eyes for one another only and not the match. Despite her considerable talent and early success, Watherston did not continue after her marriage and this, probably her finest work, is in a private collection and remains little known. From just over 1,000 in the early 1920s, there were over 3,200 affiliated tennis clubs in 1938, and tennis began to shed its elite middle-class image (Wilcox 2006). Richard Carline’s Gilbert and Janet Pairing up for Tennis (1922) reflects the game’s interest amongst the Hampstead group of artists.11 Gilbert Spencer and his wife Hilda, alongside her maid Janet Piggott, are about to make a foursome, reflecting a more relaxed social context (Sumner 2011). The profile of the game also changed during the inter-war period, with increased press coverage and the launch of tennis specific periodicals (Lake 2015). Glamorous French and American stars emerged, as did Britain’s Fred Perry and Dorothy Round. Percy Shakespeare’s bold depiction of a young woman in The Tennis Player (c.1934) was mistakenly thought to show the Wimbledon champion Round, as both player and artist came from Dudley in the West Midlands. This confident young woman with her short, bobbed hair wears a tennis skirt above her knee, just as Round 299

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did winning Wimbledon in 1934, but other features are not similar. Round was the daughter of a local builder and Shakespeare had a working-class background and taught at Birmingham School of Art. There is no evidence the two were acquainted, but tennis was now played across the social divide. His Tennis (1937), with its bright palette, documents the continued popularity of the tennis party.12 Exciting artists like Cyril Power responded to the game’s increasing speed with dynamic linocut images such as Tennis (1933) and, working with Sybil Andrews, collaborated to produce images of tennis for posters to market the 1933 Wimbledon Championships (Sumner 2011). In the first half of the 20th century, ordinary players on public courts were captured on canvas by artists like Spencer Frederick Gore, who painted a young women playing in the communal gardens near his London home, Tennis in Mornington Crescent (1909),13 and Anna Zinkeisen, who included a young stylish couple making their way to the public courts in the Valley Gardens, Harrogate with the Sun Pavilion, in the early 1930s.14 Meanwhile Eric Ravilious’s Tennis in the Park (1930) represents a court in the Manor Garden of Eastbourne, the artist’s home town.15 Ravilious, like Lavery before him, provided British tennis art with an international platform. He contributed to the 1937 Paris International Exhibition his model of Lawn Tennis to the sporting section of the British Pavilion. Organised against the backdrop of rising fascism in Europe, the British Pavilion concentrated on a sense of “fair play”. There were displays on cricket, golf, fishing and football as well as Ravilious’ section on tennis. Meanwhile, the German, Italian and Soviet pavilions made clear political statements and the Spanish used art to protest against the rise of fascism by displaying Picasso’s remarkable Guernica. Ravilious was traditionally best

Image 29.3 Percy Shakespeare, The Tennis Player (c.1929) Dudley Museum Service collection. 300

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known for his design work but recent exhibitions have drawn attention to his tennis art while the works of Hatton and Shakespeare remain relatively undiscovered.

French tennis art, 1875–1945 In the 1870s, the popularity of lawn tennis spread swiftly across The Channel, where it may well first have been played on the beaches of Britany and Normandy (Lynch 1883). The first Lawn Tennis Club in Paris was established in 1877 by a group of Englishmen (Gillmeister 1997), with other early clubs established at Le Havre and the Breton coastal resort Dinard, which was popular with British tourists. The renowned French portrait painter, Jacque-Emile Blanche painted what appears to be France’s first iconic tennis picture, his early masterpiece, The Tennis Party (1882), which betrays the influence of Tissot and the fact that he was probably not a tennis player himself. The distant players appear to be warming up rather than actually competing. It is the American Orientalist painter Frederick Arthur Bridgeman, working in Paris, who delightfully captures the atmosphere of a French club in Lawn Tennis Club (1891).16 An enthusiastic player himself, he depicts a realistic game, with relaxed spectators informally seated. The French clubs were predominantly social. Leon de Janze reported that only 300 of the 800 members of the I’Ile de Puteau Sports Society, one of the most exclusive Parisian clubs, could actually play the game (Waser 1996). Certainly, the foreground spectators here seem to have little interest in the tennis. Only recently was the relationship recognised between his large exhibition painting and a smaller related work in an American museum, Lawn Tennis Club, Dinard (1891), which depicts the same male player from a different angle hitting a backhand, but shifts the viewpoint to the group of spectators by the net. While the club’s location was initially unknown, it is now thought that it represents the one at Dinard, one of the oldest in France and popular with British and Americans. The larger canvas was exhibited at the Royal Academy in London in 1892 but did not sell to a private owner until 1899. With the outbreak of World War I, the lives of artists and players were often shattered. The Cubist André L’Hote served on the Western Front and after serious injury was discharged in 1917. His immediate response as he recovered from injury was not a depiction of the trenches, but Tennis Players (1917), a work reflecting the care-free pre-war years of tennis parties.17 L’Hote’s painting and that by Italian metaphysical painter Carlo Carrà, The Metaphysical Muse of the same year, discussed below, are two of the most interesting examples of tennis art. But in some ways, life and tennis went on. The rising star Suzanne Lenglen was able to continue practicing throughout the war, playing at her father’s club in Nice, and officers and Red Cross canteen workers played tennis matches during breaks in fighting (Sumner 2011).The Riviera continued as a lawn tennis haven throughout the hostilities (Lake 2015; Wilson 2014). After the War, the tournaments at Cannes and Monte Carlo recommenced. With her fashion sense, calf-length skirts and trademark bandeau, Lenglen began an outstanding winning run from 1919, capturing the Wimbledon trophy at her first attempt. She was the first female international tennis star and was regularly photographed on and off court, once commenting: ‘Tennis offers unlimited opportunities for the visual experience of beauty’ (Tinling 1983, p.16). Her admirers included the young English artist Christopher Wood, who visited Paris in 1921 and enjoyed the World Hard Court Championships. The highlight was watching Lenglen who ‘played brilliantly… she is a wonderful girl and one can only scarcely believe she is only twentytwo’ (Sumner 2011, p.101). His privately owned Tennis Players was painted a few years later (c.1926), when he was on the French Riviera, and might represent Lenglen and her great American rival Helen Wills (later, 301

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after her marriage,Wills Moody), who played a famous exhibition match in Cannes that year. In Wood’s work, two serene figures are seen changing ends, with one seated and the other poised to return to play; the dark-haired figure is remarkably close to Lenglen in features. The Riviera had long been famous for its winter tournaments and this exhibition match increased its popularity for players, spectators and visiting artists alike (Wilson 2014). John Lavery, by now the elder statesman of Irish art, was on the French Riviera in 1929. He painted two images of tournaments held at the Hotel du Beau Site in Cannes. His step-daughter Alice Trudeau was playing in the Cannes Handicap and is the server in Tennis under the Orange Trees, Cannes (1929).18 While French artists and those visiting the country reflected the game’s popularity, and tennis inspired numerous illustrators, fewer works were executed by women artists compared to Britain during this period.

German tennis art, 1875–1945 Tennis scenes as genre paintings do not seem to have attracted such a breadth of artistic response in Germany.Yet the game was immediately popular in the country, initially imported by wealthy British tourists to the spa towns. One of Wingfield’s early box-sets was despatched to Lord Petersham at the Royal Victoria Hotel in Bad Homburg, in 1874, a popular resort with the European aristocracy. A club was founded and the famous Bad Homberg tournament was established (Gillmeister 1997). Fritz Gehrke captured the social atmosphere and distinctive ball boys with their red and blue caps in his Lawn Tennis in Bad Homberg (1895). It was Max Liebermann, the German-Jewish Impressionist painter and printmaker, who was the first German artist to fully explore tennis as a subject, not in Germany but in the Scheveningen region of the Netherlands. He observed how the bourgeoisie spent their leisure time, and produced a series of paintings from 1901–2 including Tennis Players by the Sea (1901), in which young men and women are seen on court, enjoying a popular holiday pursuit.19 In the 1920s, tennis grew in popularity and became a feature of Weimar culture with the fashionable Rot Weiss club in Berlin as the sport’s headquarters, rather than the spa towns (Wilson 2014). During this period, two of Germany’s greatest tennis paintings were executed, which have been critically overlooked. Anton Raderscheidt experimented as part of the Dada group and in the 1920s produced a series of works of nudes in action – on the bar, at the trapeze, on the tightrope – none of which has survived.They were either seized by the Nazis as degenerate art during the 1930s or lost in Allied bombing raids during World War II. However, his Nude Tennis Player (1926) survived, and depicts a powerful young woman on court with a racket, her body treated in a sculptural fashion. A distant male figure, wearing a full suit, is separated from her by the court netting. Raderscheidt painted a series of stiffly posed isolated images of a couple, clearly depicting himself and his then wife, artist Marta Hegemann, from whom he would separate in 1933. This painting is part of that series, charting the breakdown of their relationship. The strange tension in this work appears to be influenced by Italian Metaphysical painters (Stremmel 2004). As life for artists became more difficult in Germany, Raderscheidt fled Berlin in 1936 and settled in Paris, where his art changed direction and his earlier work, such as this unique piece, was forgotten. The second striking example of inter-war German tennis art is Tennis Player by Lotte Laserstein (1929). This is a sophisticated, complex development of the traditional female figure with a racket, seated. A pioneer artist of the Weimar Republic, she often painted women in urban settings or involved in popular pastimes, epitomising the “Neue Frau” or “New Woman” era, then a haven of tolerance. Tennis Player is typical of this and shows a young woman, possibly the artist herself, in a fashionable striped dress, twisting around to watch the tennis game behind 302

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her. The scene looks relaxed and carefree but in reality, this was a time of runaway inflation and Laserstein was struggling financially. As a “three quarter Jew” in the 1930s, she was soon excluded from exhibiting in Berlin and by 1937 had re-located to Stockholm, taking with her many of her works. These remained unseen until she was rediscovered in London in the 1980s and her work exhibited.

Italian and Spanish tennis art, 1875–1945 Lawn Tennis arrived in Italy via British tourists visiting the Italian Riviera, who enjoyed all-yearround play, favouring stylish towns like San Marino. The area was particularly popular during the inter-war years with the Italian Riviera Championships being established and flourishing at San Remo. In 1930, Count Alberto Bonacossa initiated the first Italian tennis national championship in Milan, which was won by the American Bill Tilden and Spanish player Lili de Alvarez.The tournament stayed in Milan until 1934 when Mussolini moved it to his Foro Italio building in Rome. The Futurist artist Carlo Carrà served in World War I and, like the French artist L’Hote, suffered at the front. Sanctioned within a psychiatric unit of a military hospital in Ferrara in 1917, Carrà adopted the Metaphysical approach, a development seen by many as a forerunner of Surrealism. Carrà’s work became dream-like with unexpected juxtapositions often using mannequins and incongruous objects, influenced by the Metaphysical poets.The most famous is The Metaphysical Muse (1917) showing a prominent female mannequin wearing a tennis costume, set in an interior of unrelated objects.Two other works feature tennis, The Oval of Apparition (1918), with another mannequin dressed for tennis, a racket and ball in hand.20 A third poignant work entitled The Son of the Builder (1920–1) shows a young boy isolated in a bare cube-like room holding his racket and ball.21 All three works anticipate the Surrealist movement and no doubt reflect the artist’s recovery from the horrors of war (Cohen 2016). Equally impacted by World War I was the innovative Massimo Campigli, who was influenced by Carrà. Surviving as a prisoner of war, he spent the 1920s training as an artist, painting a series of pictures of stylised Etruscan inspired women, including Women Playing Tennis (1943).22 While Italian tennis art was innovative and ground-breaking, Spanish tennis art was more traditional and distinctive in style. Spaniards were slightly less swift to take up the game of lawn tennis, staging their first formalised tournament in Barcelona in 1899. The game remained elitist, played in clubs rather than on public courts. Some striking tennis images were produced such as Carlos Vazquez Ubeda’s Tennis Player (1902), depicting a dark-haired woman reclining confidently in a wicker chair, racket in her lap, with a direct gaze set against a rich floral decorated wall or hanging behind.23 The sitter’s features are close to that of the artist’s wife, who was frequently his model. Jose Villegas Cordero was Director of Madrid’s Museo Del Prado, as well as a portrait painter. In 1905, his first recorded tennis painting was executed, The Tennis Player Pablo Ramos Villegas. The sitter is the artist’s nephew, which is unusual given individual paintings of male players are much rarer than those of women sitters. A further tennis painting A Rest after the Tennis Match (c.1915) develops the theme of the young woman sitting seductively on the bench after play has ended, highlighting that by the early 20th century, gone are the awkward chaperones as in earlier British paintings. Instead this young lady looks confident and relaxed, shading herself from the sun, presumably in a Madrid park. While his Orientalist paintings are in public museums, in Barcelona and Baltimore, his tennis paintings are in private collections and so have remained largely unknown to broader audiences. Spain’s first tennis star, Lili de Alvarez, emerged in the 1920s from an affluent family. She was a three-times Wimbledon runner-up and won the 1930 Italian Championships. Alvarez 303

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was particularly popular in Spain and is also remembered for her pioneering on-court clothing, wearing the first divided tennis skirt (the forerunner of shorts) in 1931 at Wimbledon.That year she also began reporting for Britain’s Daily Mail on the political situation during the Second Spanish Republic and the experiences of women in Spain. A Republican supporter living in Paris at the time, Pablo Picasso was experimenting with sculpture and produced his comically exaggerated Head of a Warrior in 1933 – made of plaster, metal, wood and other random objects – which has bulging tennis-ball eyes and a tumescent nose with a plumed gladiator style headdress.24 The prominent plastered tennis balls are effective visually. Picasso returned briefly to Spain from France in 1934, before the Spanish Civil War erupted in 1936.

American tennis art America’s rich tennis art deserves a specific study of its own. From Otto Henry Bacher’s informal Impressionist depiction of his wife (1891) in the Cleveland Museum of Art, to works in private collections such as Leopold Seyffert’s Portrait of Helen Wills Moody (1930) and John Rutherford Boyd’s jaunty After the Match (c.1925), American artists have made a distinctive contribution. In the mid-20th century, individual portraits of male sitters with rackets such as that by Charles Webster Hawthorne (1924), are more common than in Europe, reflecting the game’s more macho image in America, with the success of male stars like Bill Johnston and Bill Tilden. Born in Philadelphia from Anglo-American “old money”,Tilden was a cultured individual who dominated tennis from 1920–6 (Wilson 2014). It was Tilden who inspired the realist painter George Bellows to create one of the most outstanding examples of tennis art internationally, The Tournament (Tennis at Newport) (c.1919). Bellows wooed his wife Emma over games of tennis, and portrayed them together on court in the early days of their marriage in Tennis Match (Camden, Maine) (1916).25 In 1919, Bellows summered in Middletown, Rhode Island, and travelled to the Newport Casino to watch the annual invitation tournament, which had been cancelled the previous two years due to the war. Bellows sketched the wealthy summer residents while he watched, capturing the relaxed social activity around the court. He developed this into his masterpiece The Tournament (Tennis at Newport) the following year (Haverstock 2007), showing Tilden striding toward the net. Bellows also produced, that same year, a second similar but more relaxed painting, Tennis at Newport, beautifully capturing mixed-doubles play with the long shadows of a late-summer day. Although this painting is housed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the fact that the greatest and most accomplished example of American tennis art, The Tournament (Tennis at Newport), is still in a private collection and has not been lent to recent exhibitions, means that Bellows boxing pictures are better known. Also significant is the art inspired by the Californian Helen Wills Moody, ranked as world number one for much of the 1920s and 1930s and an artist herself. Winner of two Olympic medals and 31 major championships, her game was based on speed and power. She became known as “Little Miss Poker Face” because she controlled her emotions so well on court (New York Times 3 January 1998). Wills Moody became as famous as Lenglen had been in France and a symbol of how Americans perceived their country and values (Wilson 2014). She was also the muse of various artists, inspiring the American sculptor Alexander Calder to create an innovative playful wire piece reflecting her on-court movement, wearing her visor. Sculptor Haig Patigian created a more traditional marble portrait bust entitled Helen of California, 1927, the year of her first Wimbledon success.26 Most famously, she was the inspiration for the vast central figure representing California in the mural Allegory of California for the San Francisco Stock Exchange, 304

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painted by the Mexican muralist Diego Rivera in 1931. Rivera (1960, p.106) later noted in his autobiography ‘California is known abroad mainly because of Helen Wills Moody; she seemed to represent California better than anyone I knew … she was intelligent, young, energetic and beautiful and I found her the best model’.

Post-war tennis art In the immediate post-war era, tennis art is disappointing as artists adjusted their responses to a highly organised, professional and commercialised game, which was arguably less appealing for them. Gradually, more innovative and thoughtful responses emerged, including David Hockney’s truly international “artistic happening”, Tennis (1989), which involved him faxing 144 sheets of A4-size paper from California to be assembled into a collage-piece in a disused Yorkshire mill;27 Tom Philipps’ reflections on his own life through hair-covered tennis balls in The Seven Ages of Man (2010);28 and the Spanish artist Ana Soler’s installation Cause & Effect (2011), involved tennis balls being suspended by nylon thread mid-air, in shot-related arcs.29 Soler explained ‘depending on where and how you hit you get one outcome or another. Life, when seen in its complexity, is like an elaborate map of tangled paths which challenge the human being and its context’ (Parafianowicz 2012, 9 March). Figurative art continued to provide the opportunity for comment on issues around the game’s broader social contexts, from Lois Dodd’s Tennis Anyone? (1999), to Hurvin Anderson’s insightful observation in the Caribbean, Country Club and Chicken Wire (2008). In Dodd’s work, a carefree woman lying on court sunbathes nude, while she awaits the colourful washing to dry on the net – a far cry from the physically restricted female figures who initially struggled to play wearing corsets, hats and heels. Birmingham-born Hurvin Anderson’s Country Club and Chicken Wire (2008) builds on a British tradition of painting an empty tennis court, from Albert Goodwin to Stanley Spencer, while commenting on the sport’s continued social exclusivity.This empty court is surrounded by an exhaustive screen of wire hexagons, which fill and flatten the canvas. Both the fence and tennis court receive equal attention to detail. The surrounding netting acts as a physical barrier to those who cannot afford to play.

Image 29.4 Hurvin Anderson Country Club and Chicken Wire (2008) Private collection. © Hurvin Anderson. All rights reserved, DACS 2018. © 2017 Christie’s Images Limited. 305

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Image 29.5 Vicente do Rêgo Monteiro Tennis (1928) Swindon Museum and Art Gallery.

Concluding thoughts This survey of international tennis art has confirmed the inspiration that the game gave wide-ranging artists over a 70-year period. Artists continue to be drawn to the aesthetics of on-court movement, increasingly producing more reflective works, with the tennis ball itself taking centre stage. Since the Court on Canvas exhibition in Birmingham in 2011, there has been an increased interest in tennis art, but there are still numerous under-appreciated international tennis paintings in public collections today. One example is the Brazilian Vicente do Rêgo Monteiro’s Tennis (1928), held in Swindon Art Gallery. While many artworks are still owned by private individuals, they remain little known to the public and, until recently, there has been a lack of understanding of the significance of tennis paintings and the light they shed on the sport’s developing social contexts. These artworks reflect the changing cultural and social attitudes to tennis across national boundaries and, as the careers of artists who painted them are researched and reflected upon, their responses to tennis are exposed. Although recent articles in Britain in the Spectator and The Times have discussed the appeal of tennis art, it would appear that it is the earliest depictions such as Lavery’s The Tennis Party (1885) that are still the most popular today.

Notes 1 Location: Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Museum (WLTM) 2 Private collection, from here on: PC 3 Location: Gemeente Museum, The Hague 4 Location: WLTM 5 PC 6 Location: Southampton Art Gallery 306

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7 PC 8 Location: WLTM 9 PC 10 Location: Hereford Museum & Art Gallery 11 PC 12 PC 13 PC 14 Location: Mercer Art Gallery, Harrogate 15 Location: Bristol Museum & Art Gallery 16 Sale record: Sothebys 8 November 2012, New York, Lot 11. 17 Location: WLTM 18 PC 19 Location: Museum Kunst der Westküste, Alkersum, 20 Location: National Museum of Modern Art, Rome. 21 Location: PC 22 Location:Vatican Religious Art Museum, Rome 23 PC 24 Location: Museum of Modern Art, New York 25 Location: Hillstrom Museum of Art, Gustavus Adolphus College, Minnesota 26 Location: Legion of Honour Fine Art Museum, San Francisco 27 Location: 1853 Gallery, Salts Mill, Saltaire. 28 PC 29 Location: Mustang Art Gallery, Alicante (installation 2011)

References Anderson G.N. (1996) The Pursuit of Leisure:Victorian Depictions of Pastimes. Nottingham: Lund Humphries. Clerici, G. (1976) Tennis. London: Octopus Books. Cohen, E. (2016) Carlo Carrà: Metaphysical Spaces. London: Blain Southern. Dunn, D. (2017, 8 July) How Artists from Ravilious to Rauschenberg Fell for Tennis. Spectator. Available at: https​://ww​w.spe​ctato​r.co.​uk/20​17/07​/how-​artis​ts-fr​om-ra​vilio​us-to​-raus​chenb​erg-f​ell-f​or-te​nnis/​ Elks, S.J. (2004) From Whalebone to Lycra: A Fashion Journey Through Midlands Lawn Tennis. Birmingham: Susan J. Elks. Fowle, F. (2005) Patterns of Taste: Scottish Collectors and the Making of Cultural Identity in the Late Nineteenth Century. In Cullen, F. (eds.), A Shared Legacy: Essays on Irish and Scottish Art and Visual culture (pp.173–90), London: Ashgate. Gillmeister, H. (1997) Tennis: A Cultural History. London: Leicester University Press. Haverstock M.S. (2007) George Bellows: An Artist in Action. London: Merrell. Holland, R. (2011) The Origins of Lawn Tennis. In Sumner, A.B. & Smith, G. (eds), Court on Canvas:Tennis in Art (pp.35–45), London: Philip Wilson. Lake, R.J. (2015) A Social History of Tennis in Britain. Abingdon: Routledge. Lynch, A. (1883) Tennis on the Normandy Coast (lithograph). Paris: Bibliotheque des Arts Decoratifs. McConkey, K. (2011) Tennis Parties. In Sumner, A.B. & Smith, G. (eds.), Court on Canvas: Tennis in Art (pp.47–81), London: Philip Wilson. Parafianowicz, L. (2012, 9 March) Cause & Effect Instillation. Frame. Available at: https​://ww​w.fra​meweb​ .com/​news/​cause​-and-​effec​t-ins​talla​tion (accessed July 2017) Paterson, M. (2008) Life in Victorian Britain. London: Constable & Robinson. Rivera, D. (1960) My Art, My Life: An Autobiography. New York: The Citadel Press. Stevenson, H. (2010) Modern Life. In Billcliffe, R. (ed.) Pioneering Painters: The Glasgow Boys (pp.76–87), Glasgow: Glasgow Museums Publishing. Stremmel, K. (2004). Realism. Cologne: Taschen. Sumner, A.B. (2011) The Changing Face of Lawn Tennis in Britain. In Sumner, A.B. & Smith, G. (eds.), Court on Canvas:Tennis in Art (pp.11–33), London: Philip Wilson. Tinling, T. (1983) Tinling: Sixty Years in Tennis. London: Sidgwick & Jackson. Waser, A.M. (1996) Tennis in France, 1880–1930, International Journal of the History of Sport, 13(2), 166–76. Wilcox, T. (2006) A Day in the Sun: Outdoor Pursuits in Art in the 1920s. Nottingham: Lund Humphries. Wilson, E. (2014) Love Game:A History of Tennis, from Victorian Pastime to Global Phenomenon. London: Profile Books. 307

30 Tennis and the media A history of shifting attitudes toward tennis journalism and broadcasting Robert J. Lake and Simon J. Eaves

In the late Victorian era, magazines and newspapers were the primary means through which information about lawn tennis was disseminated. First published in 1853, The Field occupied a primary position in Britain as an informative periodical aimed at upper-/upper-middleclass field-sport enthusiasts. The Field took an active interest in lawn tennis as a new sport from March 1874, entertaining debates and discussions about: the shape of the court, the advantages/disadvantages of different types of balls (e.g. cloth-covered vs. non-cloth-covered), the legality and sportsmanship of the volley and hard serving and the question of handicapping. Thus, The Field played an important role in the standardization of rules for lawn tennis, helping to advertise a gathering at the Marylebone Cricket Club in 1875 to test out various versions, before notifying its readers of the results (Lake 2015). Ultimately, Major Wingfield’s original rules were adopted, much to the inventor’s satisfaction, but two years later, the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club (AELTCC) devised an entirely new set of rules, led by Henry “Cavendish” Jones, Julian Marshall and C.G. Heathcote, for its inaugural Wimbledon Championships in 1877.1 Editor of The Field, J.H. Walsh, donated the trophy for the Gentleman’s singles event. After launching in 1883, and as an outcome of the sport’s growing popularity among Britain’s wealthy classes, Pastime emerged as the sport’s leading periodical. While it devoted content space to numerous sports, including football, athletics and rowing, lawn tennis came to feature most centrally. While not particularly glossy or aesthetically appealing, the magazine aimed to be interesting and relevant. However, there was growing competition. While Pastime continued to cover lawn tennis issues, The Lawn Tennis Magazine, purely for the tennis enthusiast, edited by R.N. Jackson, emerged in June 1885. It was short-lived, running only two issues, before being superseded 11 months later by the more comprehensive Lawn Tennis, which was edited by Julian Marshall of the All England Lawn Tennis Club (AELTC). Hitherto, the AELTC were the sole arbiters of the game, but their position had become untenable (Lake 2015). The first debate in these periodicals was about the feasibility of establishing an independent association to serve the general interests of players, club members and officials. Pastime reported the opinions of several correspondents who demanded the AELTC relinquish their control. Ultimately, the Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) formed in 1888 and one 308

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of its key founding members was Harry S. Scrivener, a writer for the Morning Post, who also worked as a Wimbledon referee for some years. Key figures in the press, therefore, played important roles in the sport’s incipient growth.This chapter aims to demonstrate the media’s role within critical issues influencing its development, chiefly in Britain but in the context of the sport’s global expansion, and to examine the developing relationship between tennis authorities and the chief institutions within sports media, specifically journalism and broadcasting.

Early reporting of lawn tennis Early lawn tennis reporting, as found in newspapers and magazines, was fairly bland with little dramatization. For the descriptions of play in Wimbledon’s first round in 1877, only a simple list of scores was given. For the second round and beyond, descriptions were noticeably livelier as writers commented upon players’ abilities and tactics (Gray 1974). Lawn tennis was still developing its own character and culture, and the press were contributing to it. In the 1880s and 1890s, Gray (1974) reported that The Field was particularly descriptive, in comparison to the London newspapers. Gray noted the Daily Telegraph’s coverage of Wimbledon of 1889, which went down as William Renshaw’s last and most exciting Championship, yet the extent of public interest was not matched by the journalistic style. The tone was conservative and lacked emotion and flamboyance, reinforcing perceptions of British national character more broadly.Yet, despite the rather staid style of the early writers, some were innovators. J.M. Heathcote, writing in 1890, was amongst the first to record, analyse and present game statistics, as part of his report of the Renshaw-versus-Lawford Championship match of 1883. Over the next few decades, tennis statistics would become an integral part of match reports, published throughout the world (Eaves 2015). Lawn tennis was rapidly developing a following, and was a simple and digestible sport for reporting, given its “gladiatorial”, one-on-one element. Indeed, the conflict between personalities and strategies made for most interest, especially when they were imbued with hidden elements of class ideals, amateurism, national identity and gender, the earliest example being the competition between brothers William and Ernest Renshaw and Herbert Lawford in the late 1880s. While the Renshaws played with effortless grace and refined manners befitting upperclass English gentlemen, Lawford played in a “manlier” style, with more brute force and aggression; he was effective in practice [but] theoretically incorrect. … [His] strokes, though powerful, are without that grace and delicacy which are among the chief attractions of the game; and whose execution is diametrically opposed to that which is generally accepted as correct. Taking a clear side on the argument, Pastime (13 July 1887, p.126) concluded: ‘[His] powerful hitting … detracts much from the game as a spectacle’. American James Dwight, writing in Scribner’s Magazine (August 1889, p.132) was equally dismissive of Lawford’s approach, perhaps disingenuously suggesting: ‘He may be said to play but four strokes’ and his style ‘is awkward and uncouth almost beyond conception… [nevertheless, he] is a wonderful example of what patience and hard work can achieve when there is no natural facility for the game’. During this early period, lawn tennis reporting reflected key elements of British imperialism. The conservative approach to reporting was indicative of Fleet Street more generally, with the audience assumed to be uniformly “gentlemen”, and this implied a certain class, gender and race. Indeed, tennis features only found their way into the magazines aimed at the landed classes, such 309

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as The Field and Esquire, while The Times and Daily Telegraph led the newspaper reporting. The expected place of women in lawn tennis was also expressed in The Field (25 July 1874), when they urged gentlemen to ‘serve easy balls’ to ladies, play ‘near to [them] as far as possible’, and allow them to ‘serve from [a] crease’, five yards from the net. They also recommended: ‘a lady should be allowed to refuse as many services as she likes’ (The Field 8 August 1874). The features and content also naturally assumed white (British) supremacy, as reflected in the unproblematic way that Pastime reported the following notice in 1884 (20 August, p.122) regarding a proposed change to a Devonshire tournament: They intend posting a notice at Exmouth, “No niggers allowed”. One of these peripatetic minstrels turned up there and joined in chorus with the clear and well-toned voice, cultivated at sea. … The umpire strongly objected, and flatly refused to proceed with the scoring until the “ebonite gentleman” was removed. Descriptions of British play were also seen to reflect supposedly “national” characteristics, seen most clearly in comparison with the US. A Lawn Tennis & Badminton (LT&B) correspondent remarked, for example, in 1906: ‘The Americans are all for business and for getting the set over’; they play with ‘no grace and no finesse, only business-like hard hitting, and hurry’. By contrast, ‘Englishmen will generally try to do a stroke gracefully’ (18 July 1906, p.260). From the 1890s onwards, the approach, style and quality of observation changed noticeably (Gray, 1974). Prose became more passionate and authoritative, as lawn tennis found a space between cricket and racing to grab the public’s attention.The emergence of star figures, especially the brothers Reginald and Laurence Doherty, was essential to enhancing the sport’s more general popularity from the mid-/late 1890s onwards, when it began to attract more attention through the inception of international challenge matches.The emergence of competition between British and American players, ostensibly fostered by two tours, in 1895 and 1897,‘bolstered the Americans and reinforced a growing belief of equality on the lawn courts’. (Eaves & Lake 2016, p.1976). In particular, the 1897 visit of the “Britishers”, which was widely covered in the American newspapers and magazines, had facilitated stronger and deeper Anglo-American relations, which undoubtedly laid the foundations for the Davis Cup commencing in 1900 (Eaves & Lake 2018). “Professional” tennis writers continued to discuss critical issues related to tennis governance, often taking a provocative stance against the prevailing tennis authorities. A. Wallis Myers was the leading British tennis journalist of this period and became a key figure within many aspects of the media and in numerous outside matters. He was The Field’s tennis editor for 20 years, and wrote some key early texts about the game, notably: Lawn Tennis at Home and Abroad (1903) and The Complete Lawn Tennis Player (1908), which ran to five editions. He became the Daily Telegraph’s lawn tennis correspondent in 1908 and, during the inter-war period, a central figure within the LTA Council. Other leading tennis journalists included Harry S. Scrivener and Sir Basil Liddell Hart, the lawn tennis correspondent for the Manchester Guardian. Alongside these “career” journalists, many former players “took up the pen”. F.W. Payn, arguably a second-rate player, wrote extensively in magazines, often corresponding with the editor, and authored several lawn tennis books. Likewise, P.A.Vaile, a lawyer by trade, wrote widely but often critical and sometimes acerbic commentary on the game’s ruling authorities. These writers worked outside of the LTA’s control, and so freely voiced their dissatisfaction of its governance and management. In 1903, Myers openly criticized the LTA’s apparent inertia on player development, lamenting a lack of proper teaching in public schools and the reluctance of wealthy clubs to employ tennis coaching-professionals. Payn concurred, launching a vitriolic attack on the LTA in 1906. He suggested the association was merely for the benefit of the few, 310

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and that they did little to encourage the game outside of London. He bemoaned the lack of English talent, and suggested the LTA was little more than an “opera bouffe” (Lake & Eaves 2017). Indeed, the LTA were placed often in an uncomfortable position by journalists, but were aware of their importance in developing and publicizing the sport. There was constant tension between the competing philosophies of keeping the press “at arms-length” or “keeping the enemy close” by inviting some journalists into the inner sanctum.

Inter-war antagonism between tennis officials and the press During the inter-war period, despite Myers and other journalists occupying influential positions within British tennis officialdom, several authors spoke of poor relations between the press and tennis officialdom. The roots likely lay in the LTA’s and AELTC’s ignorance of the press in terms of how their work benefited the sport, alongside emerging debates about the continued saliency of amateurism. Descriptions of the activities of the British tennis press – the leading figures of which were Peter Wilson (Daily Mirror), Lance Tingay (Daily Telegraph) and Roy McKelvie (Sunday Express) – gives an indication of a laid-back set-up. According to McKelvie (1981, 2 July): [They were an] easy-going, fairly satisfied bunch of people under no great pressure who, provided they could get a cup of tea, were content to record the affairs of the [Wimbledon] Centre and No.1 courts and blow the rest unless something startling was happening elsewhere in the stadium. They were housed in one small room with a hatchway for tea and buns. … [They] did not take life very seriously. … The newspapers reported the matches without frills. Only if Fred Perry and Dorothy Round won the titles, as they did in the thirties, were the front pages of the national newspapers interested. Wimbledon became the key if not only British tournament to generate interest for journalists from the major papers. During the inter-war period, the number of tennis periodicals and magazines, alongside national newspapers that covered the sport, increased notably (Huggins & Williams 2005). This reflected not only greater public interest and a broadening playing demographic, but also a shift in the type of coverage toward greater sensationalism and the construction of “spectacle” – a focus on fashion, tennis culture and human-interest stories – in the light of emerging tennis celebrities – e.g. Suzanne Lenglen and Bill Tilden – and the sport’s growing public appeal (Bingham 2004). The culture of sports reporting continued to develop, as sales of daily morning newspapers grew by 80 percent, and most papers increased their sports sections and aimed to make their content more interesting and profit-generating (Huggins & Williams 2005). According to Huggins and Williams (2005, p.27), the press remained ‘a force for conservatism in sport. There was little investigative journalism and little call for administrative reform in sport’. Only around issues related to upholding amateurism did the tennis press seem to engage in critical discussion. In 1906, AELTC secretary and LTA Councilor Archdale Palmer was forced to resign from both positions because his work as an executive for Slazenger’s – the official ball supplier to the Championships – represented a conflict of interest and potential threat to amateur tennis (Simpson & Barty King 2002). P.A.Vaile parodied the situation in the Observer (7 October 1905, p.139) before the LTA AGM in which he stepped down: We have a mental picture of Mr Archdale Palmer, as secretary of the All-England Tennis Club, writing to Mr Archdale Palmer, as Manager of Messrs Slazenger and Sons complaining of oversized balls. Mr Archdale Palmer, as Manager of Messrs Slazenger and Sons, replies 311

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to Mr Archdale Palmer, as secretary of the All-England Tennis Club, that the balls were all right, but the weather had affected them. In the inter-war period, when amateur ideals were being challenged by practices reflecting both the commercialization and professionalization of tennis, the emergence of cases of amateur players working as journalists, sometimes even covering tournaments they themselves were competing in, invited critical questioning of their loyalties. Unsurprisingly, a declining relationship between tennis officials and the press was evident in the midst of some high-profile cases, when the former instituted several key policy directives and regulation-change proposals. Most notable were cases involving the American Bill Tilden. Of all the male inter-war players,Tilden was the most dominant and high-profile. He actively pursued the limelight and embraced new commercial and media opportunities presented to him, which often brought sanctions and threats of suspension against him. Three times from 1923 to 1925, the United States Lawn Tennis Association (USLTA) proposed to suspend him for allegedly attempting to profit from his fame, by producing instructional films and for writing newspaper articles and giving press interviews for tournaments he was playing in (Deford 2004). For Tilden, prohibitions against players reporting on tennis tournaments were illogical, as they countered the standard advice given to players seeking financial support for their tennis endeavors, i.e. that they should find flexible employment that allows extended breaks for travel abroad. Moreover,Tilden was fully trained and qualified as a journalist.While these specific threats never materialized, in later years his outspokenness against the USLTA was less easily forgiven. Not oblivious to these developments, the British were anxious to avoid problems related to the amateur status of players-cum-journalists, and so sought to restrict press contributions from them. However, Suzanne Lenglen’s move to sign a professional contract in late-1926 shifted the landscape markedly. As the first star player to “turn professional”, her status alone represented a threat to amateur tennis. The LTA voiced concerns that restrictions on press contributions from amateurs might open the door for professionals to dominate the tennis press. LTA stalwart, Colonel Kingscote, feared the lowering of journalistic standards and also the corruption of article content: ‘You will get professionals laying down the ethics of the game … describing the Championships in the manner in which they can get the most money and in the way in which it suits them to do it’ (LT&B 18 December 1926, p.926). A. Wallis Myers firmly objected. An astute observer of global developments in tennis, Myers became a key outspoken critic of the LTA, despite occupying a Council seat. Always progressive, he urged the LTA to recognize the difficulties for players to train full-time and remain amateur; for many, journalism offered one of the few opportunities to do so. Moreover, he actively rejected the creeping stigmatization of players-cum-journalists, writing in LT&B (11 December 1926, p.902) just before the AGM: A professional journalist considers himself just as true an amateur as the professional barrister or professional stockbroker; indeed, through his profession, he may have a greater opportunity of inculcating the principles of amateurism. If the professional journalist be a true amateur, then he must, like all other amateurs, be entitled to the full privileges of amateurism. Highlighting an implicit contradiction, Myers then asked whether the LTA felt ‘justified’ in pocketing £14,000 from the 1924 and 1925 Championships, whilst seeking ‘to deprive the large outside public … of the interest and education which it derives from reading comments on Wimbledon written by players?’ (LT&B 18 December 1926, p.926). 312

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Back in the US, after further allegations were made against Tilden in 1928, for writing articles in the San Francisco Chronicle and New York World about the Wimbledon Championships that he was competing in, the USLTA suspended him from the upcoming Davis Cup Challenge Round match against arch-rivals France. Support from the Fédération Française du Tennis (FFT) president, the LTA, leading players, officials and (possibly) even US President Calvin Coolidge forced the USLTA to backpedal. Tilden was reinstated and won the only rubber in a 4-1 defeat. Upon returning to the US, however, he was immediately (re)suspended and consequently missed his own National Championships. Through his actions and the furor it engendered, Tilden shook the foundations of amateur hegemony and helped alter the balance of power between players and officials (Tinling 1983). Indeed, the USLTA took some heat over their handling of Tilden’s actions. LT&B (1 September 1928, p.614) remarked: ‘This is not a fair and proper way to treat any man, and evinces a vacillation which cannot but do harm to any constitutional authority’. Nevertheless, even after Tilden turned professional in 1930 and the USLTA was able to “wash their hands” of him, relations between tennis officials and the press continued to suffer from mutual mistrust (Gray 1974).The press’s reputation was questioned at the 1931 LTA AGM as the shameful practice of “ghosting” was discussed, and journalists who also represented the LTA were labelled “irresponsible”, with a vote cast to decide whether they should be allowed to continue representing both sides. H.H. Monckton, former LTA President, asked: How is a man who is on the public press going to differentiate between his duty as a Councillor and his duty to his paper, if he comes to a meeting where information is given to him which perhaps the chairman of the meeting does not intend should be broadcasted? (LT&B 19 December 1931, p.1014) Again, Myers defended the journalists’ professional integrity, reminding the Council of other writers who previously had rendered great service to amateur tennis, including J.H. Walsh and H.S. Scrivener. Sensing that journalists were being made the “scapegoat” for the sport’s recent turn toward professionalism, Tilden was introduced as a professional player and writer who actively defended amateur interests (Lake 2015, p.141). These supportive statements and an earlier apology by the LTA Chairman of his apparent ‘ignorance of Fleet Street’ tipped the balance and the motion was defeated by a single vote (LT&B 19 December 1931, p.1014). Still, the divided opinion regarding the apparent integrity of players-cum-journalists remained for some time. The AELTC also played an important role in the inter-war power struggle between the press and tennis officialdom. While its new ground in 1922 boasted 150 places for journalists on Centre Court, a press room, good telephone facilities and access to dressing rooms for interviews, Gray (1974, p.178) reported that until some years after the Second World War, ‘relations between the Club and the Press were distant, even to the point of frigidity’. Roy McKelvie (1981, 2 July) echoed there was ‘little or no liaison’, writing of Wimbledon when he joined in 1934: The flow or dissemination of information about what was going on to both public and Press was of the barest. There was almost a total lack of communication even within the Wimbledon organisation; a state of affairs that persisted for a very long time. (McKelvie 1984, 3 July) This kind of arms-length relationship was indicative of an amateur approach to a professional entity upon which it relied. 313

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Many if not most of the established tennis officials represented traditional Edwardian values, but the inter-war period saw numerous developments in media and broadcasting that dramatically altered the world around them in profound ways. Not only were newspapers and magazines writing more sensationalist articles and challenging authority, but also the advent of public radio broadcasting added another dynamic that might have unsettled the purists. The arrival of the BBC in 1922 was of immense impact, particularly to the coverage of Wimbledon, as Sir John Reith, 1st Director-General from 1927 to 1938, included the Championships within ‘a range of sporting events … deemed to be of national significance’ (Holt 1989, p.312). Formal relations commenced in 1927, when the BBC approached the AELTC with a view to broadcasting ‘portions of some of the important championship matches’ (letter from Gerald Cock to Cdr G.W. Hillyard, 18 February 1927). Keen to retain control, the AELTC agreed in principle, but on the condition they could ‘terminate’ the agreement with just twelve hours notice in case of ‘any complaints or other inconvenience’ (letter from the AELTC Committee to Gerald Cock, 6 April 1927). Ultimately, the AELTC considered its first broadcast in 1928 ‘of real value’, and agreed to broadcasting every day of the Championships, averaging 1.5 to two hours per day in 1929 (Robertson 1974, p.185). By 1934,Wimbledon was also negotiating overseas broadcasting rights. BBC television commenced broadcasting Wimbledon in 1937. Cock, then the BBC’s Director of Television, approached AELTC Secretary, Major Larcombe, to gauge interest, but given the technology was untried he could not guarantee success. In a memo circulated through Alexandra Palace, Cock’s excitement at the historical ‘great experiment’ is palpable: ‘For the first time anywhere in the world then television will bring into viewers’ homes pictures of outstanding international events at the exact moment they are taking place’ (‘Announcement for Wimbledon’, memo from Gerald Cock, 21 June 1937). Given its experimental nature, the AELTC did not charge the BBC in its first two years of broadcasting. In 1938, there had only been about 2,000 television sets sold in Britain, compared to eight million radio licenses, and a survey in 1939 revealed that 34 percent of the general population listened to Wimbledon on the radio. It was not until after the war when television’s value as a form of broadcasting was recognized; in the late 1950s it overtook radio to become the key focus of coverage. Reflecting later on the BBC’s relationship with Wimbledon, Seymour Joly de Lotbiniére, Head of Outside Broadcasts from 1935 to 1952, assumed their ‘generous’ nature was ‘the deliberate policy of an amateur sport towards a “public service”’ (cited in Briggs 1979, p.859). The fact that both institutions represented upper-middle-class interests in their conservative approaches and were similarly southern-centric, paternalist and elitist likely worked as an adhesive bonding them together.

Post-war relations between the press and tennis officialdom While the approach to media and broadcasting during the inter-war period was fairly leisurely, following the war the ‘more populist and sensationalist approaches of American sports reporting’ spread to Britain (Lake 2015, p.135).The Wimbledon Championships committee, led by its new Secretary Colonel Duncan Macauley, increasingly appreciated the importance of good public relations. The forward-thinking Macauley recognized that the press and public were now fascinated by the activities and personalities of the leading players, and so supported the formation of a Club Press committee. Televised interviews with players were introduced in 1946, when Alice Marble quizzed both Yvon Petra and Pauline Betz respectively after winning the singles titles. In 1951, the Lawn Tennis Writers’ Association (LTWA) formed, which helped the press gain greater credibility among tennis officials who had previously regarded their activities 314

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with suspicion. Regular meetings were soon held between the LTWA and the Championships committee throughout the year alongside daily meetings during Wimbledon, which markedly improved mutual understanding. McKelvie (1981, 2 July) remarked of the renewed relationship as ‘close and friendly, though the Press maintain their independence of mind and opinion’. Between 1966 and 1973, the press writing rooms and restaurant at the AELTC were doubled in size and new rooms for television and interviewing were built, which was partly to keep Wimbledon ahead of its grand-slam rivals (Gray 1974, p.178). The committee realized: a considerable part of the success of the Championships is owed to the Press not just during the two weeks of play but throughout the year.Wimbledon is a word, a name, that crops up in newspapers world-wide hundreds of times during the year. (McKelvie 1981, 2 July) Tennis boomed worldwide in the 1970s, and some of the leading British papers began to employ full-time tennis writers, for example John Parsons (Daily Telegraph). Magazine production also increased noticeably, and while the longstanding LT&B ceased production in 1967 because it had apparently fallen behind in terms of modern layout and format, the void of an LTA-affiliated magazine was soon filled by British Lawn Tennis, edited by C.M. Jones (Gray 1974). Independent magazines also took off, led by World Tennis, begun in 1952 and edited by Gladys Heldman, which was argued to be ‘the game’s first modern magazine, aggressively informative and opinionated, full of large advertisements and good photographs’ (Gray 1974, p.179). It became the standard-bearer for magazines involved in social-political movements, playing a key role in campaigns for “open tennis” and, most notably, the establishment of an independent women’s tour to counter the ILTF tour’s sexist prize-money differentials. Heldman secured sponsorship from the tobacco corporation Philip Morris to use its brand Virginia Slims as the tour’s title sponsor (Lichtenstein 1974). World Tennis and other independent magazines fiercely backed the movement and galvanized the general public, which allowed these feminist advances – which also included Billie Jean King’s famous victory in the “Battle of the Sexes” in 1973 – to profoundly affect wider society, transcending tennis. Equivalent magazines in Britain (Tennis Pictorial Illustrated; Tennis World), Spain (Inter Tenis), France (Tennis de France) and Italy (Tennis Club) followed its lead. Latterly, Tennis Club was founded to officially oppose the Italian Federation’s refusal to accept open tennis, while Tennis de France, founded in 1953 by Philippe Chatrier, was so successful in galvanizing French support for open tennis and expansionist policies that the organization itself took control of the FFT in 1969 and Chatrier became its President in 1972. That the emergence of a worldwide independent tennis press was intimately connected with the broader professionalization, commercialization and globalization of tennis is undoubted. As the edifice of amateurism crumbled in the advent of open tennis in 1968, the press and media played crucial roles, especially in the US. Allison Danzig (New York Times) and Al Laney (New York Herald Tribune) led American tennis journalism during the inter-war and early post-war periods, but both retired in the 1960s. They were replaced – in stature alone – by Bud Collins (Boston Globe), who was the only American writer covering tournaments other than Wimbledon. Indeed, despite the American tennis boom of the 1960s/1970s, tennis journalism did not comprehensively improve, as most tennis reporting continued to come from part-time columnists and football writers (Gray 1974). What the boom facilitated, however, was an expansion in magazine coverage, allowing sponsors to offer financial support. 315

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Television broadcasting and cultural shifts in tennis At the AELTC, under Macauley’s progressive stewardship, television coverage was (albeit begrudgingly) accepted. The BBC worked to improve the quality of their images, and by 1948, Wimbledon reported a television audience of 200,000. At this stage, LTA President Viscount Templewood urged caution so that tennis was not ‘exploited for money by outside organisations and individuals’; all British sports governing bodies were advised to ‘act together’, and to ensure amateur ideals were maintained as the LTA added a new clause to its constitution ‘to control, sanction and where necessary promote television in all aspects’ (LT&B 15 December 1950, p.719). In the 1950s, televised tennis events included Davis Cup ties, pre-Wimbledon tournaments like Queen’s, professional events at Wembley and the Junior Championships (Maskell 1974). The LTA’s income from television, though modest – just £513 in 1958, for example (equivalent to just under £12,000 in 2018) – heightened fears of television’s ‘adverse effect’ on tournament ‘gates’ (LT&B 1 January 1959, p.10). When the final rounds of the 1958 Covered Court Championships at Queen’s Club were arranged ‘to suit the requirements of television’, there were ‘mixed feelings’ expressed among the press and players. LT&B (1 April 1958, p.156) remarked: ‘The gearing of a tournament to the needs of television rather than to the players was a distinct shift in the amateur administration of tournaments’. They opined: ‘the value of television in the further popularization of lawn tennis cannot be gainsaid. … Nor, of course, can the financial benefits be overlooked’. As the relative price of television sets decreased and public ownership increased – up to 95 percent in 1970 (Bédarida 1979) – television had an increasingly profound impact on British sports programming; changes in the presentation, organization, finance, competitive structure and rules of tennis occurred during this period (Whannel 1992). As BBC2 launched in 1964, programming space increased considerably to extend Wimbledon coverage to ten hours a day.2 Color television arrived three years later, with Wimbledon tennis being BBC2’s first ever color broadcast, and the first in Europe. Buoyed by a successful BBC2televised professional event held at the AELTC after Wimbledon in 1967, which was said to have attracted even more enthusiasm than the Championships, AELTC officials were confident that open tennis was viable, and so decided to defy ILTF regulations by agreeing to open its 1968 Championships to amateurs and professionals. Certainly, the recognized commercial potential of selling television rights was a key factor that influenced the Wimbledon committee to take this monumental step (Evans 1993; Wind 1979). They were proved right, as, over the following decades, gross profits, drew mostly from selling television rights, grew exponentially, from £58,000 in 1973, to £1 million in 1981, and up to £30 million in 1997. These profits were, and still are, passed on to the LTA to develop British tennis. Throughout this period, the televised marketing of Wimbledon’s brand became increasingly important. During the tenure of A.P. “Slim” Wilkinson, Wimbledon’s BBC executive producer from 1965 to 1978, the BBC televised more of Wimbledon’s environment and fashions (Maskell 1974). Dan Maskell (cited in McKelvie 1983, 21 June) wrote: ‘Producers are now [in 1983] more au fait with the whole scene as a sporting contest; its environment and news value. They like more details about the players and a wider picture of the game. There is greater emphasis on presentation’. There were, naturally, differences between British and American approaches, epitomized in commentary styles. McKelvie (1983, 21 June) contended that the American approach assumes the audience is largely ignorant of the finer points and likes ‘total personal involvement’; American commentators, like Bud Collins, are ‘non-stop chatterers; the British are more reserved and restrained’. Maskell epitomized this style throughout his 40-year commentating career, reflecting in his autobiography that good commentary sometimes meant saying 316

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nothing and letting the action speak for itself (Maskell 1988). Regardless of style differences, the aura of Wimbledon was entrenched within its global commodity value. Geoff Mason, the NBC producer for Wimbledon in 1980 remarked: ‘We make a great effort to show the viewers that Wimbledon is something special. We want atmosphere – strawberries and cream, some champagne, the ivy etc. To do the tournament justice one must become English for a couple of weeks’ (cited in McKelvie 1981, 1 July).

Conclusion Notable developments have occurred in the history of media and broadcasting in tennis, but arguably the greatest shifts were in: the sensationalization of tennis news reporting; the growing threat that players-cum-journalists posed to the amateur establishment; the developing relations between players, tennis officials and media personnel toward greater mutual understanding yet heightened contests for authority; and the growing respect accorded to the media by tennis officials, generally, regarding their work as a key tool to enhance status and generate revenue. In these ways, the media played an important role in the sport’s professionalization, commercialization and globalization, helping to ignite change in the amateur-professional dichotomy and foster international rivalries and competitions. More critically, it has also worked to both reinforce and challenge dominant ideologies related to class, gender and race/ethnicity.Vincent’s (2004) paper on the BBC’s coverage of Wimbledon in 2000, for example, highlights the sustained marginalization, sexualization and infantalization of female players, while Schultz’s (2005) analysis of commentary on Serena Williams during the 2002 US Open suggests the intersection of class, gender and racial structures helped “produce” Williams for American television audiences in ways that reinforced rather than challenged dominant narratives of black, female physicality. Evidently, progress in these areas was rarely definite and often countered with backwards movements.

Notes 1 In 1882, the AELTCC temporarily removed Croquet from its title. 2 ITV was introduced in 1955 and shared broadcasting rights with the BBC until 1963.

References Briggs, A. (1979) The History of Broadcasting in the United Kingdom: Sound and Vision (Vol. 4). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Deford, F. (2004) Big Bill Tilden:The Triumphs and the Tragedy. Toronto: Sportclassic Books. Eaves, S.J. (2015) A History of Sports Notational Analysis: A Journey into the Nineteenth Century, International Journal of Performance Analysis in Sport, 15, 1160–76. Eaves, S.J. & Lake, R.J. (2016) The ‘Ubiquitous Apostle of International Play’, Wilberforce Vaughan Eaves: The Forgotten Internationalist of Lawn Tennis, International Journal of History of Sport, 33(16), 1963–81. Eaves, S.J. & Lake, R.J. (2018) Dwight Davis and the Foundation of the Davis Cup: Just another Doubleday Myth?, Journal of Sport History, 45(1), 1–23. Evans, R. (1993) Open Tennis: 25 Years of Seriously Defiant Success On and Off the Court. London: Bloomsbury. Gray, D. (1974) The Press. In Robertson, M., Encyclopedia of World Tennis (pp.176–80), New York:Viking. Holt, R. (1989) Sport and the British. Oxford: Clarendon. Huggins, J. & Williams, J. (2005) Sport and the English: 1918–1939. London: Routledge. Lake, R.J. (2015) A Social History of Tennis in Britain. London: Routledge. Lake, R.J. & Eaves, S.J. (2017) Defeat, Decline and Disconnect: A Critical Analysis of Attempted Reform in British Tennis During the Inter-war Period, Sport in History, 37(1), 1–24. 317

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Lichtenstein, G. (1974) A Long Way Baby: Behind the Scenes in Women’s Pro Tennis. New York: Morrow. Maskell, D. (1974) Television. In Robertson, M., Encyclopedia of World Tennis (pp.188–92), New York:Viking. Maskell, D. (1988) From Where I Sit. London: Willow. McKelvie, R. (1981, 1 July) Television and Radio. In Wimbledon Programme, the Championships 1981 (pp.89, 91), London: AELTC. McKelvie, R. (1981, 2 July) The Press. In Wimbledon Programme, the Championships 1981 (pp.89, 91), London: AELTC. McKelvie, R. (1983, 21 June) The Voices of Wimbledon. In Wimbledon Programme, the Championships 1983 (pp.85, 89), London: AELTC. McKelvie, R. (1984, 3 July) A Matter of Communication. In Wimbledon Programme, the Championships 1984 (pp.95, 97), London: AELTC. Myers, A.W. (1903) Lawn Tennis at Home and Abroad. London: George Newnes. Myers, A.W. (1908) The Complete Lawn Tennis Player. Philadelphia: George W. Jacobs & Co. Robertson, M. (1974) Radio. In Robertson, M., Encyclopedia of World Tennis (pp.184–7), New York:Viking Press. Schultz, J. (2005) Reading the Catsuit: Serena Williams and the Production of Blackness at the 2002 U.S. Open, Journal of Sport and Social Issues, 29(3), 338–57. Simpson, B. & Barty-King, H. (2002) Friends at Court:Wimbledon and Slazenger since 1902. London: Quiller. Tinling, T. (1983) Tinling: Sixty Years in Tennis. London: Sidgwick & Jackson. Vincent, J. (2004) Game, Set and Match: The Construction of Gender in British Newspaper Coverage of the 2000 Wimbledon Championships, Sociology of Sport Journal, 21(4), 435–56. Whannel, G. (1992) Fields in Vision:Television Sport and Cultural Transformation. London: Routledge. Wind, H.W. (1979) Game, Set and Match:The Tennis Boom of the Sixties and Seventies. New York: C. P. Dutton.

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31 Exploring an online tennis community Nadina Ayer and Ron McCarville

A typical tennis club offers its members the opportunity to share interests, emotions, knowledge and expertise. Proximity is paramount to the typical club. It thrives because members can physically gather to enjoy the sport and the company that fellow members offer. Increasingly, though, tennis enthusiasts are gathering through electronic means.Virtual formats offer tennis fans many of these same opportunities to gather and share but do so in ways that far exceed those of the traditional club. They extend members’ reach to thousands of fellow enthusiasts around the globe. We think this is noteworthy. Our goal here is to better understand the culture of the sport itself through the lens of an online tennis community. Trends and patterns that are replicated in online settings may be viewed as both central and pervasive to the sport itself. It is useful to monitor what is reproduced and even enhanced within online tennis community settings. The results may extend notions of tennis culture in general and online culture in particular. This chapter reports day-to-day dynamics on a message board devoted entirely to tennis.The online format lacks the face-to-face quality of traditional clubs so we sought to better understand how common interest in tennis was expressed in this virtual setting. How were posters using the tennis forum? How was that use influenced by the online environment and what does it mean for notions of tennis and tennis community? What does the study of online tennis community culture, such as a tennis forum, reveal about tennis as a sport? We focus primarily on the ways in which members of a tennis message board engage within their virtual environment. We should note that we use terms online community, forum, website (site) and message board interchangeably throughout the chapter.

Selecting an online tennis community Online communities represent important virtual spaces ‘where people come together with others to converse, exchange information or other resources, learn, play, or just be with each other’ (Resnick & Kraut 2011, p.1). As with physical communities, online forums can offer opportunities for self-expression, companionship and stimulation (Nimrod 2014). They can offer tennis enthusiasts a convenient, timely and reliable way to socialize with fellow enthusiasts

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(Chayko 2008). The growth of online communities in the tennis world seems both natural and inevitable and it is easy to appreciate their appeal. Forums are the oldest form of online community and they tend to offer rich text-based exchanges on shared interests (Kozinets 2010). It is perhaps not surprising then that a simple Google search using the term ‘tennis forum’ returned 527,000 results. The forums ranged from tennis, player and tournament discussions, to betting and professional player specific forums. The options seem limited only by the imagination of those establishing the sites. We focus here on a well-established and popular online tennis community. Specifically, we monitored posts on Talk Tennis at Tennis Warehouse (Talk Tennis). Talk Tennis is the oldest existing online community of its kind. In 1992, Tennis Warehouse started out as a specialty shop. In 1995, tenniswarehouse.com was created and three years later, it began taking full online orders. It has since evolved into an international online community called Talk Tennis at Tennis Warehouse or Talk Tennis with discussion threads dating back to January 2002. Today, Talk Tennis is an online community where members discuss a wide range of topics. Discussions are often regionally based, taking place in several languages. It is considered the world’s ‘most active tennis equipment message board’ with approximately 10,000 posts per month and 50,000 page views per day (Tennis Warehouse 2016). As of 3 August 2017, Talk Tennis consisted of 537,073 discussions and a total of 10,456,848 messages (http​://tt​.tenn​is-wa​rehou​se.co​m/ind​ex.ph​p). Talk Tennis seeks to provide posters with opportunities for interaction and sharing. Simultaneously, it allows lurkers a connection to the sport through observation of the conversation, without having to post themselves. We observed the development of Talk Tennis discussion threads from mid-December 2015 until the end of January 2016. A total of seven professional tennis events took place on both the ATP and the WTA Tours during this period, the most significant and anticipated event being the Australian Open at the end of January. This study reports on posts that appeared in four different content areas, chosen because together they offer a holistic picture of the tennis culture. The content areas: ‘General Pro Player Discussion’, ‘Pro Match Results’, ‘Tennis Equipment’ and ‘Miscellaneous’ offer discussions of interest not only to fans but also to players at every level. We analyzed an astounding 19,782 messages posted to 54 Talk Tennis discussion threads. Generally, the online discussions were focused on top professional players. On this site, at least, they comprised the glue that keeps debate and exchange active. The tournaments offered a point of reference through which the players could be discussed. For example, the timing of the data collection was such that several lower tier tournaments, like the Auckland Open and the Sydney International, were also topics of conversation. These tournaments seemed of interest because they offered clues as to players’ upcoming performances, helping to set the stage for inevitable predictions for the Australian Open. Posts hummed with anticipation for the Open. Posters seemed eager to debate any possible outcome or set of outcomes. The uncertainty offered by any tournament fueled by a blend of nostalgia and anticipation created thousands of posts. Often the discussions focused on the former top player performances and expectations (e.g., Nadal’s comeback), as well as up-andcomers entering the tour. The posts could deal with any aspect of the professionals’ lives (e.g., Murray pulling out if his pregnant wife goes into labour, or Hewitt’s retirement), their previous performance results, or speculations on player status in the upcoming Grand Slam. The online format is remarkably adept at generating and organizing commentary of all sorts. In particular, the forum provided a complete record of comments as they come and go. In Talk Tennis, most discussions occur on the day the discussion thread is developed. In this way, there was a certain immediacy to the discussion. A post is debated and the discussion then moves on. A question is posed and those interested in the question comment.The commenters then move on to another question. 320

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The online forum is remarkable, though, because posts and discussion threads have some degree of permanence. Posters may return to the same thread at a later time. For instance, a thread was created using a statement by Andy Murray on his chances of winning the Australian Open. The thread was entitled, ‘Murray: Djokovic is going to have to drop off if I’m going to win in Melbourne’. While most discussions drop down the list within a day or two after a post is created, in this case a poster returned to the discussion once the match had occurred 22 days after the thread was created.The poster had the benefit of new insight once the match was over, and commented, ‘Well, Murray was right I guess? Looked like the world nr2 lost the match before he even stepped on the court’. In this way, discussions and debates can continue over time as events take place and new insight emerges. This capacity or ‘memory’ offered through online means can help enthusiasts reflect upon and return to discussions that interest them.This may be compelling for community members. More than that, these virtual memories facilitate more informed and thoughtful debate; posters can reflect upon earlier comments and monitor results as they occur. More is written on this below.

Devotion to the sport From the outset, we must acknowledge the profound love these community members expressed for the sport of tennis. Interest in tennis and its many component parts was universal. We noted above that interest in professional players was particularly acute. Love for the professional tennis world drove much of the debate and conversation. For instance, many posters self-identified as fans of particular professional players. As such, they can be emotional and passionate about the game, being very expressive and illustrative when conveying their feelings; for example, one poster communicated: ‘Being a Nadal fan is like being strapped into a crazy ass rollercoaster in the dark’. In this sense, there is no mistaking that the forum members are fans of tennis. Posters routinely analyzed players’ performances, often in excruciating detail. In many cases they would place considerable investment in the topics, crafting detailed replies to other posters. Throughout, the focus was on performance. Consider the following post: I’m talking on aggregate. I’ve seen that Nadal can give amazing peak levels on HC…albeit he produces them less frequently than Djokovic and Federer…he produced tennis that landed him a H2H against the best players of the era…25-8 against the Big Four? His peak on grass is probably worse than Federer’s AND Djokovic’s in my view, though the latter is debatable, but his superiority on clay is so abundant that he wins the overall peak level war. We can at least compare peak displays of Nadal on HC and grass to Federer and Djokovic but I can’t return the favour for Federer and Djokovic against Nadal on clay, where the only meaningful display of comparable peak occurred in the 2013 RG SF. I understand that Masters are not worthless but have to use Slams as my main barometer. The post offered both data and analyses focusing on a performance imperative. This imperative was pervasive throughout the tennis site as its members discussed everything from stringing racquets to new equipment being adopted by the professional ranks.

Interest in fair play The focus on performance could be tempered by an interest in fair play. There was an ongoing and common interest in “netiquette” and sportsmanship in general. While performance is important and essential to keep the discussion alive in this tennis community, sportsmanship 321

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seems to be equally and often even more important than performance alone. The values made explicit through threads focused on good character and honour as much as on performance and results. These values extended both to the behaviours of professional players and to the posters themselves. Indeed, the debate over laudatory actions, or those worthy of condemnation, fueled considerable debate. Forum members may even condemn players for a single deviation from norms dictating fair play. For example, a poster once commented on Miloš Raonić’s game play and personality, ‘I’m not a big fan of Raonic’s game but he seems like a nice guy’. There was no reference to ethical concerns in the post but a second poster followed up with a video link of a point between Juan Martin del Potro and Raonić in the third round of the 2013 Rogers Cup in Montreal – in which it appeared as if Raonić deliberately cheated by not conceding a point after his foot touched the net during play – and a complaint about the player’s ethics: ‘Makes me want to vomit…Cheating in your home country against one of the nicest players on tour? Fk you Raonic’. The issue of ethics floats about the discussion board and may drop into the conversation at any time. In the Raonić posts above, note that neither comment referred to athletic performance. Instead, they focused on character.Themes of fair play, respect and honour resonated throughout the community’s message board. This seems to reflect the importance of character and etiquette in the sport of tennis. The tennis tradition rests on good etiquette and sportsmanship demonstrated by tennis players and spectators alike (Adams 1984; Bryant 1994; Davison-Lungley 1979; Johnson & Xanthos 1976). It is perhaps not surprising that those who are committed to the sport are also committed to its component parts, such as etiquette, fair play and performance.

Finding the balance The debate over player performance was most rough-and-tumble when it focused on professional tennis. Fan groups often adopted names to mark their affiliation and were quite willing to make we/they distinctions that could be problematic. As one poster commented, ‘On this site people find excuses to bash Murray mainly from Feddites and Nadalians’. Such generalizations were common and led to spirited debate, and the dynamics between posters were not always harmonious. Discord was often a result of conflicting player allegiances. Reactions to real or perceived insults to favourite players were rarely taken lightly. These dynamics were not surprising, given tennis culture is inherently competitive (Lake 2013; Muir 1991). This competitive spirit is driven by both a commitment to the sport and, to a large extent, interest in professional players. The message board seemed to offer as much emotion as would any tennis court. As often on the court, dynamics on the board could be described as raw and temperamental but also reflective and even pensive. But, like a tennis club, the board was also a place of exchange. Exchange is facilitated by cooperation, not competition. Yes, posters sought to express their own ideas, emotions and observations, but they also sought aid and comfort. So, we discovered that a balance between competition and cooperation existed and was deemed necessary. This balance was achieved by using traditional tennis conventions that typically guided and directed activities on the court and in the club. These conventions could refer to tone, word selection and even the nature of posts. Generally, it was expected that tone, for example, would be both moderate and supportive. This was especially the case when the focus was on helping other posters. As is outlined below, even as debates raged, community members could exhibit considerable patience and good will when the threads and posts were intended to help fellow members. The patterns we observed online were very much consistent with the sport’s own efforts, throughout history, to create a code of civility. Tennis is, and always has been, widely regarded 322

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as a sport governed by a strict code of conduct, founded on the ideals of amateurism with sportsmanship being a key component (Baltzell 1995; Jefferys 2009). In a match, referees are present as much to enforce the code of behaviour as to monitor the movement of the ball (see Jenkins 1986), but in this case of an online forum, fellow posters often acted as referees to ensure that, even within heated debate, decorum was observed.Violators might be called to task either by message board staff or, more likely, fellow posters. They sought to uphold the conventional standards of behaviour so valued within the wider tennis community. It would be interesting to monitor tone and approach across various sites and topics.We might speculate, for example, that helpful and conciliatory tones may be more prevalent with tennis enthusiasts than within other sports that lack such strong and well established conventional codes.

Using the Talk Tennis message board We sought to understand how interest in tennis was expressed in this online forum. We identified two dominant functions being fulfilled on this particular message board. The first is “experiential enhancement”.We created this term to refer to leveraging the emotion offered by other community members.We found that the site acted as a virtual pub or living room where enthusiasts joined fellow posters in order to better enjoy matches and tournaments. Communicating with others during the match seemed to enhance the spectator experience for many members, underpinned by a tremendous desire to share each competitive moment with fellow enthusiasts. Posters used the forum to revel in the emotional rollercoaster that tennis offered; for example, one opined: Using both my heart and my head I see their final slam counts being: Federer – 18. Ok, almost entirely heart on this one. Djokovic – 16. Hard to predict more than this at his age. Cautiously optimistic. Nadal – 15/16. Can’t fathom him not winning one more French. 30–40% chance he adds another slam after that. The things tennis enthusiasts chose to share could be profoundly emotional for some posters. Some wished to share their most heartfelt beliefs and feelings with others, which usually related to how the match or the players’ performance made them feel, as well as how they felt for the player. For instance, the 2016 Australian Open final between Angelique Kerber and Serena Williams stirred up many emotional responses. The historical importance of the match and the German player’s victory, which prevented Williams from tying the title count with the all-time record keeper at the time, Steffi Graf, may have exacerbated the reactions and feelings. In this particular case, some hinted at needing a remedy to calm down: one poster confessed: ‘It’s 11:29 in the morning here in Germany and I feel the urge to fetch a drink to calm my nerves’. These posters very much sought and valued the capacity to express their emotions, and to react to others’ emotions. In this sense, the tennis forum served the role of a “dear friend”, supportive and always there to listen. The second function was that of “exchange”. Members were constantly either seeking or offering information. The site contains thousands of posts asking for tennis-related information. Posters may seek input relating to matches, TV coverage, equipment, instruction and professional players, in general. We observed that almost every post garnered a response, sometimes from dozens of fellow posters. There existed sincere interest in guiding and directing fellow members. For instance, when it came to providing equipment-based feedback, posters would give specific advice and justification for such aid. A request for assistance about choosing racketstring tensions, for example, garnered the detailed response:‘this is too much tension on the poly 323

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for a pre 16 girl, i agree with the gut tension though, up the gut but keep rpm at 49-51lbs to keep her arm safe from injury’. This utility seeking and reciprocity were of considerable interest to many posters. This function, perhaps more than any other, created meaningful connections between members of this community. Members went to sometimes extraordinary lengths to offer aid to fellow community members. Let us consider “experiential enhancement” and “exchange” in turn.

Experiential enhancement There was a prevalent desire among community members to share personal, tennis-related reflections and spectator experiences. Spectating with virtual community members seemed to enhance the excitement and enjoyment of any point, match, set or tournament. We note above that this online community acted as a sort of sports pub.This virtual pub is as close as the posters’ phone, never closes and is filled with hundreds of fans gathered to share a much-valued event. In this sense, while online experiences can be physically solitary, they can be very much connected emotionally. We learned, for example, that posters reveled in sharing elements of these events with fellow posters. There was ongoing debate and commentary as matches progressed. There were virtual fist pumps (‘Come on!’), commentary (‘She breaks!’), congratulations (‘What a point by both’) and frustrations (‘Damn – got burned at the net again’). Each post represented an effort to reach out to other community members. They were very aware that all were sharing in the same event. We observed that the commentary could possess analytical or emotional elements.

Analytical expressions Much of the commentary was devoted to analyses undertaken by posters. The discussion wandered through the many elements of performance; comments referred to ‘smart’ play, fitness level, sportsmanship and competitive effort. The focus of these analyses was typically on excellence as determined by community members. Throughout the posts, the emphasis on performance was constant. This is perhaps unsurprising given that the forum is devoted to discussions of professional athletes and events surrounding their performance.With so many inconsistencies and so much uncertainty, conversations often weighed the pros and cons, opportunities and misses and strengths and weaknesses. We noted too of the level of expertise evident in the posts. ‘Well disguised dropper’ or ‘That was smart’ were typical of play-by-play posts. This expertise offers two important insights. This is indeed a group of people who understand and appreciate the game. At times, we learn from posters themselves their expertise and knowledge base; offering practical advice, one poster suggested to another: ‘BTW – you should probably take that ball on the rise. It’s bouncing near the service line and yet you are way back behind the baseline and off balance’. Considerable tennis knowledge and expertise are very much evident in such posts. In many cases, we found that coaches, professional stringers and avid tennis players were among those willing to offer commentary to aid fellow posters, and we sometimes marvelled that those with such expertise were so willing to contribute within the forum. Muñiz and O’Guinn (2001) reported that a sense of belonging can be associated with a sense of obligation or duty toward the larger community. This sense of belonging is very much present among these tennis community members. The sharing might also extend far beyond the exchange of expertise. We thought it important that one poster wished to share their daily itinerary: ‘I approach school now. Have to go now. Might be on at like 9:45 until then goodbye good luck jo lets do it!!!’ This poster wanted 324

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others to know why they would disappear from the forum but wished to assure them of their timely return. This exchange suggests a profound shared sense of belonging. Some of the posts even suggested that, together, posters might be able to alter outcomes on the tennis court; ‘Let’s cosmically link hands and PRAY!’, one remarked. Clearly, there was a desire to share almost any whim, idea, fact or position with fellow posters. They felt a kinship with fellow tennis enthusiasts and sought the approval, appreciation and support of their trusted colleagues. Within all of these posts, the values of the larger group were very much evident. Many of their analyses were both instigated and guided by values the larger group held near and dear to their hearts. Their preoccupation with performance and good sportsmanship were evident. When pros’ behaviour deviated from the norm of tennis etiquette, posts become harsh and unforgiving. For instance, in this forum, the young Australian players, Nick Kyrgios and Bernard Tomić, were often criticized for their conduct; one poster lambasted: ‘I only have to watch them for 5 mins to reassure me that I am right. They are both hideous, entitled brats without an ounce of integrity or honour’. Throughout these posts, the roar of the crowd may have been missing but the enthusiasm for the events surrounding the game of tennis was palpable. In this way, the forum acted as an extension of tennis culture more generally. Its format, and the social interaction within posts, seemed to rest on the values and norms surrounding the decorum and sportsmanship typically found on the tennis court. In this sense, tennis guidelines of written and unwritten rules were transferred and exercised in the online environment.

Expressions of emotion The posts could also be deeply emotional in nature. Many members were anxious to convey their emotional reactions to fellow community members. They could express admiration after a tough battle and a surprise winner (‘This is incredible. Sport never ceases to amaze’), emotional turmoil out of immense desire for the favorite to win, (‘I sweat, I shiver, I shake, I tremble’) or threats to emotional well-being during a close match, (‘Oh God I can’t take it… I need to freak out!’). Expressions of anxiety, nervousness, or anger were common. At times, expressions of contentment were offered; one poster remarked ‘Damn, this is nice’, after a great display of sportsmanship and friendship between players during an award ceremony and acceptance speeches at the close of a tournament. These tennis enthusiasts’ reactions ranged from mild (offering ‘*sniffs’, ‘happy’, or ‘my heart is a puddle’) to profound. For example, one poster noted in relation to his disappointment with Serena William’s loss in the final of 2016 Australian Open: ‘I’ve been taken off life support and been cleared to post again’. This light-hearted reference to life support speaks to the depth of emotion this poster assigned to this particular match. The poster goes on to reflect on it: Last night I had to stand up and pace in disgust a few times and my wife had to remind me that I like Serena and to quit yelling mean things at her lol. I was initially upset that she didn’t go to plan B or C. Normally she will adapt to her opponent’s game or her own deficiencies. Ultimately I now realize she couldn’t have if she wanted to last night. I was so mad that she kept going to the net when clearly her volleys were not working. Then I remembered that all her groundies were flying long (and toward the end she adjusted and started dumping them into the net), so it’s not like the baseline was doing much for her. She wasn’t cracking winners off the weak serves, her own serve was not great, a mess. So, really, she did what she could do and it just wasn’t good enough last night. 325

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Note the therapeutic nature of the post with its admissions and personal reflections. In a way, the forum acts as a kind of counsellor helping community members deal with the emotional ups and downs of tennis. In this and many other cases, it offers posters the opportunity to vent their frustrations with what they believe to be a supportive audience. By doing so, community members seek to both vent and reconcile the emotions they experience through the game. The immediacy of the player-spectator interaction may exacerbate the emotional nature of tennis fandom. It has been reported that in a typical match a tennis player makes 800 decisions (Crespo, Reid & Quinn 2006). In every case, the fans are watching the play, the professional’s face; they hear the player breathing, they suffer through every misstep, every bad decision. They see every tear – e.g., Marin Čilić during the 2017 Wimbledon final – and hear every tirade. This immediacy creates an emotional connection that begins on the court (as observed in Lake 2011), and extends to the online forum.

Exchange and reciprocity We observed above that posters seemed interested in seeking out and offering advice from fellow enthusiasts.This pattern is common in traditional tennis clubs where members seek word-of-mouth communication from fellow members (Lake 2013; Muir 1991). Online, however, the capacity to collect or disseminate information is brought to levels unimaginable just a few years ago. Forum members know that their questions can be seen by the larger (even global) community (Chayko 2008; Preece 2000; Resnick & Kraut 2011). We saw thousands of posts where members asked for assistance on topics like streaming, stringing, equipment and game improvement; they received advice and in turn offered support. For example, they often asked fellow members about technological issues that might facilitate their spectating activities;‘Is it a reliable service?’ or ‘does that work on Android?’, were typical questions. To such requests, fellow members can often be quick to assist extending resources; ‘Yes it does…i’ll link you it’, was the response received to the latter. Posters might also ask for updates or assessments of events they missed; one asked, for example, ‘Was this a HIGH quality match?’ Again, the issue of expertise and credibility seem key. Other forum members might encourage viewing the missed match, e.g., ‘It was a thriller.You’ll be entertained’. Given the expertise evident in the group when such advice is given, the poster may be relatively certain that the response is both reliable and useful. While such recommendations were expected, we were more surprised by updates during matches. On several occasions, posters would pop into the discussion to ask about a current match or tournament; after missing the start of a match, one asked: ‘Just started watching.What’s the story?’ In all cases, there were posters willing to disengage from the events to bring newcomers up to speed. Typically, in situations like these other members would offer a quick recap; in this specific case, the answer came back: ‘a bit off in the first set, but found her serve in the second’.They might also provide more detailed information and direct resource, offering “highlights” to aid the member who joined to watch the match late. We finish with this example because it is so very human. Posters who are separated by perhaps thousands of miles, those who know little of their virtual companions, those who are deeply immersed in a match are still anxious to connect with fellow tennis enthusiasts.This speaks to the very social aspect of the game of tennis, both on the court and off, whether separated by a net or an ocean.

Conclusions The online component of this community did not diminish the very human connections that tennis can offer.This message board is, first and foremost, an opportunity for tennis enthusiasts to 326

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exchange and share their love for the game. This exchange could be deeply personal and played out in ways that were remarkably consistent with those found in a traditional tennis club. We found a tone and a pace on the message board that could be both supportive and caustic; both measured and frantic. But it was consistently heartfelt and genuine. We witnessed the often profound desire to reach out to fellow tennis community members. It seemed that their joint (and often passionate) interest in tennis could create genuine and meaningful desire to connect and share. The extensive literature suggests the importance of social ties to the smooth functioning of any healthy community. Such ties may be built around consciousness of kind (Muñiz & O’Guinn 2001), which suggests that community members feel and appreciate connections they share with fellow community members (Gusfield 1975). We witnessed a wide range of interactions that informed and entertained, comforted and confronted these tennis enthusiasts.While some of these efforts were largely observational – e.g., noting upcoming events, etc. – much of what we observed related to “real time” emotions as tennis enthusiasts sought comfort and companionship during professional tennis tournaments. The sense of reciprocity we found in this tennis forum was particularly noteworthy. It is our sense that posters are very much motivated by perceived connections they share with others in the same tennis forum. We noted that during one match, one individual posted the rhetorical question, ‘Everyone sweating bullets right now?’ The poster assumed that fellow members were equally engaged in the tennis match. In these ways, connections are created and a community is built (Bishop 2013). The desire for expression, enhancement and exchange seemed to dominate dialogue during the period we observed the Talk Tennis message board. Individually, these functions suggest priorities of tennis posters within sites such as this one. Collectively, they suggest how notions of community play out. They also suggest how tennis forums are extensions of tennis culture, promoting and demanding the same code of conduct – sportsmanship, etiquette and rules – in the online environment. All suggest how and why tennis enthusiasts are so willing to reach out to other community members who share the interest, love and appreciation for tennis. As this data suggests, interest in tennis is complex. It can involve competitive allegiances, social conventions and altruistic priorities. It can be harsh and unforgiving and it can be kind and gentle. More than any of that, though, it is a way of reaching out to others who share our concerns.

References Adams, D. (1984) Tennis Etiquette. New York: Doug Adams. Baltzell, E.D. (1995) Sporting Gentlemen: Men's Tennis from the Age of Honor to the Cult of the Superstar. New York: Free Press. Bishop, J. (2013) The Psychology of Trolling and Lurking: The Role of Defriending and Gamification for Increasing Participation in Online Communities Using Seductive Narratives. In Bishop, J. (ed.), Examining the Concepts, Issues, and Implications of Internet Trolling (pp. 106–23), Hershey, PA: IGI Global. Bryant, J. (1994) Game, Set, Match: A Beginning Tennis Guide (3rd ed.). Englewood, CO: Morton. Chayko, M. (2008) Portable Communities:The Social Dynamics of Online and Mobile Connectedness. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. Crespo, M., Reid, M. & Quinn, A. (2006) Tennis Psychology: 200+ Practical Drills and the Latest Research. London: International Tennis Federation (ITF) Ltd. Davison-Lungley, R. (1979) Let’s Play Tennis. London: Octopus Books. Gusfield, J.R. (1975) The Community: A Critical Response. New York: Harper Colophon. Jefferys, K. (2009) The Heyday of Amateurism in Modern Lawn Tennis, The International Journal of the History of Sport, 26(15), 2236–52. Jenkins, B. (1986) Cross Court:Wimbledon the Future at Risk. London: Arthur Baker. Johnson, J.D. & Xanthos, P. J. (1976) Tennis. Dubuque, IA: Wm. C. Brown Company Publishers. 327

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Kozinets, R.V. (2010) Netnography: Doing Ethnographic Research Online. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications Inc. Lake, R.J. (2011) Social Class, Etiquette and Behavioural Restraint in British Lawn Tennis, 1870–1939, The International Journal of the History of Sport, 28(6), 876–94. Lake, R.J. (2013) ‘They Treat Me like I’m Scum’: Social Exclusion and Established-Outsider Relations in a British Tennis Club. International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 48(1), 112–28. Muir, D.E. (1991) Club Tennis: A Case Study in Taking Leisure Very Seriously, Sociology of Sport Journal, 8, 70–8. Muñiz, A.M. & O’Guinn, T.C. (2001) Brand Community, Journal of Consumer Research, 27(4), 412–32. Nimrod, G. (2014) The Benefits of and Constraints to Participation in Seniors’ Online Communities, Leisure Studies, 33(3), 247–66. Preece, J. (2000) Online Communities: Designing Usability, Supporting Sociability. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Resnick, P. & Kraut, R.E. (2011) Introduction. In Kraut, R.R. & Resnick, P. with Kiesler, S. et al. (eds.), Building Successful Online Communities: Evidence-Based Social Design (pp.1–20), Cambridge, MA: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Tennis Warehouse. (2016) Who started/owns Tennis Warehouse? Tennis Warehouse. Available at: http:​//tt.​ tenni​s-war​ehous​e.com​/inde​x.php​?thre​ads/w​ho-st​arted​-owns​-tenn​iswar​ehous​e.939​21/

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32 Tennis and social media Katie Lebel and Karen Danylchuk

The revolutionary impact of social media has redefined our communications infrastructure. In an era of rapid change, social media has had a tremendous impact on the way information is shared between individuals and industries around the world. The Pew Research Center suggests that among Facebook and Twitter users, 63% regularly use social platforms as a source for news (Barthel & Shearer 2015). Twitter in particular has become the choice media outlet for sport with a reported 70% of US Twitter users naming the platform as their go-to source for sport-specific content (Barthel, Shearer, Gottfried & Mitchell 2015). Indeed, sport consumers have embraced the Twitter platform enthusiastically. In 2013, sport events comprised 12 of the top 20 most-tweeted-about TV broadcasts in the US (Nielsen 2014). Perhaps more impressively, sport drove 50% of all Twitter traffic – in total over 492 million tweets (Nielsen Social 2014). Of this 50%, the sport of tennis has been well represented. Before the 2015 US Open Tennis Championship,Twitter promoted a public listing that featured the Twitter handles of 180 athletes competing in the prestigious event (Twitter 2015). In 2015, only the NBA and soccer reported more average followers per player (Adweek 2015). The purpose of this chapter is to explore the relationship that has been forged between the sport of tennis and social media. While social media has provided fans with unprecedented access in sport, it has also significantly altered the way athletes, sport organizations and events are expected to conduct themselves. Presentations of self that were once highly formal productions, filtered by marketing professionals, journalists and public relations specialists, are now expected to be authentic and insightful accounts representative of an athlete’s personality and character. This has been a very powerful opportunity, particularly for athletes in underserved sport markets, like tennis, that sometimes struggle to gain attention in traditional media outlets (Lebel & Danylchuk 2012). Social media has provided the sport of tennis with both a voice and a large public forum with which to share it. Combined, these factors have become a recipe for great influence.

The power of social media The sport of tennis was among the early adopters of social media technologies. As of January 2017, the sports insight platform Hookit calculated that the top 100 most followed tennis players in the world had a combined 202,733,591 total followers on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Following an historic 2017 Australian Open which saw record breaking wins from both Serena Williams and Roger Federer, tennis collectively generated 1,442,645 new social media followers 329

Kate Lebel and Karen Danylchuk Table 32.1 Tennis player rankings on social media. Ranked by total interactions, January 1–31 2017 Athlete

Total followers

New followers

Total posts

Engagement

Total interactions

Serena Williams Novak Djokovic Maria Sharapova Roger Federer Rafael Nadal Sania Mirza Eugenie Bouchard Nick Kyrgios Ana Ivanovic Andy Murray

17.8M 17.1M 22.7M 23.5M 28.8M 20.1M 3.6M 780.5K 5.8M 8.6M

204.1K 57.5K 119.1K 172.7K 66.3K 187.7K 41.8K 9.9K 47.6K 13.7K

43 39 90 27 52 67 54 123 33 21

0.9% 1.0% 0.2% 0.5% 0.2% 0.2% 1.2% 0.9% 0.4% 0.4%

7.0M 6.6M 3.8M 3.2M 3.1M 2.5M 2.4M 873.2K 766.4K 760.5K

Source: Hookit – Retrieved from: http://www.hookit.com/ranks/tennis/

including a 45.6% increase on Twitter, a 44.8% increase on Instagram and a 9.5% increase on Facebook (Hookit 2017). Fan interaction with professional players active on social media calculated during the month of January 2017 via real-time engagement metrics (i.e., new likes, followers, shares, mentions, etc.) indicated that Instagram was the platform of choice for tennis fans, accounting for 50.7% of all social interactions. This compared to a 47.5% interaction rate on Facebook and 1.8% on Twitter. Table 32.1 indicates the social footprint of the top tennis players on social media as of January 2017. In this case, engagement was calculated by dividing the total number of interactions by the total number of fans following a particular athlete. Interactions were defined as a combined measurement of the total number of likes, comments and re-tweets each athlete post received.

Social media and self-presentation The power of social media has evolved into a strategic marketing tool for tennis players, allowing them to leverage their brands in a variety of creative ways. At its core, however, social media might best be considered as a tool for self-presentation (Lebel & Danylchuk 2012). Erving Goffman introduced his seminal theory of self-presentation in the highly influential Presentation of Self in Everyday Life (1959). Within this work, Goffman’s central thesis proposed that individuals create preferred versions of themselves for public consumption. Goffman suggested that people strategically manage the impressions they give off to others relative to context, tactically emphasizing some characteristics while de-emphasizing others in an effort to achieve relational goals. Goffman likened the process of conveying various versions of the self to a performance and analogized his theory through dramaturgical references rooted in the differentiation between an actor’s on- and off-stage performances. Goffman reasoned that on-stage, an actor delivers a carefully scripted, formal performance. Backstage, however, when the actor is out of the spotlight, Goffman rationalized that actors are likely to conduct themselves in a relaxed manner, revealing elements closer to their true personality. It is in the differentiation between frontand backstage performances that Goffman bases his theoretical framework; the designation of a front-stage performance signifies individual self-presentation that is considered more formal in nature, whereas use of the term backstage performance is used to capture self-presentation that is less measured and more familiar. Performance exists as a critical component in any public figure’s identity (Marshall 2010). Specific to professional athletes, their presentations of self have traditionally been limited to 330

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front-stage performances; they enact their role as a competitor on the field of play and occasionally present themselves to the public through formalized interviews or sponsorship endeavors. While audiences have always been fascinated by the behind-the-scenes lives of elite athletes, it was not until the revolution of social media that backstage performances became an emphasized element of athlete presentation. Social media thus represents a tipping point in athlete selfpresentation strategy. Society has placed a premium on the presentation of insider perspectives and the everyday details of athletes’ lives; social media has enabled athletes the technology to share these behind-the-scenes minutiae. This transition has shifted the long-standing tradition of front-stage athlete performances in sport, to an expectation of seemingly more authentic, backstage performances. Specific to the sport of tennis, Lebel and Danylchuk (2012) applied the theory of selfpresentation to explore the function of gender on Twitter. Specifically, the study investigated the impact of gender on the strategies professional tennis players used to present themselves on the micro-blogging platform.This research included content analyses of all professional tennis player tweets from the time period surrounding the 2011 US Open Tennis Championships. As one of tennis’ grandest stages, the US Open Championships were selected as a highly covered sporting event that attracts the attention of a significant audience. Statistics rank the US Open as the top-ranked annually attended international sporting event in the world; it attracted 1,710 credentialed media in 2010, broadcast coverage of the event to 180 nations and boasted 12,400,000 unique visitors to USOpen.org (USTA 2011). All active professional tennis players with a verified Twitter account, as confirmed by the website tweeting-athletes.com and Twitter, were included in the sample (N = 84). Profile details and messages from the sample were downloaded for both quantitative and qualitative content analyses. Of the 84 verified professional tennis player Twitter accounts, 38 were female and 46 were male. As only English-speaking accounts were included in the design, the final sample included 34 female athletes and 35 male athletes who contributed a total of 2,783 tweets for analysis. In the spirit of Goffman’s dramaturgical analogies and the online adaptation of the presentation-of-self theory, a coding protocol was developed specifically for this study. Frames were developed to explain athlete Twitter activity based on Goffman’s definition: Given their understanding of what it is that is going on, individuals fit their actions to this understanding and ordinarily find that the ongoing world supports this fitting. These organizational premises – sustained both in the mind and the activity – I call the frame of the activity. (Goffman 1974, p. 247) All athlete tweets were first critically analyzed and reviewed for emergent themes.The researchers then translated the themes into the development of broader self-presentational frames. A total of ten self-presentation frames were constructed as a result of this process – six backstage frames and four front-stage frames (see Table 32.2).The backstage frames included: the conversationalist, the sport insider, the behind-the-scenes-reporter, the super fan, the informer and the analyst.The front-stage frames included: the fan aficionado, the publicist, the superintendent and the brand manager. On average, 77% of all athlete tweets were distinguished as backstage performances. Relative to gender, this research found posts were published at a very similar frequency and in fundamentally the same manner. Male athletes, however, were found to spend a significantly increased portion of their time performing the role of sport fan compared to their female counterparts. 331

Kate Lebel and Karen Danylchuk Table 32.2 Description of self-presentation strategy frames Backstage performances the conversationalist the sport insider the behind-the-scenes reporter the super fan the informer the analyst Front-stage performances the publicist the superintendent the fan aficionado the brand manager

Interaction with fellow athletes, celebs, family, personal friends Personal behind-the-scenes tennis info: travel, practices, matches, general insight into tennis Candid reports of the person behind the persona: site-seeing, favorite movies, extra-curricular activities Discussion of non-tennis athletes, other sports General information sharing, web apps, content, links, current events General statement of opinion, complaints, life musings Promotion, publicity regarding sponsorship, upcoming matches, autograph sessions etc. Presence maintenance i.e. “good morning tweeps” Fan interaction Formal acknowledgments associated with positive image, i.e. 9/11 recognition

Conversely, female athletes put significantly more effort into their roles as brand managers. A tendency toward sport fandom may seem a natural transition for male athletes. Early socialization grooms men to converse about sports from a very young age in our society, yet females are often encouraged to be thoughtful in their upbringing, which may explain their tendency to recognize events on Twitter as brand managers (Greendorfer 1993). Ultimately, developing sport conversational strategies may prove beneficial to the self-branding strategies of female athletes. Audience interpretation of the ten athlete self-presentation strategies in fact confirmed the sport insider approach existed as the most salient social media communication tactic (Lebel & Danylchuk 2014a) with audiences reporting particular interest in the discussion of athlete performance, athlete fitness and an athlete’s sport expertise. Further to this, an examination of athlete profile pictures revealed that audiences invest meaning in the social cues provided in these pictures (Lebel & Danylchuk 2014). Trends were established relative to the impressions profile pictures inspired as well as the calculation of their perceived effectiveness. Lebel and Danylchuk (2014) found that athletes who highlighted themselves in a sport setting or with some reference to a sport context, were consistently ranked more effectively by audiences than those who did not. The photographic linkage to sport seemed to enhance both athlete recognition and credibility while motivating more positive word associations among participants. Preferences were further expressed for profile photos that provided some insight into the athlete’s personality and remained in line with their established brand as an athlete.

Athlete voice As athletes have become more comfortable with social media communication, one of the interesting trends that has emerged exists in the redefinition of social media as a public relations tool. Where athletes were once reliant on public relations specialists and traditional media outlets for broadcasting coverage, social media has provided the ability for athletes to speak to their audiences in an unfiltered manner. This practice was no more evident than in 2016, when the International Tennis Federation stripped superstar Maria Sharapova of her playing privileges after testing positive for Meldonium, a recently banned substance. While traditional media 332

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outlets picked up on the news story, Sharapova was able to share her side of the event directly with her fans and keep them updated as her case was investigated. In a particularly descriptive 11th March 2016 Facebook post, Sharapova accepted responsibility for her mistake, thanked fans for their support and systematically corrected a series of what she believed to be false media reports. She emphasized the importance of having her fans ‘know the truth and have the facts’ (Sharapova 2016). Her honesty was well received by fans and the case was considered by many to set a new standard in the image management of athletes in the digital age. As Sharapova’s case moved along, she continued to use social media platforms to keep her fans up to date and apprised of her actions with a refreshing transparency that many argue allowed her to keep her brand as one of tennis’ elite stars largely intact.

Athlete sponsorship Irrespective of Sharapova’s doping scandal, she is viewed as a trailblazer of sorts in the realm of social media marketing. She was one of the first athletes to recognize the brand building power of social media; her social media savvy was viewed by many as a benchmark of success and an important factor in her 11-year reign as the world’s highest paid female athlete (Badenhausen 2016, 6 June). In June of 2016, Forbes’ annual athlete rankings saw Serena Williams unseat Sharapova as the highest paid female athlete as she earned a combined $28.9 million on the year: $8.9 million in prize money and over $20 million in endorsement deals (Badenhausen 2016, 6 June). Williams was also dubbed the new queen of social media in terms of generating value for her sponsors. Hookit reported her 115 posts promoting either a Nike logo or hashtag resulted in $8.1 million in media value for the sportswear company (Badenhausen 2016, 9 September). Novak Djokovic has similarly been able to capitalize on his on-court dominance by utilizing social media to showcase his personality. Between June 2015 and June 2016, the tennis star generated 74 million interactions (likes, shares and comments) on his 527 social media posts (Badenhausen 2016, 9 September). Djokovic’s top post included a Facebook chat with his fans which garnered 8.8 million views and more than half a million likes, shares and comments (Badenhausen 2016, 9 September). A video posted to Facebook of Djokovic and Williams dancing at a 2015 Wimbledon Champions event generated 300,000 interactions and was viewed close to seven million times (Badenhausen 2016, 9 September).

The darker side of social media With great power comes great responsibility. While athletes have been able to extend their branding opportunities and directly communicate with their fans through social media platforms, this has also left them increasingly vulnerable. The range of scrutiny experienced by athletes on social media is vast. Cyber bullying has become commonplace for many and at its most extreme, some players have been forced to deal with vicious threats. The Tennis Integrity Unit (TIU) has called the online abuse of players ‘an area of growing concern’ (Rossingh 2017). “Tennis trolls”, as they are known, have been likened to a social media hate epidemic, and the voracity of the harassment may be linked to the growth of online gambling. Tennis has enjoyed expanded television coverage as well as enhanced match availability via digital streaming options.This has led to a proliferation of “in-play” betting on tennis games, sets and matches. Global betting on sport has become a $3 trillion/year industry. It is suggested that the sport of tennis accounts for 12% of this figure, second only to the sport of soccer (Cox 2016). Estimates from the Global Betting and Gaming Consultants evaluate online tennis betting at a current value of $300 million a year, which is an almost four-fold increase from 2011 (Rossingh 2017). 333

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A 2014 study conducted by the Pew Research Center intimated that young women are more at risk for severe forms of online abuse. Several female tennis players have vocalized their experiences with threatening comments and harassment on social media. Canadian Rebecca Marino highlighted her struggles with cyber bullying in the announcement of her retirement from the sport at only 22 years of age (Rothenberg 2013). The abuse, however, is not limited to female players. After a loss in the first round of Wimbledon, the South African player Kevin Anderson famously tweeted, ‘Bummed to have lost yesterday, but at least I had a ton of death threats on Facebook and Twitter to make me feel better about things’. Both the ATP and WTA now offer educational programs to assist players with online abuse. In-venue security has also been increased to help protect players from potentially harmful situations. The public nature of social media platforms makes policing social media threats a challenge. While the seemingly obvious safety precaution would be to delete one’s social media presence (e.g., Andy Murray reportedly deletes relevant apps from his phone prior to major events), the allure of positive brand-building opportunities makes this an increasingly difficult decision for athletes to commit to.

Tournament social media engagement In addition to athletes, tennis tournaments have become highly attuned to the benefits of a social media presence and digital engagement with their fans. Research has found that fans are willing to connect and interact with professional tennis events when they provide them with perceived value in exchange (Thompson, Martin, Gee & Geurin 2016). Tennis fans have also been found to have a desire to proactively share social media content while in attendance at tennis events (Thompson, Martin, Gee & Geurin 2016). These findings stand in support of the vast efforts tournament organizers are undertaking to support their digital media presence. In 2014, the Australian Open was the first Grand Slam to incorporate a “Social Shack”. This was a fully connected space on the tournament grounds for fans to interact with both players and the tournament. The event featured social media promotions such as a display of live social media feeds from players, real-time interactions and a large, branded 3D sign featuring the #AusOpen hashtag that was promoted for fan photo opportunities. Given the challenges associated with its geographical location, the Australian Open has made a concerted effort to capitalize on social media interactions as a way to better connect with tennis fans around the world. The event was among the first to embrace innovative digital marketing tools like Twitter emojis, free in-venue Wi-Fi and the live video streaming application Periscope, to bolster fan engagement and produce behind-the-scenes tournament content to fans globally. Tournament organizers have recognized the success of these social media marketing campaigns and have made these initiatives a priority in their event presentation. Most recently, virtual reality technologies have been explored as a way to more deeply connect fans to events and provide them with increasingly unique experiences. Fan Cam mobile applications have also become popular. Typically co-branded through a relationship with a tournament sponsor, this innovative promotion allows fans to use in-venue cameras to snap selfies that they are then able to post to their own social media accounts. Table 32.3 illustrates the broad social media followings that each of the Grand Slam tournaments has acquired thanks to their increasing digital creativity and fan engagement ingenuities.

The evolution of digital sponsorship The development of social media technologies has transformed the marketability of tournament sponsorship in sport. Digital engagement opportunities allow companies to enhance brand 334

Tennis and social media Table 32.3 Number of followers on Grand Slam social media platforms Platform

Australian Open French Open Wimbledon

US Open

Facebook Twitter Instagram

1.92M 1.15 M 662K

1.50M 1.52M 596K

1.97M 1.65M 561K

3.69M 2.58M 970K

* Figures as of February 2017.

awareness through extended audience reach (see Table 32.4 for evidence of sponsor exposure on social media).Creative brand activation campaigns are able to tailor fan experiences to provide value-based engagement designed to convert fans into customers. Whereas traditional sponsorship was largely limited to a logo on the court, the shift to engagement-focused sponsorship strategies has resulted in a new paradigm in which sponsors are able to align themselves with players and events that fit with their brand values. Dedicated hashtags are constructed to drive social media conversation and develop storylines that bring sponsor brands to life, which is all in an effort to enhance brand affinity around events. One of the key challenges sponsors face is keeping up with the fervent pace of social media and staying apprised of the quickly evolving social media trends. While campaign rollouts can often take months to develop, digital technologies are evolving rapidly and consumer tastes often change accordingly. This has become both an opportunity and a burden for companies looking to take advantage of social media marketing. Successful digital campaigns are able to capture a balance of creativity and value for their audiences. For example, IBM is the Official Information Technology provider to the US Open. They have worked to showcase their digital solutions to tennis fans around the world through their exposure at the Grand Slam event. In an effort to provide both their audience and USTA partner with innovative worth, IBM offers access to branded features such as the IBM Scoring System and Serve Speed Radar and IBM’s SlamTracker, which features Keys-to-the Match predictive analytics. These digital technologies provide fans with pertinent information while simultaneously enhancing their company’s brand awareness. Similarly, the longtime US Open sponsor, American Express, have leveraged their technological capabilities to create a more enjoyable fan experience and leave a Table 32.4 Sponsor exposure on social media Tournament

Sponsor

Promoted posts

Interactions

Avg. post value

Media value

Australian Open

Rolex IBM BNP Paribas Longines FedEx Emirates IBM Rolex IBM BNP Paribas Rolex Audi

758 810 5,136 3,217 2,060 1,899 1,660 472 1,248 7,331 79 48

138,207 72,919 110,000 605,100 3,655,500 313,200 136,700 5,700,000 79,800 1,354,054 29,944 8,910

$166 $135 $352 $297 $320 $311 $107 $1,534 $155 $219 $298 $230

$125,785 $109,366 $1,807,872 $941,723 $654,348 $573,611 $177,039 $723,800 $160,200 $1,604,106 $23,553 $11,022

French Open

Wimbledon BNP Paribas Open

Source: Sport Business Journal, 2016: https​://ww​w.spo​rtbus​iness​daily​.com/​journ​al/Is​sues/​2016/​08/29​/In-D​epth/​Resea​rch.a​spx

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lasting impression among US Open patrons. In preparation for the 2016 US Open, Amex developed a comprehensive marketing campaign, centered on digital media technologies including virtual reality experiences and exclusive digital content that showcased their services. Using the #AmexTennis hashtag to focus their digital initiatives, Amex hosted daily Twitter debates, Snapchat live story coverage of the event and live streamed video on Facebook, in addition to sponsoring the official tournament app, which provided guests with an exhaustive guide to help them navigate the championship. Additionally, a series of social media video vignettes was produced and made available across a variety of social platforms that featured behind-the-scenes content with Venus Williams, allowing fans to experience the championship through her eyes. Together, these examples of digital activations demonstrate some of the creative ways brands are attempting to achieve innovative brand exposure, while offering value-based fan engagement. As companies move forward with increasing reliance on social media-based sponsorship strategies, the growing prevalence of social intelligence should be noted. Social intelligence capabilities are designed to provide digital consumer insights that allow for increasingly strategic sponsor partnerships. Companies like Affinio are able to segment social audiences based upon their unique interests, social consumption strategies and geographical location. This type of information is being used to inform potential sponsorship partnerships and provide direction to brand campaigns. Sentiment analysis software is also becoming a strategic means to further inform social media plans.This type of information provides marketing professionals with access to instantaneous audience feedback and is proving to be of great value as companies become increasingly attuned to the returns on their digital sponsorship investments.

Conclusion Social media technologies have had an immense impact on the sport of tennis and its delivery around the world. Social media has become deeply entwined in the communication infrastructure of the sport, providing a voice for the game’s top athletes and playing an important role in tournament coverage and sponsor partnerships. As the industry moves ahead, harnessing the power of social platforms and fine-tuning consumer insights to capitalize on fan engagement strategies will become increasingly important endeavors. Innovation and value seem to be the guiding forces of social media success at present, but education and policy development exist as other important areas of growth, as practice moves to keep up with fast-paced digital technologies.

References Adweek (2015, 6 July) Infographic:Tennis Stars Use Social Media to Showcase Brands. Available at: http:​// www​.adwe​ek.co​m/bra​nd-ma​rketi​ng/in​fogra​phic-​how-t​ennis​-star​s-use​-soci​al-me​dia-s​howca​se-br​ ands-​16568​0/ (accessed August 2016) Badenhausen, K. (2016, 6 June) Serena Williams Tops Sharapova As The World's Highest-Paid Female Athlete. Forbes. Available at: http:​//www​.forb​es.co​m/sit​es/ku​rtbad​enhau​sen/2​016/0​6/06/​seren​a-top​ s-sha​rapov​a-as-​the-w​orlds​-high​est-p​aid-f​emale​-athl​ete/#​53244​374f7​95 (accessed August 2016) Badenhausen, K. (2016, 9 September) Novak Djokovic And Serena Williams Are Tennis' Biggest Stars On Social Media. Forbes. Available at: http:​//www​.forb​es.co​m/sit​es/ku​rtbad​enhau​sen/2​016/0​9/09/​ novak​-djok​ovic-​and-s​erena​-will​iams-​are-t​ennis​-bigg​est-s​ocial​-medi​a-sta​rs/#6​1c8de​4446b​5 (accessed September 2016) Barthel, M. & Shearer, E. (2015, 19 August) Methodology: How do Americans use Twitter for news? Pew Research Center. Available at: www.p​ewres​earch​.org/​fact-​tank/​2015/​08/19​/how-​do-am​erica​ns-us​e-twi​ tter-​for-n​ews/ (accessed August 2016)

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Barthel, M., Shearer, E., Gottfried, J. & Mitchell, A. (2015, 14 July) News Habits on Facebook and Twitter. Pew Research Center. Available at: http://www.journalism.org/2015/ 07/14​/news​-habi​ts-on​-face​book-​ and-t​witte​r/ (accessed August 2016) Goffman, E. (1959) The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. New York: Anchor Books. Goffman, E. (1974) Frame Analysis: An Essay on the Organization of Experience. Boston: Northeastern University Press. Greendorfer, S. (1993) Gender Role Stereotypes and Early Childhood Socialization. In Cohen, G.L. (ed.), Women in Sport: Issues and Controversies (pp.3–14), Newbury Park: CA, Sage. Hookit. (2017, January) Hookit Index Top 100. Available at: http:​//www​.hook​it.co​m/ran​ks/te​nnis/​(acce​ ssed February 2017) Lebel, K. & Danylchuk, K. (2012) How Tweet It Is: A Gendered Analysis of Professional Tennis Players’ Self-Presentation on Twitter, International Journal of Sport Communication, 5, 461–80. Lebel, K. & Danylchuk, K. (2014) An Audience Interpretation of Professional Athlete Self-Presentation on Twitter, Journal of Applied Sport Management, 6(2), 16–36. Lebel, K. & Danylchuk, K. (2014a) Facing Off on Twitter: A Generation Y Interpretation of Professional Athlete Profile Pictures, International Journal of Sport Communication, 7, 317–36. Marshall, D.P. (2010) The Promotion and Presentation of the Self: Celebrity as Marker of Presentational Media, Celebrity Studies, 1(1), 35–48. Nielsen Social (2014, 10 March) Sports Amplify the Action Across Screens. Available at: http:​//www​.niel​ senso​cial.​com/s​ports​-fans​-ampl​ify-t​he-ac​tion-​acros​s-scr​eens/​ (accessed August 2016) Rossingh, D. (2017, 8 February) Australian Open: ‘Hope you die slowly’ – Tennis Stars Trolled. CNN. Available at: http:​//edi​tion.​cnn.c​om/20​17/01​/18/t​ennis​/aust​ralia​n-ope​n-ten​nis-t​rolls​- social-mediahate-epidemic/ (accessed February 2017) Rothenberg, S. (2013, 13 February) Player Overcomes Bullying and a Hiatus. New York Times. Available at: http:​//www​.nyti​mes.c​om/20​13/02​/18/s​ports​/tenn​is/re​becca​-mari​no-of​-cana​da-ov​ercom​es-bu​llyin​ g-and​-hiat​us.ht​ml (accessed August 2017) Sharapova, M. (2016, 11 March) To My Fans Facebook Post. Facebook. Available at: https​://ww​w.fac​ebook​ .com/​shara​pova/​posts​/1015​32823​06932​680 (accessed August 2016) Sports Business Journal (2016, 29 August) Tracking Social Media in Tennis. Available at: http:​//www​.spor​ tsbus​iness​daily​.com/​Journ​al/Is​sues/​2016/​08/29​/In-D​epth/​Resea​rch.a​spx (accessed August 2016) Thompson, A., Martin, A., Gee, S. & Geurin, A. (2016) Fans’ Perceptions of Professional Tennis Events’ Social Media Presence: Interaction, Insight, and Brand Anthropomorphism, Communication & Sport, 1–25. Twitter (2015, 31 August) Twitter is Your Go To Source for the US Open. Twitter. Available at: https​://bl​ og.tw​itter​.com/​2015/​twitt​er-is​-your​-go-t​o-sou​rce-f​or-th​e-201​5-uso​pen (accessed August 2016) USTA (2011) U.S. Open By the Numbers. Unpublished raw data.

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Part III

Politics and social issues (governance, nationalism and identity: race, gender, class and disability)

33 Tennis governance A history of political power struggles Robert J. Lake

In crucial ways, the history of tennis has been a story of the power struggles over organizational legitimacy between controlling groups. Almost immediately upon the modern game’s conception in Britain in the early 1870s, it was the leading sports clubs that assumed authority over key aspects of its development. In time, control was established by Britain’s Lawn Tennis Association (LTA), which grew in status and influence to become the de facto international governing body before the proper international federation commenced operations in 1913. Amidst the growing global influence of other national associations during the inter-war period, particularly those in the US, France and Australia, the sport became increasingly commercialized and professionalized, and in the post-war period, competing interests came from corporations, media/broadcasting organizations, tournament organizers and promoters, management groups and player unions. Today, power is effectively shared among all of these groups, alongside the top players who have become wealthy and at times influential celebrities. As demonstrated in the numerous conflicts for control over tennis that have emerged throughout its history, the sharing of power has not always been easy.The aim of this chapter is to describe the long and often tumultuous path along which tennis governance has progressed since the sport’s emergence until the present day, set in the contexts of key developments both in tennis and the wider society.

Pre-war period: British authority on the world stage Within two years of Major Wingfield publishing his first set of rules for the lawn tennis game he named “Sphairistiké” in 1874, key figures in British sport converged to control its development. His original version blended various features of badminton with Real Tennis and racquets. Wingfield adopted badminton’s six-foot-high drooping net and designed his court to be hourglass-shaped; from Real Tennis he borrowed the rackets with wooden handles and bent heads; and, from racquets, the scoring system with 15-point sets (Alexander 1986). Experimentation to suit local conditions was encouraged by the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC), English cricket’s leading club and governing body, which had assumed command of the new pastime, as it had Real Tennis and racquets (Schickel 1975). Attempting to standardize court designs and rules, the MCC hosted a one-day event in March 1875 at which various versions of lawn tennis were played and compared (Lake 2015). The result was that most of Wingfield’s original rules were 341

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accepted as standard, much to the consternation of some members of the general public who wrote to The Field of their dissatisfaction. Within two years Wingfield’s rules were superseded and effectively banished to the history books when the All England Croquet and Lawn Tennis Club (AECLTC) devised a different set of rules for its inaugural Wimbledon Championships. The Championships sub-committee, comprising writers Henry Jones (“Cavendish”), Julian Marshall and barrister C.G. Heathcote, switched Wingfield’s scoring method of 15-point games for the Real Tennis method of 15, 30, 40 and game; they introduced the double-fault; and they proposed a rectangular court instead of Wingfield’s hourglass shape. Despite going against the MCC’s rules, the AECLTC recognized the importance of their support, and agreed that authority over lawn tennis – albeit temporarily – should rest jointly in the hands of both clubs. Soon afterwards, but only for a short while, the AELTC became the chief governing body for lawn tennis, akin to the position the MCC adopted in English cricket.1 The Wimbledon Championships became the world’s most prestigious lawn tennis event, and the standard-bearer for all competitions (Barrett 1986). Other clubs and tournaments, including the inaugural United States National Championships played at the Newport Casino, Rhode Island, in 1881, followed their regulations in terms of rules and court features, which, since 1882, have remained almost unchanged. Because of its position of leadership within British tennis circles, the AELTC adopted a form of international paternalism, which was only challenged when their position of authority within Britain came to be questioned. From the mid-1880s, representatives of other clubs expressed public dissatisfaction with the AELTC’s dictatorial ways (Lake 2015). Julian Marshall, the club’s ‘colorful’ but ‘imposing’ secretary, became a target for criticism after inheriting considerable power when the MCC relinquished control of the sport to the AELTC in 1883; his ‘lack of tact’ earned him ‘many enemies’, according to Haylett and Evans (1989, p.15). It was felt that Marshall’s AELTC had neglected their duties to ‘manage the sport on a national basis, popularize it outside of west-London, or govern a democratic or representative system of decision-making’ (Lake 2015, p.57). The idea that one club should have the final say on rule arbitration, tournament date-setting and other matters was for many unreasonable and dogmatic (Potter 1963). A Pastime (15 October 1884, p.259) correspondent remarked: ‘If the AELTC wishes to retain its premier position it must march with the times. The powerful lawn tennis associations which are springing up in various parts of the country will not be governed by an irresponsible body’. The club was urged to take action and assume their wider responsibilities, but instead the ‘impassive and dictatorial’ Marshall dawdled and resisted, ‘[refusing] to listen to suggested amendments’ to rules and regulations proposed by representatives of other clubs (Potter 1963, p.12). Over the coming years, the image and status of the AELTC declined noticeably, as its prestige and authority was repeatedly challenged. The much-respected Pastime editor, N.L. Jackson, became particularly incensed with Marshall’s rough-shod approach to dealing with lesser-status clubs (Birley 1995), and he angled his magazine, the most well-read tennis weekly at the time, against the AELTC. Throughout 1885 to 1887, numerous criticisms of the club, its beleaguered secretary and even the Wimbledon Championships appeared in print, leading ultimately to a growing movement to unseat Marshall and wrest power away from the AELTC and into the hands of a more democratic body (Lake 2015). The final straw came when Harry S. Scrivener, president of the Oxford University LTC, was asked by the AELTC to alter the standard date of its annual varsity match against Cambridge in 1888 because of the assumed primacy of Wimbledon (Potter 1963). Outraged, he garnered support of over 100 other club representatives, and issued a circular criticizing the AELTC’s apparent lack of concern for other clubs and called for the formation of a new and representative association.The gathering scheduled for 26 January 1888, at the Freemason’s Tavern in Dulwich, thus became the inaugural meeting that 342

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formed the LTA. Marshall resigned from his AELTC position shortly thereafter, as the world’s premier club set about rebuilding its reputation. Despite attracting criticism of its own in its early years, the LTA nevertheless withstood mounting questions over its authority and by 1913 was able to boast not only the affiliation of almost a thousand clubs in Britain but also the associations of numerous overseas nations/regions including Australasia, Belgium, Bohemia, Ceylon, Chile, Finland, Hungary, Ireland, Jamaica, Mauritius, Netherlands, Norway, the Riviera, Russia, South Africa, Spain and Switzerland, alongside 26 individual clubs from 15 countries, e.g. Hamburg LTC, Moscow LTC and Santiago LTC (Collins 2008; Lake 2015). Thus, despite the United States National Lawn Tennis Association (USNLTA) forming seven years before the LTA, in 1881, it was the British body that set laws, settled disputes and organized the increasingly complicated tournament calendar before the International Lawn Tennis Federation (ILTF) formed in October, 1912 and came into formal operation a few months later. By this time, the Americans had become a leading nation in tennis, not only in their oncourt performances but also administratively, notably in their efforts to develop the Davis Cup. Before 1900, international matches between Britain and the US were arranged in a haphazard fashion, typically of the players’ own accords and unsupported by national associations (Eaves & Lake 2017). Off the back of others’ efforts to foster Anglo-American tennis relations, the American player Dwight Davis approached the USNLTA for support and agreed to donate a cup – a solid silver punch bowl lined in gold – as a prize. For the first international challengematch in 1900, the British sent a second-string team that were easily defeated, but the lack of standardization invited criticisms. British player Herbert Roper Barrett described the playing conditions at Boston’s Longwood Cricket Club, where the match was played: ‘The grounds were abominable.The grass was long. … The net was a disgrace to civilized lawn tennis, held up by guy ropes that were continually sagging. … [The balls] were awful – soft and motherly’ (cited in Myers 1908, p.243). In 1903, the British sent their best players, the legendary Reginald and Laurence Doherty, and they won what became known as the Davis Cup for the first time, and then again four more times before the war. The Australasians also ascended, winning five times between 1907 and 1914. The sport’s expansion and developing international character certainly helped inspire the need for an official federation to administer the sport internationally.

Inter-war period: the ILTF meets the rise of star players and “shamateurism” Much like international federations of other sports, the ILTF formed mostly from French impetus, but due to the lack of American affiliation and the almost immediate onset of the Great War, it remained largely ineffectual until the mid-1920s (MacDonald 1988).The Americans objected to the ILTF’s setting of three “World’s Championships” on grass, clay and hard-courts, because this honor excluded them. It took some diplomatic measures by the British in 1923, which included accepting the American version of the foot-fault law, refusing the offer of an extra vote they had originally been granted in ILTF meetings, and renouncing the titles of “World’s Championships”, for the Americans to join the ILTF from January 1924. In its new role as the legitimate and recognized international governing body of tennis, the ILTF was soon pressed into action to settle a dispute with the International Olympic Committee (IOC). For too long, argued ILTF and LTA officials, the Olympic lawn tennis events – featured in every Games since 1896 – had been poorly organized and managed, and the ILTF sought official representation on the IOC and a consultant role, working with the host-nation organizing committees to organize the tennis events (MacDonald 1988).They were sharply rebuffed, as the IOC was, in the 1920s, in no mood to concede authority to an international federation they 343

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regarded as representing a marginal and less than profitable Olympic sport (Lake & Llewellyn 2015).The dispute between the two organizations could not be resolved before the 1928 Games in Amsterdam, so tennis removed itself from the Olympic movement, not to return as a fullmedal sport until 1988. As in other areas of society, women were making marked advances in tennis in the 1920s. After two failed attempts to institute a women’s equivalent of the Davis Cup – the ILTF declined to reward the independent efforts of two British women, Mrs. Hall Walker in 1919 and Lady Wavertree in 1920 – the four-time US Nationals champion Mrs. Hazel Hotchkiss Wightman donated a cup in 1920 for leading British and American female players to compete for over a seven-match series. Initially, the ILTF decided ‘not to recognize this competition’; it was pointed out that ‘the Federation is opposed to the holding of a ladies’ international team competition of any kind’ (Lawn Tennis & Badminton 25 March 1920, 597), but by 1923 the “Wightman Cup” earned ILTF sanction. Issues related to amateurism also emerged at this time. The exploits of the sport’s first superstars, the Frenchwoman Suzanne Lenglen and the American William “Bill” Tilden, pushed officials to introduce stringent regulations to retain authority amidst creeping professionalization and commercialization. Both were known to have accepted under-the-table inducements to compete in tournaments, while demanding first-class travel and accommodations (Baltzell 1995; Brady 1959; Deford 2004; Engelmann 1988; Lake 2015; Wilson 2014). Tilden was targeted repeatedly by the USLTA; between 1923 and 1925, American officials threatened to suspend him three times: for profiting from producing coaching/instructional films; for writing newspaper articles for money; and for giving interviews to journalists about tournaments he was playing in (Deford 2004).These restrictions frustrated Tilden, largely because he was actually trained and fully qualified as a journalist. These rulings, therefore, effectively countered the advice often given to players from their associations that they should seek work from obliging employers that would afford them time to train, travel and compete, but remain “amateur” (Lake 2015). The LTA was also dogmatic in their amateur restrictions, supporting the proposal in 1932 for a player “declaration”, similar to the IOC’s “Olympic oath” instituted in 1925, to be signed by all tournament participants stating they had not violated amateur regulations. For some, the proposal was underpinned by fear and suspicion, and thus counterintuitive to fostering goodwill among players. For A. Wallis Myers, the well-respected British journalist and LTA Councilor, This declaration sends a cold shiver down the spine. It suggests that at every tournament in this country there is a pitfall for the young player. It conjures up a vision of commercial men lurking in the dressing-room ready to offer [money] to a player. … [This resolution] cast[s] suspicions on the great majority of honourable amateurs. In the words of Pope, they are “willing to wound, yet afraid to strike”’. (Lawn Tennis & Badminton 17 December 1932, p.933–4) Frustration grew among others within the LTA, as one Councilor remarked at the 1934 AGM: ‘I cannot help feeling that we are getting into difficulties in continually extending and elaborating the things that an amateur tennis player cannot do’ (Lawn Tennis & Badminton 15 December 1934, p.890). Indeed, these enforcements arguably did as much harm as good, in that, while stipulating acceptable actions among amateurs, they were infringing increasingly on personal liberties. Moreover, they demonstrated a comprehensive lack of appreciation for the material conditions of modern tennis, failing to recognize the growing financial difficulties that elitelevel players were faced with, balancing the time-commitments of training, competing and travelling with normal work expectations (Lake & Eaves 2017). 344

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These restrictions facilitated the practice of “shamateurism”, whereby top players were offered secret deals from sporting-goods manufacturers and given under-the-table payments from sympathetic tournament officials, which allowed them to remain “amateur” but afforded them the necessary opportunities to achieve their tennis goals. The British three-time Wimbledon champion (1934–6), Fred Perry (1984, p.40) admitted being well ‘taken care of ’ while touring America as an up-and-coming player in 1931, and his American contemporary Bobby Riggs recalled, before the war, having tournament chairmen ‘bid against each other for [his] services’; at a small tournament in Wisconsin he was paid $500 cash,2 ‘plus full accommodations, hotel and meals, and transportation’ (Riggs & McGann 1973, p.56). Such testimonies suggest how commonplace “shamateur” practices had become at some tournaments, sending the leading national associations in a tail spin. Part of the problem was administrators’ unwillingness to locate this developing issue within the burgeoning consumerism in the wider society, wherein athletes were becoming commodities and businesses and media outlets were keen for them to lend their names/faces to products and services (Smart 2007). Given the revenue that star players generated for tournaments, it was only a matter of time before they began to demand a fair share. Thus, the inter-war period was awash with various scandals and accusations of improper financial dealings, implicating tournament officials and other administrators, many of whom, it came to be known, held positions in the international federation or national associations (Jefferys 2009).

Post-war period: Open tennis, tournament boycotts and the rise of “player power” Throughout the post-war period, the ILTF sought to restore the prowess and reputations of the major championships, including Wimbledon and the US Nationals, as champion after champion left the amateur ranks for the burgeoning pro tours. Of the 15 number-one-ranked male players between 1946 and 1967, ten turned professional, with most using a major title as a springboard. Not only were profits affected, but the major championships, in effect, were turned into pro-tour qualifying competitions (Lake 2015). Thus, a key power struggle at this time was between the ILTF and tour promoters: men like Jack Kramer, the 1946 and ‘47 US National Championships and 1947 Wimbledon champion, who made his name as a successful promoter. Much to the ILTF’s disquiet, he made it a habit of poaching the best young players before they had even reached their respective playing peaks as amateurs (Kramer 1979). As a solution to the problem of talent drain, and the concomitant issue of rampant and continued shamateurism, Britain, the US and France proposed and supported several moves to make tennis “open”, thus removing the amateur-professional distinction.This would have kept professionals at least to some extent within the ILTF’s jurisdiction. The major thrust for open competition commenced before the 1960 ILTF AGM, which failed to pass the French resolutions – to create a separate class of “authorized players” who were allowed to claim limitless expenses but were not banned from amateur competitions, and to allow eight “open” tournaments for 1961 – by a mere five votes, and continued throughout the 1960s. Several more attempts along similar lines were made to garner broader ILTF support, but all failed to achieve the necessary two-thirds majority. Smaller nations feared a decline in their amateur championships, while the Soviet-led Eastern Bloc voted against professionalism as ‘state officials’ felt ‘a professional tour would challenge their power’ (Wilson 2014, p.157). Ultimately, it took the combined efforts of the LTA and AELTC to force the issue in 1967, deciding to propose an “open” Wimbledon for 1968 and risk ILTF expulsion. Given Wimbledon’s premier status and the show of support from other tennis nations and high-profile players, the general ILTF committee unanimously agreed 345

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at an emergency meeting in late March 1968 to accept the AELTC’s decision by not banning the LTA from ILTF membership. This represented what many believed was an inevitable outcome (Lake 2015). The move toward “open tennis” represented the most monumental change in the sport’s history, and had the consequence of completely shifting the balance of power in the world game. Stronger influences were now in play, not only from professional tour promoters, but also, inevitably, from commercial enterprises, player agencies and corporations eager to sponsor events or have players endorse their products; the onset of the “open era” meant players could sell themselves to the highest bidder within the free market (Bodo 1995; Evans 1993; Feinstein 1991). In part it was the possibility that professional promoters might take over the sport and alter the ‘atmosphere’ of tournaments that incited much opposition to open tennis (Noel 1955, p.155). The ILTF was a parochial body rooted in amateur ideals and, anxious to retain control over open tennis now emerging, they made the crucial mistake of failing to remove the amateurprofessional distinction (Barrett 1974). They created four distinct categories of “player” and offered individual national associations the opportunity to classify their own players accordingly (Lake 2015).3 When some nations expressed their views before the emergency meeting, Derek Hardwick, a key British figure in the push for open tennis, predicted that by setting professionals apart, it ‘[plays] into the promoters’ pockets and at the same time [drives] them away from control and [asks] them to form their own association’ (Times 22 February 1968, p.15). Predictably, they did just that. In the coming years, the ILTF made some foolish assumptions. They thought ‘the promoters would conveniently disappear as open tournaments rewarded the players with prize money honestly earned’, but, instead, promoters actually gained a stronger foothold in the US and Australia, where their national associations elected to retain amateur-professional distinctions (Barrett 1974, p.76). Thus, the ILTF’s efforts to retain authority and legitimacy in the coming years were challenged as promoters demanded their players receive better financial inducements to compete. After handfuls of top professionals skipped the 1970 Australian and French Opens because their demands had not been met, the ILTF were forced, reluctantly, to invite US tennis entrepreneur Jack Kramer aboard to design what became known as the Grand Prix circuit. This had as its explicit aim to draw talent away from World Championship Tennis (WCT), the leading professional tour/organization that had formed under the leadership of the Texan businessman Lamar Hunt (Evans 1993; Tingay 1973). Unable to broker a deal in the following two years, the 1972 Wimbledon Championships proceeded without its reigning champion, John Newcombe, and stars Rod Laver, Ken Rosewall and Arthur Ashe. The whole episode revealed the shambles that international tennis administration had become, leading Barrett (1974, p.80) to state: ‘After four years of open tennis, during which the game had boomed as never before in its history, the prospect loomed of a return to the dark ages of split worlds’. Mergers between the WCT and (ILTF) Grand Prix circuits, which all parties agreed were better for the sport, were attempted throughout the 1970s and 1980s, whereby seasons were effectively split in half, but such co-operations were fleeting. In 1973, the experiment failed owing to a combination of Hunt’s stubbornness and bullish tactics and the ILTF President Allan Heyman’s ignorance of the ‘unprecedented standards of professionalism WCT had set’ at their tournaments, which had made WCT, according to John McEnroe, ‘the best-run and most respected tour in the game’ (Evans 1993, p.69, 8). Another merger in 1978 lasted just four years, but in 1985 they merged for good. Three years later, however, it was announced that the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) would assume control of the tour in 1990, leading to both WCT and the Grand Prix tours being superseded (Evans 1993). 346

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Power struggles in the men’s game were not limited to those between tour promoters and associations. The early 1970s were also the dawn of “player power”. Recognizing the need to protect their own interests, leading male players in 1972 formed the ATP as a kind of tennis union. With Kramer as first Executive Director, they were called into action the following year, when the ILTF embroiled itself in a legal dispute with the Yugoslavian tennis player Nikki Pilic. Pilic was due to compete in a Davis Cup match against New Zealand but notified his association that he would not be available, as the match clashed with a WCT doubles tournament he was contracted to compete in. The Yugoslav federation rejected his refusal and ordered him to play, ultimately issuing him a nine-month ban for his non-attendance. Recognizing this as their first opportunity to demonstrate their authority – a crucial battle to win if the ATP was to have any real legitimacy internationally – the newly minted player’s union duly stepped in, and urged a player boycott of any tournament that Pilic was banned from competing in (Evans 1993). The ILTF reduced the ban to one month, but this still, calculatingly, covered the Wimbledon Championships. They had assumed that no player would forego the world’s most prestigious tournament, but they were proved spectacularly wrong when the ATP called their bluff, ‘a blow from which the ILTF never fully recovered’ according to Phillippe Chatrier, the Fédération Française du Tennis (FFT) president from 1972 to 1992 (cited in Evans 1993, p.94). Of the top 16 players, 13 supported the boycott, contributing to a total of 77 withdrawals. Beaten, the ILTF were forced to concede some authority, as out of the ashes of the 1973 boycott came the idea of forming the Men’s International Professional Tennis Council (MIPTC), an elected nine-man committee charged with administering the sport while acting as a go-between for the various groups competing for power. The committee comprised three ILTF representatives, three ATP members and three tournament representatives. Almost as soon as the MIPTC had formed, they were forced to deal with another tennis event that threatened the precarious balance of power: a mixed-sex team-tennis league competition called World Team Tennis (WTT). WTT was launched in 1974, and running in its initial format – 16 teams, each representing a North American city, playing a 44-game schedule in front of raucous crowds – for five seasons, spread over three months (May–August, with a threeweek break for Wimbledon). This league not only challenged the sport’s long-held cultural traditions of polite decorum and respectability, but because of schedule clashes also threatened to draw players and spectators away from some of the smaller ILTF events and, crucially, the French Open. At this time, as Chatrier reflected, the French Open was going through a difficult period of declining television fees, corporate support and spectator interest; crumbling facilities and frequent star-player absenteeism were considered the chief causes (Feinstein 1991). Chatrier took measures to ensure its survival by banning WTT players from competing in 1974, a move the ILTF supported (Bodo 1995). ‘Those were desperate times. We took desperate measures’, he recalled (cited in Feinstein 1991, p.218). If the situation for the men in the early open era was tumultuous enough, the ILTF also had to deal with issues in the women’s game. To celebrate its 50th anniversary in 1963, the ILTF introduced the Federation Cup, the first comprehensive international tennis challenge for women. The first event, held at Queen’s Club in London, was considered ‘an outstanding additional fixture’, but cost the LTA over £1,700 to host (Lawn Tennis & Badminton 15 December 1963:643). Despite struggling to garner corporate sponsorship, the improving caliber of women’s play and the emergence of new and exciting female players in the open era ensured the competition’s future success.4 Trouble was on the horizon, however. Buoyed by the widespread feminist upsurge across much of American and European society, several leading female players, led by Billie Jean King and Rosie Casals, voiced their dissatisfaction with the financial arrangements of open tennis for women, whereby their prize-money allocations averaged about 347

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one-tenth of what the men received (Lichtenstein 1974). King urged eight other professionals – most of them American and under USLTA jurisdiction – to join a “rebel” tour sponsored by Virginia Slims (a brand of the Philip Morris tobacco company). From the “Original Nine”, the Virginia Slims (VS) tour grew rapidly and by 1973 boasted 64 players and a prize-money fund of $660,000. In response, the ILTF launched an updated women’s tour, led by Chris Evert, Evonne Goolagong and Martina Navratilova, in an effort to dislodge the rebel VS tour. It succeeded in boosting the overall prize-money for the leading female players, but the VS representatives were now in a strong position to negotiate.They agreed to an amalgamated tour, under the auspices of the ILTF, but only if the US Open agreed to equal prize-money for men and women from 1973 onwards. Spearheaded by the newly formed Women’s Tennis Association (WTA), with King at its helm, the leading female professionals pressed the ILTF/USTA to the agreement, and ushered in a period of unprecedented growth for women’s tennis, contextualized as part of the broader feminist movement (Spencer 1997).

Recent years: fully amalgamated tours and the sense of a true “balance” of power The formation of the ATP Tour in 1990 signaled the end of the MIPTC as the arbitrating body administering and mediating relations within the men’s game, and represented a further blow to the ITF.5 From the mid-1980s, their Grand Prix had been ‘treading water’ with prize-money increasing only slightly above the rate of inflation, and Evans (1993, p.208) explained: Bad feeling was rife amongst members of the Men’s Tennis Council.The tournament directors were unhappy with the ITF. … Tournament leaders were … fed up with the players because there were too many exhibitions, and top stars, disenchanted with the whole system, were either refusing to fulfil commitments or pulling out injured at the last minute. Some members of the MIPTC also felt ‘the ITF was quite content to let trouble brew’ so the MIPTC looked weak in its leadership (Evans 1993, p.208). The situation was an unhappy one for all concerned, and radical change was on the cards. Refused entry to the US National Tennis Centre press conference room during the 1988 US Open, Hamilton Jordan, then leader of the ATP, organized an emergency press conference in the parking lot. He declared that the ATP would organize the tour from now on, with its board consisting of three player representatives and three tournament directors. The tour would be scheduled around the Davis Cup and four “majors”, and so would attempt to cooperate with the ITF as much as possible. ITF leaders were incredulous; before their very eyes, the ‘nightmare’ was unfolding: ‘a major, world-wide professional men’s circuit run totally outside [their] jurisdiction’ (Evans 1993, p.210). The ATP Tour was designed to culminate in the ATP Tour World Championships, staged in November, featuring just the world’s top eight players as calculated by end-of-season rankings. The inaugural event in 1990 was immediately recognized as ‘the legitimate year-end finale’, whereas the ITF’s equivalent year-end event, the Grand Slam Cup, failed to make the same impact (Evans 1993, p.222). Despite offering three times more prize money – $6 million in 1990 – many of the top players described it as ‘unnecessary’, while John McEnroe complained at the ‘obscene’ money on offer: ‘They are trying to turn us into money whores’ (Evans 1993, p.222). After 1990, the ATP Tour ran the Championships Series events – recently renamed the Masters 1000 series – which were the top-tier tournaments just below the Grand Slams, worth 2000 ranking points, and below these came the World Series 500 and 250 tournaments and the 348

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Challenger Tour. Alongside the major championships and the Davis Cup, the ITF began to run a “development” tour for lower-ranked players called the Futures Circuit. By way of escalating prize money and exposure, the women’s professional tour also progressed since the turbulent mid-1970s. In 1975, the WTA signed its first television broadcast with CBS and accepted sponsorship from Colgate the following year. Avon and then Toyota emerged as key corporate partners, each sponsoring domestic and international tournaments respectively, until they merged in 1983 when VS returned to take full sponsorship rights of the WTA tour. By 1980, over 250 women were playing professionally in almost 50 tournaments worldwide, which together offered $7.2 million in prize money. Compared to the men’s tour, the ITF retained a stronger foothold within women’s tennis as the Women’s International Tennis Council adopted a less antagonistic stance toward the beleaguered international federation in the 1980s and 1990s (Evans 1993). Similar to the men’s tour, the ITF adopted the smaller “development” circuit for players attempting to earn their place in the main draws of WTA tournaments. All told, the present system of international governance in tennis represents an impressive accomplishment, given the periods of power struggles between amateur and professional factions, and between leading men’s and women’s players and officials. Ultimately, the players have benefited most from greatly enhanced wealth and status, and much of this is to the credit of those before them who at times sacrificed much to ensure greater access to the tournament profits that helped generate. To suggest their enhanced wealth and status represents real authority, however, would be to overlook the immensely complicated and constantly fluctuating balances of power in tennis governance, held by numerous groups. In the sport’s early years, power was shared between players, tournament officials, governing body administrators and media personnel, but in the post-war period and since the advent of increasingly commercialized and professionalized “open tennis”, corporate sponsors, media/broadcasting organizations, tournament promoters, management groups and player unions have also taken their rightful place at the table. Within this increasingly complex system, not only is change much harder to manage, but also more difficult to predict, and this complexity shows no signs of diminishing as tennis sustains its position as one of the world’s largest and most popular and profitable sports.

Notes 1 In 1882, the AECLTC dropped “Croquet” from its title to reflect the club’s shifting emphasis, but in 1899, “Croquet” was re-introduced but put after “Lawn Tennis”. The club is also known commonly as the AELTC or the AEC. 2 This is the equivalent of around $7,500 today. 3 Three of these categories were for players who accepted the authority of their respective national association: “registered players”, who accepted payment and were eligible to play in the Davis Cup; “coaching-professionals”, who accepted payment for teaching the game but were ineligible for the Davis Cup; and “amateurs”, who accepted no payment. The fourth category was “contract-professionals” who did not acknowledge their own national association’s authority so were ineligible to play in the Davis Cup. 4 With the success of the “Fed Cup”, and the dominance of the Americans (51 wins to ten losses) especially in the post-war era, the Wightman Cup gradually fell out of favour, and despite occupying an important part of the sport’s history, had failed to make itself relevant in the open era. The last Wightman Cup contest was staged in 1989. 5 The ILTF dropped “Lawn” from its title in 1977.

References Alexander, G.E. (1986) Wingfield: Edwardian Gentleman. Portsmouth: Peter E. Randall. Baltzell, E.D. (1995) Sporting Gentlemen: Men’s Tennis from the Age of Honor to the Cult of the Superstar. New York: Free Press. 349

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Barrett, J. (1974) Open Tennis. In Robertson, M., The Encyclopeda of Tennis (pp.72–84), New York: Viking Press. Barrett, J. (1986) 100 Wimbledon Championships: A Celebration. London: Collins. Birley, D. (1995) Land of Sport and Glory: Sport and British Society 1887–1910. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Bodo, P. (1995) The Courts of Babylon: Tales of Greed and Glory in the Harsh New World of Professional Tennis. New York: Scribner. Brady, M. (1959) The Centre Court Story. London: Sportsman’s Book Club. Collins, B. (2008) The Bud Collins History of Tennis: An Authoritative Encyclopedia and Record Book. Chicago: New Chapter Press. Deford, F. (2004) Big Bill Tilden:The Triumphs and the Tragedy. Toronto: Sportclassic Books. Eaves, S.J. & Lake, R.J. (2017) The ‘Ubiquitous Apostle of International Play’, Wilberforce Vaughan Eaves: The Forgotten Internationalist of Lawn Tennis, International Journal of the History of Sport, 33(16), 1963–81. Engelmann, L. (1988) The Goddess and the American Girl:The Story of Suzanne Lenglen and Helen Wills. New York: Oxford University Press. Evans, R. (1993) Open Tennis: 25 Years of Seriously Defiant Success On and Off the Court. London: Bloomsbury. Feinstein, J. (1991) Hard Courts: Real Life on the Professional Tennis Tours. New York:Villard Books. Haylett, J. & Evans, R. (1989) The Illustrated Encyclopaedia of World Tennis. Basingstoke: Automobile Association. Jefferys, K. (2009) The Heyday of Amateurism in Modern Lawn Tennis, International Journal of the History of Sport, 26(15), 2236–52. Kramer, J. (1979) The Game: My 40 Years in Tennis. London: Andre Deutsch. Lake, R.J. (2015) A Social History of Tennis in Britain. London: Routledge. Lake, R.J. & Eaves, S.J. (2017) Defeat, Decline and Disconnect: A Critical Analysis of Attempted Reform in British Tennis during the Inter-war Period, Sport in History, 37(1), 1–24. Lake, R.J. & Llewellyn, M.P. (2015) The Demise of Olympic Lawn Tennis in the 1920s: A Case Study of Shifting Relations between the IOC and International Sports Federations. Olympika, XXIV, 94–119. Lichtenstein, G. (1974) A Long Way Baby: Behind the Scenes in Women’s Pro Tennis. New York: Morrow. MacDonald, G. (1988) A History of Relations between the International Olympic Committee and the International Sports Federations, 1891–1968. London: ON, Unpublished PhD dissertation, The International Centre for Olympic Studies, The University of Western Ontario. Myers, A.W. (1908) The Complete Lawn Tennis Player. Philadelphia: George W. Jacobs & Co. Noel, S. (1955) Tennis in our Time. London: Sportsmans Book Club. Perry, F. (1984) Fred Perry: An Autobiography. London: Arrow Books. Potter, E. (1963) Kings of the Court:The Story of Lawn Tennis. New York: A.S. Barnes. Riggs, B. & McGann, G. (1973) Court Hustler. Philadelphia: Lippincott. Schickel, R. (1975) The World of Tennis. Toronto: Random House. Smart, B. (2007) Not Playing Around: Global Capitalism, Modern Sport and Consumer Culture, Global Networks, 7(2), 113–34. Spencer, N.E. (1997) Once Upon a Subculture: Professional Women’s Tennis and the Meaning of Style, 1970–1974, Journal of Sport and Social Issues, 21(4), 363–78. Tingay, L. (1973) A History of Lawn Tennis in Pictures. London: Tom Stacey Ltd. Wilson, E. (2014) Love Game: A History of Tennis, from Victorian Pastime to Global Phenomenon. London: Serpent’s Tail.

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34 Defending the grand slam Government intervention, urban renewal and keeping the Australian Open Alistair John and Brent McDonald

On the 13 October 2015, the Victorian Treasurer, Tim Pallas, was quoted as saying, with reference to the Australian Open: ‘We’re investing in our sporting infrastructure to ensure it remains the envy of cities all over the world, and to maintain our status as the sporting capital’.1 This basic idea has been part of Melbourne’s urban entrepreneurial strategy for some time, and is similar to strategies in a number of other post-industrial cities. Over the past three decades, Melbourne has attempted to transform itself from a city based on manufacturing to one founded upon consumption. This has been accomplished with an urban design that has repackaged the landscape to exhibit the city as an exciting, clean and safe space for both work and leisure (Schimmel 2006). This chapter examines the establishment of the National Tennis Centre (NTC) in Melbourne, Australia, and the Victorian State Government’s appropriation of the Australian Open Tennis Championships as the central plank of its urban entrepreneurial strategy. In particular, we consider how the retention of the Australian Open, and the political justification for continued state funding, is framed to satisfy local (historical) and global (aspirational) needs. In the remainder of this chapter we briefly explain the history and significance of tennis in the Australian sporting landscape before describing the socio-political context of Melbourne at the time of the relocation of the Australian Open from the Kooyong Lawn Tennis Club to the NTC in 1988. From this context, we will discuss the political rationale for the continued redevelopment and reinvestment of public funds into the NTC especially in relation to branding, public good and competition from rival cities to acquire the Grand Slam tournament.

Why tennis? Sport is generally considered an important element of Australian identity. British settlers took advantage of factors such as climate, geography and early prosperity to establish sports recently codified and rationalised in Great Britain and Ireland (Adair 2009; Cashman, 1995). Tennis was first played in Australia in 1878 and by the end of the nineteenth century had gained popularity around Australia (Kinross-Smith 1994; O’Farrell 1985). During the first half of the twentieth century Australia boasted the highest ratio of courts to population in the world (Fewster 1985) and tennis enjoyed strong support and participation from both men and women (Senyard 1996). 351

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Promoted to all social classes (McCarthy & Frawley 2008), tennis has largely remained a sport for the middle/upper classes in Australia (O’Farrell 1985). Indeed, O’Farrell (1985, p.69, 77–8) argues that tennis in Australia ‘must be analysed in terms of the growth of an egalitarian spirit’, which has resulted in the sport being ‘an integral part of the Australian national heritage and character [despite] being the exclusive domain of the rich’. Thus, the potential class divisiveness of tennis is overridden, in Australia, by a strong sense of nationalism, which has been built upon the historical success of Australian tennis athletes. It was during the 1950s and 1960s that tennis really established itself in the Australian sporting psyche, most notably through its extraordinary streak of Davis Cup victories (15 titles in 20 years) and the phenomenal individual successes of players like Rod Laver and Margaret Court. This period coincides with what is termed the “Golden Age” of Australian sport, typified by the award of the Summer Olympics Games to Melbourne for 1956. It is a time that provokes ‘nostalgic recollections of a happier past’, when sport was “purer” and Australian athletes dominated world events (Magdalinski 2000, p.310). The “Golden Age” for tennis stretched into the early 1970s and significantly bridges the amateur and professional eras. During much of this era and prior, the Australian Open, formerly the Australasian Championships and then the Australian Championships, was staged in cities across Australia and New Zealand. It was not until 1972 that Tennis Australia awarded the private Kooyong Lawn Tennis Club (hereafter referred to as the Kooyong Club),2 located in Melbourne’s inner-suburb of Kooyong, the long-term hosting rights of the Australian Open (Foenander n.d.). While sport is a significant component of Australian identity, Melbournians often regard their city as having the strongest sporting culture across the nation (Ward 2015). Hence for Melbournians, the tennis being in Kooyong also meant Melbourne, and therefore not Sydney or Brisbane, was cemented as the nation’s sporting capital. Indeed, the legacy of the 1956 Olympics was, if nothing else, that a global sporting event had the potential to provide a platform to put one’s city on the map and to act as a vehicle to re-imagine the brand of the city as a modern, business-friendly location (Davison 1997). Perhaps the Australian Open could offer similar possibilities for re-imagining the “rust-belt” city into a desirable place for commercial activity?

From Kooyong to Flinders From the early 1970s, Melbourne encountered a period of deindustrialisation, due to the dismantling of Australia’s manufacturing base, globalisation, protective tariff reductions and the 1973 oil crisis (Dingle & O’Hanlon 2009; Sandercock & Dovey 2002) and a resultant deterioration of its central business district (CBD). In April 1982, John Cain II led the Labor Party to a state election victory and, in an attempt to reverse the effects of deindustrialisation, implemented a Keynesian-style interventionist economic strategy based on selecting and investing in Victoria’s perceived competitive strengths (Harkness 2013). Labor’s 1984 ten-year economic strategy Victoria: The Next Step stipulated nine areas in which Victoria was deemed to have a competitive strength over other states; government intervention to improve efficiency in these areas was suggested as a strategy for the State Government of Victoria. One of these strengths was ‘the national role of Melbourne as a major trading, cultural and sporting centre, and the landuse opportunities to further develop that role [emphasis added]’ (Parliament of Victoria 1984, p.7). While sporting culture has a long history in Victoria (Cashman & Hickie 1990; Davison 1997), we argue that Victoria: The Next Step commenced a more specific use of sport as an urban entrepreneurial tool. The economic strategy explicitly cited the desire to host sporting

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events in order to promote Melbourne, attract tourists and entice corporations to relocate their administrative headquarters to the Victorian capital. As such, the sporting events themselves needed to be of interest to major corporations and be attractive to the professional employees of these companies. One specific event mentioned was the Australian Open, with the government proclaiming that ‘moves to assist the location of a new National Tennis Centre in an appropriate Melbourne location close to services’ had begun (Government of Victoria 1984, p.171), illustrating the urban entrepreneurial significance placed on the annual tournament.This state-supported decision to relocate the Australian Open occurred after concerns were raised about the quality of the event at the Kooyong Club and as a consequence, the negative global exposure of Melbourne. Despite healthy attendance figures, by the early 1980s the lack of high profile international athletes attending the Kooyong tournament led to concerns being raised by tennis fans, broadcasters and sponsors (Bodo 1995; McCarthy & Frawley 2008). Two main reasons were cited for high profile players avoiding the Australian Open: the time of year when the event was held was too close to the holiday season for international players (between 1977 and 1985 the Australian Open was held in December, but it has since operated in January) and the facilities at the Kooyong Club were not up to the same standard as the other major tournaments (McCarthy & Frawley 2008). In addition to Kooyong being viewed unfavourably by the global tennis community, Tennis Australia and the Kooyong Club quarrelled over the control of facilities during the tournament and the share of profits (Yallop 1984a). By early 1982, with fears that an American campaign was mounting to steal the “grand slam” status from the Australian Open, Tennis Australia proposed that the Kooyong Club should keep the Open but would need to significantly upgrade its facilities. However, Tennis Australia would not commit to providing the Kooyong Club with a long-term contract to host the Open (Kooyong Problems 1983). As a result, in July 1983 Kooyong Club members rejected their council’s recommendation to invest one million dollars of club funds into an upgrade (Kooyong Problems 1983), and Tennis Australia began considering a number of Melbourne sites for construction of a new tennis centre, seeking state government support for a new stadium (Yallop 1983). Premier Cain explained that it was not just Tennis Australia but also the International Tennis Federation which desired a move from Kooyong: Philippe Chatrier who was … head of world tennis [the International Tennis Federation] … made it very clear that Australia, or Melbourne wouldn’t be able to hold the Australian Open, as a Grand Slam tournament, unless we did something better than Kooyong. … The facilities were pretty ordinary. The good players weren’t coming out in the early ‘80s. They just regarded it as being too close to Christmas. … So that was made very clear to us. (Cain, personal communication, 16 April 2013) Significantly, Cain cited international tennis as ‘perhaps the most attractive sport in terms of economic benefits that the State could have … [and the] government had to do all we could to ensure that we retained the Australian Open in Melbourne’ (Cain n.d., p.3). Cain clearly acknowledged the significant capital – in the form of corporate interest – that a major tennis event held. As a global sport, Cain valued the exposure that Melbourne received from hosting the Grand Slam event, but also valued the prestige of linking Melbourne to other global cities; ‘I emphasise why I believe it was important; the Grand Slam cities – New York, London, Paris, Melbourne – so you’re up there with the big players’ (Cain, personal communication, 16 April 2013).

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Constructing Cain’s cathedral In October, 1984, Premier Cain announced the A$53 million National Tennis Centre – eventually costing A$85 million (Baragwanath 1993) – comprising 16 match courts, three of which were ‘show courts’ including a 15,000-seat stadium with retractable roof, all situated at Flinders Park on a six-hectare site less than one kilometre from Melbourne’s CBD (Tennis Digest 1985). The motivation for building this new facility was three-fold: to keep the Australian Open in Melbourne, to shift control of the event away from the private Kooyong Club and to create an economic driver for the state of Victoria (Cain n.d.). Earlier that year, Cain had allocated A$50,000, along with an equal contribution by Tennis Australia, to assess the suitability of a number of locations around Melbourne for a Tennis Centre (Yallop 1984c). Yallop (1984b) reported in the Age that three sites – Flinders Park, Albert Park and Olympic Park – were being considered for the 15,000-seat stadium with the Kooyong Club essentially ruled out after negotiations with Tennis Australia had failed. Cross-party political support for the construction of a new tennis centre was evident despite concerns about the lack of disclosure of planning information related to the NTC (Parliament of Victoria 1985), limiting the opportunity for public debate. Prior to confirming the location for the tennis centre, concern over the type of playing surface that would be laid at the tennis centre appeared to be the main point of contention. The tennis fraternity appeared keen for the Open to continue to be played on grass as this was perceived to give Australian tennis players, who had had success on the surface in the past, an advantage (Mathews 1984).The desire to construct a multi-use, corporate-friendly space, meant that the government’s financial investment was conditional on the centre being used for alternative economic activities, such as concerts and conferences (Austen 1984), which would require a synthetic surface. A Treasury Department official explained that the economic forecast came back saying,“yes it is viable with a number of key criteria”, one of which it had to be a multi-use venue, that it wasn’t going to stack up as a tennis centre alone … And the second was that it had to be centrally located”. (Anonymous, personal communication, 5 October 2012) Premier Cain likewise explained, with economic undertones, that the government emphasised the multi-use element of the sporting facility; ‘We made the condition that it had to be multipurpose and that’s why grass disappeared. They had to have a roof; it had to be adaptable for other uses, which it is. The concert income there is quite considerable’ (Cain, personal communication, 16 April 2013). To relocate the Australian Open from the Kooyong Club, Tennis Australia relied heavily on the financial and political support of the state government, so the decision to lay a synthetic surface was made (Yallop 1984d). This is despite the potential adverse effect this could have on Australian athletic performance. By late 1984, with the playing surface confirmed, public discussion shifted to the location of the NTC; particularly the use of Crown land for the purpose of elite sport. On announcing Flinders Park as the location for the NTC, Cain admitted that ‘the Planning Department had not finished an environmental study on the site’ (Austen 1984, p.11). This confession prompted the Conservation Council of Victoria to raise concerns about announcing a site before a robust process of environmental impact studies and public consultation had taken place: Questions of public consultation and alienation of Crown land seem to have been ignored in the interests of establishing a preferred location for the Australian Open of the future. … 354

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Before any decisions are made about the possibility of locating the National Tennis Centre at Flinders Park a full environment effects statement must be undertaken. … It makes a farce of the whole Environment Effects Act if before the public consultation process even begins; a decision to proceed with development has already been made. (Hogan 1984, p.16) The Liberal Opposition meanwhile claimed the NTC would destroy ‘irreplaceable inner-city parkland’ (Clarke & Slamet 1985, p.5) that ‘was part of Melbourne’s heritage and one of the city’s most-used open spaces’, suggesting that alternative sites such as Albert Park or land near Flemington Racecourse had not properly been investigated (Merrigan 1985, p.11). During parliamentary debate, Liberal MP Roy Ward asserted that Labor’s approval of Flinders Park as the location for the NTC would ‘raid, plunder and commercially rape and violate this nation’s heritage to maintain the power of big sport’ (Parliament of Victoria 1985, p.733). Of further concern to the Opposition was the specific use of Crown land for tennis, as Roy argued, Flinders Park ‘belongs to the people of Victoria, not to just one section of the community’ (Parliament of Victoria 1985, p.735). Cain (n.d.) later suggested ‘the impact on the community generally, and on any organised group for that matter, was minimal’ (p.17) and that the NTC was always destined to be used by ‘the people of Victoria’ (p.11) as evidenced by stipulations that outside tennis courts be open for public use when events were not being held. However, while some outdoor courts are accessible to the public (when the Australian Open is not being hosted), overwhelmingly the NTC site – specifically the indoor arenas – is used for corporate events. At the same time as the National Tennis Centre Bill was being approved, the National Tennis Centre Trust was set up as a corporate body responsible for ‘the care, improvement, use, promotion and financial management of the Centre’ (Baragwanath 1993, p.5). The NTC Trust initially consisted of 13 trustees: five MPs, five non-MPs nominated by the Minister for Sport & Recreation,3 with the remaining three members selected from Tennis Australia (two) and the Victorian Tennis Association (one). Thus, the government ensured significant representation on the Trust – and with it the means to “select” members who supported the government’s vision for the Centre. As Cain (n.d., p.30–1) explained: We were concerned about the management structure and having some capacity as a government to exercise control over the Tennis Centre in future years. … We felt this Trust structure had the advantage of giving “precinct representation”, but at the same time, giving government overall authority and control over the composition. The make-up of subsequent Trusts has followed a similar strategy, ensuring significant government representation illustrating the importance of the NTC to the government and its urban entrepreneurial strategy.4 In January 1988, Flinders Park hosted its first Australian Open. The tournament was mediated as a success with attendance larger than previous Kooyong-based Australian Opens. Despite this proclaimed success, the National Tennis Centre reported a A$4.3 million loss in its first six months of operation (Keenan 1988) and by June 1991 the Centre had lost A$35 million, largely due to heavy interest repayments as a result of the financing arrangements of the Centre but also due to lower than expected non-tennis related revenues and higher than projected operating costs (Baragwanath 1993). In response, the Victorian government began a 12-year annual grant of A$12 million ( A$144 million in total) to the Trust (Baragwanth 1993); in return,Tennis Australia guaranteed the Australian Open at the Centre for 25 years. For Cain (n.d., p.27) that A$12 million a year ‘is a very modest investment for the considerable return that the Centre 355

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brings’, claiming that the Australian Open, at that time, added between A$34 million and A$58 million to the state economy each year. The cementing of the Australian Open at the NTC for a quarter of a century also allowed the Victorian Government to position the Australian Open as a centre-piece in its Major Events strategy.

From Flinders to marketing Melbourne Liberal leader Jeff Kennett, who employed a strategy of place promotion in an attempt to capture a larger share of investment, jobs and tourism from rival states (Engels, 2000), won the 1992 state election with support from the National Party. Adopting a ‘Thatcherite agenda’ of freemarket reform along with corporate-friendly laws (Sandercock & Dovey 2002), the Kennett Liberal-National coalition attempted to entice major (sporting) events with prominent global media broadcasting appeal to the city. Six months after entering office, Kennett launched a program of major civic projects entitled Agenda 21 (Sandercock & Dovey 2002). Agenda 21 aimed to ‘revitalise Victoria’s capital city and restore its cultural and commercial dominance by the turn of the century’ (Office of the Premier of Victoria 1993, cited in Glow & Johanson 2004, p.132). The capital works program, funded by revenue received from gambling taxes, predominantly from the newly built Crown Casino, ‘embarked upon an ambitious rebuilding of central Melbourne’ (Engels 2000, p.478) and included construction of an exhibition centre, city square (Federation Square), public museum and two sports venues (including a Multipurpose Venue at the NTC). These developments were aimed at serving the needs of large businesses and the professional workers that accompany global footloose capital as well as tourists (Sandercock & Dovey 2002). The strategy relied on the hosting of hallmark cultural and sporting events, such as the Australian Open, to ‘add to the allure that a re-equipped and re-imaged Melbourne could now offer to the discerning tourist and corporate executives’ (Engels 2000, p.478). In May 1995, after ten years of Victorian governments building the tennis “brand”, the Kennett-led coalition government announced that Flinders Park would now be called Melbourne Park (Rados 1995). Coalition Treasurer Alan Stockdale, explained that this was because Kennett had watched the Australian Open on the BBC television while in London: The Australian Tennis Open Men’s Final was about to start and the BBC had a sign saying, you know, “Stand-by, start of the Australian Tennis Open” superimposed over a logo of the Sydney Opera House. And as a result of seeing that, Jeff decided we needed to change the name Flinders Park to Melbourne Park. And we covered the whole tennis stadium in the word Melbourne. (A. Stockdale, personal communication, 6 May 2013) While the Australian Open clearly branded the nation to a foreign market, images related to Sydney appeared to be symbolic of Australian-ness. As such, legislation was introduced to rename the area “Melbourne Park” in an attempt to inform an international market of the Victorian location of the Championships. Indeed, this name change further illustrates the importance of the event to Melbourne’s urban entrepreneurial, major event strategy; the Australian Open at the National Tennis Centre had quickly become a pivotal billboard for Melbourne. In addition to using the Australian Open as a marketing tool for Melbourne, Kennett was also instrumental in enhancing the site as a place for alternative revenue by constructing a A$65.4 million Multipurpose Venue (MPV), announced in 1998 and completed in 2000. The MPV was designed to host tennis, basketball and cycling, in addition to hosting concerts (Owen & Hansen 1998). Moreover, the MPV was to have a retractable roof, allowing the government, 356

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Melbourne and Olympic Parks Trust (previously NTC Trust) and Tennis Australia to claim the Australian Open as the only grand slam tournament to have two roofed stadiums (Baker 1999) and importantly the space for non-tennis related corporate activities had significantly increased. As such, Melbourne – and Tennis Australia – could sell itself as unique among the grand slam tournaments and the city represented itself as being at the forefront of technology. In addition to augmenting the tennis and corporate facilities, Kennett rationalised the public investment by explaining: ‘The venue will significantly enhance Melbourne’s competitive strengths in attracting major events and is an integral part of our bid for the 2006 Commonwealth Games’ (cited in: Owen & Hansen 1998, p.3). The “competitive strengths” that John Cain had identified in 1984 continued to be a key concept in Melbourne’s Liberal economic approach over a decade later with the NTC at the fulcrum.

Silencing rivals Subsequent governments, both Labor (1999–2010) and Liberal-National (2010–4) retained a similar strategy of “selling” the city as a desirable place for footloose capital and international investment (see Coffey 2012; Shaw 2013). The Bracks/Brumby Labor governments which operated from 1999 to 2010 continued to emphasise the importance of investing in Melbourne as an entertainment hub for the state. For example, in the 2002 30-year Metropolitan strategy, Melbourne 2030, the government stressed the need to: [Strengthen] central Melbourne’s capital city functions and its role as the primary business, retail, sport and entertainment hub for the metropolitan area … [and] large-scale sport and entertainment facilities of State or national significance will be located within Central Melbourne and close to the Principal Public Transport Network. (Department of Infrastructure,Victoria 2002, p.80) Despite being regarded as fiscally conservative (Shaw 2013), the Bracks/Brumby governments did initiate a significant public investment in Melbourne Park towards the end of Labor’s term by way of commissioning a A$366 million first stage redevelopment of Melbourne Park in 2010. The second stage of Melbourne Park’s redevelopment, to the tune of a further A$338 million, was later approved by the Liberal-National coalition government in 2014 (Campbell 2014). These large outlays of public money were justified, in a similar manner to the rationale for relocating the event to the NTC, on the basis that the grand slam status of the Australian Open was under threat. The 25-year contract, signed in 1991, between Tennis Australia and the Victorian government to stage the Australian Open at (now) Melbourne Park secured the event in Melbourne but did not alleviate fears of losing the “grand slam” status of the tournament. While Tennis Australia determines where the Australian Open will be held, it is the International Tennis Federation that determines which events are to be considered “grand slams”. As such, although the four current grand slams date from when they were first allocated this privilege in 1923, political and media concern about the external threat of losing the “grand slam” has often been raised in Victoria. Rumours that an American tournament was planning to procure the grand slam status of the Australian Open, when it was being staged at Kooyong, helped Tennis Australia and Victorian politicians justify the NTC’s initial construction, which helped silence these fears for two decades. However, reports of rival states/nations’ desires to attain the grand slam event re-emerged in 2008 (Schlink 2008), and by the following year, Sydney, Shanghai, Madrid and Dubai were cited as immediate challengers to Melbourne (Houston 2009). 357

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In response, the Labor government conducted a A$2 million feasibility study to determine improvements to Melbourne Park; announcing the study during the 2008 Australian Open when public interest in the event was at its peak. In a similar strategy, Premier John Brumby waited for the 2009 Australian Open to commence before pledging a further “$5 million for a capital works program as well as detailed design and costings for the [redevelopment] projects first stage” (Milovanovic 2009, p.3). The timing of the feasibility study and capital works program was not coincidental with contract renegotiations on the horizon. In 2009, with Tennis Australia’s 25-year contract set to expire in 2016, the Victorian government set about re-negotiating a deal. They agreed to upgrade and extend Melbourne Park in addition to granting Tennis Australia a larger slice of revenue from the Australian Open event in return for a renewed 20-year contract to keep the Australian Open in Melbourne until 2036 (Houston 2009). Continuing the strategy to use the event as a platform, on the second day of the 2010 Australian Open, Brumby announced plans for a A$363 million first stage redevelopment of Melbourne Park – including the installation of a retractable roof and 1,500 extra seats on ”Margaret Court” show court along with 21 new courts, eight of which were indoor (Grace 2010).5 On announcing the redevelopment plans, Brumby continued to defend the expenditure on the basis that the upgrades guaranteed the Australian Open stayed in Melbourne and ensured its “grand slam” status (‘Melbourne Tennis Centre’ 2010). With similar timing to Brumby, Liberal-National Coalition premier Dennis Napthine revealed his government would make a contribution of A$298 million towards a A$338 million second-stage redevelopment to Melbourne Park the day before the 2014 Australian Open, with the remaining A$40 million provided by the Melbourne and Olympic Parks Trust (Campbell 2014).This second stage of the redevelopment included a new bridge to the west of Melbourne Park, upgrades to the Rod Laver arena and a new administration and media building (Major Projects Victoria 2014). Continuing the discourse of anticipating the competition for this pivotal festival in Melbourne’s major event strategy, Napthine justified the use of public funds by citing the importance of the NTC to the state; its development was ‘critical to continue attracting global sporting, music and other cultural events such as the Australian Open’ (cited in: Campbell 2014).The recently announced third stage of redevelopment, costing A$271 million to the state, will add, amongst other developments, a new “Function and Media Centre” and a 5000-seat show court/arena, further illustrating the importance of the site as a multi-use corporate space and sporting venue (Development Victoria 2017). Tennis Australia, as a sporting body, has benefited enormously because of successive governments’ approach to securing the Australian Open. Indeed, Tennis Australia has served to legitimise the fear of losing the Open and also to act as the primary booster for the community benefits of hosting the event. For example,Tennis Australia’s annual report in 2008–9 noted that the redevelopment of the NTC was necessary to ‘build our reputation as innovators’ and to ‘help secure the Grand Slam in Melbourne beyond 2016’ (TA 2009, p.8). In 2015, Tennis Australia described the Melbourne Park redevelopment as a ‘gift that keeps on giving to Australian Open players and fans’ (TA 2015, p.3). Further, Tennis Australia links the Open to grassroots participation rates. Record numbers playing tennis was causally related to the Australian Open, entrenching the benefits and hence importance of retaining the tournament at Melbourne Park. As such, the legitimacy of hosting the Australian Open is partly affirmed through audience size, in relation to both broadcast reach and crowd size. Available data shows that between 2008 and 2016 the attendance went from 603,160 to 703,899 spectators (TA 2009; 2016). However, both participation numbers and attendances may be illusory. Of the record participants, just over half a million were primary aged children exposed to tennis through school programmes, that is, they were not active members of a tennis club. The exponential rise in crowd sizes does not 358

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necessarily indicate an increase in popularity as it ignores the simple fact that this figure may merely be a function of the addition of new courts and stadia.

Conclusion As Magdalinski (2000, p.310–1) notes about Australian sport: ‘The cultural narratives that surround sport are part of a larger project to ensure continued support for public expenditure on events of corporate interest disguised as being beneficial for everyone’. Successive State Governments of Victoria, from both the left and right, have positioned the NTC as a cornerstone of the sporting major events strategy – underpinned by a trickle-down economics discourse that justifies public investment in this entertainment arena on the basis that citizens of Victoria will benefit – and in doing so have drawn on the perceived importance of the Australian Open as part of Melbourne’s sport history and tradition. While undoubtedly there have been some Victorians that have benefited from these investments in the NTC, we argue that Tennis Australia (along with its corporate partners) and those political elite connected to decisions surrounding the development of the NTC have benefited the most, not just in economic terms but also through the increased symbolic capital generated from retaining the Australian Open with its prestigious grand slam status. In January 2017, the NTC hosted its 30th Australian Open, and since the inaugural event, the Victorian government has successfully repelled domestic and foreign threats to hosting the tournament, rebranded it to align it directly with Melbourne, and continuously innovated the site with new stadia and infrastructure. This has been to ensure the Open’s relevance, and more importantly Melbourne’s relevance, on the world stage. In doing so, well over a billion dollars of public money has been invested, with little or no political contest or public dissent. Undoubtedly the investment is such now that it cannot be allowed to fail.

Notes 1 Quoted in: https​://ww​w.pre​mier.​vic.g​ov.au​/aust​ralia​n-ope​n-ser​ves-u​p-an-​ace-f​or-vi​ctori​a/ (accessed 11 September 2018) 2 Tennis Australia has operated under a range of names, including the Lawn Tennis Association of Australasia and the Lawn Tennis Association of Australia (see Foenander n.d.; McCarthy & Frawley 2008). 3 The nominated members were to come from Melbourne Cricket Ground Trust (three), the Olympic Park Committee of Management (one) and the Melbourne City Council (one). 4 In 1995, the National Tennis Centre Trust was amalgamated with the Olympic Park Trust to become the Melbourne and Olympic Parks Trust, consisting of 12 Trustees of which nine were nominated by the Minister for Sport, two nominated by Tennis Australia and one nominated by the Victorian Tennis Association (Parliament of Victoria 1995). 5 Initially it was announced as a $363 million redevelopment; however, the Federal Government later added $3 million to the funds to make it $366 million.

References Adair, D. (2009) Australian Sport History: From the Founding Years to Today, Sport in History, 29(3), 405–36. Agger, B. (1992) Cultural Studies as Critical Theory. London: Falmer. Austen, G. (1984, 8 October) Tennis Plan Is On – Cain. The Sun, 11. Baker, P. (1999, 9 October) MPV is MVP for Fans. Herald Sun, 86. Baragwanath, C.A. (1993) Special Report No. 20: National Tennis Centre Trust and Zoological Board of Victoria. Available at: http://www.audit.vic.gov.au/ publi​catio​ns/19​93/19​93040​1-Spe​cial-​Repor​t-20-​Natio​ nal-T​ennis​-Cent​re-Tr​ust.p​df 359

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Bodo, P. (1995) The Courts of Babylon: Tales of Greed and Glory in a Harsh New World of Professional Tennis. New York: Scribner. Cain, J. (n.d.) National Tennis Centre. Unpublished manuscript. Campbell, J. (2014, 11 January) Melbourne Park to Get $338 million Revamp. Herald Sun. Cashman, R. (1995) Paradise of Sport:The Rise of Organised Sport in Australia. Melbourne: Oxford University Press. Cashman, R. & Hickie, T. (1990) The Divergent Sporting Cultures of Sydney and Melbourne, Sporting Traditions, 7(1), 26–46. Clarke, S. & Slamet, D. (1985, 27 June) Tennis Centre Approved, But It Draws Fire. The Age, 5. Coffey, B. (2012) Another Opportunity Lost? Victorian Labor’s Enactment of Sustainability, 1999–2010, Australian Journal of Public Administration, 71(3), 303–13. Davison, G. (1997) Welcoming the World: The 1956 Olympic Games and the Re-presentation of Melbourne, Australian Historical Studies, 27(109), 64–76. Department of Infrastructure,Victoria (2002) Melbourne 2030: Planning for Sustainable Growth. Melbourne: Department of Infrastructure. Development Victoria (2017) Melbourne Park Redevelopment. Available at: http:​//www​.majo​rproj​ects.​ vic.g​ov.au​/proj​ect/m​elbou​r ne-p​ark-r​edeve​lopme​nt/ Dingle,T. & O’Hanlon, S. (2009) From Manufacturing Zone to Lifestyle Precinct: Economic Restructuring and Social Change in Inner Melbourne, 1971–2001, Australian Economic History Review, 49(1), 52–69. Engels, B. (2000) City Make-Overs: The Place Marketing of Melbourne During the Kennett Years, 1992– 99, Urban Policy and Research, 18(4), 469–94. Fewster, K. (1985) Advantage Australia: Davis Cup Tennis, 1950–1959, Sporting Traditions, 2(1), 47–68. Foenander, T. (n.d.) Australian Open: History. Available at: http:​//www​.aust​ralia​nopen​.com/​en_AU​/even​ t_gui​de/hi​story​.html​ Glow, H. & Johanson, K. (2004) The Politics of Exclusion: Political Censorship and the Arts-as-Industry Paradigm, Asia Pacific Journal of Arts and Cultural Management, 2(2), 128–41. Government of Victoria (1984) Victoria: The Next Step; Economic Initiatives and Opportunities for the 1980s. Melbourne: Government Printer. Grace, R. (2010, 19 January) Melbourne Park Plans Multi-Million Dollar Facelift in Bid to Keep Australian Open. The Age. Harkness, A. (2013) Triumphant, Troubled, then Terminal: An Examination of the Cain and Kirner Decade 30 Years On, Labour History, 105, 27–46. Hay, R. (2010) A Tale of Two Footballs: The Origins of Australian Football and Association Football Revisited, Sport in Society, 13(6), 952–69. Hogan, M. (1984, 16 October) Premature Plan. The Age, 12. Houston, C. (2009, 18 January) Brumby to Dig Deep to Secure Open. Age, 1. Keenan, A. (1988, 23 November) Tennis Centre Nets $4.3m Loss. Sun, 4. Kinross-Smith, G. (1994) Lawn Tennis. In Vamplew, W. & Stoddart, B. (eds.), Sport in Australia: A Social History (pp.133–53), Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Kooyong Problems (1983, August) Tennis Australia Magazine, 7–9. Macintyre, S. (2000) Prologue: Sport and Past Australasian Culture. In Mangan, J.A. & Nauright, J. (eds.), Sport in Australasian Society: Past and Present (pp.1–10), London: Frank Cass. Magdalinski,T. (2000) The Reinvention of Australia for the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games, The International Journal of the History of Sport, 17(2–3), 305–22. Major Projects Victoria (2014) Melbourne Park Redevelopment. Available at: http:​//www​.majo​r proj​ects.​ vic.g​ov.au​/our-​proje​cts/o​ur-cu​r rent​-proj​ects/​melbo​urne-​park Matthews, B. (1984, 10 April) Grass on the Outer? The Sun, 71. McCarthy, T. & Frawley, S. (2008) Should I Stay or Should I Go? Selecting a Date for the Australian Tennis Open, Managing Leisure, 13(2), 115–27. Melbourne Tennis Centre Nets $363m Upgrade (2010, January 19) Courier Mail. Merrigan, K. (1985, 27 June) Tennis Centre Plan Slammed. The Sun, 11. Milovanovic, S. (2009, 27 January) Facelift Aims to Fend Off Open Raiders. Age, 3. O’Farrell,V. (1985) The Unasked Questions in Australian Tennis, Sporting Traditions, 1(2), 67–86. O’Hanlon, S. (2009) The Events City: Sport, Culture, and the Transformation of Inner Melbourne, 1977– 2006, Urban History Review, 37(2), 30–9. Owen, K. & Hansen, K. (1998, 21 May) $65m Arena Gets Green Light. Herald Sun, 3.

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Parliament of Victoria (1984) Victoria: The Next Step: Economic Initiatives and Opportunities for the 1980s. Melbourne: Government Printer. Parliament of Victoria (1985) Parliamentary Debates: Legislative Council: Official Hansard, 379, 1–776. Parliament of Victoria (1995) Parliamentary Debates: Legislative Assembly: Official Hansard, 423, 749–1448. Rados, A. (1995, 4 May) New Name to Boost Reputation. Herald Sun, 5. Sandercock, L. & Dovey, K. (2002) Pleasure, Politics, and the ‘Public Interest’: Melbourne’s Riverscape Revitalization, Journal of the American Planning Association, 68(2), 151–64. Schimmel, K.S. (2006) Deep Play: Sports Mega-Events and Urban Social Conditions in the USA, The Sociological Review, 54(2), 160–74. Schlink, L. (2008, 18 January) Unforced Error: Neglected Facilities Threaten Open. Herald Sun, 97. Senyard, J. (1996) The Tennis Court: A Country Woman’s Window to the Modern World, Sporting Traditions, 13(1), 25–41. Shaw, K. (2013) Docklands Dreamings: Illusions of Sustainability in the Melbourne Docks Redevelopment, Urban Studies, 50(11), 2158–77. TA (2009) Tennis Australia Annual Report. Available at: http:​//www​.tenn​is.co​m.au/​wp-co​ntent​/uplo​ads/2​ 010/0​9/200​8-09-​Annua​l-Rep​ort.p​df TA (2015) Tennis Australia Annual Report. Available at: http:​//www​.tenn​is.co​m.au/​wp-co​ntent​/uplo​ads/2​ 015/1​1/TEN​137-R​oom44​_AnnR​ep141​5_V16​-lo-r​es-en​tire-​repor​t-hi-​res-l​ogos.​pdf TA (2016) Tennis Australia Annual Report. Available at: http:​//www​.tenn​is.co​m.au/​wp-co​ntent​/uplo​ads/2​ 016/1​0/TA_​Annua​lRepo​rt_20​15-20​16_LR​.pdf Tennis Digest (1985, October) Tennis Australia Magazine, p.8–9. Ward, T. (2015, 13 August) Aussies are Sports Mad, but Victorians are the Clear Winners. The Conversation. Yallop, R. (1983, December) Around the States:Victoria. Tennis Australia Magazine, 62. Yallop, R. (1984a, March 23) New Site Soon for LTAA? The Age, 28. Yallop, R. (1984b, April 10) ATP Wants Open in January. The Age, 46. Yallop, R. (1984c, June 8) Kooyong: It’s Game, Set and ‘Classic’. The Age, 30. Yallop, R. (1984d, October 9) Stadium Spells the End of Lawn Tennis. The Age, 48.

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35 Tennis and the Olympics An historical examination of their on-off relationship since 1896 Matthew P. Llewellyn and Robert J. Lake

The Olympic Games stand as the largest sporting phenomenon of the twenty-first century. Attracting the world’s premier sportsmen and sportswomen from 205 representative nations, as well as global television audiences soaring upwards of four billion viewers, the Olympics are a cultural, economic and political colossus (Guttmann 2002). The Games represent the apogee for the world’s greatest athletes, and under the intensive spotlight of the world’s media, elite international tennis players take their place alongside swimmers, basketballers, gymnasts, figure skaters and other professional athletes in the quest for gold medals, international recognition, lucrative commercial endorsements and other financial rewards. Tennis and its star professional players currently occupy a marquee position on the Olympic program. The popularity of Olympic tennis, however, obscures the sport’s long and troubled history with the Olympic Movement – a relationship which traces all the way back to 1896 and the inaugural summer games in Athens. As this chapter will reveal, haphazard organization, glaring mismanagement, and intense debates over the meaning and enforcement of amateurism prompted the International Lawn Tennis Federation (ILTF) to remove the sport from the Olympic Movement in the aftermath of the 1924 Olympic Games in Paris. Despite two appearances as an exhibition sport in 1968 and 1984, tennis remained estranged from the Olympic Movement until 1988 when International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Juan Antonio Samaranch issued orders to welcome tennis and its leading “professional” players back in time for the summer Olympic Games in Seoul.

A troubled beginning The summer Olympic Games held in Athens in 1896 proved to be a rather small-scale affair, as only 241 athletes from 14 nations participated in the Greek capital (Lennartz & Wassong 2004). As would become a standard feature of all pre-war Olympiads, the lawn tennis event in Athens fell victim to poor organization, a lack of publicity and low international turn-out. Considered inferior to more established competitions, like the Wimbledon Championships, only 13 male tennis players participated. Remarkably, not a single overseas player made the journey to Athens specifically for the event. Most of the entrants were Greek and some were literally pulled off

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the street to make up the numbers (Little 2004). The winner of the gentlemen’s singles event was John Boland from Ireland, who coincidentally was on holiday and entered on a whim after being persuaded by his friend (Boland n.d.). Boland also won the doubles event playing alongside his partner, Germany’s Friedrich Adolph Traun; more definitive guidelines for national representation were still to be introduced. Olympic lawn tennis suffered a rather inauspicious start. The next two editions of Olympic tennis in 1900 (Paris) and 1904 (St. Louis) were besieged with similar issues. A lack of advertising, inadequate facilities, poor officiating and, in the case of Paris 1900, the scheduling of the Olympic tennis event to commence just three days after the conclusion of Wimbledon, ensured that many of the leading male and female tennis stars stayed away. Although the 1908 London Games witnessed the introduction of both indoor (covered-court) and outdoor tennis events, the short-sightedness of Olympic planners meant that Olympic tennis again clashed with Wimbledon. The subsequent absence of many of the big-name British, French and American players, left only a handful of lesser-known competitors to take the spoils. A review of early Olympic tennis tournaments indicates that the sport experienced initial growing pains. Despite tennis’ global popularity, rich history and established traditions, Olympic tennis consistently garnered less public interest and media attention than track-and-field athletics, swimming, boxing and other sports. The IOC acknowledged this reality, voting during its 1911 annual session in Budapest to not select tennis as an “indispensable” sport fundamental to the Games (International Olympic Committee 1911). The organization of Olympic tennis events throughout the pre-war period certainly remained a key area of criticism from leading lawn tennis officials, who viewed the lack of attention to detail in terms of event timing, advertising, facilities and spectator requirements as evidence of the IOC’s incompetence (Lake & Llewellyn 2015). The establishment of the ILTF in 1913 brought amateur tennis on a direct collision course with the IOC over the structure and organization of future Olympic tennis events. The ILTF’s decision to institute three “World’s Championships” (on grass, hard and wood courts) rankled Olympic officials in Lausanne who sought, perhaps somewhat naively, to establish the Olympic tennis event as the de facto world championship. For the IOC, attracting all of the best players and raising its prestige was paramount. However, this would now prove even more challenging given the Davis Cup’s exalted position, as well as the well-established and preeminent stature of Wimbledon, alongside other major championships (Lake 2015). With the world’s best players from North America, Europe and Australia now competing in an increasingly cramped and inflexible tournament calendar, Olympic organizers worked to devise strategies for raising the status of its lawn tennis event. This proved a difficult task. The continued organizational failures of the post-war Olympic tennis events in Antwerp (1920) and Paris (1924) – which critics claimed were characterized by “unplayable” practice courts, “totally inadequate” facilities, and poor officiating – undermined IOC efforts to convince tennis officials of their intentions to properly promote and effectively manage a tennis event befitting the title “World Championship” (Lake & Llewellyn 2015). The IOC tried to defend itself against accusations of mismanagement. They even apportioned blame to the ILTF for its failure to enforce a strict definition of amateurism as a cause for much of the public criticism surrounding Olympic tennis, and further suggested that the ILTF should cancel the Davis Cup and major championships (Wimbledon and the US, French and Australian National Championships) during each Olympic year in order to promote the Olympic lawn tennis event as “The Championships of the World” (International Olympic Committee 1924). The ILTF were incredulous (MacDonald 1998). 363

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Upset at the lack of consultation on key issues surrounding the event’s organization, alongside ‘other arguments about the definition of amateurism and the prestige and precedence of the game’s traditional events’, the ILTF proposed at the Olympic Congress held in Prague in 1925 that: each international federation, including itself, be granted at least one delegate on the IOC; the right to work in cooperation with the Organising Committee for the organization of their specific event; and the presidents of international federations be granted IOC membership (Gray 1979, p.215). Not only were their proposals comprehensively rejected, but the IOC made further stipulations that no Olympic sports could hold their respective world championships during Olympic years, and that athletes from all sports follow a standard amateur definition; they: ‘must not be a professional in any branch of sport; must not have been reinstated as an amateur after knowingly becoming a professional; and must not have received compensation for lost salaries’ (International Olympic Committee 1925, p.27). Given that the ILTF had agreed fairly recently to the reinstatement of ex-professionals in amateur lawn tennis competitions, and had only just resolved the controversy over the ownership of “world championship” titles, they were in no mood to concede. Instead, the ILTF issued an ultimatum, threatening to withdraw from the Olympics unless it was: allowed one ILTF representative on the IOC, allowed to co-operate in the technical and material organization of the game, allowed to enforce its own definition of amateurism, and not asked to cancel the major championships during each Olympiad, or be forced to recognize the Olympic tennis event as the “Championship of the World in Tennis”. Like most international sport federations, the ILTF did not care to have new rules “dictated to them” by Olympic officials in Lausanne (MacDonald 1998), but with its demands not met, the ILTF threatened to withdraw tennis from the Olympic program for the 1928 Amsterdam Games (Lake & Llewellyn 2015). The IOC, through its president Comte Henri Baillet-Latour, made attempts to salvage the situation by keeping channels of communication open (MacDonald 1998), but offered no concessions, so that when ILTF officials failed to show for an important meeting in August 1927 in Paris, the IOC Executive Board reaffirmed its ruling in Prague that unless the ILTF realigned its amateur definition in accordance with IOC regulations, lawn tennis would not be played in Amsterdam (International Olympic Committee 1927). As such, lawn tennis did not appear on the 1928 Olympic program. Many were convinced this issue would soon resolve itself, particularly after the IOC approved in 1930 the formation of a Consultative Council of ISFs, the Conseil des Délégués des Fédérations Internationales, as an open forum to address technical and legislative issues pertaining to the Olympic Movement (International Olympic Committee 1929). Nevertheless, when the ILTF returned to this issue at its 1931 and 1939 AGMs, neither it nor the IOC seemed willing to budge, and moves to reinstate lawn tennis lost momentum (Lake & Llewellyn 2015). By this stage, both organizations had grown in stature to such an extent that neither one required relations with the other. Lawn tennis had become one of the world’s most popular sports, and, second only to the football World Cup, the Davis Cup had become the world’s largest and most international single-sport event. Meanwhile, the summer Olympic Games could rely on a number of other marquee sports, such as athletics, gymnastics, swimming, cycling and soccer, to establish it as the world’s most significant and profitable multi-sport event.

The decades of discontent Throughout the remainder of the inter-war years and beyond, tennis remained absent from the Olympic program. In fact, it took until 1956 before the ILTF made a conciliatory effort to reestablish working relations with the Olympic Movement. Dr. Giorgio de Stefani, president of the ILTF and Italian representative to the IOC, spearheaded the move to bring tennis back in 364

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from the Olympic wilderness (Llewellyn & Lake 2017). At the 1956 IOC session in Melbourne, de Stefani – a competitive tennis player of the inter-war period – requested that the ILTF be reaccredited as an IOC-approved international sport federation, the inevitable first step on the path towards the reintroduction of Olympic tennis (International Olympic Committee 1956). Unlike the muddled and haphazard early Olympic spectacles, the post-World War II Olympics had rapidly become an attractive commodity. A larger, more globally representative roster of participatory nations, intensive media coverage (including the new medium of television) and a Cold War nationalistic medal race between the United States and the Soviet Union (and their respective allies), heightened the status and influence of the Olympic Games (Guttmann 2002). Evidently, the tremendous explosion in the popularity of the Olympic Games fuelled the ILTF’s desire to reposition tennis back on the Olympic program. De Stefani’s proposal met with fierce resistance from IOC president Avery Brundage, a selfprofessed apostle of pure and honest amateurism. With a pugnacity and passion unmatched by any other Olympic official, Brundage defended amateurism with an almost religious conviction. His personal investigatory crusades convinced him that “sham-amateurism” pervaded tennis. The post-war popularity of professional tennis circuits, along with the widespread reports of amateur tennis players profiting either openly, under-the-table or via a middle-man (fixer) only solidified Brundage’s opposition. ‘It is considered an international scandal that practically every one of the leading tennis players does nothing but play tennis from one year to the next’, he sermonized.1 Despite De Stefani efforts to defend his organization’s strong amateur traditions, Brundage stood defiant.2 He rejected the ILTF’s pleas for Olympic reaccreditation, demanding that the sport undertake a “major operation” to save itself from the corrupting influence of professionalism before the IOC would reconsider its decision (International Olympic Committee 1957).3 The ILTF began by adjusting its regulations on players’ expenses, limiting claims to just 150 days abroad per year and 90 at home (not including Davis Cup) – players had previously been entitled to claim expenses for an entire year – and a maximum £5 per diem allowance.They also formed a “Special Committee” in 1958 to help tighten-up and strengthen its amateur “rules and controls” (International Lawn Tennis Federation 1959). When such regulatory designs failed to curb the inroads of professionalism into the sport, the Frenchman and former inter-war tennis star, Jean Borotra, compiled a sympathetic report on behalf of the Fédération Française du Tennis (FFT), in which players’ living conditions were called to attention alongside stressing the importance of earning one’s living honorably,‘in the full light of day’ (Lawn Tennis & Badminton 1 September 1959, p.387). It was contended that players were victims of a system that compelled them ‘to violate the rules of amateur status in order to live’ (Lawn Tennis & Badminton 15 May 1960, p.240). Claiming the ILTF had failed to deal effectively with sham-amateurism, the FFT proposed to create a category of, essentially, “authorized players”, who would be permitted to accept full and limitless expenses but also remain eligible for the Davis Cup and other amateur competitions. “Open” championship events were also called for, whereby amateurs and “authorized players” could compete side-by-side. Borotra felt that amateur tennis could not compete against the star-studded, financially lucrative professional circuits that had grown to prominence in the 1950s, but the ILTF’s adherence (loose or otherwise) to amateur regulations deprived itself of the world’s leading tennis players. “Open” tournaments that included professionals ‘would give back to the International Championships all their former success’, he argued (Lawn Tennis & Badminton 15 October 1960, p. 501). These ideas, aimed at ensuring players were better supported and at restoring the prominence of ILTF sponsored tournaments, formed the basis of two proposals made for discussion at the 1960 ILTF AGM: creating the category of “authorized players” and establishing eight “open” tournaments for the 365

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1961 season. Both failed to reach the necessary two-thirds majority, though the latter narrowly missed the mark by just five votes, 134 to 75. Writing to Borotra afterwards, Brundage sharply denounced the Frenchman’s plans. ‘The goal for amateurs would be destroyed’, he objected. ‘The competition would be monopolized by professionals, who, even if they were not paid, would be striving for a title which would add immeasurably to their value in the professional tennis market’.4 Nevertheless buoyed by the close results, Borotra set about reapplying in 1962. However, further opposition came from the Soviet Union and its allies, who, in an aim to preserve the advantages afforded through their model of state-amateurism, mobilized en masse to defeat the proposal (New York Times 12 July 1962, p.32). With Borotra’s progressive designs temporarily stalled, calls for the reintroduction of Olympic tennis gathered momentum, as Brundage and the IOC seemed to consider the two mutually exclusive. At its 1963 AGM, the United States Lawn Tennis Association (USLTA) voted unanimously to pursue the reintroduction of tennis onto the program for the 1968 Mexico City Olympic Games.5 Brundage responded by warning the USLTA that he would only welcome tennis back into the Olympics if the sport could demonstrate a concerted effort to eliminate the scourge of sham-amateurism.6 Meanwhile, behind the scenes, the Mexico City Olympic Organizing Committee (MCOOC) were being convinced to exercise their authority and stage both non-medal “demonstration” and “exhibition” tennis events at the Games (International Olympic Committee 1967).7 The unrelenting winds of democratization in sport would soon converge to throw the forthcoming tennis events in Mexico City into chaos. On 31 March 1968 – following the decision by the All England Lawn Tennis Club to allow professionals to compete alongside amateurs at its 1968 Wimbledon Championships – the ILTF voted to finally approve the staging of “open” tournaments (Jefferys 2009). For Brundage, the ILTF’s move confirmed his deep-rooted suspicions that professionalism pervaded competitive tennis. Unable to prevent the MCOOC from staging tennis events at the 1968 Games, Brundage nevertheless deployed his administrative influence to downplay their significance and size. He penned a circular letter to all IOC Executive Board members and National Olympic Committees advising ‘that this tennis tournament has no connection whatsoever with the Olympic Games’, and will only comprise ‘a half dozen players, to be selected by the Organizing Committee’.8 Despite Brundage’s sabotaging efforts, tennis courts at prestigious country/sports clubs in Mexico City and Guadalajara were thronged with Olympic tennis, as 46 competitors from 15 nations competed in men’s and women’s singles, doubles and mixed-doubles competitions within the demonstration and exhibition events (Mexico City Olympic Organizing Committee 1968). After a 44-year absence, tennis reappeared on the Olympic program, albeit in a highly circumscribed role.

A new horizon Following Avery Brundage’s retirement in 1972, tennis’ relationship with the Olympic Movement entered into a new phase. Under the leadership of Ireland’s Lord (Michael Morris) Killanin, the IOC displayed a gentler, more diplomatic approach to inter-organizational relations. He welcomed a change of course in the IOC’s long and largely fractious relationship with the ILTF. During an October 1975 meeting of the IOC Executive Board, he urged his colleagues to vote in favour of reaccrediting tennis’ international governing body. ‘A rapid and perhaps unjust decision had been taken to withdraw recognition when the question of professionalism had arisen’, Killanin opined. ‘The ILTF was a federation with which the IOC should 366

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have official contact’ (International Olympic Committee 1975). The IOC membership agreed, voting the following year to reaccredit the ILTF as the Olympic governing body for tennis (International Olympic Committee 1976). With dialogue restored, the International Tennis Federation (ITF – the word “Lawn” was dropped in 1977) engineered plans to place tennis on the Olympic program at the 1984 Olympic Games scheduled for Los Angeles. The IOC’s recent revisions to its amateur code (Rule 26 in the Olympic Charter) during the 1974 Varna Congress, whereby it dropped the language requiring that athletes ‘be engaged in a basic occupation to provide for his present and future’ and also lifted the limits on both the payment of indemnities and the days that an athlete could devote to training, placed the more-liberal ITF on a stronger footing regarding the historically thorny issue of Olympic eligibility (International Olympic Committee 1973, p.21-5). Sensing his opportunity, the ITF president Phillipe Chatrier appealed to the IOC’s Programme Commission in March 1979 to reinstate tennis on the Olympic program for the Los Angeles Games. This put the IOC in an awkward predicament, as the program for the Los Angeles Games was already established and the staging of demonstration sports was now prohibited under IOC rules, so the Executive Board faced no other option than to reject the ITF’s requests (International Olympic Committee 1979a). Lord Killanin worked to find a solution, appealing to the IOC Programme Commission to ‘study the matter again’ and ‘reconsider whether demonstration sports should be reintroduced’ (International Olympic Committee 1979b). As Olympic officials continued to investigate the feasibility of a tennis demonstration in Los Angeles, the IOC received an additional proposal from the ITF appealing for the permanent restoration of a full-medal tennis tournament for the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul (International Olympic Committee 1980). Ultimately, the IOC’s decision-making on both these issues did not center upon the addition of one sport, but rather the future and broader direction of the Olympic Movement. Under Lord Killanin’s short tenure as IOC president, the Olympics became swamped with political and economic controversies. Substantial financial losses, African-led boycotts and a diminished roster of participant nations and Cold War nationalism had steered the Olympic Movement over the precipice of disaster. Seeking to correct course, the IOC voted during its 1980 annual session in Moscow to elect Juan Antonio Samaranch to lead the IOC. Throughout his presidency, the Spaniard worked to secure the financial prosperity of the Olympic Movement, overseeing the IOC’s unmistakable transformation into a fully-fledged corporate entity. He brokered windfall television deals, revamped its commercial sponsorship arrangements and also broadened the demographic composition of the IOC across national and gender lines, a move that helped to erode the Eurocentric and aristocratic power structure that sustained and legitimized the amateur ethos for over eight decades.Though Samaranch’s presidency would become marred by bribery, bidding scandals and a culture of corruption, he provided the necessary philosophical and administrative support to usher tennis back into the Olympic Games (Barney, Wenn & Martyn 2004; Shaw 2008). Under Samaranch’s direction, the IOC Executive Board approved the staging of two demonstration events at the Los Angeles Games: tennis and baseball (International Olympic Committee 1981).9 For Samaranch, the telegenic, commercially driven and global sport of tennis proved extremely alluring. With ABC signing an unprecedented $150 million contract (plus a further $150 million in technical costs) for US broadcasting rights to the 1984 Los Angeles Games, the IOC, in conjunction with the Los Angeles Olympic Organizing Committee (LAOOC) came under intense pressure to provide a superior product (Barney et al. 2004). Many within the IOC, including Samaranch, felt that the best players, professional or otherwise, had to compete in order to ensure the future prosperity of the Olympic Movement and to satisfy the demands of television broadcasters and viewers alike (Llewellyn & Lake 2017). 367

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The future of Olympic tennis rested partly on the work of IOC Eligibility Commission chairman,Willie Daume. Like Samaranch, the West German Olympic official envisioned a more democratic and financially prosperous Olympic Movement open to the world’s leading sportspeople, professional or otherwise. Sensing opposition from an old-guard within the IOC that clung to Brundagian thinking on the issue of amateurism, he worked to reach a compromise with ITF officials who demanded that its professional “players” should ‘be eligible to play in tennis contests at Olympic Games’ (International Olympic Committee 1982). Daume shrewdly adopted a cautious approach. For the purposes of the demonstration event at the 1984 Los Angeles Games, Daume proposed that only tennis players under the age of 20 (irrespective of whether they held a “professional” status or not) would be permitted to compete (International Olympic Committee 1983). He also proposed reducing the demonstration event to a mere 32 singles players (16 men and 16 women) and prohibiting professionals from receiving Olympic medals. Despite warnings about the dangerous precedent of having a demonstration sport with open professionals, the IOC approved Daume recommendations. By the early 1980s, the Olympic Movement faced disaster. The fear of debt, infrastructural “white elephants”, urban blight, political boycotts and terrorist attacks had grown so strong that global metropolitan cities abstained from even bidding on the Olympic spectacle. Held at a crucial time, the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles provided a progressive blueprint for redesigning and revitalizing the Olympic Movement, but it appeared that growing financial and organizational concerns trumped any lasting fidelity among IOC officials to pure and honest amateurism. Led by LAOOC chairman Peter Ueberroth, the Games set new standards in Olympic commercialism, boasting record-breaking television contracts and corporate sponsorship deals. Ueberroth’s cleverly negotiated licensing deals with a limited number of sponsors granted companies such as Coca-Cola, McDonalds and IBM exclusive rights as “official” Olympic sponsors (Dyreson 2015; Wenn 2015). Samaranch would subsequently embrace this model for commercializing the Olympic Games with “The Olympic Partner” (TOP) program (Barney et al. 2004). The 1984 Olympic tennis demonstration, held at the Los Angeles Tennis Center at the University of California, symbolized the growing fusion of commercialism and professionalism. It proved a noted success. Fifteen-year-old West German tennis sensation, Steffi Graf, stunned the Southern Californian crowds on her way to clinching the singles title. Already a professional since 1982, Graf, along with men’s singles champion, Sweden’s Stefan Edberg, led the first wave of tennis professionals to openly participate in the Olympic Games (LA Times 12 August 1984, p. H22).

‘The old days of amateurism are over’ Not satisfied with limiting the tennis event in Los Angeles to only a small cohort of junior professionals, the ITF demanded the full professionalization of Olympic tennis at the forthcoming 1988 Seoul Games. Bemoaning the paltry attendance figures at the 1984 Olympic tennis event, ITF officials calculated that the sight of the world’s leading professional stars would propel tennis to a marquee status on the Olympic program (International Olympic Committee 1984). The ITF promised that it would observe the Olympic Charter and that Olympic tennis would be subject to all Olympic conditions under the supervision of the respective National Olympic Committee. Professional tennis players, ITF officials guaranteed, would not receive monetary payments for either Olympic participation or prize rewards, would subject themselves to routine drug testing, abstain from playing in professional tournaments two weeks either side of the Olympic Games, temporarily suspend commercial endorsements, wear national uniforms 368

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(irrespective of the sporting apparel manufacturer) and forgo luxurious accommodations for the more humble Olympic Village (International Olympic Committee 1985a). Willie Daume championed the ITF’s revolutionary plan. Presenting a report on eligibility at the 1985 annual IOC session in Berlin, he urged his colleagues to break with long-standing amateur tradition and embrace the modern realities of televised, commercially driven elite sport (International Olympic Committee 1985b). From Daume’s perspective, an Olympic tennis tournament represented a trial balloon to see if global audiences were receptive to the sight of professionals gracing Olympic courts, and, in the future, possibly other Olympic events too. Even with the IOC’s financial coffers overflowing from record-breaking television contracts and commercial branding, tradition proved difficult to discard. Despite decades of known shamamateurism and contradictory regulations, amateurism had engrained itself so deeply within the Olympic Movement that some IOC members still refused to countenance the idea of open professionalism. ‘There was no place in the Olympic Games for professionals’, Japanese IOC member Masaji Kiyokawa blustered (International Olympic Committee 1985a). The reticence on behalf of the IOC to throw open the doors to widespread professionalism frustrated Daume. He took to the floor at the 1986 IOC session in Lausanne to lobby his colleagues to support an open professional tennis event at the Seoul Olympics. Daume challenged that the high demand among television broadcasters and global spectators for professionals to be permitted to compete, as well as the professional realities and demanding conditions of elite sport, could no longer be overlooked: ‘We have to come to terms with the reality’, he averred (International Olympic Committee 1986). With Olympic officials unable to reach a consensus, the IOC delayed a vote on professional tennis until its 1987 annual session in Istanbul. The vote would mark an historic moment in Olympic history. Austrian IOC member Phillipp von Schoeller captured the gravity of the situation, noting that perhaps ‘for the first time the IOC is legalizing the breach of the amateur status’.10 When the full IOC membership took to the floor, somewhat surprisingly, an 84-member majority elected to permit professional tennis players to the 1988 Seoul Games on an experimental basis, and in-so-doing took a major step towards removing the shackles of amateur eligibility (International Olympic Committee 1987). After a 64 year absence, the IOC welcomed the avowedly professional sport of tennis back into the Olympic Movement as a full-medal sport. ‘The old days of amateurism are over’, an enthusiastic Daume rejoiced (Chicago Tribune 17 May 1987, p.8). Despite the absence of some of the world’s leading players, including world-number-one players Ivan Lendl and Martina Navratilova, the 1988 Olympic tennis event proved a notable success. Held from 20 September to 1 October 1988 on outdoor hard-courts at the Seoul Olympic Park Tennis Center, the tournament attracted 129 professional players from 37 nations. Following her impressive victory in the demonstration event in Los Angeles four years earlier, West German tennis star Steffi Graf clinched the women’s singles championship. Czechoslovakian Miloslav Mečíř continued his fine form during the 1988 season – which included a semi-final appearance at Wimbledon – to win gold in the men’s singles. From an all-important financial, commercial and media perspective, the tennis tournament sold over 111,000 tickets and generated over 2,000 hours of media coverage. These figures fell behind only the more established Olympic sports of soccer, track and field, basketball and swimming (Seoul Olympic Organizing Committee 1988). Olympic tennis, and its elite troupe of professional players, was here to stay.

Notes 1 See: Correspondence from Avery Brundage to Giorgio de Stefani (1957, 11 July) International Lawn Tennis Federation. Urbana-Champagne, IL: Brundage Archives. 369

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2 See: Correspondence from Giorgio de Stefani to Avery Brundage (1957, 17 July) International Lawn Tennis Federation. Urbana-Champagne, IL: Brundage Archives. 3 See also: Correspondence from Avery Brundage to Giorgio de Stefani (1957, 18 August) International Lawn Tennis Federation. Urbana-Champagne, IL: Brundage Archives. 4 See: Correspondence from Avery Brundage to Jean Borotra (1961, 20 February) International Lawn Tennis Federation. Urbana-Champagne, IL: Brundage Archives. 5 See: Correspondence from Harold A. Lebain to Otto Mayer (1963, 5 February) International Lawn Tennis Federation. Urbana-Champagne, IL: Brundage Archives; correspondence from James Mason to Avery Brundage (1963, 13 June) International Lawn Tennis Federation. Urbana-Champagne, IL: Brundage Archives. 6 See: Correspondence from Avery Brundage to James Mason (1963, 13 June) International Lawn Tennis Federation. Urbana-Champagne, IL: Brundage Archives. 7 See also: Correspondence from Francisco Guerrero Arcocha to Avery Brundage (1965, 29 March) International Lawn Tennis Federation. Urbana-Champagne, IL: Brundage Archives. 8 See: Avery Brundage, Circular Letter (1968, 8 April) Urbana-Champagne, IL: Avery Brundage Archives. 9 See also: Correspondence from Peter V. Ueberotth to International Olympic Committee (1981, 10 April) IOC Executive Board Meeting in Lausanne (9 April, 1981). Lausanne: IOC Archives. 10 See: Correspondence from Philipp von Schoeler to Juan Antonio Samaranch (1987, 13 May) IOC Annual Session in Istanbul (5–9 August, 1987). Lausanne: IOC Archives.

References Barney, R.K., Wenn, S.R. & Martyn, S.G. (2004) Selling the Five Rings: The International Olympic Committee and the Rise of Olympic Commercialism. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press. Boland, J.P. (n.d.) Collected Diaries of John Pius Boland. Unpublished, British Olympic Foundation Archives. Dyreson, M. (2015) Global Television and the Transformation of the Olympics: The 1984 Los Angeles Games, International Journal for the History of Sport 32(1), 172–84. Gray, D. (1988 [1979]) Tennis and the Olympics. In Tingay, L., Shades of Gray: Writings of David Gray (pp.213–7), London: Willow. Guttmann, A. (2002) The Olympics: A History of the Modern Games, 2nd ed. Champaign, IL: University of Illinois Press. International Lawn Tennis Federation (1959, 8 July) Minutes of the International Lawn Tennis Federation AGM in Dublin. Urbana-Champagne, IL: Brundage Archives. International Olympic Committee (1911, 23 May) Minutes of the Annual Session in Paris. Lausanne: IOC Archives. International Olympic Committee (1924, July) Minutes of the Executive Board Meeting. Lausanne: IOC Archives. International Olympic Committee (1925, 29 May–4 June) Minutes of the Technical Olympic Congress in Prague. Urbana-Champaign, IL: Avery Brundage Archives. International Olympic Committee (1927, 8 August) Minutes of the IOC Executive Committee Meeting in Paris. Lausanne: IOC Archives. International Olympic Committee (1929, July) Minutes of the Executive Board Meetings in Vittel. Lausanne: IOC Archives. International Olympic Committee (1956, 19–21 November and 4 December) Minutes of the Annual Session in Melbourne. Lausanne: IOC Archives. International Olympic Committee (1957, 23–8 September) Minutes of the Annual Session in Sofia. Lausanne: IOC Archives. International Olympic Committee (1967, 3–9 May) Minutes of the Annual Session in Tehran. Lausanne: IOC Archives. International Olympic Committee (1973, 1–4 October) Official Report of the Olympic Congress in Varna, Lausanne: IOC Archives. International Olympic Committee (1975, 4–October) Minutes of the Executive Board Meetings in Montreal. Lausanne: IOC Archives. International Olympic Committee (1976, 2–3 February) Minutes of the Annual Session in Innsbruck. Lausanne: IOC Archives. International Olympic Committee (1979a, 9–10 March) Minutes of the Executive Board Meetings in Lausanne. Lausanne: IOC Archives. 370

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International Olympic Committee (1979b, 3, 4 and 6 April) Minutes of the Executive Board Meeting in Montevideo. Lausanne: IOC Archives. International Olympic Committee (1980, 8–15 February) Report of the Commission for the Olympic Programme, at the Executive Board Meetings in Lake Placid. Lausanne: IOC Archives. International Olympic Committee (1981, 21–3 February) Minutes of the Executive Board Meetings in Los Angeles. Lausanne: IOC Archives. International Olympic Committee (1982, 10–3 October) Eligibility Commission Report at the Executive Board Meetings in Baden-Baden. Lausanne: IOC Archives. International Olympic Committee (1983, 19 and 21 January) Minutes of the Executive Board Meeting in Los Angeles. Lausanne: IOC Archives. International Olympic Committee (1984, 30 November–1 December) Minutes of the Executive Board Meeting in Lausanne. Lausanne: IOC Archives. International Olympic Committee (1985a, 4–6 June) Minutes of the Annual Session in Berlin. Lausanne: IOC Archives. International Olympic Committee (1985b, 4–6 June) Report of the Eligibility Commission at the Annual Session in Berlin. Lausanne: IOC Archives. International Olympic Committee (1986, 12–7 October) Report of the Eligibility Commission at the Annual Session in Lausanne. Lausanne: IOC Archives. International Olympic Committee (1987, 5–9 August) Minutes of the Annual Session in Istanbul. Lausanne: IOC Archives. Jefferys, K. (2009) The Triumph of Professionalism in World Tennis: The Road to 1968, International Journal of the History of Sport, 26(15), 2253–69. Lake, R.J. (2015) A Social History of Tennis in Britain. London, Routledge. Lake, R.J. & Llewellyn, M.P. (2015) The Demise of Olympic Lawn Tennis in the 1920s: A Case Study of Shifting Relations between the IOC and International Sports Federations, Olympika, XXIV, 94–119. Lennartz, K. & Wassong, S. (2004) “Athens 1896”. In Findling, J.E. and Pelle, K.D. Encyclopaedia of the Modern Olympic Movement (pp.17–26), Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. Little, A. (2004) Tennis and the Olympics. London: AELTC. Llewellyn, M.P. & Lake, R.J. (2017) ‘The Old Days of Amateurism are Over’: The Samaranch Revolution and the Return of Olympic Tennis, Sport in History, 37(4), 423–47. MacDonald, G. (1998) A History of Relations between the International Olympic Committee and the International Sports Federations, 1891–1968 (Unpublished PhD Dissertation). London, ON: International Centre for Olympic Studies, University of Western Ontario. Mexico City Olympic Organizing Committee (1968) Official Report of the 1968 Mexico City Summer Olympic Games. Los Angeles: LA84 Foundation. Available at: http:​//lib​rary.​la84.​org/6​oic/O​ffici​alRep​ orts/​1968/​1968v​2pt1.​pdf.;​ http:​//lib​rary.​la84.​org/6​oic/O​ffici​alRep​orts/​1968/​1968v​3pt2.​pdf. Seoul Olympic Organizing Committee (1988) Official Report of the 1988 Seoul Summer Olympic Games. Los Angeles: LA84 Foundation. Available at: http:​//lib​rary.​la84.​org/6​oic/O​ffici​alRep​orts/​ 1988/​1988v​1p3.p​df Shaw, C.A. (2008) Five Ring Circus: Myths and Realities of the Olympic Games. Gabriola Island BC: New Society Publishers. Wenn, S. (2015) Peter Ueberroth's Legacy: How the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics Changed the Trajectory of the Olympic Movement, International Journal for the History of Sport, 32(1), 157–71.

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36 The Wimbledon effect The tennis championships as changing national symbol Stephen Wagg

This chapter looks historically at “Wimbledon”, the annual tennis championship staged by the All England Lawn Tennis Club (AELTC) in London, and in particular at the subtly mutating notions of the “Englishness” which the tournament has so often been claimed to represent.This “Englishness” has, inevitably, always been rooted in social class myths, skilfully adapted according to changing political circumstance. The chapter revisits much of the content of my previous article “Sacred Turf ” (Wagg 2015) and takes account of recent work by the leading historian of English tennis, Robert J. Lake (Lake 2017a and 2017b). It attempts to identify and interpret the elements of “Englishness” that Wimbledon has, at different times, been held to represent.

Origins: behind those solid ‘Forsyte’ homes Lawn tennis became established on what Max Robertson refers to the ‘spacious lawns behind those solid “Forsyte” homes’ – a reference to The Forsyte Saga, a series of novels by John Galsworthy about English upper-middle-class life, published between 1906 and 1921 (Robertson 1981, p.17). Working-class people of the late nineteenth century, it need hardly be added, didn’t have lawns. And, as the historian Richard Holt pithily observed, the tennis clubs which sprang up in the English suburbs, of which Wimbledon was one, were often surrounded by trees: ‘The shelter afforded was not so much from the sun as from the intrusive gaze of the common herd’ (Holt 1992, p.126). The All England Croquet Club was founded in 1868 in the affluent south-west London suburb of Wimbledon, initially for well-to-do people who wished to play croquet, another emergent lawn sport for ladies and gentlemen of the upper middle classes. In 1877, little more than two years after the game’s codification, the Club was re-titled “The All England Croquet and Lawn Tennis Club”. Tennis championships were inaugurated the same year by The Field magazine, a journal dedicated to the chronicling of upper-class pastimes.1 The words “All England” in Wimbledon’s title have always been something of a misnomer, but this was especially the case during the early decades of the Wimbledon Championships. Male members had invariably attended a leading public school and/or Oxford or Cambridge University. In the first singles final, Old Harrovian Spencer Gore, a descendant of the Earl of

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Arran, beat Cambridge blue William C. Marshall; the Renshaw brothers, William and Ernest, who dominated the tournament in the 1880s, were men of independent means and had a court built at a hotel in the south of France at their own expense for winter practice; and R.F. and Laurence Doherty, who were similarly prominent Wimbledon competitors around the turn of the twentieth century, had been educated at Westminster School and Cambridge, and so on. Gore and the Dohertys were born in Wimbledon itself. Female players, admitted to competition for the first time in 1884, were drawn from the same social milieu.The first finalists, Maud and Lilian Watson, were vicar’s daughters from north London.The father of Blanche Bingley, six-times singles champion between 1886 and 1900, ran a successful tailoring business in central London. Charlotte Cooper (five singles titles between 1895 and 1908) and Dorothea Lambert Chambers (nee Douglass), who dominated women’s Wimbledon between 1903 and 1914 (seven singles titles, four-times runner-up) were both from wealthy west-London families, and the father of five-times champion Lottie Dod, who first won the women’s singles in 1887, aged 15, had made a fortune in Liverpool’s cotton trade. All these women played their tennis within the restrictions prescribed by the proprietary upper-middle-class males who ran Wimbledon and the other tennis clubs. Women of this class were, after all, still in the throes of campaigning for access to sports and physical exercise and the early female competitors at Wimbledon spent much of their time stranded on the baseline attired in floor-length dresses, petticoats, boots, bodices and straw hats secured by hat pins. At Wimbledon in these early decades, both male and female players became the bearers of class myths, which were propounded and guarded by the club hierarchy and which together constituted a specific kind of Englishness. This hierarchy, like the club’s membership, was drawn from the higher, but arguably least progressive, echelons of British society, being linked variously to the Royal Family, the British Empire and the military and attuned to reflexively conservative political discourse – Wimbledon administrators had generally been officers in the armed forces and maintained their rank in civilian life. Needless to say, they were all white (indeed, black people did not play at Wimbledon until 1951, when African-American Althea Gibson reached the Third Round of the Women’s Singles) and perceived sport through the same lens of whiteness as their contemporary upper-class males who forged the modern Olympic movement (Spracklen 2013, p.107–8). For instance, Herbert Wilberforce (Vice President 1911; President 1921–9; Chairman 1929–36) was educated at Eton and Sandhurst and became a Brigadier General in the British army. In 1887, he had won the men’s doubles with Patrick Bowes Lyon, whose niece, Elizabeth, would in 1923 marry the Duke of York (later George VI). Surgeon, stockbroker and political fixer Sir Louis Greig (Chairman 1936–53) was an equerry (and tennis doubles partner) to King George VI and a member of the January Club, formed in 1934 to explore the possibility of support among the British establishment for the British Union of Fascists (Keeley 1995). George Hillyard (Secretary 1907–25) used the title of “Commander” following service in the Royal Navy in the late 1870s and early 1880s. His successor, Dudley Larcombe had been in the Pay Corps in the First World War and answered to “Major”, while Duncan Macaulay (Secretary 1946–63) deployed his full title of “Lieutenant-Colonel A.D.C. Macaulay OBE” in his memoir of 1965, sharing authorial credit with another Wimbledon stalwart, Conservative politician “Brigadier The Rt Hon Sir John Smyth, Bt., VC, MC, MP” (Macaulay 1965). The club did not countenance anti-military views: the membership of losing finalist Henry “Bunny” Austin (Repton and Cambridge) was allowed to lapse when he was construed as a conscientious objector during the Second World War and was not restored until 1984, by which time he was 77 (Gray 2000). The Englishness over which these men presided was founded, like the Olympics, principally on the evasive notion of “amateurism”, which as an idea flourished in the period roughly 373

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between 1860 and 1960. Amateurism, although it purported to define behaviour, in practice defined people (Wagg 2006). The Wimbledon version of the amateur ideal, whatever its correspondence to reality, was founded on ideas of not striving unduly for victory, the graceful acceptance of defeat, female decorum, the wearing by both genders of specified apparel and, above all, the absence of financial reward for playing the game. Underlying the latter stipulation was distaste for the open commercialism represented by the middle-class men of “trade”; typically, upper-middle-class people – rentiers, financiers and top professionals – disdained talk of money (Wiener 2004). The AELTC therefore conducted its commercial transactions discreetly: in 1905, for instance, the Wimbledon tournament was played with a ball that was not regulation size. At the time, the AELTC secretary was Essex player Archdale Palmer, who was also managing director of Slazenger, which manufactured the balls (Dobbs 1973, p.168). The commercial partnership with Slazenger has been maintained, thus constituting “tradition”. In 1890, it was decreed that Wimbledon competitors must wear white clothing for matches. Why is not wholly clear. It might have been that white was the colour thought most likely to conceal sweat and, thus, any suggestion of undue effort – especially on the part of females – or that white most successfully reflected the sun. Lake (2017b) suggests that white was chosen because it was the colour adopted for cricket, the other British establishment summer sport, while American writer Emily Chertoff (2012) recently identified white, which dirties easiest, as the symbol of wealth and leisure. This observation is a reminder that, as with the Olympics, the values that were held to govern lawn tennis in its early decades were not confined to Britain, nor did they necessarily originate there. But they were claimed as British – or, more accurately, as English – and that historic claim has grown stronger even as the values themselves have gained greater redundancy.

Becoming Mecca: Imperial Wimbledon, 1900–39 Between the turn of the twentieth century and the outbreak of the Second World War, Wimbledon, having initially been little more than the genteel playground of tennis enthusiasts among England’s leisured elite, engaged increasingly with the outside world, adjusting and compromising its amateur-based Englishness as it did so. On the face of it, however, relations of class and status at the tournament were maintained – even strengthened. The most striking feature in this regard was the growing prominence of the Royal Family. George V, having, as Prince of Wales, been made AELTC President in 1907, came to open the club’s new premises in 1922 and, with Queen Mary, was a frequent visitor during the tournament. The Royal Box within Centre Court has been a regular feature of Wimbledon writing down the years and the club’s presidency has resided with the family of the Dukes of Kent since 1935. According to the historian David Cannadine (2000, p.120–1, 133), the British monarchy had, since the late nineteenth century, ceased to be ‘inept, private and of limited appeal’ and was now ‘splendid, public and popular’: it had embraced the sort of ceremonial which in other countries surrounded the head of state and, as such, constituted ‘a cavalcade of impotence’. It was wholly in keeping with this (comparatively) new mode of operation that the Royal Family should be seen sat among their subjects enjoying some summer sport. These subjects were attending in ever greater numbers. The inaugural Championships at Worple Road in 1877 had drawn 200 people, but players such as the Renshaws and the Dohertys had turned Wimbledon into a spectator sport on some scale and the club had its public to consider. Worple Road had held 7,000 spectators; at Church Road, the club’s new home from 1922, the Centre Court alone held 10,000 (Macaulay 1965, p.18), and in 1932 attendance figures topped 200,000 for the first time (Robertson 1981, p.305). In 1928, the club instituted 374

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a ballot system for the allocation of tickets, taking care to balance the interests of its members and those of the country’s tennis clubs with consideration of ‘the man in the street’ (Macaulay 1965, p.52, 131). Wimbledon was now both a popular event and an occasion that carried royal approval: it should be open, availability permitting, to all the King’s subjects. By the end of the nineteenth century, tennis was becoming a global game and was especially popular in the US, Brazil, India, several European countries – notably in Germany and the wealthy holiday resorts of France – South America and the Middle East. By 1924, 20 different nationalities were represented in the Wimbledon men’s singles. In the words of Sir John Smyth, Indian Army officer, Conservative MP and member of the AELTC’s establishment coterie, by this time Wimbledon had become lawn tennis Mecca and winning there a player’s highest aspiration (Smyth 1953, p.25). As with the early modern Olympic Games, many of these players were drawn from the same social class as the club’s founders and administrators, in many cases from settler families in British dominions. For example, the Australian Norman (later Sir Norman) Brookes, who became the first male overseas Wimbledon singles champion in 1907 and who won again in 1914, was the son of the managing director of Australian Paper Mills. His doubles partner Anthony Wilding, who won the singles title four years in a row (1910–3), was born in Christchurch, New Zealand, to wealthy English migrant parents and studied law at Cambridge. Gerald Patterson, singles winner in 1919 and 1922 was from a socially eminent family in Melbourne and a nephew of the Australian operatic soprano Dame Nellie Melba. On the face of it, a gentlemanly amateur Englishness was maintained and, where it was deemed necessary, lower-born tennis personnel were admitted, symbolically or otherwise, to the Wimbledon myth. Significantly, when recalling 30 years later the victory of Australian farmer’s son “Gentleman Jack” Crawford in the Wimbledon singles of 1933, Lt-Col Macaulay remarked that ‘no player from the British Empire had won since another Australian, Gerald Patterson, had gained the title ten years earlier’ (Macaulay 1965, p.80–1). Even more significantly, the following year, came one of the most cited incidents in Wimbledon history. Fred Perry, who beat Crawford in the men’s singles final of 1934, after the match overheard club committee member Brame Hillyard telling Crawford: ‘Congratulations. This was one day when the best man didn’t win’ (Perry 1984, p.10). Perry had won in straight sets, but Hillyard’s remark had not been a tennis judgment. As New Yorker columnist John R. Tunis wrote, Perry, ‘a poor boy without a varsity background’ (Fred’s father had been a trade unionist and Labour MP, both anathema to the AELTC) was not popular at Wimbledon because it was ‘the most snobbish centre of sport in the world’ (Perry 1984, p.78). Perry himself thought he had become a pariah in elite English tennis circles because of his self-professed will to win: Your opponent isn’t going to look up to you if you look down on yourself, and you have to try to impose your superiority on him as forcefully as you can. Give him a beating to remember. Well, I don’t think this was an approach generally favoured in England at the time. It was un-English. It wasn’t done, old bean. Not in tennis, anyway. (Perry 1984, p.78; see also Jeffreys 2009). Fred is even thought to have expressed ambivalence about having to bow to royalty (Robyns 1973, p.70). Thus Perry, though English, did not conform to the “Englishness” propagated and affirmed by Wimbledon. Perry was shunned. When he turned professional in 1936 his honorary membership of Wimbledon was withdrawn and not restored until 1949. This was despite the fact that he had won the Wimbledon Men’s’ Singles three years in a row (1934–6) and had been the first 375

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Englishman to win it since 41-year-old Arthur Gore, a throwback to the Doherty era, in 1909. If Englishness was to be stamped on the tournament, it would not be with racquets: France, Australia and the US dominated the men’s singles for the next 40 years. Perry was not the only one to pose a visible challenge to Wimbledon’s vaunted amateur credentials. His perceptible will to win was shared by other leading performers – France’s Suzanne Lenglen, for instance, and the American Bill Tilden – and they and others, though registered as amateurs, had no apparent private income. Norah Cleather, Wimbledon Secretary during the Second World War, later felt obliged to suggest that the club had simply paid generous expenses to such figures in order to compensate them for ‘longer journeys and longer absences from home’ (cited in: Lake 2015, p.136).

Least upset by the war: Wimbledon, America and the tennis market 1940–75 In his memoir, Lt-Col Macaulay remarked, rather huffily, that the US had been ‘least upset by the war of all the tennis-playing nations’ (Macaulay 1965, p.149). The post-war relationship between the AELTC and American tennis loosely paralleled the relationship between Britain and the US over the same period. While British governments took huge loans from the US and resigned themselves to the dismantlement of the British Empire, American tennis players dominated the Wimbledon championships while American entrepreneurs hovered around the club, waiting to sign the latest champions to a professional contract. America represented social forces that Wimbledon defined itself against, but, in the end, could not resist. A central figure here was the American Jack Kramer, who had won the Wimbledon men’s singles in 1947 and turned professional the following year. After retiring as a player in 1954 he ran a pro tour in the US and recruited for it at Wimbledon. While fond of the tournament, Kramer (1979, p.103) was one of the few leading tennis figures to confront the Wimbledon mystique: The fact is that Wimbledon’s pre-eminence is really rather new. We all have a tendency to assume that anything from England is older than anything from America and therefore is steeped in tradition. And it is true that lawn tennis was invented in England and that Wimbledon is older than our championship – by all of four years. But our national association started before England’s, and the Davis Cup is American. So Wimbledon has no significant seniority over the U.S. Nationals. The Wimbledon hierarchy were not slow to recognise the challenges of modernity. For example, Sir Louis Greig was strongly pro-television, thinking it would boost crowds, and in 1946 he had authorised Macaulay to do a deal for extended coverage with the BBC’s Head of Sport, future Conservative MP Ian Orr-Ewing; the corporation duly installed extra cameras at the club in 1952 (Macaulay 1965, p.154, 187). The inauguration of Wimbledon as a television programme (it was already popular on BBC radio) may have triggered a greater concern at the club that they should be able to feature the world’s best players, along with a respectable performance by British ones. This once again called the professional-amateur divide into question, but British tennis authorities were divided on this issue, with the Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) and International Lawn Tennis Federation apparently more reluctant than Wimbledon to throw the field open, although the latter voted narrowly against open tennis in 1960 (Evans 1988, p.3). In 1952, however, LTA Chairman Lord Templewood (formerly Sir Samuel Hoare) had declared: 376

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The day of the amateur who played tennis at his own expense and could reach the top has gone beyond recall. If we are going to have good players in these times we must finance them. We will do this by a special fund. (cited in: Noel 1955, p.22) While the successful development of these good (British) players would prove to be more than half a century away, the amateur/professional issue came to a head in the late 1960s. ‘Shamateur tennis was finished one afternoon during the Wimbledon of 1966’, recalled Kramer, who that year was asked to call into the BBC tent at Wimbledon to meet corporation executive Bryan Cowgill and Herman David, a critic of ‘shamateurism’ and AELTC chairman since 1959. The pro tennis circuit had claimed most of the (generally either American or Australian) Wimbledon champions of the 1950s. David told Kramer that the AELTC had finally tired of staging ‘secondclass tennis’ and asked him whether ‘after all these years of fighting the pros, will the public still support us?’ Kramer responded that England had just won the association football World Cup and ‘it was clear that nobody cared that the soccer heroes earned a living at their game’. Wimbledon agreed to stage a professional tournament the following year, the BBC providing prize money of $35,000, and the following year the championships went open (Kramer 1979, p.259–60). This move affirmed Wimbledon primarily as a television show and events now followed the logic of that affirmation, the club once again tailoring its professed Englishness to new political circumstances. There were important new commercial challenges in the early 1970s. Virginia Slims cigarettes and World Tennis magazine had inaugurated a professional women’s tennis circuit in the United States in 1970. In 1972, Wimbledon banned players contracted to oil billionaire Lamar Hunt’s World Championship of Tennis (WCT) when Hunt demanded appearance money and TV fees. This meant that reigning men’s singles champion John Newcombe was unable to defend his title (see: Newcombe 2002). Attendances that year were nevertheless the second highest in Wimbledon’s history. However, the following year 81 members of the newly formed Association of Tennis Professionals boycotted Wimbledon in support of the Yugoslav player Nikki Pilic who was in dispute with his national association, and the AELTC was obliged once again to trawl the tennis world for credible “amateurs” (Gray 2013). Chris Gorringe (2009, p.45–6), who became AELTC Assistant Secretary that year, recalled the committee’s thinking after these successive boycotts: The ongoing fear was what the ongoing implications might be. We thought that we could go through two, maybe three Championships of inferior quality before we would suffer. … [Then] people would start questioning whether to buy a ticket in advance, if there could be no guarantee of the world’s top players attending.There would also be a knock-on effect for TV and commercial partners. They would be even more suspicious and hard-nosed when it came to re-negotiating contracts if they were finding that the top players were not competing. The club had meanwhile begun a marketing operation under the auspices of London’s leading sports marketer Bagenal Harvey, who had negotiated with companies whose products, such as Robinson’s Barley Water and Slazenger tennis balls, were inevitably seen in Wimbledon broadcasts, and who arranged for the first corporate hospitality tent to be opened at Wimbledon in 1975. It was not long, however, before Harvey gave way to US marketing magnate Mark McCormack, who had been involved with the club since 1968 and whose International Management Group (IMG) were now made sole agents for Wimbledon. McCormack, said 377

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Gorringe (2009, p.60, 69), was a ‘tougher negotiator’ – ‘I remember going to a Eurovision meeting in Paris, where he really tore strips off one person because they were offering what he thought was a derisory amount. It was not particularly nice to watch’. At some point amid these transactions, a Wimbledon official expressed disquiet at this ‘opening the temple to the moneychangers’ (cited in:Wilson 2014, p.158).The task now for the AELTC was to maintain its timeless non-pecuniary aura nonetheless.

Packaging Wimbledon ‘The great thing about Wimbledon that I really appreciate is the tradition that is respected and protected for more than 130 years’ said Novak Djokovic, then the tournament’s defending men’s singles champion, on his Facebook page in June 2012. ‘We still wear only white clothes during the tournament, and the defending champion always plays at 1pm on Monday!’ (Montague 2012). However, as Jack Kramer had implied, those narrating “Wimbledon” have tended to assume that “history” was theirs alone. The remainder of this chapter discusses how Wimbledon has been constructed as a temple of English sporting tradition and how this “Wimbledon Englishness” might be interpreted. Some of the chief signifiers of Wimbledon – for instance, the strawberries and cream annually invoked in press commentary of the tournament – are as much the creature of modern promotion as they are of tradition. Strawberries and cream were eaten in the English royal court in the early sixteenth century and they were served at the first Wimbledon championship in 1877 (Boyle, 2015). It’s arguable, though, that they remained simply a motif for the summer leisure of the English upper-middle class until the 1950s, when club catering and publicity and routine press discourse began to establish Wimbledon as the “strawberries and cream” tournament in the annual sporting calendar (Lake 2017b). This, of course, would be an example of the “invention of tradition” explored at length by Hobsbawm and Ranger (2012). The strawberries and cream and the fact that the tournament continued to be played on grass have maintained the redolence of a suburban English garden party that Wimbledon now sought more than ever to cultivate. Moreover, in a burgeoning marketplace of international tennis competitions they have helped to preserve the ‘unique quality, character and image’ of Wimbledon, as per the AELTC’s mission statement (Lake 2017b, p.52). Awareness of, and concern for, this image seemed to crystallise in the 1970s in the wake of the club’s decision to open the tournament to professionals and, in this context, the early 1980s offered up a ready-made passion play. Alan Mills (2005, p.2), an ex-professional player who joined the Wimbledon staff in 1977, remembered: Since the late 1970s, a different kind of animal had come to stalk the court, and once the barriers of good conduct had been broken down, this new breed had begun to stampede into the former bastion of civilised behaviour with a terrifying lack of embarrassment or shame. The clout of the professional tennis player had been growing year on year since the advent of the Open era in 1968. With every nought added to the end of their prize money cheques came a proportionate rise in the amount of power the players felt was entitled to them. As far as many of them were concerned, some of the chair umpires and line judges were just doddery old amateurs. Preeminent among these was New Yorker John McEnroe, who first won the Wimbledon men’s singles title in 1981 at the age of 22. There’s little doubt that McEnroe’s disputatious on-court behaviour privately affronted the AELTC’s “old guard”; indeed, in the year of this first victory 378

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McEnroe received the maximum penalty for conduct, and honorary membership of the club – now routinely awarded to a champion – was withheld (it was given to McEnroe the following year). But the AELTC and their media advisors realised in all probability that the outbursts of McEnroe and others, above all else, constituted “good television”. Audiences, in particular those young and/or American, will have relished the public anguish of these latter-day James Deans (see my other chapter in this book), particularly since they seemed to represent new, meritocratic wealth confronting patrician, uptight traditional authority. As journalist Tim Adams (2003, p.55) observed: At some point the B.B.C., itself groping for new boundaries of public decorum, must have found that the soundtrack was generating at least as much interest as the passing shots and half-volleys and so, in the interests of, well, voyeurism, they tended to let it run. Wimbledon, needless to say, continued to evince an authority that could be railed against – in particular still insisting upon sports apparel that was “almost entirely white”. The flamboyant American player Andre Agassi boycotted Wimbledon for three summers from 1988, and in 1990 the Wimbledon chairman John Curry visited him in Paris and urged him to come back. When he did so, Agassi said that he’d been wrong to stay away and that Wimbledon was “special” (Philip 1993, p.2–3). Reconciliation with les enfants terribles of the past is another important element in the Wimbledon narrative of the last 30 years: as in Oliver Goldsmith’s poem The Deserted Village (1770), ‘they came to scoff and remained to pray’. McEnroe,Wimbledon’s prodigal son, pays an annual homage as a broadcaster at the tournament each July. Wimbledon meanwhile moved to boost its commercial operation. The on-site Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Museum, in which the Victorian croquet mallets from pre-tennis days are preserved, opened in the centenary year of 1977 and the club began offering corporate hospitality themed, according to Gorringe (2009, p.129), as ‘tennis in an English garden’. The AELTC recruited a marketing director in 1985, a TV marketing director in 1989 and an IT director in 1995. Astutely, it has opted for a merchandising strategy and allows no advertising, beyond logos incidental to tennis such as the label on a bottle of Lemon Barley water, within its precincts. There are other discreet and lucrative partnership deals: Rolex watches, for instance, became ‘Official Timekeeper’ to the Championships in 1978. The club’s website (www.wimbledon. com) states: One of the Club’s key objectives is to enhance the unique character and image of The Championships by keeping our courts and grounds relatively free of commercial sponsorship and product placement, hence the lack of overt advertising around the Grounds. This, they explain, protects the ‘Wimbledon brand’; they warn against any attempt at ‘ambush marketing’.The AELTC now has shops selling Wimbledon merchandise on site and in India and China (Gorringe 2009, p.165). Thus, like the British Royal Family, who are similarly held to stand above politics and the market, but have nevertheless installed gift shops at their various palaces, Wimbledon commercialises what has always purported to be above commerce. Invoking “tradition”, the AELTC maintains exclusivity while taking credit for its abolition. The trick, of course, is that the precise nature of that exclusivity has changed, with the many hospitality bars and tents now thronging with forgiven ex-professionals and corporate guests and the Royal Box featuring a greater number of celebrities – symbols of achieved, rather than inherited wealth: restrictions were placed on the number of seats allocated to the Duchess of Kent in 1999 (Ezard 1999). The practice of 379

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players bowing or curtseying to the Royal Box was discontinued in 2003 (save for the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh).

Conclusion: a postcard from a country that never existed? The commodified Englishness that defines Wimbledon originated in the period 1880–1920 and was forged in Britain’s public schools and elite universities. As Robert Colls and Philip Dodd wrote in 1986, ‘it is within the shadow of that period, and its meanings, that we still live’ (Colls & Dodd 1986, p.i). It’s possible to argue, more than 30 years later, that this is still, to a degree, the case.The construction and maintenance of Wimbledon’s Edwardian “English garden” image runs parallel to the dismantlement of the British Empire and the decline of Britain as a world power. In that time, the commanding heights of the British class structure, headquartered in the south-east of England, have held firm; its monarchy, aristocracy and historic seat of financial power in the City of London adapted to circumstance but was comparatively undisturbed by significant reform. The British establishment governs no colonies any more than it produces elite tennis players. Such players are now typically schooled in tennis ranches, camps and academies, such as the one run by American Nick Bollettieri in Bradenton, FL, bought by IMG in 2001. Wimbledon, therefore, has become simply an important cog in a vertically integrated system of tennis production, in which the same companies produce and market the players and the tournaments in which they play. Analogously to the City of London, Wimbledon now principally services foreign tennis capital. Indeed, as a perceptive Guardian editorial suggested in 2004 (19 June): The globalisation of UK commercial and artistic activities is not new. We have got used to industries like motor manufacturing, stockbroking, investment banking, electricity, water and computing falling into foreign hands. But does it matter? The Japanese, who have pursued the opposite strategy of nurturing national champions, have coined a phrase for it.They call it the Wimbledon Effect, a reference to tennis. The economic theory is that it doesn’t matter if you don’t own the winners – as long as you host the tournament. So, don’t worry that Wimbledon tennis does not produce a UK victor – just count the money coming in. Tennis, moreover, has never become a mass participation sport in Britain and LTA priority has been given to the search for an elite performer who could compete on the international circuit – a search realised in the form of Andy Murray, who turned professional in 2005 and won his first Wimbledon singles title in 2013. Murray, the Scottish son of a newsagent and a tennis coach, emerged, geographically and socially, from well outside the Britain public school elite. The marginal place of tennis in British life, outside of the Wimbledon fortnight, has meant that the narrative of British decline propounded by the nation’s sports press has focused most notably on the travails of the England football team (Wagg 1991). However, as Lake (2017a) has written, Tim Henman, the leading British tennis player prior to Murray and a professional from 1993 to 2007, was relentlessly assimilated to this narrative by the British sport media. Henman’s biography more closely approximated to the Wimbledon myth: he was the privately educated son of a solicitor and had been born (in 1974) in the Home Counties (Oxfordshire). He was also, however, an accomplished tennis player and fierce competitor, winning 11 singles tournaments and reaching six Grand Slam semi-finals in his career. But, as Lake (2017a, p.1747) argues, the press depiction of him borrowed both from his well-to-do background (suggestive of amateur attitudes) and his failure to win Wimbledon, to paint him as ‘an under-performing perennial loser who lacked a “killer instinct”’. 380

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Henman’s emergence, however, did bring with it a strong suggestion of an adjustment in class relations at Wimbledon. In 1997, a large and mostly young cadre of the general public was admitted to the Centre Court during “People’s Sunday”, when, because of heavy rainfall in the first week, the tournament committee voted against tradition and scheduled play on the middle Sunday. That year also saw the construction of a big-screen television that allowed fans without show-court tickets to sit on a grassy bank and watch matches. Often adorned in Union Jack regalia, sat out in all weathers and waving for the cameras (something which wealthier and more privileged Wimbledon spectators seldom do) they cheered “Nearly Man” Henman to the echo; the press talked of “Henmania”, as expressed by the patriotic crowd on “Henman Hill”. This invited comparison with The Last Night of the Proms at which a similar brand of jovial, post-1960s “banal nationalism” (Billig 2011) is annually on display. As Aditya Chakrabortty, citing David Cannadine, recently suggested, the patriotic musical repertoire for this occasion, which is also frequently cited as “tradition”, was composed and assembled at a time when British power was waning: in a judgment that could just as easily be made of “Wimbledon”, he states: ‘The entire musical sequence is a postcard from a country that never existed’ (Cannadine, 2008; Chakrabortty, 2017). The boisterousness of the occasion – the streamers, funny hats and Union Jacks – are also a recent innovation and, like “Henmania”, suggest a reduction in deference, and an admission of emotion and frivolity, into the dealings between the country’s elite and the general public. As a number of commentators remarked at the time, the funeral of Princess Diana in 1997, which married hierarchy, purported tradition and the public expression of emotion, marked a watershed in this regard.2 In keeping with this apparent relaxation, the same year it was deemed only right, with the monarch perhaps ensconced in her Centre Court box, surrounded by film stars and television personalities, that the gentlemanly custodians of the ersatz Victorian myth that is Wimbledon should allow in some ordinary folk – many having queued overnight – to enjoy themselves in the outer grounds and cheer for a plucky British tennis player.

Notes 1 By 1882, croquet ceased to be played on the club grounds and so was dropped from the Club’s title, which became the All England Lawn Tennis Club. In 1899, the Club decided to add Croquet back into its title, making it the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club, but it is commonly referred to as the All England Lawn Tennis Club. 2 For a discussion, see the Open University’s ‘A Tale of Two Funerals: Shifting Britishness’ in which three academics compare the cultural significance of the funerals of Winston Churchill and Diana, Princess of Wales: http:​//www​.open​.edu/​openl​earn/​histo​ry-th​e-art​s/tal​e-two​-fune​rals-​shift​ing-b​r itis​ hness​(accessed 11th October 2017).

References Adams, T. (2003) Being John McEnroe. London:Yellow Jersey Press. Billig, M. (2011 [1995]) Banal Nationalism. London: Sage. Boyle, D. (2015, 7 July) What Do Strawberries and Cream Have to do with Tennis? The Independent. Cannadine, D. (2000) The Context, Performance and Meaning of Ritual, The British Monarchy and the “Invention of Tradition” c. 1820–1977. In Hobsbawm, E. and Ranger, T. (eds.), The Invention of Tradition (pp.101–64), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Cannadine, D. (2008, 18 March) The ‘Last Night of the Proms’ in Historical Perspective. Institute of Historical Research. Available at: http:​//onl​ineli​brary​.wile​y.com​/doi/​10.11​11/j.​1468-​2281.​2008.​00466​.x/fu​ll (accessed 11th October 2017) Chakrabortty, A. (2017, 10 September) The Last Night of the Proms – A Postcard From a Country That Never Existed. The Guardian. 381

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Chertoff, E. (2012, 7th August) Why Do Tennis Players Wear White? The Atlantic. Available at: http:​// www​.thea​tlant​ic.co​m/ent​ertai​nment​/arch​ive/2​012/0​8/why​-do-t​ennis​-play​ers-w​ear-w​hite/​26078​5/ (accessed 8th October 2017) Colls, R. & Dodd, P. (eds.) (1986) Englishness: Politics and Culture. Beckenham: Croom Helm. Dobbs, B. (1973) Edwardians at Play: Sport 1890–1914. London: Pelham Books. Evans, R. (1988) Open Tennis:The First Twenty Years London: Bloomsbury. Ezard, J. (1999, 23 September) Wimbledon Tries to Mollify Duchess. The Guardian. Gorringe, C. (2009) Holding Court. London: Arrow Books. Gray, D. (2013) From the Archive, 20 June 1973: Top Players Boycott Wimbledon. The Guardian. Gray, M. (2000, 28 August) Bunny Austin [Obituary]. The Guardian. Hobsbawm, E. & Ranger, T. (eds.) (2012 {1983]) The Invention of Tradition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Holt, R. (1992) Sport and the British Oxford: Clarendon. Jeffreys, K. (2009) Fred Perry and British Tennis: “Fifty Years to Honour a Winner”, Sport in History, 29(1), 1–24. Keeley, T. (1995) Blackshirts Torn: Inside the British Union of Fascists, 1932–1940. Available at: http:​// www​.coll​ectio​nscan​ada.g​c.ca/​obj/s​4/f2/​dsk2/​tape1​7/PQD​D_002​6/MQ3​7564.​pdf (accessed 11th October 2017) Kramer, J. with Deford F. (1979) The Game: My Forty Years in Tennis. New York: Putnam. Lake, R.J. (2015) A Social History of Tennis in Britain. London: Routledge. Lake, R.J. (2017a) Tim Henman, British Tennis and the Social Construction of English Identity in the 1990s and 2000s, Sport in Society 20(7), 1745–64. Lake, R.J. (2017b) “Tennis in an English Garden”:Wimbledon, Englishness and British Sporting Culture. In Gibbons, T. and Malcolm, D (eds.), Sport and English National Identity in a ‘Disunited Kingdom’, London: Routledge. Macaulay, D. (1965) Behind the Scenes at Wimbledon. London: Collins. Montague, J. (2012) Game, set and match:What Wimbledon says about the British. CNN. Available at: http:​ //edi​tion.​cnn.c​om/20​12/06​/25/s​port/​tenni​s/ten​nis-w​imble​don-p​revie​w-yor​k-oly​mpics​-iden​tity/​ index​.html​(accessed 11th October 2017) Newcombe, J. with Writer L. (2002) Newk: Life On and Off the Court. Sydney: Pan Macmillan Australia. Noel, S. (1955) Tennis in Our Time. London: The Sportsmans Book Club. Perry, F. (1984) Fred Perry: An Autobiography. London: Hutchinson. Robertson, M. (1981) Wimbledon: Centre Court of the Game. London: British Broadcasting Corporation. Robyns, G. (1973) Wimbledon:The Hidden Drama. Newton Abbott: David and Charles. Spracklen, K. (2013) Whiteness and Leisure. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Wagg, S. (1991) Playing the Past: The Media and the England Football Team. In Williams, J. and Wagg, S. (eds.), British Football and Social Change, Leicester: Leicester University Press. Wagg, S. (2006) ‘Base Mechanic Arms’? British Rowing, Some Ducks and the Shifting Politics of Amateurism, Sport in History 26(3), 520–39. Wagg, S. (2015) Sacred Turf: The Wimbledon Tennis Championships and the Changing Politics of Englishness, Sport in Society 20(3), 398–412. Wiener, M.J. (2004) English Culture and the Decline of the Industrial Spirit 1850–1980. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Wilson, E. (2014) Love Game: A History of Tennis from Victorian Pastime to Global Phenomenon. London: Serpent’s Tail.

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37 Andy Murray and the borders of national identities (Re)claiming a tennis champion John Harris1

Andy Murray is amongst the leading tennis players in the world – retaining his ATP worldnumber-one ranking throughout most of 2017 – and is one of the most famous sport stars in contemporary Britain. As the individual who ended the 77-year wait for a “home” winner of the men’s All England Lawn Tennis Championships title at Wimbledon, the man from Dunblane in Scotland became a national hero and was voted the BBC Sports Personality of the Year in 2013. As his profile and status as an international tennis player grew, he became the site for contested claims of national allegiance during a period when London hosted the Olympic Games, Glasgow the Commonwealth Games and there was a referendum on Scottish independence. In this time, Murray won two of the four major tennis championships, a gold medal for Team GB at the London Olympic Games and was the central figure in the resurgent performances of Britain’s Davis Cup team. As a man who lived in England, Murray did not have a vote in Scotland’s referendum, but he caused controversy when tweeting his support of the Yes campaign on the day that Scotland went to the polls. This chapter considers the ways in which Murray has been (re)claimed as a site for the promotion of varying national identity politics and explores where he sits within and around these contested borders. It also considers Murray’s wider profile as a sporting celebrity and his location in other areas of popular culture where discourses of Scottishness and Britishness collide.

One Andy Murray? Andrew Barron Murray was born in Glasgow in 1987. He grew up in Dunblane, a picturesque town situated near Stirling in the central part of Scotland. Murray has an older brother named Jamie who also became an elite tennis player, reaching world-number-one in doubles in 2016. The two brothers who went on to achieve success at the very highest level of the game began playing the sport at the local tennis club in their hometown. Their mother had also been a good tennis player and subsequently became a very successful coach. The Murray brothers attended Dunblane Primary School and were in the school on the day that a lone gunman shot dead 16 children and a teacher.This tragic event catapulted Dunblane into the national and international news. It became a place name associated with something very sad and terrible, but it has been suggested that the success of the Murray brothers, and the increased public profile of Andy in 383

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particular, has been used as a means of reclaiming the name of the town and presenting Dunblane to the rest of Britain and further afar in a positive context (Harris 2014). We see a strong local attachment in the media narratives surrounding the Murray brothers and their achievements became de facto the achievements of the town. In some ways, the successes of individuals from small towns carry an extra resonance as they are places that are otherwise rarely in the news (except in circumstances like those referred to above). A strong sense of attachment to place and a particular local identity was a theme visible in the writing of the cultural critic Raymond Williams as both an academic and a novelist (Williams 1960). The work of Williams, as it applies to a discussion of the borders of national identities, will be considered towards the end of this chapter in bringing together some of the central themes identified in the discussion of Murray. The remarkable success of the two men from Dunblane has occasionally been positioned as occurring with limited support from the English establishment that governs tennis in Britain. This is a contested area as both players have received support from those governing the game, yet have also at various times achieved success in spite of the governance systems in place. This is a common theme visible across many areas of Scottish sport and indeed many of the much wider social, economic and political terrains. This particular theme offers an interesting point of departure when considering one of the first widespread discussions of Andy Murray as a public figure in wider national media representations at the beginning of his professional tennis career.

Andy Murray: the anti-Henman As he embarked upon his tennis career, Murray was often discussed not for what he was, but for what he was not. This dour, stroppy Scottish man with the unruly mop of hair was positioned as someone markedly different to the polite, pleasant and sensibly coiffured Tim Henman. The son of an Oxford solicitor, Henman was perceived as a figure representative of quintessential middle England. He would attract massive media interest for the annual fortnight in the year when tennis briefly permeated the wider British consciousness (see Lake 2017a; Wagg 2017). The Championships take place at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club but have in many ways developed into a broader British event that would emerge as a dominant narrative in the career of Andy Murray. Henman was the great hope of British tennis and came agonisingly close to ending the long wait for a home-grown male singles champion at Wimbledon where he reached the semi-finals on four occasions. That he fell just short of achieving the ultimate prize led to some media being quite critical of him and questioning his mental fortitude. Some of these narratives attributed a so-called physical and psychological vulnerability to what was described as a privileged upbringing (see Lake 2017a). Whilst being perceived and (re)presented as polar opposites, Murray and Henman have always enjoyed a very good relationship. The younger man was just emerging as a potential star of British tennis as the elder man edged towards the end of his professional career. Murray (2008, p.83) has always talked warmly of his respect for Henman noting that ‘Tim was a great player. … He was also my friend, he was my mentor, and I looked up to him’. It was their friendship and being at ease in each other’s company that led to an incident which catapulted Murray into the headlines for making a tongue-in-cheek remark in a conversation about football ahead of the 2006 World Cup. After some gentle baiting from Henman and a journalist noting that Scotland would not be taking part, Murray was asked who he would be supporting in the competition. He replied that he would support whoever England was playing. This “anyone but England” stance was the position that any self-respecting Scot is expected to take when discussing football. Bairner (2001, p.51) has noted that ‘it is frequently only to the extent that sport can be recruited to the traditional anti-English cause that it truly unites the Scottish people’. 384

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Of course, as we will see later in this chapter, Murray has himself become a very popular figure in the wider national press and other areas of popular culture in Britain. As Henman progressed through the rounds at Wimbledon the scarcity (and cost) of tickets to the show courts meant that many would watch his matches on the big screen in the grounds of the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club.This became known as Henman Hill, but after he retired and Murray came to prominence then it is now more likely to be referred to as Murray Mound (or sometimes Murrayfield, which is also the name of Scotland’s national rugby stadium in Edinburgh). This particular corner of SW19 soon became a site where the obligatory smattering of Saltire flags and “See You Jimmy” hats became noticeably visible alongside the Union Jacks and strawberries and cream. Scottishness and Britishness interact and intersect in the grounds of the All England club, but it is of course the essentialised Englishness of Wimbledon (see Lake 2017b; W   agg 2017) that partly explains why Andy Murray’s national identity has become such a focal point in any discussion of his achievements.

Andy Murray: Braveheart Not far from Dunblane stands a monument to William Wallace, a thirteenth century patriot and freedom fighter. This same geographical area also includes the Bannockburn Visitor Centre, and the tourism industry within this part of Scotland has developed in large part by focusing on the many battles fought between Scotland and England. Scotland and England were brought together by the Acts of Union in 1707 to create the United Kingdom of Great Britain.The story of Wallace, as popularised by the Australian actor Mel Gibson’s film Braveheart, came at a ‘crucial time for the reconstitution of Scottish identity’ (Edenesor 2002, p.145). Such narratives highlight the ways in which selective traditions are used in the telling and retelling of national histories. As his stature as an international tennis player grew, we saw an increased focus on Andy Murray as a representative of Scotland. Murray’s ascent to the very top of world tennis coincided with a period of significant change and unrest in Scotland, Britain and Europe. In an increasingly sanitised and commodified sport business, athletes are ever less likely to express opinions on important subjects but that does not stop them becoming sites for the discussion of identities. It was in the build-up to the referendum on whether Scotland should become an independent country that we saw increasing claims to Murray on the basis of his nationality. The then leader of the Scottish National Party (SNP), Alex Salmond, famously unravelled a very large saltire flag in the Royal Box at Wimbledon after Murray’s victory in 2013. Salmond was a man not averse to using sport as a means of gaining political capital, but he was not alone in doing this. His main political foe in the build-up to the referendum, the then British Prime Minister David Cameron, used the site of the Olympic Park in London (and referred explicitly to the recent successes of Team GB) as the stage for his passionate speech on the preservation of the Union early in 2014. With Glasgow hosting the Commonwealth Games in the summer of 2014, just two months before the Scottish nation went to the polls for the vote on independence, sport became a topic discussed well beyond the confines of the sports pages. Murray’s victory at Wimbledon in 2013 was described in the Independent newspaper (8 July 2013) as follows: It is strange that so much store should be put, by such shrewd politicians as Salmond and Cameron, on the opinions of a young man who has no record of success or judgement in anything other than striking a tennis ball with improbable power and accuracy. Trying to get high-profile Scottish people to show their support for a particular side became a key feature of the build-up to the vote. The staging of major sporting events provided sites 385

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upon which identity politics loomed large and often provided the impetus for further discussion about national identities. Sport though for the most part is largely politics with a small “p” and speculation about what the successes or failures of Team Scotland would mean for the vote on independence was largely shown to be irrelevant to how people would vote (Harris & Skillen 2016). On the morning that Scotland went to the polls, Murray sent out a tweet that read ‘Huge day for Scotland today! no campaign negativity last few days totally swayed my view on it. Excited to see the outcome. lets [sic] do this’. This attracted a considerable amount of attention with media in different parts of the world commenting on it. Harris and Skillen (2016) have noted that any discussion of politics was soon overshadowed by discussions of what Murray’s comment would mean for the tenure of his mother Judy Murray on the popular television show Strictly Come Dancing. Andy Murray had some reservations about Judy’s dancing ability but at least he could cast a vote if he wanted to (something, being resident in England, he was not eligible to do in the referendum on Scottish independence). Murray’s tweet on the independence debate was met with some vitriolic online abuse and numerous accusations against him across all forms of media. Whilst many of the British newspapers focused on the comments of a twitter troll who stated that he wished Murray had been killed at Dunblane in 1996, most of the commentary accused the tennis player of being unpatriotic and anti-British. It is even more remarkable then to consider just what a popular figure he has now become in a wider British context.

Andy Murray: a Great Briton Whilst pilloried in some quarters for his views on the England football team and his intervention into the referendum debate, Murray has since become a very popular figure in Britain. Moving beyond national distinctions we must also acknowledge the intersections of social class, gender and various other identity markers. The back-story of attending Dunblane Primary School and being in the school on that awful day in 1996 was also a recurring topic in the character portrayals of Murray. The sporting body can be (re)presented as a site for many things, and Murray soon became the sole figure on whom the hopes of the wider British nation were pinned as the man who could finally end the quest for a men's championship title last won by the Lancastrian Fred Perry in 1936. Murray’s victory at Wimbledon in 2013 marked the end of a 77-year wait for a home-grown winner of the men’s singles championship. This of course was a wait for a British champion. You would have to go even further back in history to uncover the last Scottish men’s singles champion of Wimbledon. In 1896, Harold Mahony won the title but although he was born in Edinburgh, he was often referred to as an Irish tennis player.2 It was in fact some six years before Andy Murray’s Wimbledon singles title that reference to Mahony’s achievement briefly appeared in the press following Jamie Murray’s mixed-doubles title success with Jelena Jankovic. Later in 2013, Murray unveiled his new management company under the name 77 and spoke of the great pride in finally bringing to an end the British search for a men’s singles Wimbledon title (Murray 2013). In a purely Scottish context, 117 would have been a more appropriate name for the company although the fact that Murray secured the title on the seventh day of the seventh month (7th July) should also be noted here. But this was very much a British quest for success and was something that had captured the public imagination in recent times, during the Henman era in particular. Andy Murray is certainly not the only British tennis player to have his national identity debated and contested. At the time that Tim Henman was in the top group of players in the world his great rival on the domestic scene was Greg Rusedski. Rusedski was born in Montreal, 386

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Canada, and initially represented that country in tennis though crucially never in the Davis Cup. The son of an English mother (who was born in Yorkshire but moved to Canada as a child), Rusedski secured British citizenship and moved to London, where he still lives. In more recent times, Laura Robson (who won a silver medal in the mixed doubles at the 2012 Olympics with Andy Murray) and Johanna Konta have also contributed to the development and profile of British tennis. These women were both born in Australia but represent Great Britain. Konta reached the semi-finals of Wimbledon in 2017, and an interview with the veteran broadcaster John Humphreys shortly after the championships focused on her British citizenship. Many were critical of the way in which Konta was asked to explain her nationality and whom she represented (e.g. Daily Mail 18 July 2017). Aljaz Bedene, who was ranked the number two men’s singles player in Britain behind Andy Murray in 2015, was granted British citizenship in 2015 but was unable to represent Great Britain in the Davis Cup as he had already played in the competition for his native Slovenia. There was once even talk of the Lawn Tennis Association looking into the possibility of Murray’s great rival Novak Djokovic ‘changing nationality and becoming eligible to play for Britain’ (Murray 2008, p.192). In 2016, when Andy Murray successfully defended the Olympic title he had first won in London 2012, his status as something akin to a national treasure in wider British popular culture was secured. A few days before this win Murray was given the honour of being asked to carry the flag at the opening ceremony at the head of the Team GB delegation. Here he would be following in the footsteps of the cyclist Sir Chris Hoy (also from Scotland), who had undertaken this prestigious role in 2012. Murray described this as the biggest honour in sport and one of the undoubted highlights of his career.This inevitably led to criticisms from both sides of the political spectrum. Some suggested that he was unpatriotic (in a British sense) and so should not have been given this honour as his tweet ahead of the referendum indicated that he wanted Scotland to be separate from the rest of the UK. Others believed that he was unpatriotic (in a Scottish sense) for describing it as his proudest moment. These competing critiques show the pressure often placed upon Murray and highlight the ways in which high-profile athletes become the sites for multiple and competing claims to them. For athletes from a range of sports, the Olympic Games represents the pinnacle of an athletic career.This is not necessarily the case in tennis where a player’s status in the game is measured in Grand Slam titles.Yet for tennis players from across the world the opportunity to experience an Olympic Games and be part of a team was something that many have identified as a particular highlight in their careers.3 The other chance to compete for a nation in the sport comes in the Davis Cup and it is to another momentous event in the annals of British tennis that I now turn.

Dunblane wins the Davis Cup The Davis Cup is the premier men’s team event in the sport of tennis. First contested in 1900 it allows the best players from the member nations of the International Tennis Federation (ITF) the chance to represent their country in a sport where players usually compete as individuals. The tournament was established after a Harvard University student named Dwight Davis donated a trophy. The Davis Cup was initially designed as a competition between the US and Great Britain, and Davis captained the US team to a victory against their British opponents during the first match in Boston. The Davis Cup evolved to become a competition between a wider number of countries in 1905 and has developed significantly in the years following that (Harris 2011). In 2015, with Andy Murray as its inspiration, Great Britain won the Davis Cup for the first time since 1936. With a standout player like Murray, then one man can almost single-handedly 387

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carry a nation to the title for if he wins his two singles rubbers then the team only requires one more point from the other two singles rubbers or the solitary doubles rubber. Murray often also took part in the doubles rubber (in addition to playing the two singles matches) where he was partnered by his brother Jamie. Jamie Murray is one of the best doubles players in the world but his achievements are often overlooked since he is known primarily as Andy’s brother, and doubles is afforded less status and prestige than singles tennis.When playing together the Murray brothers combined to win key rubbers in the latter stages of the competition and contributed to 11 of the 12 victories as Britain won the Davis Cup. The Scottish influence on the resurgence of British tennis was not just confined to the Murray brothers. Other Scottish players such as Colin Fleming and Jamie Baker had been a part of the British team that had quite recently been just one match away from relegation to the bottom tier of the competition.The captain of the successful 2015 British team, and a long-standing friend and former coach of Murray, was Scotsman Leon Smith. With a Scottish captain and the two Murray brothers in the team then matches were sometimes staged in Glasgow to draw upon a passionate home support. The “legacy” of the Murray brothers is now prominent in various discussions of performance sport and/or physical (in)activity in Scotland and Britain with a recent advertisement for the Chief Executive Officer position in Tennis Scotland referring specifically to the “Murray Effect” as the key factor in the current high profile of the sport within Scotland.There is a clear push to capitalise on the profile of the sport and to ensure that there is further investment in developing better facilities. It was 31 miles from Glasgow that the Davis Cup success was perhaps celebrated most of all with many of the residents of Dunblane taking particular delight in the achievements of their favourite sons. The Murray brothers had not always enjoyed harmonious times as team-mates. In 2008, when Andy withdrew from a Davis Cup match against Argentina there was a public spat between the two when Jamie criticised his brother’s decision. Some of the biggest stars in individual sports like golf or tennis do not always do well in team events and many do not prioritise them as part of their schedules. Andy Murray’s commitment to the Davis Cup team was clearly an important part in his redemption as a British sporting hero. The back-story of the two brothers who were both in Dunblane Primary School on that horrendous day in 1996 and had since gone on to achieve incredible things was often mentioned in articles about them. The fact that they could share in this professional success meant that Dunblane once again became the site for celebratory news stories across the British media. The golden post-box in the centre of the town, painted in honour of Andy Murray’s 2012 Olympic title (see Harris 2014), became a popular focal point for celebration. Whilst there may have been claim and counter-claim to Murray as a Scot or a Brit there was no doubt that for the townsfolk of Dunblane he was most definitely one of them.

Is Andy Murray Scottish or British? We can look back to the Wimbledon 2012 final which he lost to Roger Federer as a key moment in the wider national (British) embracing of Andy Murray. In his post-match interview on Centre Court, screened live on the BBC, Murray choked-up and broke down in tears as he reflected on the defeat. Ahead of the match itself an article in the Daily Mail (8 July 2012) noted that ‘for all the manic intensity of the scrutiny, we know precious little about the man.We know nothing of his politics, his views on Afghanistan, the deficit, the Union, the Monarchy’. The article went on to note that ‘the sages impose their own ponderous stereotypes upon his elusive personality’ (Daily Mail 8 July 2012). 388

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Discussions of Murray often focused on positioning him as an “outsider”, noting his distance from middle England and a specific upper-middle-class Englishness.This particular portrayal has long been a key part of the Englishness that defines Wimbledon and also links closely to representations of the British Royal Family, some of whom are often present at Wimbledon during the championships (see Wagg 2017). This of course links back to the wider national (British) introduction to Murray as someone quite different from Tim Henman. Murray’s tears would have seen him revealed as something more than a hard-nosed, dour Scot and clearly showed just how much the quest for that elusive Wimbledon title meant to him. Such a descriptor does often appear a little trite, but he really did seem to be carrying the hopes of a nation and many turned on the television simply to watch his matches. Sport stars are often under incredible pressure to become something representative of so much more than just their successes and failures as athletes. In contemporary times, they are deemed boring or without personality for remaining neutral on most topics, yet when they do share their views on anything, they can quite quickly become embroiled in controversy. Murray (2008, 2013) has reflected on this and also noted the pressure that was placed on his good friend, noting that the public persona of Tim Henman was very different from the private person. Given the wider political climate shaping Scotland and Britain in the early part of the twenty-first century then anything linked to the subject of national identity became particularly contentious for Murray and was perhaps his defining characteristic in much of the print media coverage of him. There was a widespread belief in Scotland that, for the purposes of the London-based British media, Murray was British when he won but Scottish when he lost. As my colleague, Hugh O’Donnell (2012) has noted, this is simply not the case although something of an urban myth developed around this view. The topic was also the subject of a Masters thesis in linguistics at Stirling University where it was clearly shown that the press was consistent in describing Murray’s nationality whatever the result (Dickson 2015). There has at times seemed to be a disproportionate amount of interest in this particular distinction. Yet it is important to note that this is not an either/or distinction for many people (including Murray himself) since they are happy with a dual identity. Many now recognise him as a patriot who embraced his Scottish identity and yet also was very proud to be British. As Murray (2008, p.126) noted in his autobiography: Let me say, here and now, that I am Scottish. I am also British. I am not anti-English. I never was. I’m patriotic and proud to be Scottish, but my girlfriend is English, my gran who I love to bits is English and half her family is English. He also noted that ‘I practice in England with English players, I play Davis Cup for Britain – but I love being Scottish’ (Murray 2008, p.126). Murray also now has a daughter who was born in England and he has become a very popular figure in British sport as evidenced by his being asked to lead out the Team GB delegation for the opening ceremony of Rio 2016. Moreover, few other things demonstrate the esteem in which he is held better than the fact that he has received the prestigious BBC Sports Personality of the Year award on three separate occasions. No other athlete in the history of the event has ever received this award three times and in 2016 Murray polled more than double the number of votes from the British public than the runnerup, the triathlete Alistair Brownlee. Yet while there may be ongoing debates about whether Murray is Scottish or British, the one nationality he definitely is not is English. England and Britain are two words that are often used interchangeably with little recognition of the differences between them and, according to Murray (2008, p.127), ‘the majority of the world thinks England is the only country in 389

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Britain’. This particular distinction resurfaced when a tweet from the New York Times in the immediate aftermath of Murray’s Wimbledon victory in 2013 read ‘After 77 years, Murray and England rule’. This was quickly corrected but not before being shared across social media and attracting much commentary. An article in the Guardian (7 July 2013) noted ‘Andy Murray had won Wimbledon, and Scottish, British – who cares? Today and probably forever, the man from Dunblane belongs to us all’.

Concluding remarks: on the border(s) of national identities After Murray had won his third BBC Sports Personality of the Year award in 2016, an article in the Guardian (19 December 2016) reflected on how much things had changed since he was pilloried for his tongue-in-cheek comment on the England football team: Anyone But Murray, eh? The ABM meme could hardly seem more tatty and irrelevant now, seven years after it was spawned with spite and ignorance, before the difficult Scot had proved Little Englanders and other snipers wrong with his eloquent tennis racket. Here we see the continual shaping and reshaping of identities. This is something clearly visible during the Wimbledon fortnight where tennis briefly enters the wider national consciousness (Wagg 2017). Raymond Williams (1969, 10 July) noted how the scale of the tennis court fits television so exactly. Williams was a scholar who worked for many years on the borders of different academic disciplines. His understanding of national identities was also shaped by growing up in a small Welsh village a few miles from the border to England (Williams 1960). I refer to Murray as being on the borders of national identity because these borders are imprecisely drawn and understood. Despite the claims made on him, and the political capital sought by various individuals and groups in relation to his on-court successes, Murray cannot be considered as just Scottish or British. This is not an either/or distinction. He may now reside in a mansion in Surrey but will always be a son of Dunblane. He takes great pleasure from representing Britain in the Davis Cup and Olympic Games but is also resolutely Scottish when Scotland play football. The Davis Cup victory in 2015 was according to the Daily Record (30 November 2015) ‘a triumph for Britain, Scotland and Dunblane’, with the further caveat that ‘it was a triumph for Cockburn Avenue, site of the former family home in the Perthshire town’. In November 2016, Murray finally achieved another long-standing goal when he became the number one tennis player in the ATP world rankings.Then at the very end of 2016, he once again appeared on the front page of most newspapers in Scotland and across Britain when it was announced that he would be made a knight of the realm in the Queen’s New Year honours list and hereby become Sir Andy Murray. At the age of 29, he is the youngest man in living memory to be granted such an honour. We saw the inevitable wider debate about whether sports stars deserve to be honoured in this way, and somewhat more predictably there were further discussions of national identities and Murray’s patriotism. He was on both the front and back pages of the Scottish Daily Mail with one article describing him as a ‘true British hero who is a role model to millions’ (31 December 2016). Some might suggest that Andy Murray has become “more” British in the last four years, but he has always been very keen to represent Britain in the Davis Cup and at the Olympic Games. On these contested borders Sir Andrew Barron Murray does now perhaps sit squarely in the Scottish tradition of nationalist unionism, a man proud to be British but at the same time still passionately Scottish.

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Notes 1 Thanks to Thomas Wyn Harris for his assistance with this chapter. 2 Mahony was the son of a wealthy landowner. The family had a home in Edinburgh, but spent most of their time at their Irish residence, Dromore Castle in County Kerry. 3 Tennis featured in the modern summer Olympic Games from their inception in 1896 until 1924. It was reinstated as a full medal sport at the Seoul Games in 1988.

References Bairner, A. (2001) Sport, Nationalism and Globalization. Albany, NY: SUNY Press. Dickson, B. (2015) Newspaper Discourse on Andy Murray’s Performance at Wimbledon. Unpublished MSc thesis, University of Stirling. Edensor, T. (2002) National Identity, Popular Culture and Everyday Life. Oxford: Berg. Harris, J. (2011) Davis Cup. In Encyclopedia of Sport Management and Marketing (pp.363–4), New York: Sage. Harris, J. (2014) Dancing in the Streets of Dunblane: Contested Identities in Elite Scottish Sport, Catalan Journal of Communication & Cultural Studies, 6(2), 273–9. Harris, J. & Skillen, F. (2016) Sport, Gender and National Identities. In Hutchinson, D., Blain, N. & Hassan, G. (eds.), Scotland’s Referendum and the Media (pp.83–93), Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Lake, R.J. (2017a) Tim Henman, British Tennis and the Social Construction of English Identity in the 1990s and 2000s, Sport in Society, 20(11), 1745–64. Lake, R.J. (2017b) ‘Tennis in an English garden’: Wimbledon, Englishness and British Sporting Culture. In Gibbons, T. and Malcolm, D. (eds.), Sport and English National Identity in a “Disunited Kingdom” (pp.49–64), London: Routledge. Murray, A. with Mott, S. (2008) Hitting Back:The Autobiography. London: Century. Murray, A. (2013) Seventy-Seven: My Road to Wimbledon Glory. London: Headline. O’Donnell, H. (2012) Scotland the We(e)?: A Small Country in a Large World at the Salt Lake Winter Olympics. In Sandvoss, C., Real, M. & Bernstein, A. (eds.), Bodies of Discourse: Sports Stars, Media, and the Global Public (pp.37–54), New York: Peter Lang. Wagg, S. (2017) Sacred Turf: The Wimbledon Tennis Championships and the Changing Politics of Englishness, Sport in Society, 20(3), 398–412. Williams, R. (1960) Border Country. London: Chatto & Windus. Williams, R. (1969, 10 July) Watching From Elsewhere. The Listener.

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38 Racial politics in the history of American tennis Sundiata Djata

Recently, an extensive article focused on the racist and sexist comments heaped upon Serena Williams each time she wins (Desmond-Harris 2016, 7 September). Typically, these comments have come from people posting racist comments at will, hiding behind the anonymity of social media, which suggests that we are not living in a post-racial society. Even with political correctness, some commentators, analysts and players have provoked a public discussion of racism by making comments derived from years of racist ideology – racism that has become part of the social fabric of the United States. Jack Olsen, journalist and author, argues, ‘Every morning the world of sports wakes up and congratulates itself on its contributions to race relations. The litany has been repeated so often that it is believed almost universally’ (Olsen 1968, p.6). It has also been argued, The issue of race and sport in the United States is somewhat baffling in that many persons would rather it not be addressed at all even though sport has been intricately intertwined with racial issues in the United States throughout the Twentieth Century. (“Black Athletes: Fact or Fiction” 1989) Trying to find logic to racism, particularly in sports, has raised a number of pertinent questions. For example, Arthur Ashe asked: Why did so many blacks excel so early on with so little training, poor facilities and mediocre coaching? Why did the civil rights organizations of the time complain so little about the discrimination against black athletes? And why were white athletes so afraid of competing on an equal basis with blacks? (Ashe 1993/1988, p.xiii) He argues that he had to find his own answers because for ‘120 years, white America has gone to extraordinary lengths to discredit and discourage black participation in sports because black athletes have been so accomplished’ (Ashe 1993/1988, p.xiii). It is impossible to determine at what point whites actually began to “fear” competing against blacks. However, it is clear that whites created a white institution in the world of tennis, and worked to keep it that way. 392

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For socialites, the issue might not have been competition, but rather a cultural tradition, which mirrored society. For competitors, however, there was a question of refusing to compete against blacks, which extended beyond social ramifications of racial segregation. Generally, racial practice has not been accompanied by a reasonable explanation of racist policy. Constitutions of sports organizations denied the entry of nonwhites, but without explanation, as if the reasoning should be understood. In short, it was an accepted fact that blacks and whites should be separate in all social institutions and public spheres. As to the actual defense of such racial policies, it was left to the educated elite to produce essays to support racial separation. As tennis began to grow among whites and blacks, segregation began to find support in tracts, rationalizing Jim Crow (Fredrickson 1987/1971, p.262).

Early black participation and the emergence of the American Tennis Association The ideology of segregation existed at the founding of the nation, sanctioned by white liberals (Guyatt 2016). Due to racism, most white liberals believed in the unity of all human beings, but believed that nonwhites needed to be in separate states (Guyatt 2016). By the late 1880s, there was a preliminary outpouring of “anti-Negro” writing. In 1896, the Supreme Court in Plessy vs. Ferguson made racial segregation constitutional law. In addition, literature explained and defended racist ideas in articles, beginning in the 1890s and continuing in the following decades. According to one scholar, ‘During the first (and most important) of these periods, the basic ideas of segregationists crystallized, received systematic and authoritative exposition, and enjoyed widespread respectability in academic and intellectual circles’ (Newby 1970/1968, p.3–4).The next generation defended racist ideologies and practices with the biological sciences, social sciences and religion. While tennis was introduced in the United States in the 1874, the available evidence suggests that blacks had begun playing by the following decade. In 1887, for example, the Christian Recorder, a newspaper with a black readership in Philadelphia, ran ads from Wanamaker’s store for tennis “goods” (25 April 1887). Some prefer to use “class” as opposed to “race” as a determining factor in tennis. However, class and race have always been intertwined in US society, giving white skin a premium, which money cannot buy. Private clubs were elitist, but existed for white elites only. As a result, even wealthy black families had to find other alternatives to participate in organized and competitive tennis. In 1957, for example, Ralph Bunche, chief of the United Nation’s Division of Trusteeships, and his son had been rejected by the West Side Tennis Club in Forest Hills although, following a national outcry, the club later “grudgingly” accepted them (Henry 1996). Although tennis was an elitist sport, I argue that there has been an attitude that it is a sport for whites since some believe that only whites should be “elites”, which created a special hatred from poor whites for affluent blacks. In other words, money did not “whiten” in the US. Although the world of sports likes to give itself a pat on the back for being a progressive institution in terms of race (see, for example: Olsen 1968, 1 July, p.15), sports, including tennis, have had to overcome de facto racist sentiments and actions from their earliest introduction in the US. The first record of racial discrimination came with the formation of the United States National Lawn Tennis Association (USNLTA) in 1881, which barred blacks from membership and play in their sanctioned tournaments.1 As a result of these racist practices in organized tennis, black tennis history had a parallel development outside of the parameters of “mainstream” development, culminating with the founding of the American Tennis Association (ATA) by representatives of black tennis clubs in Washington, DC, in 1916. 393

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The USNLTA eventually argued that the problem of racism existed only with lower tournaments. In order to qualify for the US National Championships, one had to earn points in local tournaments. However, most of those tournaments were held at exclusive private clubs, which did not allow nonwhite membership or participation in their tournaments, making it impossible for nonwhite players to quality. The major eastern tournaments were by invitation only. As a result, even when the USLTA pardoned itself from being a major proponent of racial segregation, it was difficult for black American Althea Gibson in 1950 to “prove” herself when she was unable to enter the necessary tournaments to do so. This was the case in the New Jersey State Championship at the Maplewood Country Club, where she was told that she lacked sufficient experience, from playing other tournaments, to qualify; thus, she was officially marked down as “not enough information”(Gibson 1958, p.66–7). This also suggested that segregation existed beyond the confines of the South (Gibson was from South Carolina). The ATA and the USLTA had “cordial” relationships only as long as there were no attempts to “integrate” tournaments. For instance, in 1921, Dwight F. Davis, donor of the Davis Cup and the US Secretary of War in the administration of Calvin Coolidge, umpired the semifinal match between Tally Holmes (an ATA founder from Washington) and Sylvester Smith at the ATA nationals. In 1929, the ATA and the USLTA had its first confrontation over the entries of Reginald Weir and Gerald Norman, Jr. in the USLTA’s Junior Indoor event at New York City’s seventh Regiment Armory. Weir and Norman had paid their one-dollar entry-fee and showed up to play. When informed that his son could not participate, Norman’s father, Gerald Sr., complained to the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), whose assistant secretary, Robert Bagnoll, protested but received the following reply: The policy of the USLTA has been to decline the entry of colored players in our championships. … In pursuing this policy we make no reflection upon the colored race but we believe that as a practical matter, the present method of separate associations … should be continued. (Montgomery Advertiser 28 December 1929) Neither Weir nor Norman was permitted to play. Often, racism is subtle or difficult to prove especially when one is on the outside looking in or not looking at all.The British player Angela Buxton, who played doubles with Althea Gibson in the mid-1950s – they won the 1956 French Championships and Wimbledon as a doubles pair – felt as though she had similar experiences due to her ethnicity – she had Russian Jewish ancestry. She argues that she ‘invariably’ found herself ‘on the receiving end of unexplained situations’.This experience caused her to understand Gibson’s position, and to befriend her because she witnessed Gibson’s “isolation” in tennis circles (New York Times 10 September 1997; Davis 1997, 20 November, p.19; Shoenfield 2001, p.147–50). Interestingly, Gibson plays down the role of race in her autobiography, published in 1958, which was common in autobiographies by blacks around this time. However, Gibson’s sister-inlaw, Rosemary Darben, maintains, ‘Althea was the one who got the N-word [nigger] hollered at her during matches. She went through hell’. Bertram Baker recalled when Gibson played against Louise Brough at the US Nationals in the 1950s, some white fans shouted,“Beat the nigger, beat the nigger” (Kamlet 1999, September, p.37). Decades later, Venus and Serena Williams also played down race in interviews early in their careers, as did Chanda Rubin’s2 mother, who argued that they wanted to be like everyone else. Meanwhile, the father of the Williams’ sisters, Richard Williams, readily addressed racism as did the father of MaliVai Washington.3 394

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I argue that one of the main problems with “integration” is that social institutions on the whole do not integrate. Instead they require that blacks assimilate within the existing structure and culture. There is little to no effort to change the institutional culture so that people of various backgrounds can fit comfortably within the structure. Therefore, the process of assimilation is understood as the sole responsibility of the individual, and when one has difficulty with assimilation, then that person is seen to be at fault. “Integration” means the coming together of multiple cultures, rather than expecting one culture to be completely forgotten and another totally accepted. Even when the race “barrier” was broken, there were still limitations. For example, the USLTA used a “quota system” to limit the numbers of blacks participating in the tournaments. In addition, the ATA had to recommend a black player in order to play at Forest Hills. Some ATA members strongly objected to this procedure (Fitzgerald 1960, p.28). The ATA barred no one based on race from competing in its tournaments (Djata 2016, p.166–7). Although the organization was created in part to provide competitive play among black tennis players, white players were welcome to participate in ATA events. The hypothetical question was whether in a society where racial thinking reigned supreme, white players might participate in a “black” tennis event. The ATA’s response to this query came through an official statement in 1940, which stated: ‘The constitution of the A.T.A. prohibits no player because of color. Our only prohibition of any player is based on proven facts that he is a player of “ill repute”’. The statement was issued because Edward Graysing, white, had applied to play in an Englewood (NJ) Tennis Club tournament, which was an ATA-affiliated tournament. An official at the Englewood Club insisted that he had confirmation from the ATA, granting permission for Graysing to participate, to which the ATA responded, ‘We have no objection to any white player who is in good standing with a member club, entering any tournament. We believe our players can hold their own against such competition. If the white element wins, so what’. However, the ATA-affiliated New Jersey Tennis Association ignored the national directive, and banned all white players in its tournaments, in an amendment to their constitution. Thus, they opted to do what the USLTA had done, but by enacting a discriminatory policy against whites instead of blacks. New Jersey was the only state to raise this issue, although it must be said that some black club members disagreed with the constitutional amendment and welcomed white players. At the same time, some blacks felt that whites should be allowed to play in black tournaments only if blacks were allowed to play in white tournaments (Chicago Tribune 27 July 1940. See Djata 2016, p.173–4).

Structural Discrimination against blacks in tennis: facilities, travelling and racialized myths Racial segregation also translated into fewer or no facilities for nonwhites. Since city parks were often segregated, blacks were unable to enjoy many of the public facilities available in white parks. In fact, many towns had no parks for black citizens even though blacks paid taxes that supported public institutions. Tax was one phenomenon, which was not segregated although white public institutions were known to have received the lion’s share of tax dollars. Comparatively speaking, fewer black schools than white schools had tennis facilities, though some blacks gained access to tennis facilities after the desegregation process turned all-white schools into predominantly black schools through the phenomenon of “white flight”. Travelling was another area that proved difficult for black players. In 1969, white British players Phyllis Konstam and H.W. “Bunny” Austin travelled in the American “South” with black American actor-singer Muriel Smith. They stayed in the home of a white southern family, but 395

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were unable to ‘eat together in the restaurant, nor go to the cinema, nor even ride in a taxi together’; the multiracial troupe stayed in a black-owned hotel, where generally only blacks stayed, and a cross was burned outside their front door (Austin & Konstam 1969, p.216). Black tennis players, like the Negro League players in baseball, had problems finding lodging and eating establishments when travelling. As a result, the locations for black tennis tournaments had to be strategically selected. Another glaring example of racism in tennis was the notion of “natural talent” that has often been associated with black athletes. This forms part of the “race logic” that suggests that if blacks are physically superior to whites, then implicitly, blacks are intellectually inferior to whites.Various physical and physiological studies in the past have asserted that blacks are better equipped for activities requiring speed and power, but these contentious theories have been thoroughly and routinely debunked as myths (see: Edwards 1971, 2 March, p.58–70; Hoberman 1997). Jimmy “the Greek” Synder, then a CBS sportscaster, was fired in 1988 because he asserted that blacks were better athletes because they were bred to be during slavery, as slave masters coupled enslaved men and women based on physical attributes. He added that blacks put in time to excel, while white athletes tended to be lazy (Ballad 1988, 25 January, p.7). Few have lost jobs or received other reprimands for making racially offensive comments, and such views continue to exist among private citizens, who continue to hold to such myths and express them on social media. Tennis commentators and analysts have used the phenomenon of “superior athleticism” to explain the success of black players, including Gibson, the Australian Aboriginal Evonne Goolagong Cawley,Yannick Noah (of Cameroonian and French extraction), the American James Blake (who has a black father and a white mother) and the Williams sisters. The “natural talent” or “athletic gene theory” has been so pervasive in sports. Contrary to Snyder’s argument, research has revealed that it is white athletes that have been perceived as working hard to achieve sport success, where blacks have been often viewed as successful due to “natural talent” (Boyd 1997, p.7; Edwards 1971, November, p.16–28; Edwards 1993, November, p.43–52). As examples, Gibson was defined as a ‘natural’, who ‘developed a ball sense which she never wanted to waste’ (Heldman 1969, April, p.68). In a World Tennis brief (August 1971, p.34), a reporter wrote of Goolagong Cawley’s ‘rare natural talent and instinctive flair for match play’, and a columnist made a distinction between Chris Evert and Goolagong Cawley, stating, ‘Evonne’s talent had been discovered accidentally, and luckily in Australia. Chris had been brought up to be a champion’ (Gray 1976, September, p.27). One journalist wrote of Noah, ‘Noah’s size dwarfs the racquet in his hand, and pure athleticism so dominates his game that the racquet seems no more conspicuous than a hammer or saw in the hand of a carpenter’ (Bodo 1984, June, p.35). Another wrote that he ‘prowled around the court, muscles coiled up, just waiting for the opportunity to spring’ (Dobbs 1983, 6 June). Meanwhile, Mats Wilander, Noah’s white opponent in the 1983 French Open, was described as having an “implacable nature”. (Gross 1983, 4 June). For white players like Martina Navratilova and Ivan Lendl, on the other hand, sport announcers credited hard work for their physical sculpturing, and when described as athletic, powerful or strong, it is not then tied to “racial genetics”. The demographics in sports provide another component of explanation. Blacks have made gains in professional football and basketball, even dominating the numbers in professional basketball and heavyweight boxing, while the numbers in professional sports like tennis have remained low. This is particularly true with black males. In professional tennis, black women from the US have fared better, although black women constitute a lower percentage in collegiate sports than black males. In 1950, the National Basketball Association (NBA) signed the first black player, but in 1998 blacks eventually comprised 77% of professional basketball players. Similarly, by 1998, 65% of the National Football League (NFL) players were black, despite “racial stacking”– racism 396

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implicit in the allocation of positions (black athletes were considered better at speed positions). Many of the studies on race and sports do not even mention tennis, but focus analyses and comparisons on sports like basketball, football, track, swimming, baseball and boxing (see: Carrington 2010; Hylton 2008; Jarvie 2000; Liston & Dolan 2015; Ross 2004; Smith 2009). The numbers of black players, though, in professional baseball are much lower, and in tennis, even lower. In fact, the numbers have been so low in tennis that only a few black players have advanced to the upper echelon of tennis, reinforcing the belief that blacks do not even play the sport.The list of black players breaking into the elite ranks in the post-war era includes: Gibson, Ashe, Goolagong Cawley, Noah, the Americans Zina Garrison and Lori McNeil, Rubin, Blake, the Williams sisters, Sloane Stephens, Madison Keys and Frenchmen Gael Monfils and Jo Wilifred Tsonga. Several others have been ranked within the top 30.

Racism in contemporary tennis The Civil Rights era, while making gains in legal and public desegregation, led to a certain expectation, according to Ellison and Martin (1999, p.223), that ‘entrenched patterns of prejudice and discrimination would gradually disappear from the social landscape’. Such ‘giddy optimism seems painfully naïve’, however, as ‘experimental studies indicate that discrimination against African Americans and other racial and ethnic groups persist at alarming levels in housing, law enforcement, retail sales, and many other contexts’. Blatant racial discrimination within tournaments has disappeared from the professional tennis landscape, but it continues in more subtle ways like not being selected for a junior traveling team, overlooking black professionals for exhibitions at private clubs, the media focusing mainly on white players, fans calling black players racist names at tournaments where most of the people are unable to hear the remarks, or when a security guard allows white players to pass unidentified into a facility but requires identification from a black player.Then, with more black umpires finally being able to sit in the chair, there has been an accusation that the black umpire favored a black player, but no argument that white umpires have favored white players just because the players were white. Diane Morrison, a tour player in the 1980s, maintains, There were racial undertones everywhere I played. Nobody called me names on the court, but nobody rooted for me either. When you’d go to tennis clubs, you’d get strange looks. And it was always trickier finding housing for the black players. I tried to tune out the issues and just focus on the tennis. (cited in: Harris & Kyle-DeBose 2007, p.193) Another potential reason for racism in tennis is the ranking. According to Ronald Agenor of Haiti, being ranked in the top 20 saved him from racial experiences, but once that high ranking was lost, he began to experience racism (Djata 2006, p.182). Noah rejected the notion that he was judged by the color of his skin, but a tennis fan once called him a “dirty nigger”, until the fan realized Noah’s identity. Noah’s fame had shielded him from the most blatant racial insult. An absence of black administrators in the history of tennis organizations has proved an important factor. In 1991, there were no blacks on the 24-member US Open Committee. In addition, there were no blacks on the USTA Board of Directors (“U. S. Open ‘9l” 1991, p.18– 9). There were, however, nonwhites on the USTA Executive Committee; Filipino-American Virginia M. Glass of San Diego and Washington’s Dwight A. Mosley were presidential appointees. In 1997, the USTA Board of Directors included no blacks although Mosley had served on the board from 1993 to 1996. He was elected secretary-treasurer in 1995 when the board 397

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was realigned. That year the USTA had 18 blacks on a staff of 156; the ATP tour had 86 US employees and only one black, Erika Green. The WTA tour had approximately 25 full-time US employees, but refused to reveal if any were black (Pentz 1997, 20 November, 16). In 1998, a tennis magazine editor argued, Minority representation at the game’s highest leadership levels is pitiful. No blacks sit on the U.S. Tennis Association’s 14 member Board; not one black has a place on the International Tennis Hall of Fame’s 22 member Executive Committee; no blacks are among the hierarchy of the ATP’s top 15 Board and Executive staff members; none are on the USPTA [United States Professional Tennis Association] Board; and none on the USPTR [United States Professional Tennis Registry] Board. (Scott 1998, 7 May, p.8) Moreover, no black entrepreneur has risen to be a tournament director of the 90 men’s ATP tour events or of the 53 WTA tour events. Nonwhites, who have been recommended for positions of leadership in the USTA, usually have been turned down. According to former head of the Minority Participation Committee Pat Koger, this is because the USTA felt that they need training, they did not know the USTA well enough to be effective, they needed to be educated as to how the USTA does things, they probably would not fit in, not our kind of folks, not from the USTA family, etc. Then the USTA turns around and says it cannot find suitable, qualified and credentialed people of color to fill these positions. (Koger 1998, 4 June, p.3) Very few professional players of any race have hired black coaches, agents, accountants, lawyers and even hitting partners, which demonstrates that discrimination could exist at an institutional level, and within the occupations that surround professional tennis. Racist views continued in private clubs. For instance, in 1991, Lawrence Otis Graham, a corporate lawyer and graduate of Princeton University and Harvard Law School, obtained a job as a “busboy” at the Greenwich Country Club, which had no black members at the time. Although the term “busboy” was considered demeaning, club members still used it. After one member heard him speak, she commented, ‘That busboy has a diction like an educated white person’. He also found that the building where black workers had lived was still being called “Monkey House” although blacks had been virtually replaced by Latinos (Graham 1995, p.8, 10–2, 17).

The role of the media in representing blacks in tennis Some in the media, too, have added to the racial discord, while others have exposed and criticized racism. Mainstream, meaning white, media, has virtually ignored coverage of segregated black sports institutions. Over the years, few major media outlets covered the ATA and its programs and events. Similarly, the programs at black colleges and universities have been ignored, even by local presses. Meanwhile, negative coverage of black athletes on all levels has made headlines. At other times, attempts, perhaps, at being humorous or colorful, have backfired. In 2000, during coverage of the Davis Cup tie between the United States and Zimbabwe, Bud Collins wrote, ‘[T]he final day of the best-of-five series commenced with the American surrounded by jungle drumbeaters, gyrating dancers’. When Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe described the tie as ‘the dwarfs against the giants’, Collins stated, ‘The dwarfs looked like rain 398

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forest pygmies with poison darts’ (Collins 1982, June, p.10, 11). Another example involved an attempt by the NBC tennis commentator, Ted Robinson, during the 2001 French Open (31 May), to praise Richard Williams, the father of the Williams sisters, because he was an “African American” man who had helped raise his children, commenting on the phenomenon of “absent black fathers” being a problem. Certainly, few white fathers have been judged on these terms. Advertising has also failed in achieving diversity. Sometimes, success can bring “crossover” appeal, particularly to advertisers, who use black athletes as if they are “colorless” (Djata 1987, p.11–2).While Arthur Ashe and the Williams sisters have done well in securing endorsements to support their professional careers, most black professionals have had difficulty in obtaining deals. In some instances, higher-ranked black players failed to land endorsements when lower-ranked white players had more lucrative opportunities. Generally, when white professionals have failed to land major endorsements, it has been due to an issue like sexuality as with the case of gay Czech/American tennis icon Martina Navratilova, who landed far fewer endorsements during her career despite being the top ranked player in the world, compared to the “girl next door” Chris Evert, who managed significantly more endorsement contracts (Che, 2000, 30 April, p.48). Evert’s image conformed to Madison Avenue in terms of race and sexuality. Television spots have eluded black players more than print ads. In addition, rarely have black models been used in tennis fashion layouts in magazines or print ads. This suggests that blacks do not possess the Madison Avenue “image” that advertisers seek to appeal to the general white public (Djata 1987, p.10–1). Since many companies have avoided segmented advertising, they have continued to use all or mostly white models in their marketing strategies. Part of this is due to the myth that blacks do not play tennis, while another aspect concerns the intersectionality of structures of class, gender and race that disproportionately disadvantages black female players. The term “stereotype” often refers to the ‘images (typically exaggerated or false, and usually unflattering) that people may hold regarding certain racial and ethnic groups’ (Ellison & Martin 1999, p.223). It has been argued that tennis ‘has been type-casted as a game played by whiteskinned people with dark tans, oblivious to the “real world” as they traipse around with cotton sweaters hanging over their shoulders’ (Lurie 1999, 9 May). Some blacks, too, have developed the attitude that tennis has been a “white” sport (Djata 2008, p.188–90). Some in black communities have also accepted certain racial perimeters. Tennis, golf and other sports have been deemed to be “white” sports. Although the so-called “black” sports were introduced to black communities just as the “white sports” were, certain sports, like basketball and football, were readily adopted, and quickly became sports for blacks. Meanwhile, other sports became sports that blacks just did not play, perhaps because of other factors, including social class. Despite the fact that more blacks have played tennis than many realized, young black players found variously derogatory views of this in their own communities. Some black males who played tennis endured insults, like being called “sissies”, as a means to undermine their masculinity. Girls could also face ridicule because tennis was viewed as too genteel (Bodo 1993, October, p.51; Lorge c.1981; Mathabane 1989, p.250; Talbert 1957; Wamuru 1989, April). The peer pressure on black youths to shun “white” sports has been strong in some black communities, and black families. A cultural sense of blackness has developed, which divides activities into racial categories. Playing tennis has been often viewed as “acting white”, where it has been assumed that one must adapt “white cultural patterns” to play the game (Whitsitt 1994). The irony of this phenomenon has been explained. It might seem odd to call football WASP (White Anglo-Saxon Protestant) when the majority of its players today are black, but blacks and non-WASPS are nonetheless playing a game which is, if not ‘white’, nevertheless a product of the attitudes and beliefs of an Anglo-Saxon, 399

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Protestant culture which was largely white. It could be said, in an ironic twist, that the best black or non-WASP players embody these WASP values more successfully than whites. (Whitsitt 1994, p.60) The racism that has existed in tennis has progressed from aggressive segregation, to institutionalized discrimination and to subtle and hidden speech patterns and practices. Reporter Bob Davis argues: ‘There is abundance of proof that black Americans were denied an equal opportunity to play tennis’. He maintains that the anger of those who have been deprived must be recognized and understood. It should not be beyond the grasp of any present USTA member to recognize that his/her governing body willingly played a role in this discrimination. The USTA was designated by Congress to be the governing body of tennis for all Americans, and in many respects, it failed to represent all of us equally. These are facts, not accusations charged with anger; just historical snapshots. (Davis 1997, 20 November, p.19) Blatantly racist incidents are now largely absent from the professional tour, but racist ideologies continue to permeate among some tennis fans and observers, or, on occasion, individuals who work within tennis organizations. This is despite these institutions having polices of inclusion. In the new millennium, black athletes still face racist commentaries because some still see tennis as a “white domain”.

Notes 1 The United States National Lawn Tennis Association changed its name, removing “national” in 1920, and “lawn” in 1975. 2 Rubin (b.1976) was a black American player from Lafayette, Louisiana. Her career slightly pre-dated the Williams sisters. 3 Washington was a male black American tennis player from New York, born in 1969.

References Ashe, A. (1993/1988) A Hard Road to Glory: A History of the African-American Athlete 1919–1945, New York: Amistad, vol. 2/Warner. Austin, H.W. & Konstam, P. (1969) A Mixed Double. London: Chatto and Windu. Ballad, S. (1988, 25 January) An Odds Maker’s Odd Views. Sports Illustrated. Bodo, P. (1984, June) Yannick Noah: A Champion in Turmoil. Tennis. Bodo, P. (1993, October) Mal’s Content. Tennis. Boyd, T. (1997) Am I Black Enough for You? Popular Culture from the ‘Hood and Beyond. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Carrington, B. (2010) Race, Sport and Politics:The Sporting Black Diaspora. London: Sage. Che, C. (2000, 30 April) Martina Navratilova. The Advocate. Collins, B. (1982, June) Zimbabwe Zeal. Tennis Week. Davis, B. (1997, 20 November) A Search for Sanity? Tennis Week. Desmond-Harris, J. (2016, 7 September) Serena Williams Is Constantly the Target of Disgusting Racist and Sexist Attacks. voxmedia.com. Djata, S. (1987) Madison Avenue Blindly Ignores the Black Consumer, Business and Society Review, 60, 9–13. Djata, S. (2006) Blacks at the Net: Black Achievement in the History of Tennis, v. 1. Syracuse, New York: Syracuse University Press.

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Djata, S. (2008) Blacks at the Net: Black Achievement in the History of Tennis, v. 2. Syracuse, New York: Syracuse University Press. Djata, S. (2016) Game, Set, and Separatism:The American Tennis Association, a Tennis Vanguard. In Wiggins, D.K. & Swanson, R.A. (eds.), Separate Games: African American Sport behind the Walls of Segregation. Fayetteville: University of Arkansas Press. Dobbs, M. (1983, 6 June) French Cheer as Noah Outlasts Wilander. Washington Post. Edwards, H. (1971, 2 March/1971, 8 November) The Myth of the Racially Superior Athlete, Intellectual Digest, 2, 58–70. Edwards, H. (1993, November) The Black Athletes: 20th Century Gladiators for White America. Psychology Today. Ellison, C.G. & Martin, W.A. (eds.) (1999) Race and Ethnic Relations in the United States: Readings for the 21st Century. Los Angeles: Roxbury. Entine, J. & Brokaw, T. (Producers) (1989) Black Athletes: Fact or Fiction [Television Broadcast]. New York: National Broadcasting Corporation News. Fitzgerald, E. (ed.) (1960) Round Table Discussion: The Negro in American Sport, Negro History Bulletin, 24, 27–31, 47. Fredrickson, G.M. (1987/1971) The Black Image in the White Mind:The Debate on Afro-American Character and Destiny, 1817–1914. Hanover, NH: Wesleyan University Press. Gibson, A. (1958) I Always Wanted to Be Somebody. New York: Harper and Brothers. Graham, L.O. (1995) Member of the Club: Reflections on Life in a Racially Polarized World. New York: HarperCollins. Gray, D. (1976, September) Wimbledon: Only the Final Was a Surprise. World Tennis. Gross, J. (1983, 4 June) Wilander Plays Noah in Final. New York Times. Guyatt, N. (2016) Bind Us Apart: How Enlightened Americans Invented Racial Segregation. New York: Basic Books. Harris, C. & Kyle-DeBose, L. (2007) Charging the Net: A History of Blacks in Tennis from Althea Gibson and Arthur Ashe to the Williams Sisters. Chicago: Ivan R. Dee. Heldman, J.M. (1969, April) Distinguished Women in Tennis: Althea Gibson Darben. World Tennis. Henry, C.P. (ed.) (1996) Ralph J. Bunche: Selected Speeches and Writings. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Hoberman, J. (1997) Darwin’s Athletes: How Sport Has Damaged Black America and Preserved the Myth of Race. New York: Mariner Books/Houghton Mifflin. Hylton, K. (2008) ‘Race’ and Sport: Critical Race Theory. London: Routledge. Jarvie, G. (ed.) (2003) Sport, Racism and Ethnicity. London: Routledge. Kamlet, K. (1999, September) Going It Alone. Tennis. Koger, P. (1998, 4 June) Letter to Tennis Week. Tennis Week. Liston, K. & Dolan, P. (eds.) (2015) Sport, Race & Ethnicity:The Scope of Belonging? London: Routledge. Lorge, B. (c. 1981) “A Late Charge” Leslie Allen Has Yet to Reach Peak. Washington Post News Service. Lurie, M. (1999, 9 May) Racial Net Gains on Court Come with a Price. Sportsline:Tennis, New York, CBS. Mathabane, M. (1989) Kaffir Boy: An Autobiography. New York: Signet. Newby, I.A. (ed.) (1970/1968) The Development of Segregationist Thought. Homewood, Il: The Dorsey Press. Olsen, J. (1968) The Black Athlete: A Shameful Story. New York: Time-Life. Olsen, J. (1968, 1 July) The Cruel Deception. Sports Illustrated. Pentz, L. (1997, 20 November) Racial Disharmony, pt. III. Tennis Week. Ross, C.K. (ed.) (2004) Race and Sport: The Struggle for Equality on and off the Field. Jackson, MS: University of Mississippi Press. Scott, E.L. (1998, 7 May) Vantage Point Tennis Week. Shoenfield, B. (2001) The Match: Althea Gibson and Angela Buxton. New York: Amistad. Smith, E. (2009) Race, Sport and the American Dream. Durham, NC: Carolina Academic Press. Talbert, W.F. (1957) Preface. In Cummings, P. American Tennis: The Story of a Game and Its People. Boston: Little, Brown. “U. S. Open ‘91,” (1991) Tournament Program. White Plains, NY: USTA. Wamuru, J. (1989, April) The Plights of Blacks Playing Tennis. unpublished article. Whitsitt, S. (1994) Soccer: The Game America Refuses to Play, Raritan: A Quarterly Review, 14, 58–69.

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39 Arthur Ashe Politics, racism and tennis Eric Allen Hall

At the Wimbledon Championships in 1964, excitement on the court gave way to political controversy outside the lines. Soviet Alex Metreveli announced he would forfeit his match with Cliff Drysdale in protest of South African apartheid. Then, Hungary’s István Gulyás, citing apartheid as well, refused to take on Abe Segal, a white South African. Reporters scrambled to get reactions from the players, and a young Arthur Ashe did not mince words. ‘This no doubt is some sort of political strategy on the part of the Russians’, he said. ‘I don’t think you want political protests of this kind in sports – especially here at Wimbledon’. Ashe declared, ‘I am a Negro and apartheid objectively concerns me. But I would play Segal any time’ (Los Angeles Times 27 June 1964, p.A5). Back in the US, veteran sportswriter Sam Lacy, a columnist for the Baltimore Afro-American, was flabbergasted. He wrote, ‘That [Ashe] presumes to [be an] expert on international “politics” … clearly demonstrates that he is either educationally puerile or politically naïve’ (Lacy 1964, 30 June). Lacy challenged Ashe to study the history of apartheid and consider the nightmare that blacks and coloreds lived before speaking to the press.1 By 1973, Lacy’s opinion had changed. Late in the fall, Ashe traveled to Johannesburg to compete in the South African Open. While in the country he visited Soweto, an impoverished ghetto made up of blacks and coloreds,2 and met with local activists. He also stopped at Stellenbosch University and engaged in a remarkable exchange with anthropology professor Christopf Hanekom, an Afrikaner who fiercely defended apartheid. Ashe controlled the debate from the onset, picking apart Hanekom’s arguments using scholarly evidence and irrefutable logic. He asked Hanekom, ‘All the sophisticated evolutionary arguments aside, all the intellectual and political position papers forgotten – in your heart, do you think [apartheid is] right’ (Ashe & Deford 1975, p.139–42)? Interrupting the professor’s jargon-filled response, Ashe pointed to Conrad Johnson, a colored tennis official, and demanded to know, ‘Why can you vote and this man can’t? Why are you free and this man isn’t?’ After pausing for a moment Hanekom replied, ‘I cannot defend that’ (Ashe & Deford 1975, p.139–42). Sports Illustrated’s Frank Deford later wrote, ‘I’ve never yet seen another athlete throw a touchdown pass or hit a home run or score a goal that was as impressive as what Arthur Ashe did that afternoon’ (Deford 2012, p.302). The Ashe at Stellenbosch was a far cry from the man who had lamented the intrusion of politics into sports nine years earlier. This new version of Ashe confronted his opponents with hard facts and risked his reputation in tennis to fight for civil and human rights. For Ashe and everyone else, 402

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a lot changed in the late 1960s and early 1970s. In the US, Black Power militancy had overtaken the Civil Rights Movement, pushing black athletes like him into action. ‘There were times’, Ashe remembered, when I felt a burning sense of shame that I was not with other blacks – and whites – standing up to the fire hoses and the police dogs, the truncheons, bullets, and bombs that cut down such martyrs as [James] Chaney, [Michael] Schwerner, and [Andrew] Goodman,Viola Liuzzo, Martin Luther King, Jr., Medgar Evers, and the little girls in that bombed church in Birmingham.3 (Ashe & Rampersad 1993, p.113–4) Ashe also faced racial injustice on a personal level, particularly related to South Africa. And he no longer remained silent, giving a speech on race just one month before Dr. King’s assassination and appearing on CBS’s Face the Nation in 1968. Additionally, the years between 1964 and 1973 coincided with tennis’s rise as a televised spectator sport. ‘The big purses’, Ashe’s teammate Stan Smith noted, ‘made people watch who didn’t know a lob from a volley, and suddenly a lot of people realized tennis was good for spectators, and good to play’ (Gooding 1973, June, p.126). With the cameras rolling, Ashe played the best tennis of his life, winning his first US Open in 1968, the Australian Open in 1970, Wimbledon in 1975 and multiple Davis Cup titles. Using Ashe as a window into the fusion of sports and politics in the 1960s and 1970s, I argue that his political and intellectual transformation is best reflected in three episodes: his 1968 speech at the Church of the Redeemer, his attempts to enter South Africa from 1969 to 1973 and his “Black Power” salute at Wimbledon in 1975.

The speech For most Americans, and especially black athletes, 1968 was unlike any other year. One scholar described 1968 as ‘combin[ing] both revolutionary bombast and spiritual fulfillment, ecstasy and self-destruction, success and failure’ (Chafe 1999, p.343). The assassinations of Dr. King and Robert F. Kennedy, riots outside the Democratic National Convention and news reports from Vietnam shook many to the core. In sports, scores of black athletes protested openly against racism. At the Olympic Games in Mexico City, sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos injected activism into athletics by raising their black-gloved fists while standing on the victory platform of the 200-meter race. ‘We want people to understand’, Carlos explained to a reporter, ‘that we are not animals or rats. We want you to tell Americans and all the world that if they do not care what black people do, they should not go to see black people perform’ (Povich 1968, 17 October, p.C1). A “Revolt of the Black Athlete” was well underway. Ashe felt pressure to join the movement as early as the mid-1960s while still a student at UCLA. Critical classmates, journalists and activists accused him of neglecting black youths in the inner cities and failing to support those on the front lines of the freedom struggle.‘While blood was running freely in the streets of Birmingham, Memphis and Biloxi’, Ashe conceded, ‘I had been playing tennis’ (Ashe & Rampersad 1993, p.113–4). One day after class, Ashe had a chance encounter with doctoral student Ron Karenga, a rising black nationalist who later founded Organization US. Karenga, remembered Ashe, ‘was known as the heaviest, baddest black dude on campus’ (Ashe & Amdur 1981, p.61). The two struck up a conversation following a speech by Karenga near the Student Union. ‘It’s attitudes like yours I’m trying to change’, Karenga said. ‘Look, you’re the cream of the black crop, you’re in college, you’re going to do fairly well in life. If I can’t convince you, then what do you think about the black masses’ (Ashe & Amdur 1981, p.62)? 403

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In fact, Ashe had a lot to lose if he joined the Black Freedom Movement. His position as a second lieutenant in the US Army prohibited him from making political statements or speeches. Defying the Army could result in disciplinary action or even court-martial. Ashe also risked his lucrative product endorsements and status in a predominantly white, upper-class sport that did not welcome demonstrations or activism. Finally, he questioned whether black people would take him seriously. Did he possess the expertise to chime in on the topic of civil rights? The Reverend Jefferson Rogers of the Church of the Redeemer in Washington, D.C. was determined to find out.A disciple of Dr. King and member of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), Rogers frequently brought politics to the pulpit. He introduced a speakers’ series at his church that included politicians, artists, intellectuals, activists and celebrities who spoke about race relations and the path forward for African Americans. In 1968, Rogers invited Ashe to address his congregation, but the tennis star politely declined, citing Army regulations. Undeterred, Rogers pressed him to reconsider and suggested that Ashe’s excuse served as a cop out. The gauntlet thrown down, Ashe could no longer resist the pull of the movement. He would give the speech, consequences be damned. ‘A long time ago’, Ashe confessed to the Washington Post, ‘I was standoffish about everything. I wasn’t aware that what I said carried any weight. It obviously carries weight now; it would be almost sinful not to throw it around in the right direction’ (Asher 1968, 6 March, p.E5). Ashe spent many hours preparing his speech. Defining himself as a black activist but not militant, Ashe would make a point to challenge black leadership. He also planned to lay out the role of black athletes in the freedom struggle. Ashe traveled everywhere with a yellow legal pad, writing down any ideas that came to him. Phrases such as ‘Poverty is one-half laziness’, ‘Everything yields to diligence’, and ‘NO VIOLENCE’ filled in the pages (Amdur 1968, 6 March, p.S5). In an interview with the New York Times before the address, Ashe smiled as he acknowledged, ‘I guess I’m becoming more and more militant’ (Amdur 1968, 6 March, p.S5). But Ashe’s speech was neither militant nor progressive, at least on the spectrum of civil rights activism. Focusing on self-help and personal responsibility, he delivered remarks so tempered that Booker T. Washington, famed advocate of black progress through education and self-help, could have given them eighty years earlier. Ashe described his approach as ‘a do-it-yourself blood-and-guts, Me Power kind of philosophy’ (Asher 1968, 11 March, p.C1). Too often, he said, African Americans blamed everyone but themselves for failure: racist whites, the government, elite blacks and so on. He preached, ‘There is a lot we can do and we don’t do because we’re lazy. This may be brutal, but poverty is half laziness’ (Asher 1968, 11 March, p.C1). Ashe believed that blacks must concentrate their efforts on entrepreneurship, using football’s All-Pro Jim Brown’s Negro Industrial Economic Union (NIEU) as an example of creating ‘producers instead of consumers, achievers instead of orators’ (Asher 1968, 11 March, p.C1). Ashe concluded his speech with a promise to take up the mantle of civil rights in interviews, meetings, public statements and addresses. The Church of the Redeemer speech, however tempered and conservative, marked a significant shift in Ashe’s approach to racism and the Black Freedom Movement. As he transitioned away from being just an athlete, Ashe registered his commitment to actively fight against discrimination. Even a tongue-lashing by his Army superiors did not deter him.‘I accepted rebuke’, he wrote, ‘as my way of paying dues to the [black] cause’ (Ashe & Amdur 1981, p.102). Ashe wasn’t done. One month later, he joined 30 other amateur and professional athletes in defending a boycott of African athletes of the Olympic Games in protest of the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) refusal to expel South Africa. The Black Unity Congress (BUC) also targeted Ashe as a speaker for its 1969 convention along with boxing icon Muhammad Ali and black activist Stokely Carmichael. Perhaps the most significant validation of Ashe’s efforts came 404

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when Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. reached out to him, ‘Your eminence in the world of sports and athletics gives you an added measure of authority and responsibility. It is heartening indeed when you bring these attributes to the movement’ (King to Ashe 1968). America’s most influential civil rights figure agreed that black athletes had a prominent role to play in the movement.

The visa If Ashe’s speech and support for an African boycott of the Olympics represented baby steps on the path to activism, his four-year tussle with South Africa over a travel visa would place him firmly within the leadership of the Black Freedom Movement. In 1969, Ashe privately reached out to South African government and tennis officials, hoping for a visa to compete in one of the sport’s premier events, the South African Open. Despite backing from the South African Lawn Tennis Union (SALTU), Prime Minister B.J. Vorster denied the request, citing Ashe’s encouragement of African liberation movements and his inflammatory statements opposing apartheid. Ashe had once told a reporter, ‘Because of apartheid I would like to drop a hydrogen bomb on Johannesburg’. In a Tennis South Africa questionnaire, he wrote, ‘Abolish apartheid first… Print that if you like – nothing against you personally, just your god-damn, stinking country’ (Scott 1968, June, p.40-4). The government claimed that Ashe’s public comments and views solely informed their decision, but Ashe wasn’t so sure. He believed that race had much more to do with it. To the press, Ashe announced that he would not cower before injustice and demanded that the International Lawn Tennis Federation (ILTF) remove the South African Open from its circuit. At Wimbledon, Ashe took his case to the public and to his fellow players. In the London Times, he urged tennis officials to bar South African athletes from the Davis Cup unless he was granted a visa. Appearing before the International Tennis Players Association (ITPA), Ashe asked the union for a statement of support, which ultimately failed by a vote of 19-17. The ITPA offered ‘sympathy for Ashe’s views’ but remained wary of taking an overt political stand (New York Times 30 June 1969, p.49). Many players expressed their disapproval of the government’s decision in private, yet few were willing to risk their visas and contracts by speaking out publicly. One day after Ashe’s interview with the Times, the South African government responded, ‘dar[ing] Ashe to produce a letter of refusal to back up his claims’ (Washington Post 1 July 1969, p.C1). The government knew that Ashe had no such document because he had not formally filed for a visa. Ashe then upped the ante, declaring, ‘This time I won’t be silent. I’ll go right to the South African embassy in New York. If they want to turn me down, they’ll have to do it right there in front of [the press]’ (Amdur 1969, 30 July, p.32). Over time, an increasing number of journalists, players and tennis fans rallied around Ashe. No outlets were as emphatic as the black press. Attacking the players who stayed silent or voiced criticism of Ashe, Gertrude Wilson of the Amsterdam News wrote, ‘Tennis players are a special breed of men. They have one arm of tremendous muscular strength, legs of steel, but, it seems, rather wobbly backbones’ (Wilson 1969, 19 July, p.17). Five years after his initial condemnation of Ashe, Sam Lacy had also changed his tune. ‘Ashe’s performance’, Lacy contended, ‘was more courageous than the gloved-fist salute by Tommy [sic] Smith and John Carlos in last October’s Olympics. … [It was] not as dramatic, perhaps, but more gutsy’ (Lacy 1969, 8 July, p.16). Even top South African players Ray Moore and Cliff Drysdale and the SALTU head Alf Chalmers openly backed Ashe. Although Drysdale, President of the ITPA, explained that his intent was not ‘to agitate on political matters’, he warned that the government’s ruling would result in a ‘catastrophic outcome’ for South African tennis once the international community retaliated (New York Times 4 December 1969, p.20). 405

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Widening support for Ashe did not translate to a rise in his play. In fact, after establishing himself as a top-ranked competitor in 1968, Ashe’s performance declined dramatically in 1969. He struggled daily with the balance between tennis and activism. Ashe confessed to the Los Angeles Times, I can’t shut out the color issue. I think about it all the time. Is it possible to be a tennis player first and a black man second? It has to be. If I put the priorities the other way round I’ll be a poor tennis player and therefore a less effective black man. (McIlvanney 1969, 7 July, p.B1) Ashe understood that winning led to interviews, invitations and endorsements, all of which broadened his platform. His success as an anti-apartheid activist necessitated that he remain in the international spotlight. On January 28 1970, South Africa formally denied Ashe’s visa application, identifying, yet again, his anti-apartheid statements and promotion of African liberation as grounds for rejection. The news made front-page headlines across the globe (New York Times 29 January 1970, p.1). Reaction clustered into three camps: those who unconditionally supported Ashe and demanded immediate retaliation, those who defended South Africa’s right to refuse Ashe and those who sought middle ground. Democratic Congressman Charles Diggs, of the first camp, insisted that individual South African athletes such as golfer Gary Player receive the same treatment as Ashe. If Player refused to publicly condemn his countrymen, Diggs contended, then the US had no choice but to lock him out of competition. But Ashe disagreed. His beef was with the government, not Player or Cliff Drysdale. Testifying before a House Foreign Affairs subcommittee with Diggs looking on, Ashe explained that his ‘gut reaction’ was to call for Player’s expulsion from US events, though his ‘moral conscience’ eventually convinced him otherwise. ‘I wouldn’t want them to suffer the same indignities from my government that I have from theirs’, he said (Nossiter 1970, 5 February, p.A2).The proper response, Ashe believed, would be for the ILTF to eject South Africa from the Davis Cup competition. Between 1970 and 1973, international activists, sports bodies and a number of foreign governments worked to isolate South Africa from the rest of the world. In March of 1970, the ILTF expelled South Africa from the Davis Cup, pointing to the threat of protests that ‘would endanger the carrying out of the competition’ (Tupper 1970, 24 March, p.1). Outside of tennis, Gary Player faced incessant harassment on the golf links. He was physically assaulted by three men, chased by another who had scaled a fence, and subjected to media questioning. Player’s plea, ‘I’m not a racist, I love everybody’, failed to satisfy his critics, Ashe included. ‘Anyone who says sport and politics do not mix is silly and vicious’, Ashe shot back. ‘They can no longer be kept apart’ (Wilson 1969, 19 August, p.9). South Africa even tried to cause a distraction by granting a visa to Evonne Goolagong, an Australian aborigine who appeared politically disinterested, while denying Ashe’s application yet again. The public relations move proved largely unsuccessful. By mid-1971, the government and Ashe had adopted new tactics. In a speech to Parliament on 23 April 1971,Vorster unveiled a new sports policy aimed at reintegrating South Africa into the international community. He announced that beginning immediately whites and nonwhites would compete alongside each other at home and abroad. Although critic Helen Suzman of the Progressive Party rightly identified the shift as ‘an absurd technical maneuver to placate overseas sports administrators’, it led to the ILTF’s decision in 1972 to readmit South Africa into the Davis Cup (New York Times 24 April 1971, p.11). While the Davis Cup drama made the public rounds, behind closed doors Ashe began to negotiate with South Africa. In the summer of 1973, he received word from South African 406

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Open tournament director Owen Williams that Minister of Mines, Immigration, Sports and Recreation Piet Koornhof wished to deliver him a message. If Ashe eased his criticism of the government, Koornhof told Williams, South Africa would issue him a visa. Ashe responded positively to the overture but made his own series of non-negotiable demands. He vowed to reject the visa unless he was permitted to travel freely inside South Africa, play before integrated crowds and enter as a black man – not as an ‘honorary white’. Ashe also insisted that Koornhof make a ‘conscientious effort’ to arrange a meeting between him and Vorster (Ashe & Deford 1975, p.18). Before departing, Williams begged Ashe ‘not to drop any more H-bombs on Johannesburg’ (Ashe & Deford 1975, p.18). By Halloween, Ashe had his answer: the government accepted his conditions provided he avoid political statements while in the country. All things considered, Ashe was pleased. ‘Whereas I don’t see myself as Jackie Robinson or even as Rosa Parks’, he explained, ‘neither trailblazer nor pawn of history, I do think I’m just a little bit of progress. Ellis Park will be integrated, and I will be a free black man on display’ (Ashe & Deford 1975, p.108). At the time and years later, Ashe judged the trip a success, albeit with several hiccups. He met many blacks and coloreds who thanked him for visiting and listening. ‘You are the pride and idol of us all’, said Reggie Ngcobo, the President of South Africa’s Black Tennis Association, in a speech. ‘You epitomize sportsmanship, for the essence of sportsmanship is to experience happiness in the happiness of others—and to feel their pain and their suffering too’ (Ashe & Deford 1975, p.136). But Ashe also squared off with nonwhite journalists and young militants who believed that his presence did little more than prop up the government.‘The black man still has his place—cleaning toilets’, exclaimed one opponent. ‘You [celebrities] stay away, all of you’. Others shouted at him ‘shame, shame’ or whispered ‘Uncle Tom’ (Ashe & Deford 1975, p.126– 7). And while Ashe eventually played before integrated crowds, the government initially maintained black and white seating until Williams himself gave “white” tickets to black and colored patrons (Ashe & Deford 1975, p.122–3). Ashe also failed to win the tournament, yet he made it all the way to the final before losing to the American Jimmy Connors. The South African press raved about him. ‘He was not the fire-spitting revolutionary some people expected’, one writer editorialized. ‘On and off the court his courtesy and sportsmanship won the respect and friendship of people from the dusty streets of Soweto to the rich White homes of Rondebosch’ (Cape Herald 8 December 1973).

The Salute After fighting apartheid for so long, Ashe got back to winning in 1975. Responding to those sportswriters and critics who declared him old and washed up, he refocused on physical and mental training. He lifted weights more frequently, ran longer distances and studied his opponents with increased attention. Soon, the wins followed. Ashe entered 29 tournaments in 1975, reaching the finals in 14 and emerging victorious in nine. He defeated one of the sport’s newest stars, Sweden’s Bjorn Borg, to capture the World Championship Tennis (WCT) title, but his goal hadn’t been met. Ashe had his eyes on Wimbledon and a potential date with nemesis Jimmy Connors. ‘He ain’t one of the boys’, Ashe remarked of Connors. ‘Right now he’s sorely misguided. We hardly say hello’ (Time 28 April 1975). Connors had angered Ashe and others by refusing to join the ATP, compete on the WCT tour, or participate in the Davis Cup. Several players blamed US losses to Colombia and Mexico on the absence of America’s top player. More recently, Connors filed a lawsuit against Ashe for statements made to ATP members claiming that Connors had pressured officials to fire US captain Dennis Ralston. ‘If the US Davis Cup captaincy is changed to accommodate Jimmy Connors’, Ashe had written, ‘then the US public 407

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won’t like it if a brash, cocky, talented and seemingly unpatriotic youngster is to dictate who will be the United States Davis Cup captain’ (Lorge 1975, 5 July, p.E1). Just days from Wimbledon, Ashe was asked if he had reconsidered his views. ‘I don’t regret writing that letter’, he fired back, ‘I just think Jimmy is misguided’ (Lorge 1975, 5 July, p.E1). Sportswriters covering Wimbledon prepared for fireworks, and they would come – though not in the manner that anyone had anticipated. Many prognosticators believed that pigs had a better chance of flying than Ashe had of defeating Connors. The opening rounds seemingly confirmed their pessimism. ‘Connors could not have been hungrier or more aggressive’, observed the Guardian, as he became only the fourth player since 1938 to make it to the final without losing a set (5 July 1975, p.17). Ashe, on the other hand, had to work to eliminate his opponents, needing a fifth set to dispatch Tony Roche in the semifinal. Sportswriters had already composed their Wimbledon obituaries. ‘Ashe’, wrote Joe Jares of Sports Illustrated, ‘had no more chance than a scoop of ice cream in that fiery furnace’ (1975, 14 July). Bud Collins was ‘scared to death that Arthur was going to be terribly embarrassed’ (Towle 2001, p.39-41). Ashe’s friend Frank Deford, hoping to avoid the drubbing, decided not to attend the match.Yet unbeknown to most of them, Ashe had a plan that involved precision rather than power. Ashe knew that he would lose a slugfest. Instead, he aimed to slow things down, dink and dunk and “rope-a-dope” Connors. In other words, Ashe prepared to outthink Connors and lob his way to victory. The blueprint worked to perfection. Ashe walked onto the court wearing red, white and blue wristbands and his Davis Cup jacket, a clear patriotic jab at Connors. Ashe came out of the gate ‘the way a junkball pitcher handles a baseball, softly returning serves, gently stroking his passing shots’ (Jares 1975, 14 July). He sailed to a 6-1, 6-1 lead before Connors regained his form in the third set. But Arthur Ashe owned the moment. He fought back from a 3-0 deficit in the fourth set to send Connors home and the grandstands into hysteria. Then it happened. Seconds after the final point, Ashe raised his right arm at a 90-degree angle and gave a fisted salute. To anyone familiar with the Black Panthers, Stokely Carmichael, Harry Edwards4 or Tommie Smith and John Carlos, the sign was unmistakable – it was the ultimate expression of Black Power. Two journalists later argued that Ashe ‘displayed the second most famous clenched fist ever by a black athlete’ (Harris & Kyle-DeBose 2007, p.92). Scholar Sundiata Djata wrote, ‘Ashe calmly raised a fist, a black power symbol, but an action that seemed “momentous” for some whites who thought of Ashe as being quiet and shy’ (2006, p.49). In interviews after his historic victory, Ashe downplayed the salute and claimed it was merely a sign of appreciation directed at his friends who helped him prepare for Connors. He did not, however, go out of his way to quash the story. Doug Smith of USA Today concluded that Ashe could have it both ways. Even if Ashe’s intention was not to invoke politics, the gesture was a political act nonetheless (Smith 2004, p.166). To many African Americans and people of color throughout the world, the salute represented the perfect ending to one of the most significant wins in all of sports. ‘Among blacks’, Ashe revealed, ‘I’ve had quite a few say it was up there with Joe Louis5 in his prime and Jackie Robinson breaking in with the Dodgers in 1947’ (Flink 1985, July, p.16). The Chicago Defender noted that the victory ‘stirred ashes in a game which used to be an all-white affair, beyond the skill and ingenuity of a black player’ (Chicago Defender 12 July 1975, p.21). The militants who had earlier disparaged Ashe could now smile, at least for a brief period. When Arthur Ashe died of AIDS in 1993, Americans and people all over the world – liberals and conservatives, blacks and whites, friends and foes – remembered him as a man of principle who fought for civil and human rights at home and abroad. ‘Arthur Ashe was just plain better than most of us’, remarked New York City Mayor David Dinkins (Allen 1993, 11 February). ‘Most athletes’, noted civil rights icon Jesse Jackson, ‘limit themselves to achievements 408

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and contributions within the lines, but Arthur found greatness beyond the lines’ (Williams 1993, 11 February). Ashe’s life illustrates that for black athletes the collision of sports and politics was unavoidable. In answering the call to act, Ashe adjusted with the times and became increasingly more militant as Black Power eclipsed the Civil Rights Movement. Through it all he opposed on-court demonstrations and demanded that players be treated as individuals. He embraced open dialogue, even with his fiercest enemies. ‘He wasn’t Martin Luther King, and he wasn’t Malcolm X’,6 said one funeral mourner. ‘But when you saw him, he stood for something. He wasn’t always talking, but he always had something to say’ (Allen 1993, 11 February).

Notes 1 For a fuller narrative of Ashe’s life and times, see my book, Arthur Ashe: Tennis and Justice in the Civil Rights Era (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014). 2 South Africa’s Population Act of 1950 established a three-part racial classification system, consisting of “Whites”, “Blacks” (native Africans) and “Coloreds” (those of “mixed race” – usually of combined African and Asian descent. Blacks and Coloreds were denied the vote.) 3 Four African American girls died when the Ku Klux Klan bombed a Baptist church in Birmingham, Alabama, in 1963. 4 African American Sociology professor and founder of the Olympic Project for Human Rights (OPHR), a campaign to combat racism in the Olympic movement. Tommie Smith and John Carlos, who delivered the famed clenched fist salute at the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City, were members of the OPHR. 5 World heavyweight boxing champion 1937–49. Seen by many as the first African American sportsman to gain the status of national hero. 6 Regarded as a black radical, he spent most of his adult life in the black nationalist Nation of Islam. He was assassinated in Washington in 1965.

References Allen, M. (1993, 11 February) Just Plain Better Than Most of Us. Richmond Times-Dispatch. Amdur, N. (1968, 28 January) Ashe, Net Pro of Future, Prepares Civil Rights Talk. New York Times. Amdur, N. (1969, 30 July) Ashe to Test So. Africa Policy. New York Times. Ashe, A. & Amdur, N. (1981) Off the Court. New York: New American Library. Ashe, A. & Deford, F. (1975) Arthur Ashe: Portrait in Motion. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. Ashe, A. & Rampersad, A. (1993) Days of Grace: A Memoir. New York: Knopf. Asher, M. (1968, 6 March) Ashe Becomes Activist, Plans Civil Rights Speech Here. Washington Post. Asher, M. (1968, 11 March) Ashe Wants Athletes to Act. Washington Post. Cape Herald. (1973, 8 December) A Nation of Bad Sports. Chafe, W. (1999) The Unfinished Journey: America since World War II. New York: Oxford University Press. Chicago Defender (1975, 12 July) Ashe Didn’t Let “Snubs” Stand in His Way to Top. Deford, F. (2012) Over Time: My Life as a Sportswriter. New York: Atlantic Monthly Press. Djata, S. (2006) Blacks at the Net: Black Achievement in the History of Tennis. Syracuse: Syracuse University Press. Flink, S. (1985, July) The Inside View. World Tennis. Gooding, J. (1973, June) The Tennis Industry. Fortune. Guardian (1975, 5 July) Ashe No Write Off. Harris, C. & Kyle-DeBose, L. (2007) Charging the Net: A History of Blacks in Tennis from Althea Gibson and Arthur Ashe to the Williams Sisters. Chicago: Ivan R. Dee Press. Jares, J. (1975, 14 July) A Centre Court Case. Sports Illustrated. King, M. to Ashe, A. (1968) Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. New York Public Library, New York. Box 2, Folder 1. Lacy, S. (1964, 30 June) A Communist Without a Card. Baltimore Afro-American. Lacy, S. (1969, 8 July) Ashe Deserves a Doff of the Hat. Baltimore Afro-American. Lorge, B. (1975, 5 July) Ashe vs. Connors on Court, in Court. Washington Post. 409

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Los Angeles Times (1964, 27 June) No Place for Politics in Sports, Says Ashe. McIlvanney, H. (1969, 7 July) Black is Beautiful. Los Angeles Times. New York Times (1969, 30 June) Ashe is Refused Visa by South Africa to Compete in Nation’s Tennis Open. New York Times (1969, 4 December) South African Unit Backs Entry of Ashe. New York Times (1970, 29 January) South Africa Denies Visa to Arthur Ashe. New York Times (1971, 24 April) New Sports Policy Stirs South Africa. Nossiter, B. (1970, 5 February) Don’t Retaliate for Denial of Visa, Ashe Tells Hill Unit. Washington Post. Povich, S. (1968, 17 October) “Black Power” on Victory Stand. Los Angeles Times. Scott, E. (1968, June) No Apartheid in Kruger Park. World Tennis. Smith, D. (2004) Whirlwind: The Godfather of Black Tennis: The Life and Times of Dr. Robert Walter Johnson. Washington, D.C.: Blue Eagle Press. Time (1975, 28 April) Jimmy Connors: The Hellion of Tennis. Towle, M. (ed.) (2001) I Remember Arthur Ashe: Memories of a True Tennis Pioneer and Champion of Social Causes by the People Who Knew Him. Nashville: Cumberland House Press . Tupper, F. (1970, 24 March) South Africa Barred in Davis Cup Tennis. New York Times. Washington Post (1969, 1 July) S. Africa Denies Ashe Ban. Williams, M. (1993, 11 February) Your Spirit Lives On and On. Richmond Times-Dispatch. Wilson, D. (1969, 19 August) When Backlash Hits Campaigners. Guardian. Wilson, G. (1969, 19 July) Phony “Gentlemen” in Tennis. New York Amsterdam News.

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40 The Original 9 The social movement that created women’s professional tennis, 1968–73 Kristi Tredway

In 1970, nine top-ranked tennis players joined together for the common cause of advocating for equal prize money for women in professional tennis.This collective, known as the “Original 9”, were: Jane “Peaches” Bartkowicz, Rosemary Casals, Judy Tegart Dalton, Julie Heldman, Billie Jean King, Kristy Pigeon, Kerry Melville Reid, Nancy Richey and Valerie Zeigenfuss. They joined together to pressure the governing bodies of tennis to offer equitable pay and access to tournaments for women as they did for men. In spite of threats, the Original 9 used expert marketing and advertising, as well as couture fashion, to maintain pressure on the governing bodies of tennis. In just a few years, what began as a protest by nine women who banded together to begin a women’s tour had turned into a force of over 60 players, which necessitated the creation of an organizing body in 1973: the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA). This chapter considers the context, issues and prime movers responsible for stemming the ever-increasing disparity between men’s and women’s prize money and, by doing so, helped create the global spectacle that women’s tennis is today.

Feminist predecessors to the Original 9 Individual complaints about the inequality present in women’s tennis as compared to men’s tennis had permeated the game as far back as 1926. Suzanne Lenglen was an eight-time Grand Slam champion, the namesake of the Coupe de Lenglen given to the women’s champion of the French Open, and the world’s first female tennis celebrity.1 She also was a very early advocate for tennis becoming professional. In 1926, Lenglen stated that: In the twelve years I have been champion I have earned literally millions of francs for tennis and have paid thousands of francs in entrance fees to be allowed to do so. … Where did all this money go? … Why shouldn’t the players get something out of it? It meant years of practice and a life’s work for most of us. … The owners of these clubs at which I so often played were mostly shrewd businessmen and they saw to it that these tournaments netted them a handsome profit. … Under these absurd and antiquated amateur rulings only a wealthy person can compete. … Is that fair? Does it advance the sport? Does it make

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tennis more popular or does it tend to suppress and hinder an enormous amount of tennis talent…whose names are not in the social register? (Lenglen 1926, p.14–5) Had it not been stated beforehand that these words were spoken by Lenglen in 1926, one might have suspected that one of the Original 9 had made these remarks in 1970, 44 years later. Indeed, similar views would reflect the growing unrest in women’s tennis that finally came to a head in 1970. What Lenglen’s words do indicate is the extent of the dissatisfaction felt in relation to making a fair livelihood in women’s tennis. Until 1968, men and women competed alongside each other as amateurs at the Grand Slam tennis events: the Australian Championships, the French Championships, the Wimbledon Championships and the US Championships. There was no prize money; however, many men were profiting from appearance fees and reimbursement of expenses (Lake 2015). Granted, there were professionals – only men – who made a living playing events created for professional players, but these players were not allowed to play in the Grand Slam events because these events were only open to amateurs at the time. In 1968, this all changed.The Grand Slam tennis events became “open”. That is, the tournaments now allowed both amateurs and professionals to play, and the two competed against each other in the same draws. For the first time, prize money was offered, but with a great discrepancy between men and women. Of note, this is when all of the Grand Slam events altered their names to include the word “Open”, to demarcate the change, as in the “US Open” instead of the US Championships (see, for example, CNN Library 2017). Only Wimbledon retains the older name, “The Championships”. The change to open tournaments soon made female players realize that they needed to improve their position in the world of tennis. Prior to 1968, there existed only a small offering of tennis events for women outside of the Grand Slam events, and now they were also being short-changed in regards to prize money with the new Open Grand Slams. Female players began to feel disgruntled. Following the Lawn Tennis Association’s (LTA) decision on 14 December 1967 to end the ban on professionals from entering tournaments previously only allowed for amateurs and the subsequent agreement by the International Tennis Federation, the world’s first open tennis event was the British Hard-Court Championships, held in Bournemouth, England, 22–27 April 1968 (Wilson 2014, p.157). Ann Jones (née Haydon), a well-known British player, boycotted the LTA event due to the unequal prize money distribution. The men’s singles winner at the tournament, Ken Rosewall, received £1,000 and the women’s singles winner, Virginia Wade, would have received £300, but she was still an amateur and therefore obliged to refuse all of the prize money except expenses (Lake 2015). This state of affairs goes some way to accounting for Jones’ action. Having won the French Championships in 1961 and 1966, she attempted to leverage the power that she had earned through playing tennis against the LTA. Since the British Hard-Court Championships was the first open tennis event, Jones’ protest was the first explicitly taken against unequal prize money distribution in professional tennis. Linda Timms, in an early article on prize money disparity, wrote: The leader of the movement, and the most militant of all, is Ann Jones, four time Hard Court Champion. She promptly declared that she was ‘seriously considering withholding her entry for Bournemouth as a protest’ and that she was confident of support from Christine Truman, Virginia Wade and Angela Barrett – these four between them having won the singles titles there for ten out of the last thirteen years. (Timms 1968, p.34) 412

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As it turned out,Truman,Wade and Barrett did not join Jones in her boycott of the Bournemouth tournament, thus thwarting any possibility for powerful social activism. In the same article, Jones is quoted as saying: I feel the protest must be made now. … In this country, once a precedent is set it immediately becomes a tradition. We are not asking for equal prize money, but it should be at least half of the men’s amount, not a third as they are offering now. … This protest is not a gesture, it is a firm threat. Unless some adjustment is made to the proportion of the prize money before the entries close in April, I will not play. The whole of the men’s game is expanding, and the women must not be left behind. (cited in:Timms 1968, p.34) Thus, according to Jones, women were offered a third of the prize money offered to men. Jones’s protest, then, was a push for earning half of what the men were earning. Jones had the vision of what was to come for women in professional tennis, but no other players joined her in her boycott, and she ultimately backtracked to this position of advocating for one half of the men’s prize money (Lake 2015). Thus, a social movement to correct the economic disparity would have to wait. The unequal prize money distribution that Ann Jones illuminated in Bournemouth, England, was replicated in all of the subsequent tournaments of 1968 and 1969. The men’s and women’s winners of Wimbledon in 1968 – Rod Laver and Billie Jean King – earned £2,000 and £750, respectively (Lake 2015). There was a slight gain for women at Wimbledon the following year, though it was still inequitable; winners Rod Laver and Ann Jones earned £3,000 and £1,500, respectively. There were similar ratios of inequitable prize money distribution at the other Grand Slam events. Moreover, disparity was growing at all of the tournaments, not just Grand Slam events, and by 1970, the Italian Open men’s and women’s winners, Ilie Nastase and Billie Jean King, received $3,500 and $600, respectively (Barajas 2016). The disparity in prize money between men and women had grown from around 2:1, and remained at this level at the Grand Slam events, to almost 6:1 in only two years of open tennis at the tournaments outside the Grand Slams.

The Original 9 and women’s economic equality in tennis Prior to the open era of tennis, players were individually paid undisclosed amounts of money “under the table” based on their marketability for the tournament. Since the payments were privately arranged, nobody knew what others were receiving. After the open era of tennis began, money was distributed through cash prizes based on the level one attained in a tournament. Critically, prize money distributions for tournaments became publicly known. In 1970, after two years of increasing inequality with the prize money between men’s and women’s tournaments, the Original 9 formed. The term “women’s lob” – merging the slang term of “women’s lib” for feminism with the lob tennis shot – was coined in the early 1970s by Gladys Heldman, the founding editor of World Tennis magazine, to describe the particular feminism that was being used in women’s tennis (King & Starr 1988). It is clear that the Original 9 drew on two main components of the broader women’s liberation movement of the time: 1) equal pay for equal work, and 2) access to an economic livelihood.2 In tennis, these objectives were reflected through demands for equal prize money for men and women, and an equal number of tennis tournaments offered for men and women. Equal prize money but with an offering of four tournaments for women and 20 413

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for men would not accomplish the goals that women wanted and needed.Thus, both equal prize money and an equal number of tournaments had to happen. It is possible that not all nine women considered themselves feminists. Their actions and the outcome of their actions, however, can be understood as feminist because they were seeking to achieve the same conditions between male and female tennis players. Sexuality, class and race were sidelined as issues during this movement in an effort to keep the social activism by the Original 9 aimed at fighting for economic equity unfettered. “Women’s lob” feminism can therefore be discerned as drawing on the branch of liberal feminism from second-wave feminism. Indeed, during an interview, Kristy Pigeon noted that: Prior to the formation of the Original 9 I had been exposed to the women’s rights movement while attending the University of California at Berkeley. In 1968 [while a freshman at Mills College] I attended a lecture presented by Betty Friedan and had a clear understanding of changes that needed to be made to our society. As a professional tennis player there was never a doubt that I needed to support the group’s quest for equal prize money. (personal correspondence, 9 November 2014) The Original 9 were focused solely on changing the rules and culture of professional tennis to ensure fair and equal compensation for work for all women in tennis.

The players front-stage In 1970, the Pacific Southwest Championships in Los Angeles, California, offered prize money showing a disparity of 8:1 – the men’s winner would make $12,500 and the women’s winner would make $1,500. The need to stem the tide was becoming all the more urgent. In a piece that has recently been published online, Billie Jean King identified the aims of the Original 9: We wanted to be paid equally and we wanted to be treated fairly. Originally we had hoped to partner with the men’s tennis tour and have a unified voice in the sport on a global basis. But the guys wanted no part of it. And not every women’s player wanted to join us. So we went to plan B. (King 2015) The “plan B” King refers to here took the form of the first women’s only professional tournament that directly competed with another tournament for both men and women that offered disparate prize money distributions – and it was destined to change the future of women’s tennis. Originally, this competing event was going to include: Margaret Court, Rosie Casals, Nancy Richey, Judy Dalton, Kerry Melville, Peaches Bartkowicz, Patti Hogan and Valerie Zeigenfuss, and, only for doubles, Billie Jean King (Heldman 1970). Court, who was suffering from an ankle injury, was replaced by Kristy Pigeon. Hogan got cold feet, and, with all of the top female players barred from competition due to their membership of the independent tour, she became the No.1 female player from the US. King stepped up to fill Hogan’s spot in the singles draw. Julie Heldman, suffering from tennis elbow at the time, played one point against King in a preliminary match. Thus, the women who would become known as the Original 9 by playing the Virginia Slims of Houston tournament were: Jane “Peaches” Bartkowicz (USA); Rosemary “Rosie” Casals (USA); Judy Tegart Dalton (Australia) Julie Heldman (USA); Billie Jean King (USA); Kristy Pigeon (USA); Kerry Melville Reid (Australia); Nancy Richey (USA) and Valerie Zeigenfuss (USA). Casals, Dalton, King, Reid and Richey were at the top of their games at 414

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this juncture and looking forward to continuing high-profile careers. The others – Bartkowicz, Heldman, Pigeon and Zeigenfuss – were young players at the beginning of their careers. To be sure, there were risks involved for the Original 9.The greatest risk was expulsion from tennis. Billie Jean King later explained, ‘For us, everything was at risk. The USLTA … threatened us with suspension and expulsion’ (King 2015). Indeed, as interviews with some of the players reveals, the risks were real. The Original 9 were banned from the Federation Cup and the Wightman Cup (Casals, personal correspondence, 15 November 2014), and they were told that they were to be banned from Wimbledon, but this threat was never realized. Nevertheless, as King explained, the Australians Judy Dalton and Kerry Melville faced even more severe sanctions: ‘They were told if they signed with us, their playing days were over’ (King 2015). As Dalton also remembered, ‘The Australian Tennis Association banned us from playing in our country and also using our Australian endorsed tennis racquets and shoes’ (personal correspondence, 15 November 2014). Kristy Pigeon added that, We also risked being proven wrong and that possibly the public had little interest in watching women play tennis if men were not also playing in the same tournaments. Therefore, our pride and our livelihoods were also at stake. Fortunately, the risks were not realized. (personal correspondence, 9 November 2014) With that, Rosie Casals noted that, ‘In many ways it was scary taking these chances but mostly it was exhilarating’ (personal correspondence, 15 November 2014).

The backstage: Gladys Heldman, Joseph Cullman III and Ted Tinling As indicated by Kristy Pigeon’s observation above, an argument posed against equal pay for women’s tennis was based on the belief that female players did not draw the crowds to the tournaments because they were less entertaining than men.This kind of prejudicial thinking and arguments that women should not be paid equally were countered with the argument that women’s tennis did have as much entertainment value as men’s tennis, and the women in tennis were going to prove it. Increasing the entertainment element of women’s tennis is exactly the angle that was taken for this tennis circuit which was viewed as principled and legitimate by its insiders, and “rogue” by those maintaining, or hoping to benefit from, the status quo in tennis. This was done through a masterful consortium of sorts with the Original 9, Gladys Heldman, publisher of World Tennis magazine, Joseph F. Cullman, CEO of Philip Morris, the tobacco company and the former Wimbledon player liaison turned couture fashion designer, Ted Tinling. They worked seamlessly together to make women’s professional tennis an entertainment spectacle. Gladys Heldman was a formidable figure. She was charismatic, dominant and preferred conditions on her own terms that, because they were ethically sound, usually were convincing to others. In 1953, she founded World Tennis magazine, which, from the start, was notable for its equal coverage of men’s and women’s tennis under her guidance.Thus, equality of the sexes had a prominent outlet through her from a very early stage. Joseph F. Cullman III was a marketing genius with a philanthropic heart, who also happened to be a lover of tennis. Following in line with his hiring and management practices at Philip Morris, Cullman was interested in increasing the diversity and changing the “upper-classness” of the sport. He stated: I became interested in tennis as a “project” in the 1960s, when the sport was dominated mostly by club types who played at restricted clubs. … I was not happy with the lack of 415

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diversity – racial, religious, gender, and economic – of the players and those in the stands. There were a few outside the mold earlier – very few. … More change was on the way, in the form of Pancho Gonzales, Althea Gibson, Arthur Ashe, Manuel Santana, Billie Jean King, and a host of other minority and female players. It was something like the situation Jackie Robinson faced in baseball after the war. I appreciated that it takes time for people to change attitudes, but tennis wasn’t moving fast enough until the Marlboro CBS-TV national sponsorship changed things. (Cullman 1998, p.173, 175) Truth be told, it was not solely Marlboro advertising that began to create a change in people’s attitudes, but the television broadcast of the US Open more broadly. Cullman explains further: Now for my role in tennis, and my attempts to address some of the sport’s problems. In 1968, I had become part of the tennis “establishment”. I was active in helping get the US Championship held at Forest Hills nationally televised for the first time on CBS and sponsored by Marlboro. This national TV broadcast of the US championships changed tennis from a white shoe club sport to a sport for all Americans. In 1969 and again in 1970 I served as chairman of the US Open. (Cullman 1998, p.174) Indeed, the televised aspect of the US Open is what changed people’s perceptions, not Marlboro’s involvement per se. It was Cullman’s foresight to bring tennis to the masses through television that changed people’s perception. Marlboro, through Cullman’s positioning as the CEO of Philip Morris, was just the vehicle he used to put his ideas into action. Whilst television offered exposure, it was Ted Tinling’s eye-catching couture fashions that each of the top players wore that heightened the spectacle and entertainment value of women’s tennis. Tinling was an Englishman who, when the post-war rations on fabric limited his artistic freedom and sensibilities, gave up creating wedding dresses for London’s elite in the 1940s for the creations he could make with smaller amounts of fabric in tennis fashion (Tredway 2016).

Making tennis history: establishing the Virginia Slims tour As earlier noted, the growing disparity between the prize money offered to men and women came to a head as the Pacific Southwest Championships, with Jack Kramer as tournament director, offered the men’s singles champion $12,500 and the women’s singles champion $1,500 (Heldman 1970, p 14). In an attempt to find a more common ground, Gladys Heldman told Kramer, ‘The girls are talking about boycotting your tournament because of the low prize money’, to which Kramer responded:‘That’s fine with me. … I’ll take the $7,500 and throw it in the men’s singles’ (Heldman 1970, p.14). Ultimately, rather than a boycott of the tournament, for fears it would adversely affect the lower-ranked players who would play there anyway, consensus was formed around organizing an eight-woman tournament elsewhere during the same week as to coincide with the Pacific Southwest tournament, held 23-27 September 1970. A reporter once asked Gladys Heldman if she was the one who created the Virginia Slims Women’s Circuit. According to Tinling, Heldman quickly retorted, ‘No. It was Jack Kramer’ (Tinling 1979, p.305). Kramer’s refusal to equalize the prize money for men and women was the final straw that compelled the formation of the Original 9 under the guidance of Gladys Heldman.

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Heldman went to work immediately. She put up $5,000 of her own money and secured the sponsorship of Philip Morris, the tobacco company, through her friendship with the CEO Joseph Cullman III, to support the Virginia Slims of Houston tournament (Heldman 1970). In exchange for signing one dollar contracts, not only were the players protected by anti-trust laws imposed by the United States Lawn Tennis Association (USLTA), but the event became essentially an exhibition tournament instead of one needing sanctions. The sponsorship by Philip Morris came easy because the company was eager to find an advertising venue for the cigarette created for women which they had introduced in 1968.Their marketing slogans, especially ‘You’ve come a long way, baby!’, were a perfect fit for women’s professional tennis. Thus, the Virginia Slims tennis circuit was born with Cullman eager to support the fledgling tour with Virginia Slims sponsorship. Describing the original tournament in Houston, he wrote: The women’s tournament, to be held at the Houston Racquet Club, was originally to be called the Houston Invitational, but when Gladys – who was a good friend of mine – told me what was going on and that she was looking for corporate support, I saw a unique opportunity to support women’s tennis. I saw the Houston tournament as a chance to support the women’s game and as a unique sponsorship opportunity for Philip Morris. So we put up $2,500 and had the name of the event changed to the Virginia Slims Invitational. The tournament, which had total prize money of $7,500, was won by Rosie Casals and marked the birth of the women’s professional tennis tour. (Cullman 1998, p.176) In response to the formation of this alternate tournament, Cullman further corroborated what the players revealed during interviews, that ‘the USLTA responded by taking away the eligibility cards of those players who competed in Houston, which meant they could no longer play in USLTA sanctioned events’ (Cullman 1998, p.176). Not only were the players barred from playing in USLTA sanctioned tournaments, which included the US Open, the USLTA could block the players from playing in the other Grand Slam events.Thus, Heldman’s strategy to pay each of the players one dollar in exchange for signing contracts as professional players proved very smart. In this way, the Virginia Slims of Houston did not need to be sanctioned because it was not being counted for ranking points. It was as if the players were playing an exhibition tournament, but it certainly felt real to them and placed additional demands on their energy. Original 9 players were frequently on morning radio shows or at stores doing direct advertising. As Kristy Pigeon noted, ‘I can remember getting up at 5am to do radio talk shows and sitting in the sports section of KMart talking to passers by. In addition, we frequently did clinics to drum up ticket sales for our tournaments’ (personal correspondence, 31 August 2015). At the time, Billie Jean King said similarly, that players must get up early to give clinics and interviews because that is what makes our tournaments successful. Sometimes it’s a pain, but it’s part of the bargain. It makes the sponsors want us. We ask for big prize money, but we do a lot more than just play tennis to get it. (The WT Reporter 1971, p.40) This, no doubt, had a tremendously adverse effect on the tennis accomplishments of each of the Original 9; however, the players were all suffering for the cause in similar ways and their accomplishments turned out to be far-reaching. 417

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The Virginia Slims Circuit was properly born, as Cullman (1998, p.177) described: Within a week after the first Virginia Slims Invitational [in Houston] in November 1970, we were able to announce that Virginia Slims would sponsor eight women’s tournaments, each in a sixteen-draw format beginning in January 1971. And the rest is tennis history. … By the end of 1971 there were sixty-four women competing in tournaments for about $225,000. Furthermore, in 1972, with Virginia Slims’ continued support, two $100,000 events took place, one in Boca Raton, Florida, and the other in Hilton Head, South Carolina. That same year Billie Jean King became the first female athlete in history to win $100,000 in prize money – a lot of money at that time – in a single year. (Cullman 1998, p.177) Indeed, women’s tennis was growing at an incredibly rapid pace, not only in terms of prize money distribution but the increase in players as well. Cullman sums up the history of the tour nicely when he says, ‘the Virginia Slims Tour, which culminated annually with the women’s championship at Madison Square Garden, became one of the most successful promotions in women’s sports history and lasted for more than twenty years’ (Cullman 1998, p.177). Something which cannot be overlooked in adding to the entertainment value of women’s tennis and the success of the Virginia Slims tour were the tennis fashions created for each player by Ted Tinling. At the time he helped establish the Virginia Slims tennis circuit, Cullman named Tinling the official clothing designer for the tour. As such, by the mid-1970s, Tinling was overseeing a $500,000 per year budget for dresses for the Virginia Slims players (Thomas 1990). Tinling described his method for creating individualized dresses for each player when he stated that: You see, when you dress a player you must take into account both her personality and the way she hits a ball. I would never dare dress a player without seeing her play. And sometimes the person and the player can be quite contradictory. I originally objected when Billie Jean wanted frillier dresses, but I went along with her and put her into the sequin business – I called it my firefly collection – because she was big enough to pull it off. They said she looked like an aging rock queen, but in the context of her majesty, that was a compliment. (cited in Deford 1984) Tinling crafted each dress to the personality, and special requests, of its owner and no two dresses were alike. The statements that he made through his designs can therefore be understood as entirely in keeping with the tour’s aim of garnering recognition for women’s tennis.

The formation of the Women’s Tennis Association, 1973 Even before the tour in 1970, Billie Jean King had written about the ability for a single players’ union of men and women to buffer against discrimination. She saw such a union as being able to withstand the pressures and social dictates, such as racism, from tournament directors and the governing bodies of tennis. She asserted: 418

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Players of the World, speak out! You have a responsibility to the future of the game. If the players form a union, they could become an active factor in tennis. Now a club-oriented organization runs the game from a narrow-minded perspective.The players must not endorse this situation by default. How many tournaments would be staged in clubs which discriminate on racial or an ethnic basis if the players as one unified body decided not to participate? A players’ union motivated by more than just self-interest could be a plus factor to the game. (King 1968, p.32) King was advocating for a players union that would be for both men and women. The men ultimately formed their own organization, the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) in September 1972. The Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) was formed the following year. In January 1973, according to King, the politics of women’s tennis was still contentious because of ‘our decision to sign contracts with Gladys [Heldman] that called for the founding of a Women’s International Tennis Federation (WITF), and Gladys’s lawsuit, which I later joined, seeking an injunction to prevent the USLTA from disrupting our tournaments’ (King 1988, p.142). Whilst Heldman’s lawsuit failed in court (there was no proof of injurious actions from the USLTA, only threats of such actions), the idea for an organization that focused on the interests of female players flourished. According to Rosie Casals, the conceptualization of the WITF had become, by June of 1973 when it was actually formed, the WTA (personal correspondence, 2016). It was formed by 64 women, including most of the Original 9, during a secret meeting at the Gloucester Hotel in London, a few days before the start of Wimbledon. There were two main outcomes of the meeting: first, the WTA Tour was created through the merging of the North American-based Virginia Slims tennis circuit and the European-based International Lawn Tennis Federation’s (ILTF) Women’s Grand Prix circuit. Second, the WTA was formed as a governing body for the WTA Tour that existed apart from the ILTF and the smaller national tennis organizations like the USLTA. Player Françoise Dürr, in describing the meeting, said: Sitting in that room at the Gloucester Hotel, I felt like we were going to make history. Well, we hoped that was what we were going to do, but we couldn’t be sure. So we locked the door and we said we would not leave until we’d created an association of some kind. Some of the women were more nervous than others. But my good friend Betty Stove, who was very tall, stood guard – and nobody left. Of course Billie Jean was the main force behind it all, but Rosie Casals was right there and me too. … I’m glad we held our nerve because when more people come together it only makes your position stronger. Afterwards I remember feeling a real sense of achievement. When you are on the court, you have to take things into your own hands – you are playing for yourself. But after taking the decision to create the WTA as a group, we were very happy.The men were making more money and it was time to show what we could do too. (cited in Newman 2013) One condition of the meeting from the start was, in feminist fashion, that either forming the WTA would be agreed upon by consensus or not at all. If all of the players were not in agreement, then the push to form the WTA would not proceed. After the formation of the WTA, Gladys Heldman, who would have been the leading contender for executive director of the new organization, fell into the background. According to her daughter, Julie Heldman, one of two things occurred: either Gladys was exhausted from 419

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the long struggle to get women’s tennis viable, or she was pushed out, a casualty of the politics (personal correspondence, 2015). If all of the political baggage could be foisted onto Heldman, the new WTA could emerge as a non-political, thereby seemingly more legitimate, organization in professional tennis.

Conclusion The era of 1968 to 1973 in women’s tennis was politically contentious. In 1968, there was one woman, Ann Haydon-Jones, who made a stand against inequitable prize money for men and women. Then, in 1970, nine women, dubbed the Original 9, made a stand. By the end of 1971, 64 women were making a stand.There is power in numbers. Ann Jones, with only a one-person protest, was easily ignored, and the members of the Original 9 were threatened by the governing bodies in tennis; however, nothing could be done to undermine 64 women who were joined in consensus for the creation of the WTA. The history of women’s tennis shows the power that one person has. Even in apparent failure, Jones went on to influence nine people, who learned from that failure how to protest successfully. The outcome then snowballed into a fully-fledged and viable women’s tennis tour.

Notes 1 Lenglen actually won 12 Grand Slam singles titles: Wimbledon, 1919–23, 1925; and the French Championships, 1920–3, 1925–6. Until 1925, the French Championships was not open to players from outside of France, so her four titles from 1920–3 are not officially counted in her tally. 2 The other goals of the women’s liberation movement – such as abortion rights, men sharing housework, the raising of children and access to education – were seemingly not relevant to the Original 9, at least not publicly, though these might have been personal goals of individuals within the collective.

References Barajas, J. (2016, April 12) Equal Pay for Equal Play. What the Sport of Tennis Got Right. PBS News Hour. Available at: http:​//www​.pbs.​org/n​ewsho​ur/ma​king-​sense​/equa​l-pay​-for-​equal​-play​-what​-the-​sport​ -of-t​ennis​-got-​r ight​ (accessed 10 September 2017) Bradley, P. (2003) Mass Media and the Shaping of American Feminism, 1963–1975. Jackson: University of Mississippi Press. Casals, R. (1970, October) The Women: Up or Down? World Tennis Magazine, pp. 16–8. CNN Library (2017, August 10) ‘US Open Tennis Tournament Fast Facts. CNN. Available at: http:​//www​ .cnn.​com/2​013/0​7/31/​us/u-​s-ope​n-ten​nis-t​ourna​ment-​fast-​facts​/inde​x.htm​l (accessed 10 September 2017) Cullman, J.F. (1998) I’m a Lucky Guy. New York: Philip Morris. Deford, F. (1984, July 9) A Head to Heed: Since the Days When Peach Ice Cream Tasted Like Peach Ice Cream,Teddy Tinling’s Grace and Sense of History Have Meant as Much to Tennis as his Dress Designs. Sports Illustrated. Available at: http:​//www​.si.c​om/va​ult/1​984/0​7/09/​62043​3/a-h​ead-t​o-hee​d (accessed 10 September 2017) Evening Independent (1972, July 8) Warning: Casals Dressed Down. Available at: http:​ //new​ s.goo​ gle.c ​ o m/ne​ w spap​ e rs?n​ i d=95​ 0 &dat=19720708&id=TVhQAAAAIBAJ&sjid=u1cDAAAAIBAJ &pg=7375,1902523 (accessed 10 September 2017) Heldman, G.M. (1970, November) Editorial: World Tennis Magazine Signs 9 Girls to Pro Contracts. World Tennis Magazine, 14–6, 48–9. Heldman, J.M. (1967, June) Distinguished Women in Tennis: Nancy Richey. World Tennis Magazine, 18–9. Heldman, J.M. (1968, January) Distinguished Women in Tennis: Judy Tegart. World Tennis Magazine, 40. King, B.J. (1968, December) A Great Idea from Florida. World Tennis Magazine, 32–3.

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King, B.J. (2015, August 26) The Legacy of the Original 9. The Players’ Tribune. Available at: http:​//www​ .thep​layer​strib​une.c​om/bi​llie-​jean-​king-​women​-tenn​is-hi​story​-orig​inal-​9/ (accessed 10 September 2017) King, B.J. & Chapin, K. (1974) Billie Jean. New York: Harper & Row. King, B.J. & Deford, F. (1982) Billie Jean. New York:Viking. King, B.J. & Starr, C. (1988) We Have Come a Long Way:The Story of Women’s Tennis. New York: McGraw-Hill. Lake, R.J. (2015) A Social History of Tennis in Britain. London: Routledge. Lenglen, S. (1926) Why I Became a Professional. In Pyle, C.C. (pp.14–5), Professional Tennis: Souvenir Exhibition Programme, New York: Charles C. Pyle. Newman, P. (2013, June 18) Forty Years On, Billie Jean King Led the Revolution that Propelled Women to Greater Equality. The Independent. Available at: http:​//www​.inde​pende​nt.co​.uk/s​port/​tenni​s/for​ty-ye​ ars-o​n-how​-bill​ie-je​an-ki​ng-le​d-the​-revo​lutio​n-tha​t-pro​pelle​d-wom​en-to​-grea​ter-e​quali​ty-86​64164​ .html​(accessed 10 September 2017) The WT Reporter (1968, October) Distinguished Women in Tennis: Julie M. Heldman. World Tennis Magazine, 58–9. The WT Reporter (1971, July) Interview with Billie Jean King. World Tennis Magazine, 40–5. Thomas, R.M., Jr. (1990, May 24) Ted Tinling, Designer, Dies at 79; A Combiner of Tennis and Lace. The New York Times. Available at: http:​//www​.nyti​mes.c​om/19​90/05​/24/o​bitua​r ies/​ted-t​inlin​g-des​igner​ -dies​-at-7​9-a-c​ombin​er-of​-tenn​is-an​d-lac​e.htm​l (accessed 10 September 2017) Timms, L. (1968, April) Poor Little Poor Girls. World Tennis Magazine, 34. Tinling, T. (1979) Love and Faults: Personalities Who Have Changed the History of Tennis in My Lifetime. New York: Crown Publishers. Tredway, K. (2016) “The Leaning Tower of Pizzazz”: Ted Tinling, Couturier for the Women’s Professional Tennis Revolution, Fashion, Style & Popular Culture, 3(3), 295–312.

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41 Giving all women the chance The battle of the sexes in popular culture Jessica Luther

On 20 September 1973, Billie Jean King stood across the net from Bobby Riggs at the Houston Astrodome. She was 29, a five-time Wimbledon champion, No.1 in the world, and a leading figure in both women’s sports and the political movement for women’s equality. He was 55, a has-been former winner of Wimbledon and the US Open, a tennis hall-of-famer and known for his chauvinistic comments – for example, ‘Women belong in the bedroom and kitchen, in that order’ (Roberts 2005, p.92).The occasion of their meeting was an exhibition match that became known as the “Battle of the Sexes”. Every account of that night says that the arena had a circus-like atmosphere. According to the New York Times, both competitors were carried in, her on ‘a Cleopatra-style gold litter that was held aloft by four muscular’ men and him ‘in a gold-wheeled rickshaw pulled by six professional models in tight red and gold outfits’. Before the match, Riggs gave King ‘a large candy sucker’ and she reciprocated with a ‘brown baby pig’. Some of Riggs’s supporters handed out Sugar Daddies caramel candy pops (Amdur 1973, 21 September, p.31). Thirty thousand people showed up to watch in person, including well-known personalities such as the boxer George Foreman who cheered for King. It was the largest ever ‘live’ tennis crowd to date. Moreover, roughly 90 million people in over 36 countries tuned in on their television sets. On the line was a hefty purse and the bragging rights to superiority for male players (Riggs) and equal athletic ability for female players (King). Lesley Visser, a pioneer for women in sports broadcasting, was a junior in college at the time. She recounted in the 2013 documentary Let Them Wear Towels what King’s participation meant: ‘That was the seminal moment of the women’s movement’,Visser said. ‘It was more than a sporting event. It was gender politics. It was financial equity. It was social equity’. King was well aware of what was at stake. ‘Billie Jean King’s decision to play Bobby Riggs was a conscious political act’, writes historian Susan Ware. ‘She always realized that the match was much bigger than just tennis, and she was willing to put her hard-won credibility on the line to prove the point that women deserved just as much respect as men’ (Ware 2011, p.7). As it happened, she need not have worried: the match lasted just over 2 hours and resulted in a resounding victory for King in straight sets, 6-4, 6-3, 6-3. ‘She was too good. She played too well’, Riggs said afterward. In the wake of King’s win, the gender politics around the match exploded. ‘Mrs. Billie Jean King struck a proud blow for herself and women around the world with a crushing… rout of 422

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Bobby Riggs tonight in their $100,000 winner-take-all tennis match at the Astrodome’ was the The New York Times lead the next day (Amdur 1973, 21 September, 1). ‘It was so profound’,Visser says, ‘and Billie Jean knew that. She really was doing it for me, but she didn’t just give me the chance, she gave all women the chance’. King instantly became an icon of the feminist movement, her actual win a larger symbolic win in the political fight for equality. The Battle of the Sexes has remained a powerful cultural touchstone in the 45 years since it took place. The aforementioned documentary about it was released in 2013, on the 40th anniversary of the match. During the summer of 2017, while promoting a new book, John McEnroe incited a whole new discussion about men versus women on the tennis court when he provocatively said in an NPR interview,‘if [Serena Williams] played the men’s circuit she’d be like 700 in the world’.There was a firestorm of anger that he’d suggest such a thing about one of the greatest female tennis players ever. Williams, for her part, responded coolly via Twitter: ‘Dear John, I adore and respect you but please please keep me out of your statements that are not factually based. I’ve never played anyone ranked “there” nor do I have time. Respect me and my privacy as I’m trying to have a baby. Good day sir’ (Garcia-Navarro 2017, 25 June, Skiver 2017, 27 June). Then, in September 2017, a feature film starring Oscar-winner Emma Stone as King and Steve Carell as Riggs titled The Battle of the Sexes hit theatres, almost 44 years to the day of the match it chronicles. This suggests that what King did on the court at Houston Astrodome in 1973 continues to resonate. Its importance endures likely because it was not just a sporting event (though that matters) but because it was a political one.The fight over gender politics and for financial and social equity for women – the battle of the sexes, if you will – is still ongoing, both within tennis and in wider society. While the match finds frequent mentions in academic research about women and gender relations in sport, with the exception of Nancy E. Spencer’s (2000) incisive analysis, there is surprisingly little thorough academic research on the match, that is, which exceeds a standardized outline of the event and the assertion that King’s win meant much for women’s equality. This chapter purposefully synthesizes a narrative using available internet resources – those which construct and sustain it in public memory as both spectacle and political statement. This approach therefore also infers the critical role the media played at the time – and continues to play – in producing and reproducing discourses around gender relations, in this case through the lens of tennis.

Social and political context The early 1970s in the United States was an important time both for the feminist movement and for women’s tennis. At the intersection of the two stood Billie Jean King. The year before King met Riggs on the court, Ms. Magazine published its first regular issue. Mary Tyler Moore was playing the single, independent woman Mary Richards on TV, conveying the message to women ‘you might just make it after all’ in the working world. The Supreme Court heard the oral arguments for the landmark case Roe v. Wade and, in January 1973, ruled that women in the United States had a constitutional right to access abortion. The Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), after nearly 50 years of failure, finally passed through both the US Senate and the House of Representatives in 1972 and was sent to the states for ratification.The ERA would have codified in the Constitution that ‘equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex’. It ultimately failed because only 35 of the necessary 38 states signed off on it, but the two years it had the most support were 1972 and 1973. However, that was not the end of the story for women’s rights; on 23 June 1972, President Nixon signed Title IX of the Education Amendments into law, albeit with little national fanfare. It was only 37 words long but broad in scope: ‘No person in the United States shall, on the basis 423

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of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any educational program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance’. While the statute outlawed discrimination in all aspects of education, over time, it was interpreted most famously to cover equity in sports (Schulman 2002). Thus, three things explain the popularity of the Battle of the Sexes within the media and, therefore, popular culture: the when, the who and the where. At the end of 1972, King was named “Sportswoman of the Year” by Sports Illustrated – the first-ever woman to receive the title. Curry Kirkpatrick wrote in the accompanying article that King earned the honor because she ‘swept the Big Three tennis championships and, at 29, earned over $100,000 for the second straight year, the only woman ever to do so’ (Kirkpatrick 1972, 25 December). Unsurprisingly, he did not say she was also famous for taking on the male establishment in tennis with regard to the issue of equal treatment of male and female players. The first year of the Open Era, 1968, King won Wimbledon, her third title there, and she received £750. The men’s champion, Rod Laver, received £2,000 (Shephard 2016, p.31). By 1970, King was fed up. She found out that the International Federation of Tennis was holding 34 tournaments for men and only 19 for women. Then a tournament that year listed the men’s winning prize as $12,500 and the women’s at $1,500. It was at that point that King and eight other women – so named the “Original 9” – broke away from the United States Lawn Tennis Association (USLTA), signed symbolic $1 contracts and formed their own tour – the Virginia Slims Tour (Roberts 2005, p.75-81). King told Kirkpatrick that female tennis players ‘don’t want to compete against men. We just want the opportunity to get into sports programs at all levels’. Alas, five months later, a woman would play a man, when Margaret Court met Bobby Riggs in what became known as ‘the Mother’s Day Massacre’. On 13 May 1973, Riggs handily beat Court, 6–2, 6–1, in 57 minutes. Court was not King and she did not foresee the match as being the politically charged event that King believed it to be. In her book A Necessary Spectacle: Billie Jean King, Bobby Riggs, and the Tennis Match That Leveled the Game, Selena Roberts described how King took the news that Court would play Riggs: ‘King said to her, ‘Margaret, I’m just going to ask one thing of you: You have to win this match’.When Court did not seem to grasp the seriousness of this directive, King continued: ‘No, I mean it. You have to win this match. You have no idea how important this is’ (Roberts 2005, p.16). Tellingly, soon after Court’s defeat, King agreed to play Riggs. At a press conference before the “Battle”, she told reporters, ‘that pride as a woman athlete mattered “a lot more than money” to her’ (Amdur 1973, 20 September, p.57).

Approaching the battle In between the two matches that Riggs played against these women, King stayed busy. Before Wimbledon in the summer of 1973, she convinced 64 of the top female players to unionize under the banner of the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA). She then won Wimbledon for the fifth time. The USLTA, which had put up a women’s tour to compete against the independent Virginia Slims circuit, finally gave in. According to Roberts (2005, p.81), ‘the USLTA brass soon surrendered to fiscal reality, asking, ‘Why not one circuit and one prize pot for all?’ Promising an equal purse at the US Open – the first major title to make such a gesture – the USLTA merged with the Virginia Slims to form one tour’. Additionally, the US Open agreed to the equal prize money because Ban deodorant put $55,000 into the purse (Keese 1973, 20 July, p.19). Just 12 days before King was due to play Riggs, Margaret Court sprang back from her defeat at his hands to win the US Open – she earned the same amount of money as the men’s champion. 424

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The timing of the Battle was crucial, both socially and politically. In 2015, King told Maggie Gray of Sports Illustrated, ‘A lot of players have been trying to get it to happen again. It won’t be the same, though. It just won’t. It won’t have the same cachet’. In fact, there have been numerous tennis matches pitting men and against women in the 45 years since the Battle. Over the years, Jimmy Connors beat Martina Navratilova; Karsten Braasch played both Venus and Serena Williams for a set each, beating them both; Yannick Noah defeated Justine Henin; and Li Na beat Novak Djokovic 3–2 (Gildea 1992, 26 September; Harwitt 2017, 21 January). Indeed, these did not have the same cachet. The “when” of the match, therefore, cannot alone explain the Battle’s ongoing popularity, decades later. ‘In my work for the Women’s Political Caucus’, King told Sports Illustrated in 1972, ‘I think of myself as a woman, not an athlete, and yet what makes me valuable is that I’m a tennis star’ (Kirkpatrick 1972, 25 December). Many years later, King expressed to author Susan Ware why that value mattered: ‘It’s easier to change attitudes through sports. Sports are a visual example of what the world can be’ (Ware 2011, p.10). King did not meet Riggs on opposite ends of a boardroom table. They did not face off in a restaurant kitchen. They did not each submit a newspaper article on the same subject. They were fully in public view on a tennis court. This was sports, not only a space occupied by men but one of the leading places within American society where ideas about masculinity were formulated and exhibited. ‘Athletics have long been the province of men’, Susan K. Cahn wrote in the introduction of her seminal book Coming On Strong: Gender and Sexuality in Women’s Sport. ‘In the Western world, not only have men dominated the playing fields, but athletic qualities such as aggression, competitiveness, strength, speed, power, and teamwork have been associated with masculinity’ (Cahn 2015, p.3). This long history of sport being a space for men (or, really, a space absent of women) meant that King’s moment was a disruption in the understanding of not only what a woman could do, but also who got to be powerful, aggressive, strong and a winner. In 1973, King’s star and the interest in women’s tennis were rising against a backdrop of the political movement for women’s equality. Then she went onto men’s turf, literally. And she won.

Situating King’s achievement Whenever anyone asks King about the impact of that match, she tells a similar story. People can remember exactly where they were that day, it’s really amazing. I get men and women coming up to me saying, “It changed my life”. … Guys come up to me with tears in their eyes and say, “I have a daughter now”. Women come up to me and say, “You gave me more self-confidence to ask for a raise”, or to do something they didn’t think they could do before. (Shephard 2016, p.38) ‘Every single day of my life since that match, I could never even go out the door from the apartment without somebody asking me it. I have not gone through one day since 1973 without somebody telling me their story’ (Sports Illustrated 2015, 9 September). Billie Jean King’s impact on the public demonstrates that she was right to believe that sport was the vehicle through which women could change the world. Title IX has also radically altered the landscape of women’s sport. On the 45th anniversary of its passing in 2017, the Women’s Sports Foundation – an organization founded by King in 1974 – observed, ‘Before Title IX, only one in 27 girls played sports. Today, that number is two in five. This shows a dramatic increase in participation rates of over 900%’ (Olmstead 2017, 23 June). Those numbers 425

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are only for the United States, but there have also been significant gains throughout the world in creating more participation opportunities for girls and women in sport. At the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, a record number of close to 4,700 women competed, which was 45% of all Olympic athletes present at the event. There were also a record number of 28 women’s sports showcased (International Olympic Committee 2016). The highly visible work done by King, as well as many others to promote and, in the US, institutionalize women’s sport through Title IX, has given us a better understanding of how important girls and women’s participation in sport is – not just in their lives, but also within their societies. Everyone benefits when girls and women get to play sports. In 2007, the United Nations published a study titled, “Women, Gender Equality, and Sport”.The UN was interested in the benefits girls and women receive from participating in sport and what kind of obstacles they face in doing so. ‘In addition to improvements in health, women and girls stand to gain specific social benefits from participation in sport and physical activity’, the introduction to the study states. It continues: Sport provides women and girls with an alternative avenue for participation in the social and cultural life of their communities and promotes enjoyment of freedom of expression, interpersonal networks, new opportunities and increased self-esteem. It also expands opportunities for education and for the development of a range of essential life skills, including communication, leadership, teamwork and negotiation. (United Nations 2007, December) Barbara Kotschwar, a professor of Latin American studies and economics, wrote in 2014, ‘Allowing girls the same access to sports as boys can help them stay healthier, perform better in school, and do better in the labor market’ (Kotschwar 2014, p.3). And when a society has better gender equity, economic growth follows, according to Appelbaum et al. (2014, 15 April) and Duflo (2012). For Kotschwar, the next step is obvious: ‘Given the much-cited and tested benefits of gender equity, equalizing access to sports should be a priority for policymakers in countries where gaps persist, particularly in developing countries’, in large part because sports are ‘an effective and relatively low cost vehicle for boosting countries’ gender equity performance’. When one society benefits from this growth, it has been shown that others do, too.The US State Department has partners with the University of Tennessee’s Center for Sport, Peace & Society and espnW to run the Global Sports Mentoring Program. According to the program’s website, it draws ‘on the principles of Title IX – the landmark US law that afforded equality for American women in sports and education’ to create global initiatives that spread this idea of gender equality in sport worldwide (Global Sports Mentoring Program).Yet, the issues of financial and social equity that Billie Jean King stepped on the court to advocate for in 1973 are still ever-pressing issues, both within sport and well beyond.

Tennis back in the spotlight In 1984, 11 years after the US Open first did it, the Australian Open offered equal prize money for the first time. Then, over the next 17 years, the tournament varied the purses. In 1987 and 1988, women made slightly more than the men. In 1995, the tournament organizers said the men’s matches were getting higher rankings and so, for five years, women made less. Finally, in 2001, equal prize money became the official rule. The French Open followed suit in 2006 (Popovich 2015, 11 September). A Venus Williams-led campaign convinced the All England Lawn Tennis Club to join the other three. In 2007, when Williams was once more 426

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Wimbledon champion, she became the first women to be awarded equal prize money for that effort (Duvernay 2013). It is only in the Grand Slams that female tennis players make the same as their male counterparts. Otherwise, they generally make less.Yet, still, the debate over whether female tennis players should get equal prize money in Grand Slam tournaments continues. Not least, it is conditioned by the kind of attitude expressed in 2016 by Raymond Moore. He was the tournament director and CEO of the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells, California, and, when asked about the WTA, responded: In my next life when I come back I want to be someone in the WTA, (laughter) because they ride on the coattails of the men. They don’t make any decisions and they are lucky. They are very, very lucky. If I was a lady player, I’d go down every night on my knees and thank God that Roger Federer and Rafa Nadal were born, because they have carried this sport. They really have. (Tennis Panorama News 2016, 20 March) When Serena Williams was asked about Moore’s comments, she said, ‘Obviously I don’t think any woman should be down on their knees thanking anybody like that’. Then she shifted to talk about her own popularity within the game: ‘If I could tell you every day how many people say they don’t watch tennis unless they’re watching myself or my sister, I couldn’t even bring up that number. So I don’t think that is a very accurate statement’. She also brought some hard evidence to bear, noting that at the US Open the year before, the women’s final sold out before the men’s. ‘I’m sorry’, Williams said, ‘did Roger play in that final or Rafa or any man play in that final that was sold out before the men’s final? I think not’ (Tennis Panorama News 2016, 20 March). Moore apologized and then he voluntarily resigned less than a day after making the remarks. Novak Djokovic, then No.1, chose that moment to say that the (men’s) Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) ‘should fight for more because the stats are showing that we have much more spectators on the men’s tennis matches. I think that’s one of the, you know, reasons why maybe we should get awarded more’ (Press Association 2016, 21 March). When he said this, he was in the midst of a calendar year where he would pull down $55.8 million in earnings from tennis. He had already earned more than $20 million in the 2015 season, the first player ever to do so, and was months away from becoming the first tennis player ever to earn more than $100 million total prize money. Indeed, by the summer of 2017, he was estimated as having amassed a lifetime prize money amount of approximately $108 million (Forbes 2017, 12 June). These earnings are worthy of comparison with those of Serena Williams, who turned professional eight years before Djokovic. Over her career, she has earned $84 million in prize money, which is more than double the next closest woman. And in 2016, she earned a total of $28.9 million with earnings and endorsements (Badenhausen 2016, 6 June). Both Williams and Djokovic were well under Federer’s $67.8 million that year (ATP Staff 2016, 22 September). The examples of Djokovic and Williams demonstrate that a huge disparity in rewards still exists between the men’s and women’s games. But those who argue that women deserve less than men, whether that be on the basis of sets played or seats sold, are missing the point: as King told the New York Times in 2016, ‘We have a chance to continue to lead. To have equal prize money in the majors sends a message. It’s not about the money, it’s about the message’ (Rothenberg 2016, 12 April). The message pay equity conveys is that female athletes are worth the same as their male colleagues, that female athletes are not inferior or lesser versions of the men who play on the same courts as them. 427

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Beyond the value attributed to players by money, there are other inequities within tennis. Angelina Chaplin, in an article for Racquet, wrote, During Grand Slams fewer women’s matches are held on main-stage courts.Women receive less media coverage than the men, and the coverage they do get is all too often sexist. … Only three of the top 50 women’s players have female coaches, and there’s only a few women in powerful organizational positions. (Chapin 2017, p.46) That said, tennis fares better than almost all other sports when it comes to gender equity. For example, in 2016, Bill Littlefield wrote an article titled, ‘No Matter The Sport, Women Athletes Are Always Paid Less’. Littlefield touched on how national women’s teams are underpaid compared to men, and how organizations allocate resources and funding in wildly unequal ways. He quotes economist Andrew Zimbalist, saying that FIFA (the international governing body of association football), rewards men’s teams 30-to-1 as compared to women’s, and how even at professional level, female players receive a smaller percentage of the revenues than the men do from their respective leagues (Littlefield 2016, 16 April). In recent years, both the US women’s soccer team and the US women’s ice hockey teams have fought for more money and resources (Evans 2017, 29 March). Title IX has been hugely important and has inarguably created many more opportunities for girls and women to play sport than ever would have existed without it. Even so, Title IX is rarely, if ever, enforced as well as it should be. A 2016 Vice Sports report found that ‘many NCAA Division I athletic programs may not be fully compliant with Title IX’ because universities have disparity in athletic aid between men’s and women’s programs, low participation rates for women’s sports or are ‘overstuffing the rosters of inexpensive sports such as women’s rowing and counting the male practice player opponents used by many teams as female athletes’ (Trahan 2016, 15 June). This is true on the high school level, too (Wong 2015, 26 June). There are other ways that gender inequity shows up in sport.The numbers of female coaches is dropping in most women’s sports and in men’s sports they are few and far between (Longman 2017, 30 March). A rare exception to this rule – coincidently found in tennis – was the relatively short-lived partnership (2014–6) between British player Andy Murray and his French player-turned-coach Amélie Maresmo (Mitchell 2016, 9 May). Sports media is created by an overwhelming percentage of men, what they produce mostly focuses on men’s sports and what coverage they do of women’s sports is often sexist (Gibbs 2017, 14 July; Kroh 2015, 12 June; Morrison 2014, 19 February). To quote a phrase which has become common currency among those rooting for women’s equality in sport and elsewhere, ‘If you can’t see it, you can’t be it’. The chance that Lesley Visser saw in King’s win in 1973 has yet to be realized in many ways in society at large. According to the United Nations, ‘Globally, women are paid less than men. Women in most countries earn on average only 60 to 75 per cent of men’s wages’. They are disproportionally responsible for unpaid care and domestic work, and ‘more women than men work in vulnerable, low-paid, or undervalued jobs’ (UN Women 2017a). In the US, the pay gap is worst at the intersection of race and gender. In 2017, Serena Williams wrote a piece addressing the staggering pay gap for black women: I’d like to acknowledge the many realities black women face every day. To recognize that women of color have to work – on average – eight months longer to earn the same as their male counterparts do in one year.To bring attention to the fact that black women earn 17% less than their white female counterparts and that black women are paid 63% of the dollar 428

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men are paid. Even black women who have earned graduate degrees get paid less at every level. This is as true in inner cities as it is in Silicon Valley. (Williams 2017, 31 July) There are gender inequities throughout the world in healthcare (Nordell 2017, 11 January), education (UNESCO 2017, 3 March), science and technology, (Elsevier 2017, 6 February), business (Wolfers 2015, 2 March), politics (UN Woman 2017b) and in becoming victims of sexual and/or domestic violence (World Health Organization 2017, November). Thus, while it is possible to argue that women have come a long way since 1973, we still have a long way to go.

Conclusion A few years back, ESPN published a piece suggesting the Battle of the Sexes was rigged. The claim was based, firstly, on the word of one man who said he overheard other men planning the fix; secondly, what people believed about Riggs’ character; and, thirdly, the author’s close scrutiny of the match video (Von Natta Jr. 2013, 25 August). Shortly before they played the match, Lorne Kuhle, a close friend of Riggs, told the New York Times that Riggs would win because of the money involved. ‘There’s really too much money on the line for him to lose’ (Amdur 1973, 20 September, p.60). Two months before Riggs died in 1995, he did a long Q&A interview with the New York Times. The interviewer asked him if he threw the match. ‘She outplayed me’, Riggs said. ‘There are no secrets. She surprised me … I took the lie detector test from F. Lee Bailey and passed the test, which proved I did not throw the match. She won fair and square’ (Stevenson 1995, 27 August). How the outcome of the match was achieved does not matter in the end. The narrative that will outlast them all will be that Billie Jean King’s win became a driving force for decades within sports and beyond in the struggle for gender and women’s equality. Moreover, the Battle remains as relevant now as it did in 1973 because, as examples in this chapter show, that struggle continues. Thus, the Battle can be understood as both old and new, historical and present all at once. In 1972, King told Sports Illustrated, ‘Many people consider me radical, but 10 years from now my ideas will seem antiquated’ (Kirkpatrick 1972, 25 December). On this, she was unfortunately proved wrong. The gender politics at the center of the match are with us still and what King represented – financial and social equity – are still dreams to pursue, not goals met.

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42 Break point Renée Richards and the significance of sex and gender in women’s tennis Lindsay Parks Pieper

In the 1976 La Jolla Junior Veteran’s Championship, California, newcomer Rene Clarke defeated top-seeded favorite Robin Harris, 6-1, 6-1. Clarke’s powerful performance, coupled with her 6’2 frame and rookie status, awed the crowds. San Diego broadcast journalist Dick Carlson was particularly impressed. He set out to air an uncontroversial piece on the local star; yet, his segment became a sensational story dissected across the US. Carlson’s research uncovered that Clarke was an alias for Renée Richards, former men’s tennis player Richard Raskind (Birrell & Cole 1990; Pieper 2012). The victory of a male-to-female transgender competitor at the La Jolla tennis tournament immediately raised concerns. Richards’s presence seemingly upended the local tournament’s eligibility divisions. She also challenged longstanding assumptions about men and women in sport. Most notably, beliefs of male biological advantage in physical endeavors underpinned much of the protest against her. Those who opposed Richards’s inclusion in women’s competitions claimed that she possessed an innate masculine edge that could not be remedied by surgery or hormone treatments. Outcries about fairness went hand-in-hand with such complaints. Moreover, Richards surfaced at a time when female tennis players had just started to chip away at inequalities and earn equal prize money to the men (Cahn 1994; King & Starr 1988; Lichtenstein 1974; Schultz 2014). Unsurprisingly, the opposition swelled when she announced her desire to compete at the 1976 US Open, a preeminent and lucrative tennis tournament. Espousing similar ideals about biological advantage and level playing fields, the United States Tennis Association (USTA) and Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) quickly barred Richards from the US Open. The two organizations introduced a chromosome test for all female applicants, thereby limiting eligibility to those with an XX chromosomal composition (Birrell & Cole 1990; DeMartinia 2014; Pieper 2012). According to the USTA, ‘entry into women’s events at the US Open … of persons not genetically female would introduce an element of inequality and unfairness’ (USTA Press Release 1976). In the same vein, New York Times writer Neil Amdur (1976, p.B10) surmised the WTA’s ‘party line’ as ‘it’s damn unfair to a woman who has devoted her whole life to tennis to lose a spot in a draw to a man.’ Richards responded with a lawsuit that claimed the Barr body test violated her rights under the New York State Human Rights Law, which prohibits discrimination in employment. Her legal victory in the New York

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State Supreme Court opened the door for her inclusion at the 1977 US Open, where she lost to Virginia Wade in the first round, 1-6, 4-6. This chapter examines Richards’ plight in tennis, which occurred against the backdrop of the burgeoning women’s liberation movement.Yet, the belief in male biological advantage, combined with the recent strides female tennis players had made in the sport, convinced the USTA and WTA to enact a policy to ban Richards. Her successful lawsuit and ensuing career seemed to challenge the dichotomous nature of sex and question the correctness of men’s and women’s divisions in sport; however, her inclusion actually reaffirmed a belief in binary sex and polarized gender. The court permitted her participation because she cast herself as appropriately feminine and drastically weakened by hormones. Richards’ story and the opposition she experienced thereby demonstrate critical issues regarding sex and gender in tennis.

The fight for equality in women’s tennis Richards burst onto the scene just as female athletes were gaining ground in US sport. As sport scholar Jaime Schultz (2014, p.123–4) explains, the word ‘revolution’ is often used to describe the advancements in women’s athletics in the 1970s. In conjunction with the larger women’s liberation movement, female pioneers started to demand access into areas traditionally reserved for men, including sport. Feminist thought ‘challenged the monolith that was men’s sports, pried open the small, insular world of women’s sports, and caused fundamental change in both’ (Ware 2011, p.11). Moreover, Title IX, which prohibited sex discrimination in federally funded programs, significantly increased sporting opportunities for girls and women (Carpenter & Acosta 2000). For example, in 1971, 294,000 girls competed in interscholastic sport; by 1979, the number increased to more than two million (Schultz 2014, p.130-1). Recognizing the significant progression, Sports Illustrated enthusiastically labeled 1974 the “Year of the Woman in Sport”. No sport experienced a greater expansion in female opportunities than tennis. As sport scholars Mary A. Boutilier and Lucinda SanGiovanni (1983, p.39) rhetorically ask, ‘Who could possibly write about the female sporting revolution without mentioning tennis?’ Changes first commenced in 1968 with the start of the “open era,” which allowed professional players to compete with amateurs.This, in turn, increased both the occasions for participation and the available prize money. Unfortunately, the financial adjustments largely benefited the men (King 1974; Marple 1983). For example, at the 1968 Wimbledon, the first staged in the open era, the purse for male tennis players was almost double that for the women. When US standout Billie Jean King defeated Australian Judy Tegart in the championship match, King earned £750 and Tegart £450. In contrast, Rod Laver pocketed £2,000 for his victory, while Tony Roche took home £1,300 for second place. As tennis historian Susan Ware (2011, p.31) notes, ‘having won round one to take the sport professional, women now found out that they had to fight a second battle: to get gender equity for women professionals’. Therefore, in 1969, four female players joined the women’s auxiliary of the National Tennis League (NTL): Rosie Casals, Françoise Dürr, Ann Haydon Jones and King. Although the women’s division of the NTL was short-lived – it folded after just one year – the league was an important step in the fight for equality in tennis. Women took an even more significant stand one year later at the 1970 Pacific Southwest Championships. The Southern Californian tournament organizers did not even attempt to hide the gender disparity in payouts: they offered $12,500 to men and $1,500 to women. Female tennis players were also not guaranteed any financial compensation unless they made it to the quarterfinals (Ware 2011, p.31).‘It became pretty clear that it was a sport controlled by men who were unwilling to even think about giving women a fair shake when it came down to the nitty-gritty – money,’ King (1974, p.99) wrote at the time. Angered by the flagrant gender disparity, Ceci Martinez and 433

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Esme Emanuel demanded women receive equal prize money.When Jack Kramer, executive of the Pacific Southwest Championships, flatly refused, Gladys Heldman, founder and publisher of World Tennis magazine, organized a separate women’s-only tournament. Nine women risked expulsion from the USTA and each signed a $1 contract to join her competition, thereby founding the Virginia Slims Tour. Although the Virginia Slims Tour started on a shaky footing, it quickly brought acclaim and money to the sport. By 1971, the tour officially debuted with 19 tournaments and a total purse of $309,100.Two years later, the success of the Virginia Slims Tour pushed King to found the WTA, the principal organizing body of women’s professional tennis (King & Starr 1988). Also in 1973, for the first time, women who competed in the US Open earned equal prize money to the men – a notable increase from the 12:1 ratio in compensation offered at the Pacific Southwest Championships just three years earlier. The WTA continued to increase its financial sustainability with a CBS television contract in 1975. And in 1976, Chris Evert became the first female tennis player to earn over one million dollars in a single year. It was within this profitable environment that Richards emerged.

The qualifications of womanhood Richards started her tennis career as Richard Raskind. She showed athletic promise as an adolescent and was a four-sport athlete at the Horace Mann School, competing in baseball, football, swimming and tennis. Her skills eventually led her to captain the Yale University varsity men’s tennis team (Richards 1983). As a Bulldog, she won the Men’s Eastern Junior Indoor Championships in 1953. Richards graduated from Yale shortly thereafter and continued her education at the University of Rochester Medical School, where she specialized in ophthalmology. Upon graduation in 1959, she returned to New York City to complete an internship at the Lennox Hill Hospital then finish her residency at the Manhattan Eye, Ear and Throat Hospital. During this time, she also continued to play tennis competitively. In 1964, Richards won the New York State men’s clay court title and, six years later, was ranked sixth nationally in the men’s 35-and-over division. By 1974, she dropped to 13th in that category. Despite starting a medical practice and accruing several on-court accolades, Richards was tormented. As she recalled in her 1984 autobiography, she felt more feminine than masculine. Richards explained that she copied other men’s mannerisms and behaviors in order to abide by societal expectations of masculinity. ‘My feeling for appropriate masculine behavior came from more observation and impersonation than it did from any internal mechanism,’ she wrote in her autobiography (1983, p.111). Richards therefore bought motorcycles, drove fast cars and dated a string of women. The efforts failed to calm her discontent. ‘A lot of times I was like a man from a foreign country trying to blend in with the population,’ she explained (1983, p.111). In 1975, Richards decided to undergo gender reassignment surgery and moved to California to start a new life as Renée. It was her victory in the La Jolla tournament that ended her anonymity. Carlson’s expose on Richards caused concern and sparked backlash. Both the USTA and WTA – in line with most sport organizations – divided participation into men’s and women’s categories. Although this split was enmeshed in tennis almost from the beginning of organized competitions, neither the USTA nor the WTA had ever identified the line that separated men from women.The question Richards’s presence raised was: how does a sport organization determine a competitor’s sex? While the USTA and WTA debated the matter, Gene Scott, organizer of the Tennis Week Open in New Jersey, a leading tournament used as a warm-up for the US Open, welcomed Richards’s participation.‘I accepted her on the basis of a gynecological affirmation she is a woman,’ he explained.‘There is no rule in tennis that any tests must be used to determine what a woman is’ 434

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(Nevada State Journal 1976, p.11). Rather than rely on chromosomes, Scott argued that Richards’s physical appearance, including her anatomy, breast development and lack of facial hair, proved her womanhood. He also pointed out that Richards had lost over 30 pounds of muscle due to reassignment surgery and hormone therapy, and was therefore a much weaker player than in the past (Aiken Standard 1976, p.10A). While his unfettered acceptance of her was commendable, Scott’s justifications for her inclusion played into the belief that conventional gender norms, such as women’s lesser abilities in sport, verified sex. Some female competitors viewed the situation differently. Also reaffirming the assumption of male superiority in sport, they argued that the inclusion of a male-to-female transgender athlete in the women’s division disrupted the level playing field. For example, Tennis Week Open’s number two seed, Ann Kiyomura, argued that ‘We all feel she’s still a man and it’s just not fair’ (Dunn 1976, B4). Others lamented that a former man would cash in on the recent monetary progress of women’s tennis. As Richards recalled in a later interview, some believed ‘I was potentially taking money from the women’ (Pieper 2009). Such anxieties about fairness and finances convinced 25 of the originally slated 32 players to withdraw from Tennis Week Open. The WTA sympathized with the athletes and similarly withdrew its sanction from the tournament. WTA Executive Director Jerry Diamond explained that the organization decided to remove its approval because ‘a biological male has been admitted to the women’s tournament’ (New York Times 1976, p.34). The WTA organized a separate event down the road in Westchester to accommodate those who opted to forgo the Tennis Week Open. It should be noted that not all women opposed Richards. A handful acknowledged that if they denied Richards’s inclusion based upon assertions of fairness, then they inadvertently supported claims of men’s superiority in the sport.These women therefore pushed aside the notion of athletic inadequacy and sought to prove their talent by defeating her on the court. One of the first to publicly support Richards was Gladys Heldman, founder of the Virginia Slims Tour. A few weeks after the La Jolla Tournament, she argued that ‘Renee Richards is a woman. She is a woman by law. She has a passport and a driver’s license. She is a woman. She is not a man masquerading as a woman’ (Ryan 1976, p.D1). Perhaps most significantly, Billie Jean King also approved of Richards’s inclusion. She told the New York Times (Amdur 1977) that ‘Renée Richards is a human being, another tennis player and I want to beat her like anyone else.’ Heldman and King seemed to recognize that to dispute Richards’s entrance would signify their adherence to the belief of male athletic dominance, which would counter their claims that women deserved equality in the sport. As Richards continued to compete, and proved beatable – an important point as her losses seemingly contradicted the theory of insurmountable male advantage – other women also welcomed her. Nevertheless, the USTA and WTA remained firm in their belief that Richards posed a threat to women’s tennis. Upon learning of Richards’s win in La Jolla, Jean Brinkman, the promotion director for the Virginia Slims Tour, commented that ‘for the first time in the history of tennis a man has won a women’s tournament’ (Herman 1976, p.16). She also noted the possibility that the USTA and WTA would implement some type of exam as an eligibility prerequisite. This offhand remark eventually became the reality.

Chromosomal eligibility in sport When Richards publicly announced her decision to compete in the 1976 US Open, the USTA and WTA quickly enacted a rule change. For the first time in tennis history, the two organizations required all female competitors undergo a chromosomal check prior to participation. The USTA and WTA justified the measure in two ways. First, they rationalized that the test was necessary to uphold fairness in tennis. According to Diamond, ‘a man has greater strength than 435

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a woman. … What they do to themselves is irrelevant’ (Paris News 1976, p.15). Assumptions of a male competitive edge buttressed these arguments. Second, the two tennis authorities followed the example set by the International Olympic Committee (IOC). In 1968, the IOC implemented compulsory sex testing for all female Olympians. As George Gowen, USTA general counsel, put it, the IOC ‘chromosome test is considered a reasonable screening test’ for female eligibility, including in tennis (Nevada State Journal 1976, p.11). Although the IOC introduced the policy based on (unfounded) fears of male masqueraders, the USTA’s and WTA’s later embracement of the practice followed the same faulty logic: that the chromosome control erased unfair masculine advantages from women’s sport. In the 1968 Grenoble Winter Olympics, the IOC implemented the Barr body test, a scientific technique that used cheek cells to identify chromosomes. The IOC reasoned that an individual’s chromosomal composition dictated his/her sex. Because the IOC believed that male Olympians possessed an edge over female Olympians, men did not undergo comparable screening.The IOC believed the method successfully deterred male masqueraders and extended testing to all women competitors in the 1968 Mexico City Summer Olympics (Cahn 1994; Pieper 2016;Schultz 2014).Tennis was a demonstration sport that year, which meant that female tennis players did not undergo the control. Although tennis was not an official Olympic sport until 1988, the WTA and USTA had the Barr body test at their disposal in 1968. The two organizations only opted to introduce it as an eligibility requirement in 1976, the year Richards demanded inclusion in the women’s bracket of the US Open. A USTA press release clarified the sudden change, noting that ‘persons competing as women in the US Open Tennis Championships will be required to undergo sex determination tests (sometimes referred to as the chromosome test) as used by the Olympics’ (USTA Press Release 1976). Diamond verified the WTA’s position that ‘if she [Richards] can pass the IOC test that she is genetically a woman, then she can play women’s tennis’ (Paris News 1976, p.15). Richards refused and instead took her fight from the court to the courtroom.

Richards’s legal victory: a reaffirmation of a binary The IOC, USTA, and WTA all faced criticism upon introducing the Barr body test into competition. Medical practitioners cautioned that the singular use of the chromosomal check in the determination of sex was inaccurate. Five Danish doctors penned one of the earliest protests against the IOC’s practice. They argued that several factors constituted sex and the IOC’s focus on chromosomal composition was ‘irresponsible from medical point of view, and unethical’ (A Memorandum on the Use of Sex Chromatin 1972). Others joined in opposing the IOC; however, Olympic leaders ignored their claims and continued testing. Richards opposed the USTA and WTA’s policy along similar lines in the courtroom. Put simply, she argued that the Barr body test ‘is not infallible proof of sexual identity’ (Richards 1983, p.343). The New York State Supreme Court agreed. While Richards’s legal victory seemed poised to dismantle the IOC’s practice, in actuality the decision only extended to her participation in women’s tennis. Moreover, because Richards’s outward feminine appearance and diminished skills helped sway the judge, the ruling reified a gender binary and sex divide in sport. One month prior to the 1977 US Open, Justice Alfred M. Ascione heard Richards case. The first question was the reliability of the chromosome test in the determination of sex. Richards’s legal team argued that the USTA and WTA’s reliance on the Barr body test was ‘insufficient, grossly unfair, inaccurate, faulty and inequitable’ (Richards v. United States Tennis Assn. [1977], p.2). Her doctors provided further evidence of this position by noting that a variety of factors, from anatomy to genetics, constitute sex. The USTA countered by highlighting the IOC’s use 436

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of chromosomes as the international standard ‘to assure fairness and equality of competition’ (Richards v. United States Tennis Assn. [1977], p.3). The next issue revolved around the definition of womanhood. On behalf of Richards, sexologist John Money testified that one’s sex – and hence by extension womanhood – depended upon an assortment of factors, including anatomy, chromosomes, genitals, hormones and psychology. Daniel Federman, the chair of the Department of Medicine at Stanford Medical School, refuted Money’s claims and argued that the Y chromosome was the most significant element in the determination of male sex. He also suggested that certain elements of maleness remained permanently immutable, offering credence to the USTA’s claims of unfairness. Finally, and most persuasively, female tennis players offered their opinions.The affidavits centered on competitive advantage. On the one side, Billie Jean King again trumpeted Richards’s right to compete. She concluded that Richards did ‘not enjoy physical superiority or strength so as to have an advantage over women competitors in the sport of tennis.’ On the other, Françoise Dürr, Janet Newberry, Kristien K. Shaw, and Vicki Berner claimed that the benefits possessed by male-to-female transgender athletes were insurmountable, and thus Richards should be barred (Richards v. United States Tennis Assn. [1977], p.6). Justice Ascione weighed the evidence and ruled in favor of Richards. He found the singular use of the Barr body test in eligibility decisions ‘grossly unfair, discriminatory and inequitable.’ While he acknowledged that a chromosome test could be one part of the process, Ascione ruled that it ‘is not and should not be the sole criterion’ in the determination of sex. He also argued that ‘the unfounded fears and misconceptions of defendants must give way to the overwhelming medical evidence that this person is now female.’ The justice also pointed out that ‘as the result of the administration of female hormones, she has the muscular and fat composition of a female.’ His decision cleared Richards for the 1977 US Open (Richards v. United States Tennis Assn. [1977]). Many people applauded the victory as a step forward for transgender rights; however, the decision was limited to Richards’s participation and did not create blanket acceptance for transgender athletes in sport. In his ruling, Ascione clarified that the court was ‘not striking down the Barr body test’. He instead suggested sport practitioners employ other checks when ‘the circumstances warrant consideration of other factors’ (Richards v. United States Tennis Assn. [1977], p.6). For Richards specifically, the warranted circumstances included her conventionally feminine appearance, medical history, and diminished tennis capabilities. Therefore the New York State Supreme Court ruling guaranteed that any future questions would be decided on case-by-case basis. It also did little to alter the mindset of the Olympic authorities. Moreover, by merely modifying the boundaries of womanhood to include Richards, Ascione’s decision served to uphold both conventional gender norms and the sex divide. Richards’s legal victory stemmed from her ability to convince the court that she did not pose a threat, verified through her weakened physique and muscle loss. Richards was permitted to play because she reaffirmed, rather than dismantled, the dichotomous divide. She thus competed in the 1977 US Open, where she lost in the first round to Virginia Wade, 1-6, 4-6. Although she never dominated her opponents as many originally feared, she did find some success in doubles. In her first US Open, she reached the finals with Betty Ann Grubb Stuart, and the semi-finals in mixed doubles with Ilie Năstase. In 1981, she ended her career and retired from the sport.

Conclusion Richards quietly returned to her ophthalmology practice and remained out of the headlines for several years. Then, in 2003, the IOC introduced a policy that, on the surface, seemed to open 437

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the door for transgender athletes in Olympic competition. Known as the Stockholm Consensus, the IOC’s guidelines initially stipulated that transgender athletes undergo anatomical surgery, obtain legal identification and undergo hormone treatment prior to competition (IOC Medical Commission 2003). Despite the appearance of inclusivity, scholars criticized the regulations as western in orientation, limited to affluent individuals and merely a reaffirmation of the sex and gender divide in sport (Cavanagh & Sykes 2006; Sykes 2006). Pushback eventually convinced the IOC to outline new guidelines in 2015.1 In the wake of the Stockholm Consensus, Richards briefly returned to the spotlight. In a 2007 interview, she denied participating in the movement for transgender rights. ‘I’m not politically or socially what ordinary people would call an activist,’ she argued (Giltz 2007). In a different interview that same year, Richards disapprovingly reflected upon her fight for acceptance on the women’s tour. With what author Belinda Goldsmith described as ‘an unmistakable air of sadness,’ Richards expressed regret. ‘I made the fateful decision to go and fight the legal battle and be able to play as a woman and stay in the public eye and become this symbol,’ she explained. ‘I could have lived a more private life but I chose not to’ (Goldsmith 2007).Yet, even more surprising, Richards publicly opposed the Stockholm Consensus, which would have permitted her inclusion in the 1970s. According to Richards, the IOC’s decision to allow transgender athletes into the Olympic Games is ‘a particularly stupid decision’ (Walder 2007). In a different interview she clarified ‘that they made a big mistake because … I know from my experience that if I had had the operation when I was 20 and was trying to play on tour at 22, I would have had a tremendous advantage’ (Pieper 2009). As with much of the debate about Richards, issues of gender and sex center on the question of supposed advantage. Sex and gender collided on court when Richards fought for entrance into the women’s tour in 1976. She appeared at a time when women had just started to gain respect in sport and claim prize money in tennis. That Richards’s emergence coincided with such strides convinced some that she merely sought to reap women’s newly earned rewards. In tandem with this concern, fears of an unfair advantage regularly thwarted her desire to compete professionally. Female tennis players, the USTA and the WTA argued Richards possessed an unfair edge; their arguments were influenced by the larger societal belief of natural male dominance in sport. Likewise, though the New York Supreme Court granted her the right to compete, the decision only extended the opportunity to her and upheld tennis’s binary categorization system. Put simply, the ruling expanded the criterion of womanhood to permit her eligibility. Richards’s short career and legal battle illustrate the centrality of sex and gender in the questions of fairness.

Note 1 In November 2015, the IOC adjusted its guidelines for transgender participation in the Olympics. The new policy stipulated that those who transition from female to male are eligible to compete without restriction.Those who transition from male to female are eligible to compete if the athlete declares that her gender identity is female, demonstrates that her testosterone levels fall below 10 nmol/L and agrees to be monitored (International Olympic Committee 2015).

References Amdur, N. (1976, 15 August) Touching All Bases – Sex Test for Renee. New York Times, p.B10. Amdur, N. (1977, 24 March) Mrs. King Shaky Victory. New York Times, p.B7. Birrell, S. & Cole, C.L. (1990) Double Fault: Renee Richards and the Construction and Naturalization of Difference, Sociology of Sport, 7, 1–21. 438

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Boutilier, M.A. & SanGiovanni, L. (1983) The Sporting Woman. Kent: Human Kinetics. Cahn, S.K. (1994) Coming on Strong: Gender and Sexuality in Twentieth-Century Women’s Sport. New York: Maxwell Macmillan International. Carpenter, L. & Acosta, R.V. (2000) Women in Intercollegiate Sport: A Longitudinal Study, Twenty Three Year Update, 1977–2000, Women in Sport and Physical Activity Journal, 9(2), 141–4. Cavanagh, S. & Sykes, H. (2006) Transsexual Bodies at the Olympics: The International Olympic Committee’s Policy on Transsexual Athletes at the 2004 Athens Summer Games, Body and Society, 12(3), 75–102. DeMartinia, A.L. (2014) Thirty-five Years After Richards v. USTA: The Continued Significance of Transgender Athletes’ Participation in Sport. In Regalado, S.O. & Fields, S.K. (eds.), Sport and the Law: Historical and Cultural Intersections (pp.97–114), Fayetteville: University of Arkansas Press . Does Sex Change Operation Qualify Renee for Women’s US Open tennis? (1976, 11 August) Aiken Standard , p.10A. Dunn, A. (1976, 21 August) 24  Girls to Boycott Tennis Week Open. Chicago Tribune, B4. Goldsmith, B. (2007, 18 February) Transsexual Pioneer Renee Richards Regrets Fame. Reuters. Available at: http:​//www​.reut​ers.c​om/ar​ticle​/us-r​ichar​ds-id​USN16​19986​12007​0218 (accessed August 2016) He is a She But Will (He) She Play as a She? (1976, 12 August) The Paris News (Paris, Texas), p.15. Herman, R. (1976, 24 July) A Former Male Tennis Player Seeks to Join Women’s Tour. New York Times, p.16. International Olympic Committee (2015). IOC Consensus Meeting on Sex Reassignment and Hyperandrogenism. International Olympic Committee. Available at: https​://st​illme​d.oly​mpic.​org/D​ocume​ nts/C​ommis​sions​_PDFf​i les/​Medic​al_co​mmiss​ion/2​015-1​1_ioc​_cons​ensus​_meet​ing_o​n_sex​_reas​ signm​ent_a​nd_hy​peran​droge​nism-​en.pd​f (accessed December 2016) International Olympic Committee Medical Commission (2003). Statement on the Stockholm Consensus on Sex Reassignment in Sports. International Olympic Committee Medical Commission. Available at: https​ ://st​illme​d.oly​mpic.​org/D​ocume​nts/R​eport​s/EN/​en_re​port_​905.p​df (accessed December 2016) King, B.J. (1974). Bille Jean. New York: Harper and Row. King, B.J. & Starr, C. (1988) We Have Come a Long Way:The Story of Women’s Tennis. New York: McGraw-Hill. Lichtenstein, G. (1974) A Long Way, Baby: Behind the Scenes in Women’s Pro Tennis. New York: William Morrow & Company. Marple, D. (1983) Tournament Earnings and Performance Differentials Between the Sexes in Professional Golf and Tennis, Journal of Sport and Social Issues, 7(1), 1–14. Memorandum on the Use of Sex Chromatin [document] (1972) Available at the Avery Brundage Collection. University of Illinois Archive, United States. No Jersey Bar on Dr. Richards (1976, 14 August) New York Times, p.34. Pieper, L.P. (2012) Gender Regulation: Renee Richards Revisited, The International Journal of the History of Sport, 29(5), 675–90. Pieper, L.P. (2009). Interview with Author. New York City: New York. Pieper, L.P. (2016). Sex Testing: Gender Policing in Women’s Sports. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. Richards, R. (1983) Second Serve:The Renee Richards Story. New York: Stein and Day. Richards v. United States Tennis Assn. [1977]. New York Supreme Court. Ryan, J. (1976, 20 August) 12 Women Replaced in Protest of Richards. Washington Post, p.D1. Schultz, J. (2014) Qualifying Times: Points of Change in U.S. Women’s Sport. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. Sykes, H. (2006) Transsexual and Transgender Policies in Sport, Women in Sport & Physical Activity Journal, 15(1), 3–13. USTA Press Release (1976, 15 August) Atlanta Journal Constitution, p.11D. Walder, J. (2007, 1 February) The lady Regrets. New York Times. Available at: http:​//www​.nyti​mes.c​om/20​ 07/02​/01/g​arden​/01re​nee.h​tml (accessed January 2017) Ware, S. (2011) Game, Set, Match: Billie Jean King and the Revolution in Women’s Sports. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. Will Transsexual Play in U.S. Open? (1976, 12 August) Nevada State Journal, p.11.

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43 Venus and Serena are “doing it” for themselves Theorizing sporting celebrity, Marxism and Black feminism for the Hip-Hop generation Jayne O. Ifekwunigwe1

Against a political economic backdrop that highlights the differential structural positions of young Black women in the United States, the following discussion explores what has been retained from “older” Black feminist praxis and traces the contours of a “new” Hip-Hop Black feminist theory and practice. By analyzing specific media constructions and representations of the tennis super-star sisters Venus and Serena Williams,2 this chapter aims to illustrate the ways in which these sporting Black females both embody a new Hip-Hop Black feminist world-view and reproduce a gendered and racialized hegemonic social order predicated on the “Just Do It” liberal political rhetoric of meritocracy and inclusion, which has been appropriated by (conservative) Republicans in the US. Utilizing fused Marxist, cultural studies and Black feminist analyses, this chapter situates these representational “race”, gender, generational and class politics beyond and within the arena of high-performance professional sports studies. Although feminist scholars of sport have engaged critically with “race” and gender politics (see, for example: Birrell 2000; Scraton 2001), this analysis serves as a corrective to the ongoing under-representation of Black feminist voices in sport studies, as noted by Douglas (2002). While a deliberate reflection of my disciplinary moorings outside sports studies, this conceptual approach also facilitates my engagement with three entangled problematics, which in turn highlight the complexities and contradictions of global capitalism as a dual process of de-territorialized but markedly racialized global commodification and territorialized local signification of specific historically situated, engendered and racialized power dynamics. Rather than questions in search of definitive answers, they (and this chapter in general) are intentionally polemical: first, in keeping with Morgan (1999), what constitutes protest and complicity for the post-Civil Rights Hip-Hop feminist generation? Second, invoking Priti Ramamurthy’s theoretical formulation (2003), what are the “perplexities” of the symbiotic relationship between transnational corporate patronage and global Black female sporting celebrity?3 Third, is the burden of talent and entitlement heavier for young, Black American and female sporting celebrities such as Venus and Serena Williams (Douglas 2005)? That is, do they have an ethical as opposed to a charitable responsibility to the economically disadvantaged and the politically disempowered?4 This 440

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would  nclude both working-class, young African American women and the predominantly young female work-forces in Caribbean and South East Asian sweatshops who produce the sporting commodities they endorse (Hapke 2004). In addition to my critical engagement with literature across multiple inter/disciplinary fields, the raw materials for this chapter include a wide range of newspaper and magazines articles spanning the breadth of this sister-act’s sporting career, which I critically read as discursive texts. Interwoven with textual analyses are three theoretical threads, which collectively contribute towards the shaping of a new Hip-Hop Black feminist praxis on the dialectics of young Black American female sporting celebrity. First, situating “on the court” representations of Venus and Serena Williams as “Ghetto Cinderellas” within a Black feminist frame uncovers continuities in the changing same depictions of resisting Black women, that is, as representations of deviant sexuality located outside the scope of Eurocentric standards of beauty and femininity (Ifekwunigwe 2004a). Second, assessing the class politics of “Black American Princesses” (BAPs), the “off-the-court” (post-Civil Rights) persona I have fashioned for Venus and Serena, uncovers a shift towards an individual bourgeois (Chambers 2003) rather than a collective socialist (Davis 1989/2000) Black (American) female politics of empowerment. Third, by illustrating how high-performance Black sporting celebrities, such as the Williams sisters, collude with their transnational corporate patrons in the marketing of “The American Dream” in both its Horatio Algier and Martin Luther King, Jr. manifestations, I expose the very limited and over-determined ways in which Blackness is personified in the public sphere. In other words, this chapter will interrogate the interface between “real” Blackness and the “authentic” / “sincere” (Jackson 2005, p.28) dimensions of athleticism, class consciousness and ethical responsibility or what in colloquial terms is known as “giving back”.

Black Venus strikes back: athleticism and ‘changing same’ representations of Black womanhood There are different gendered, racialized, ethnic, class-based and cultural conceptions of sporting female bodies, which are the discursive products of specific knowledge systems and particular historical circumstances, such as plantation slavery (Douglas 2002). In particular, sports journalism plays an important role in the manufacture of a racialized and sexualized sporting female aesthetic (Rowe 2004). In the tennis world, the differential media discourses on the “superfeminine” Anna Kournikova and the “transmasculine/she-male” Williams sisters presuppose a heterosexual White male gaze and erase the possibility of lesbian sport spectatorship while also paradoxically constructing muscular female athletes as the popular stereotype of a lesbian (Griffin 2002). Depictions of Kournikova in particular reinscribed a particular version of White European beauty which then becames the yardstick for the measurement of Venus and Serena’s heterosexual attractiveness (Wertheim 2002). Sharpley-Whiting’s (1999) “Black Venus master narrative” provides the historical context for such polarizing representations. Though primarily engaging with nineteenth and twentieth century French representations of Black women from Hottentot Venus to Josephine Baker, throughout the text and explicitly in the epilogue, Sharpley-Whiting argues that the Black Venus master narrative is reasserted in other milieux and in contemporary historical moments: ‘black women, embodying the dynamics of racial/sexual alterity, historically invoking primal fears and desire in …men, represent ultimate difference (the sexualized savage) and inspire repulsion, attraction, and anxiety, which gave rise to the collective…male imaginations of Black Venus (primitive narratives)’ (1999, p.6). Regarding the ways in which this master-narrative is reproduced in contemporary tennis journalism, I was surprised to discover the number of times the sisters were described or referred to as 441

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“delicious”, revealing the ambivalent semiotics of “inter-racial” desire. For example, ‘The notion of the Williams sisters battling in Grand Slam finals, their hair beads and gargantuan groundstrokes whipping through the wind, is beyond the delicious fantasy stage’ (Silver, Cook & Mravic 1999, 22 March, p.39).That said, Ms. magazine’s rationale for including Venus and Serena Williams among the 2001 recipients for “Ms.Women of the Year” offers an alternative yet still racialized and therefore relational feminist characterization, which claims to celebrate the very attributes which rendered the sisters undesirable to a heterosexual male market: ‘For serving up a discomfiting mix of sinew, grit, coal black kink and ‘tude – and daring to call it woman’ (msmagazine.com 2001). Hence, these media examples confirm that what it means to be an embodied Black sporting female is already and always oppositional (Hoberman 1997). With both their ever-changing hairstyles and dress codes, on the court,Venus and Serena actively challenge these same prevailing representations of the Black embodied female aesthetic while also defying the conventional etiquette of the lily-White elite tennis world. In doing so, they strategically subvert their contradictory positioning as hyper-sexual Black women and hyper-masculine female athletes (Schutz 2005). Mindful of the dangers of racial essentialism shaped by authenticity claims, I also suggest that both sisters exploit an “authentic Ghetto Blackness” in both its embodied symbolic and its commodified expressive forms: ‘to say it is a “black” thing doesn’t mean it is made up entirely of black things’ (Kelley 1997, p.42). Constituent parts of a racially transcendent reinvention process that produces the American origin myth of the “rags-to-riches” self-made (wo)man (Grewal 2005), I argue that on the court, they position themselves and are indeed constructed as “Ghetto Cinderellas”.This performative role was fashioned for them by their father Richard Williams, who joins a long line of “tennis-fathers” (Spencer 2001). As a “present Black father”, Williams has also been instrumental in challenging the stereotype of the “Black father”, whose absence is said to have such a deleterious social impact on burgeoning Black womanhood (Wertheim 2002). Journalist Allison Samuels (2001, p.46) refers to him as ‘part huckster, part stage dad, part ambassador, part entrepreneur’. Despite the fact that by ages 11 and ten respectively Venus and Serena had left “the hood” and were living in suburban Florida, where they attended private school and had a professional coach, in a 1998 interview, Papa Williams – as he is known on the circuit – perpetuates the myth of his daughters’ exclusively “ghetto” origins and artfully intertwines their embryonic development as athletes with the emergent West Coast Hip Hop scene (Jenkins 1998). Regarding Papa William’s conjuring of Compton, sadly life imitated art, when in 2003,Venus and Serena’s half sister Yetunde Price was murdered in their old neighborhood. Ironically, the “ghetto” dimensions of their Compton beginnings are parts of a past neither Venus nor Serena could strategically afford to disavow (Kelley 1994).As Jacques (2005) has noted, it is both these “authentic” origins and their indisputable talent which also make them ready-made role models for many Black fans on the other side of the Atlantic. By focusing on the Williams family’s calculated deployment of authentic Ghetto Blackness, I am not thereby discounting the political and historical significance of the sisters’ athletic achievements and prowess nor how their dominance of the game has transformed the social landscape of tennis and exposed the racism at its core (Douglas 2005).Yet, racism and caricature notwithstanding, one can never underestimate the power nor the expectations Black female sporting celebrity status yields (Spencer 2001).

Suburban Cinderella and her fairy god-mammies: Black bourgeois feminism and the politics of entitlement While the figure of “Ghetto Cinderella” functions as a potent symbol of Black working-class female transgression within the exclusive and exclusionary predominantly White tennis world, the “BAP” or “Black American Princess” (not to be confused with “Ghetto Fabulous”) facilitates 442

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readings of Venus and Serena’s off the court complex and contradictory identity performances. Defined by the authors of The BAP Handbook:The Official Guide to the Black American Princess, a “BAP” is: ‘An African-American female whose life experiences give her a ‘sense of entitlement’’ (Johnson, Lewis, Lightfoot & Wilson 2001, p.1). As the epitome of the bourgeois Black feminism that James (1999) criticizes, BAPs symbolize both the partial victories of the Civil Rights and Women’s movements (which explains why figures like Rosa Parks and Angela Davis are mentioned in the handbook) and the complete reign of free-market capitalism (Pough 2004). While mindful of Serena and Venus’ inclusion in The BAP Handbook’s role-call of famous BAPs my relegating them to BAP status is inspired by two particularly illuminating texts. The first is their self-help book entitled Venus and Serena: Serving from the Hip: 10 Rules for Living, Loving and Winning (Williams, Williams & Beard 2005). The second is their appearance on Oprah to promote this new book, which coincidentally aired on 30 March 2005, the day after they played each other in quarter finals at the Nasdaq-100 Tennis Open. Their book appeals to “raceless” suburban female adolescent constituents, whose everyday realities are a far cry from the authentic Ghetto Blackness to which they make coded references, signifying they are “hip sistuhs” (Williams, Williams & Beard 2005). “Got your back”; “back in the day”; “crib”; “bling bling”, as well as both the title of the book – Serving from the Hip – and the “Sister Rules” framework are all linguistic plays on authenticating Black signifiers (Williams & Beard 2005). At the same time, there is only one explicit reference to “race” and this was to mention an “inspiring” poem, “Dreams” by Black artist of the Harlem Renaissance Langston Hughes (Williams & Beard 2005). Deference to expressive Blackness without a broader reference to embodied Blackness is also evident in the pumping hip-hop soundtrack that accompanies the “dreammaking” segment on Oprah. In fact, Oprah has herself become a billionaire by cooking up a digestible Black feminist politics of acceptability and serving it to “ordinary” Americans (Collins 2004).This mainstreaming is further exemplified by the show in an episode entitled “The Secret Life of Girls,” featuring Venus and Serena Williams, the actress Jada Pinkett Smith and a Black woman psychologist as emotional “wet-nurses” for “troubled teen” guests – but not the lived experience of even one young Black woman. The stories showcased included those of a 16 year old “notorious” for having had sex with eight boys, a 17 year old seeking plastic surgery to correct her “hideous” nose, and a 16 year old emotionally “empty” over-eater. As an alternative narrative, in the Black women’s magazine Essence, the series entitled “The War on Girls” paints a more inclusive and complete picture of teenage “crisis” (Villarosa 2002, January). In spite of earlier feminist struggles to uncouple these dichotomous public/private associations, Oprah’s “Secret Life of Girls” episode and to a lesser extent Essence magazine’s “War on Girls” reproduce a differentially gendered youth discourse on loci of social control (Pilkington & Johnson 2003).That is, in post-industrial urban Western societies, young women are primarily relegated to the private sphere, where their practices are individualized, sexualized and medicalized via representations of promiscuity, distorted body image and eating disorders (Griffin 1997). By implicit comparison, however, representations of young men are predominantly situated in the public sphere, where their actions are collective, criminalized and legislated through gang behaviour (Kinshasa 1997). Thanks to Title IX legislation, competitive sport is a public sphere activity that can vanquish the body image anxieties that plague so many teen women (Dworkin & Messner 2002). For example, among the teen tales recounted on the aforementioned episode of Oprah is that of Kelly, a suburban White blonde teen woman in the eighth grade, who is “truly disadvantaged” because she is six feet tall and wears a size 12 shoe at age 13. Her only refuge from the “fe fi fo fum” taunts of her schoolmates is the tennis court, where she has competed successfully in many tournaments. Not surprisingly, her chosen role models are Venus and Serena, whom Oprah 443

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recruits to help stage “Operation Surprise Kelly”. This unsuspecting Suburban Cinderella is picked up in a white stretch limousine, and whisked away to Nasdaq-100 Tennis Open’s Center Court in Miami, where Venus and Serena, her Fairy God-Mammies, await. Before “the ball”, Nike, Serena Williams’ transnational corporate patron, dresses Kelly from head to toe. Prior to coaching Kelly on the finer points of “achieving the dream” including “leaving the negative people behind”,Venus and Serena play her in a two-on-one match, their figurative dance at the ball. However, the climax of this suburban fairy-tale is yet to explode back at Harpo Studios in Chicago. After publicly extolling the virtues of Kelly’s “inner and outer beauty”, Serena draws this magical tale to a close by presenting Kelly with a custom-made size 12 tennis “slipper” – courtesy of Nike. Hill Collins (2004, p.138-9) offers a useful analysis of the BAP syndrome promulgated by Oprah and promoted by Venus and Serena: The controlling images associated with poor and working-class Black women become texts of what not to be. … Oprah Winfrey reinforces an individualistic ideology of social change that counsels her audience to rely solely on themselves. … Yet Winfrey’s message stops far short of linking such individual changes to the actual resources and opportunities that are needed to escape from poverty. At the heart of a rose-tinted BAP outlook is an amnesia that deliberately downplays the lived repercussions of persistent social inequalities. These structures make “dreams” affordable for the few rather than the many. When this bourgeois feminism is harnessed to the predatory capitalist interests of transnational corporations, as was the case with the multi-million-dollar endorsement deal Venus and Serena forged with McDonald’s, Inc., the outcome is particularly compelling (Adams 2005, January). The multi-million-dollar endorsement deals with multiple multinationals garnered by Black super-star sporting celebrities such as Venus and Serena Williams, golfer Tiger Woods, basketball greats Michael Jordan before and LeBron James since, are frequently wheeled out as evidence of how far the winds of social change have blown since the segregationist era of Althea Gibson or even Arthur Ashe (Zirin 2005). However, three shifts in the political economy are closer to fact. One is that, in the twenty-first century, sport in all its myriad forms is a colossal and lucrative business (Schaaf 2004; Zirin 2005). The second is that Madison Avenue advertising executives now shamelessly embrace and in fact pander to the buying power represented by the “black dollar” (Brandweek 2005, 17 October). Third, these same corporate image-makers consistently exploit the abilities of certain Black celebrity athletes (and entertainers) to convert the symbolic social and cultural capital encoded in commodified and fetishized urban Black cool into hard cash profits (Dyson 2001).

“All about the money, honey”: transnational corporate patronage, and the “perplexities” of “giving back” There is a memorable scene in Cameron Crowe’s 1996 hit film Jerry Maguire where the Black wife of a professional Black football player is negotiating with her husband’s agent for a more lucrative contract, which would include what she refers to as The Four Big Jewels of Celebrity Endorsement: the shoe, the car, the clothing line and the soft drink. This comical exchange between the characters played by actress Regina King and actor Tom Cruise highlights the significant ways in which the economic destinies of professional sport, transnational corporate enterprise and the multimedia are entwined. Corporations produce commodities, and then 444

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deploy advertising executives to market their products to willing consumers. In this global age of over-exposed celebrity worship, the superstar-athlete, already also a performer, is frequently hired to accomplish this marketing feat (Rowe 2004). As Andrews and Jackson suggest, ‘the manufacturing of sporting celebrities has become a highly systematized, almost McDonaldized (Ritzer 1998) process. … The sport celebrity is effectively a multi-textual and multi-platform promotional entity’ (2001, p.7). With the globalization and commodification by corporate America of caricatured urban Black culture as the pinnacle of cool, it is increasingly Black celebrity athletes who are “shown the money” (Carrington, Andrews, Jackson & Mazur 2001). As suggested earlier, the most famous Black celebrity-athlete turned commodity endorser and one who is said to have paved the sponsorship way for other 20-something Black superstar-athlete-performers such as Tiger Woods and the Williams Sisters is former Chicago Bulls basketball player Michael Jordan (Kellner 2001). Yet, to invoke an old adage: to whom much is given, from whom much is expected. In the 1990s, when the media trained its spotlight on both Nike’s exploitative labor practices in sub-contracted Asian sweatshops and the spate of AirJordan related crimes in “inner-city” American communities, Jordan was criticized for neither taking a political stance nor uttering a condemning statement (LaFeber 1999). Sport, commerce and media represent an “unholy trinity” (Schaaf 2004) and black superstar celebrities are the lubricant greasing the wheels of this global capitalist machinery (LaFeber 1999). Before I focus on the entangled fortunes of Ms. Serena Williams and Nike, Inc. as they represent the tainted bountiful fruits of what I conceptualize as transnational corporate patronage, it is worth pointing out what I refer to as “the eclipse of Venus”.That is, while Serena seems to assertively court celebrity (on and off the court), as much as is possible when one’s every move is chronicled in the press, her more introspective and shyer older sister Venus appears more comfortable beyond the glare of the limelight (Wertheim 2002). By signing her as a global icon and “trademarked Nike Goddess” in 2003 (Adams 2005, January, p.19), Nike was and continues to be instrumental in the multi-media cultivation of Serena Williams’ celebrity image. However, by capitalist design on Nike’s part and by strategic decision on Serena’s, the moment that deal was sealed, for both, the possibility of any real political engagement with social and economic injustice was foreclosed.Thus, any acts of “corporate responsibility” orchestrated by Nike, which usually bear the public face of celebrity-athlete-performers such as Williams, are in reality “perplexing” manifestations of what I call pseudo-ethical charity as opposed to responsible social action. Put simply, pseudo-ethical charity is a form of reputation management for multinational corporations, like Nike, whose labor practices are deemed not only unethical but in fact exploitative (Hapke 2004). As an illustration of the political economic dynamics of transnational corporate patronage, the cover story for the March 2005 edition of the business magazine Black Enterprise was “The 50 Most Powerful African Americans in Sport.” This feature showcased the accomplishments of Black men and a few Black women, who as agents/promoters, coaches/managers, executives or athletes had managed to transcend the color barrier in professional or collegiate sports (Hughes 2005). Only three athletes made the cut: the “old-timer” Michael Jordan and two “new-comers” Serena Williams and Tiger Woods. The three “Big-name” athletes in this line-up all had multi-million-dollar contracts with Nike. Two of the corporate executives on the list also worked for Nike, Inc. The first, Trevor Edwards, corporate vice-president of global brand management and the individual responsible for Serena Williams’ $55 million endorsement deal (BBC Sport 12 November 2003). The second, Larry Miller, president of Nike Jordan Brand, which achieved sales of $500 million or an increase of 288 percent since he took over in 2001 (Hughes 2005). In 2004, Nike, Inc. sales were up 15 percent to $12.3 billion (Holmes 2004, 22 November), but it was spending a record $56.6 million a year on magazine advertising alone 445

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(Brandweek 2005, 17 October).This differential highlights inequities in Nike’s production practices as opposed to its consumption strategies (Hoechsmann 2001). By literally and figuratively harnessing “authentic Ghetto Blackness” to Nike commodities so that its signification conveys as much brand recognition as “the Swoosh”, Edwards and Miller used the “master’s tools” not to build – in the words of Audre Lorde (1984) – a “master’s house” but rather to erect a palatial mansion. For example, a few clicks of the mouse will take the hiphop or ‘“wannabe” hip consumer to nike.com, and for a mere $85 she could purchase an “SW Iconic Nike Sphere Hoody” from Serena Williams’ Early Winter 2005 Collection. For the tennis player who is more concerned about “the swoosh in her swing” than “the sexy swish” of her “SW Iconic Skirt,” there was the utilitarian “Statement Skirt II” for $45. With women accounting for more than 80 percent of all sporting goods purchases, this constituted niche marketing at its best (Schaaf 2004). Serena William’s lucrative relationship with Nike persists and as one of a dozen endorsement partners, this global brand has contributed to her being ranked among the highest paid athletes on the Forbes list (Forbes.com, 17 June 2017). For a celebrity super-star athlete such as Williams, there is a different dynamic at work: the seduction of transnational corporate patronage. I prefer to describe this as a patron-performer rather than a master-slave relationship since the former recognizes the free will of both actors and the potential for mutual capital gain, which is lacking in conditions of enslavement. Nike and Serena Williams collaborate to accomplish two goals: cultivate a recognizable global brand and thereby move more merchandise (nikebiz.com 12 December 2003). This mutual admiration society still thrives as exemplified by a 2016 Nike ad declaring that Serena Williams is ‘the greatest athlete ever’ (Monlloss 2016). As mentioned earlier, the merchandizing strategy underpinning this partnership is the perpetuation of her now iconic status as a Black siren with a powerful forehand, which was confirmed when she wore “that catsuit” to the 2002 US Open (Schutz 2005). In an interview for the Black magazine Upscale just prior to signing with Nike, she recalled: ‘The catsuit really took it to a whole new level… but I think it’s great. Even though I don’t consider myself a sex symbol, I am’ (Ashton 2004, December/January). Connecting the dots, with so much potential profit to be made, trailblazing in the corporate sports sphere aside, for both Nike’s Black marketing executives and their celebrity-performerendorsers, “Just Doing It” for Nike, Inc. will always be more important than “Doing the Right Thing”. This “Just Do It” philosophy is echoed in their aforementioned book for young girls (Williams, Williams & Beard 2005). In fact, Serena’s self-fashioned motto is “Do You”. At the time of their book’s release, she and Venus (whose ground-breaking endorsement had come earlier in 2000 with Rebook) were collectively worth $100 million, yet in the social class-inflected ‘“Sister Rule 8”: All About the Money, Honey: Bling-Bling Isn’t Everything, When it Comes to Cash it’s Better to Stash than Flash’, Serena’s advice is contradictory (Williams, Williams & Beard 2005). Indeed, Serena’s advice is predicated on a specific set of assumptions about access to material wealth and social capital (Green 2001, Pattillo-McCoy 1999). Collectively, these suburban realities are emblematic of a Black bourgeois feminist politics of entitlement made manifest by the political struggles of the Civil Rights and Women’s movements (Cole & Guy-Sheftall 2003). These dreams may no longer be deferred for some (Chambers 2003); Hurricane Katrina, which struck the Gulf Coast of the US in August 2005, brought to the consciousness of the nation, the number of young black women living the American nightmare. Serena Williams’ very public response to this tragedy – that of pledging $100 per ace for the remainder of the year and then subsequently donating a pair of borrowed diamond earrings with a retail value of $40,000 to be auctioned off on TennisKatrina.com – generated media controversy regarding the true extent of her pseudo-ethical and charitable inclinations (Tandon 2005). To make matters worse, 446

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when USA Network broadcaster Michael Barkann informed Serena Williams that the infamous $40,000 diamond earrings had a retail value which surpassed the $21,700 career earnings of her US Open opponent Jung-Jan Chan, her response was: “You gotta have the bling” (Rovell 2005, 25 September). Under such charged complex social, political and economic conditions, it is worth reflecting on what has become of Venus and Serena Williams in more recent years. It is exciting to see the ways in which they have both matured politically, as well as embraced the social responsibilities associated with being trailblazers and role models for aspiring younger female tennis players of all hues and backgrounds (Ifekwunigwe, in press). For example, in 2016, the sisters opened the Yetunde Price Resource Center to support community members impacted by gun violence (Jones 2016).

Conclusion Deploying the popular cultural figures of The Ghetto Cinderella and The Black American Princess, who represent the extremes of social deprivation and entitlement respectively, this chapter sheds light on the nuanced complexities of political progress and stasis as they are played out in a post-Civil Rights Hip-Hop generation moment in African American history. The seemingly contradictory on-the-court/off-the-court performances executed by tennis superstar celebrity sisters Venus and Serena Williams provide the ideal context for the critical exploration of upwardly mobile young Black women’s strategic impression management (Goffman 1959).The research findings of Jones and Shorter-Gooden (2003) demonstrate that the Williams Sisters’ ghetto/bourgeois code-switching is far from an aberration. As instructive as this concept of “shifting” is, what I find more captivating are both the apparent dominance of “the one-drop rule” as an explanatory model for defining racial differences, and more explicitly Blackness, in the United States (Ifekwunigwe 2004b) as well as the ways in which social status is configured in specific racialized ways.This “racial” hegemony is evident in my Ghetto Cinderella and Black American Princess appropriations, wherein ‘race’ and class are also conflated. By focusing on two of America’s major obsessions, sport and celebrity, I have argued that, mediated by corporate America and its shameless appropriation, commodification and manufacture of a prescribed “authentic Ghetto Blackness” – while keeping the heterogeneous Black populous at bay – celebrity-sport-performance, like popular Hip-hop culture in all its gendered political economic manifestations, selectively and individually empowers, but collectively and strategically disempowers African American young women and men, who cannot translate ghetto cultural capital into “bling bling” economic capital (Carter 2003). In particular, I suggest that for the post-Civil Rights Hip-Hop feminist generation, protest and complicity take on multiple, contradictory and complex forms. These “perplexing” contradictions are exemplified by the Black super-star sporting celebrity sisters Venus and Serena Williams, whose athletic achievements in tennis signal the triumph of talent over adversity but yet whose lucrative sponsorship deals also highlight the seductive double-bind of transnational corporate patronage.

Notes 1 I would like to extend my thanks to colleagues at conferences for insightful feedback, also Ben Carrington and Ian McDonald for editorial assistance and especially my husband Chris (Felix) Nwoko for “vibeing” sessions which facilitated the birthing of this chapter. 2 For detailed biographical information on Venus, see www.venuswilliams.com and for Serena, see www. serenawilliams.com 447

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3 ‘I focus on how identities are embodied through consumption, and how consumption constitutes women as gendered subjects through language, through market and cultural interactions, and through class and labor in multiple modes of social becoming. As subjects operating within economic constraints and interpellated in multiple discourses, perplexity reveals the excess of subjects – how they are more than just their bodies’ (Ramamurthy 2003, p.543). 4 This distinction was influenced by Farred (2009), which is partly a philosophical treatise on the proprietary relationship between the “over-waged” professional football (soccer) player and the “underwaged” fan.

References Adams, T. (2005, January) Selling the Sisters, The Observer Sport Monthly, 59, 14–21. Andrews, D.L. & Jackson, S.J. (2001) Introduction: Sport Celebrities, Public Culture and Private Experience. In Andrews, D.L. & Jackson, S.J. (eds.), Sport Stars: The Cultural Politics of Sporting Celebrity (pp.1–19), New York/London: Routledge. Ashton, N. (2004, December/January) The Baddest Chick. Upscale. BBC News (2003) Nike Confirms Serena Deal. BBC. Available at: http:​//new​s.bbc​.co.u​k/go/​pr/fr​/-/sp​ ort1/​hi/te​nnis/​33121​19.st​m (accessed 26 July 2017) Birrell, S. (2000) Feminist Theories for Sport. In Coakley, J. & Dunning, E. (eds.), Handbook of Sport Studies (pp.61–76), London/Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Brandweek (2005, 17 October) Apparel and Accessories, Brandweek, 26(37), SR19–SR19. Carrington, B., Andrews, D.L., Jackson, S.J. & Mazur, Z. (2001) The Global Jordanscape. In Andrews, D.L. (ed.), Michael Jordan, Inc: Corporate Sport, Media Culture and Late Modern America (pp.177–216), Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. Carter, P. (2003) “Black” Cultural Capital, Status Positioning, and Schooling Conflicts for Low-Income African American Youth, Social Problems, 50(1), 136–55. Chambers,V. (2003) Having It All?: Black Women and Success. New York: Harlem Moon/Broadway Books. Cole, Johnetta & Guy-Sheftall, B. (2003) Gender Talk: The Struggle for Women’s Equality in African American Communities. New York: One World/Ballantine Books. Collins, P.H. (2004) Black Sexual Politics: African Americans, Gender and the New Racism. New York/London: Routledge. Davis, A.Y. (1989/2000). Women and Capitalism: Dialectics of Oppression and Liberation. In James, J. & Sharpley-Whiting, T.D. (eds), The Black Feminist Reader (pp.146–82), Malden, MA/Oxford: Blackwell Publishers. Douglas, D.D. (2002) To Be Young, Gifted, Black and Female: A Meditation on the Cultural Politics at Play in Representations of Venus and Serena Williams, Sociology of Sport Online 5(2). Available at: http:​//phy​ sed.o​tago.​ac.nz​/soso​l/v5i​2/v5i​2_3.h​tml (accessed 26 July 2017) Douglas, D.D. (2005) Venus, Serena and the Women’s Tennis Association: When and Where “Race” Enters, Sociology of Sport Journal, 22, 256–82. Dworkin, S.L. & Messner, M.A. (2002) Just Do…What?: Sport, Bodies and Gender. In Scraton, S. & Flintoff A. (eds.), Gender and Sport: A Reader (pp.17–29), London/New York: Routledge. Dyson, M.E. (2001) Be Like Mike?; Michael Jordan and the Pedagogy of Desire. In Andrews, D.L. (ed.), Michael Jordan, Inc: Corporate Sport, Media Culture and Late Modern America (pp.259–68), Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. Farred, G. (2009) Socratic Solitude: The Scouser Two-as-One. In Carrington, B. & McDonald, I. (eds.), Marxism, Cultural Studies and Sport (pp.154–78), London/New York: Routledge. Forbes.com. Profile, Serena Williams. Forbes. Available at: https​://ww​w.for​bes.c​om/pr​ofile​/sere​na-wi​lliam​ s/ (accessed 26 July 2017) Garvey, M. (2005, 20 October) Cosby Takes a Stand in Compton. Los Angeles Times . Goffman, E. (1959) The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. Garden City, NY: Doubleday. Green, C. (2001) Manufacturing Powerlessness in the Black Diaspora: Inner City Youth and the New Global Frontier. Lanham, MD: AltaMira Press. Grewal, I. (2005) Transnational America: Feminisms, Diasporas, Neoliberalisms. Durham, NC/London: Duke University Press. Griffin, C. (1997) Troubled Teens: Managing Disorders of Transition and Consumption, Feminist Review 55, 4–21. 448

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Griffin, P. (2002) Changing the Game: Homophobia, Sexism and Lesbians in Sport. In Scraton, S. & Flintoff, A. (eds.), Gender and Sport: A Reader (pp.193–208), London/New York: Routledge. Hapke, L. (2004) Sweatshop: The History of an American Idea. New Brunswick, N.J./London: Rutgers University Press. Hoberman, J. (1997) Darwin’s Athletes: How Sport Has Damaged Black America and Preserved the Myth of Race. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. Hoechsmann, M. (2001). Just Do It: What Michael Jordan has to Teach Us. In Andrews, D.L. (ed.) Michael Jordan, Inc: Corporate Sport, Media Culture and Late Modern America (pp.269–76), Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. Holmes, S. (2004, 22 November) Nike: Can Perez Fill Knight’s Shoes? Business Week Online. Hughes, A.M. (2005) The 50 Most Powerful African Americans in Sports. Black Enterprise, 88–108. Ifekwunigwe, J.O. (2004a). Recasting ‘Black Venus’ in the New African Diaspora, Women’s Studies International Forum, 27, 397–412. Ifekwunigwe, J.O. (2004b) Introduction: Rethinking “Mixed Race” Studies. In Ifekwunigwe, J.O. (ed.), “Mixed Race” Studies: A Reader (pp.1–29), London/New York: Routledge. Ifekwunigwe, J.O. (in press) “And Still Serena Rises”: Celebrating the Cross-Generational Continuities of Black Feminisms and Black Female Excellence in Sport. In Mansfield, L., Cauldwell, J., Watson, R. & Wheaton, B. (eds.), The Handbook of Feminisms in Sport, Leisure and Physical Education, Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave. Jackson, J. Jr. (2005) Real Black: Adventures in Racial Sincerity. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press. Jacques, M. (2005, January) The Sisters Expose Tennis’s Racist Heart. The Observer Sport Monthly, 59, 20. James, J. (1999) ShadowBoxing: Representations of Black Feminist Politics. New York: St. Martin’s Press. Jenkins, S. (1998) Double Trouble, Women’s Sport and Fitness 2(1), 102–6. Johnson, K., Lewis, T., Lightfoot, K. & Wilson, G. (2001) The BAP Handbook:The Official Guide to the Black American Princess. New York: Broadway Books. Jones, M.A. (2016) Venus and Serena Williams Return Home to Compton to Give Back. The Undefeated. Available at: https​://th​eunde​feate​d.com​/feat​ures/​venus​-and-​seren​a-wil​liams​-retu​r n-ho​me-to​-comp​ ton-t​o-giv​e-bac​k/ (accessed 26 July 2017) Jones, C. & Shorter-Gooden, K. (2003) Shifting: The Double Lives of Black Women in America. New York: Harper Collins. Kelley, R.D.G. (1994) Race Rebels: Culture, Politics and the Black Working Class. New York/London: The Free Press. Kelley, R.D.G. (1997) Yo’ Mama’s DisFUNKtional: Fighting the Culture Wars in Urban America. Boston: Beacon Press. Kellner, D. (2001). The Sports Spectacle, Michael Jordan, and Nike: Unholy Alliance?. In Andrews, D.L. (ed.), Michael Jordan, Inc: Corporate Sport, Media Culture and Late Modern America (pp.37–63), Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. Kinshasa, K. (1997) Crisis and Lifestyles of Inner City Bloods: Youth Culture as a Response to Urban Environment. In Green, C. (ed.), Globalization and Survival in the Black Diaspora:The New Urban Challenge (pp.289–305), Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. Kitwana, B. (2002) The Hip Hop Generation:Young Blacks and the Crisis in African American Culture. New York: Basic Civitas Books. LaFeber, W. (1999) Michael Jordan and the New Global Capitalism. New York/London: W.W. Norton and Company. Lorde, A. (1984) Sister, Outsider. Trumansburg, NY: Crossing Press. Monlloss, K. (2016) Nike Calls Serena Williams the Greatest Athlete Ever in This Striking U.S. Open Ad. Adweek. Available at: http:​//www​.adwe​ek.co​m/cre​ativi​ty/ni​ke-ca​lls-s​erena​-will​iams-​great​est-a​thlet​ e-eve​r-str​iking​-us-o​pen-a​d-173​254/ (accessed 26 July 2017) Morgan, J. (1999) When Chickenheads Come Home to Roost: My Life as a Hip-Hop Feminist. New York: Simon and Schuster. Ms. Magazine Online. (2001) Ms. Women of the Year. Ms. Magazine. Available at: http://www.msmagazine. com/dec01/woty.asp. Pilkington, H. & Johnson, R. (2003) Peripheral Youth: Relations of Identity and Power in Global/Local Context, European Journal of Cultural Studies, 6(3), 259–83. Pough, G.D. (2004) Check It While I Wreck It: Black Womanhood, Hip-Hop Culture and the Public Sphere. Boston: Northeastern University Press.

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44 Wheelchair tennis Historical development and narratives of play Linda K. Fuller

Similar to the regular game of tennis, wheelchair tennis is played according to rules whereby opponents hit a ball with a racket over a three-foot high net in the middle of a court, with a goal of winning points by dominating play. Court size, racket size and tennis balls are all the same except that, in wheelchair tennis, the ball is allowed to bounce twice; that second bounce not necessarily needing to land within the court area. The wheelchairs themselves are called “sport chairs”, with the wheels adapted to help with balance and mobility, and the sport accepts a wide range of different forms of physical disability in its determinations of eligibility.1 These adaptations made for tennis played in wheelchairs are less than 50 years old, and they continue to evolve and expand, such that today there are more than 50,000 wheelchair players around the world who participate in some 150 sponsored events. Beginning with a brief historical background, this chapter provides some case studies of key figures in the sport’s development, reviews some of the foundational literature on the subject and positions wheelchair tennis within a broader socio-political context of challenges within disability sports.

Wheelchair tennis: a brief history Wheelchair tennis was founded after a fortuitous meeting when, in 1976, acrobat skier Brad Parks, who became paraplegic due to a spinal-cord injury, met wheelchair athlete Jeff Minnebraker during his rehabilitation. Soon, the two began playing and promoting the game, putting together rules, and by 1980 they formed the National Foundation of Wheelchair Tennis (NWFT), complete with a Board of Directors and a circuit of tournaments across a number of American cities. Encouraging player involvement, the Wheelchair Tennis Players Association (WTPA) was formed in 1981 and the first “Grand Prix Circuit” was established. Aided by Parks’ promotional efforts, these events began including competitors from outside of the US, who then went back to their respective countries to form wheelchair tennis sections within tennis clubs in France, Australia, Japan and Britain. In Britain, as in some of these other countries, the ideology of wheelchair tennis conveniently fit the socio-political movement of “Sport for All” that was developing in the 1970s and 1980s (Lake 2015). It was aimed at helping to increase sports participation for the least privileged and/or most 451

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disadvantaged groups in society, of which people with disabilities were included (Tomlinson 1987). In time, wheelchair tennis became a global phenomenon. Brad Parks, the pioneering founder of wheelchair tennis, recalled: The sport of wheelchair tennis has been such an important part of my life and I am very pleased to be able to give back to the sport and the ITF. After my accident, wheelchair tennis gave me a sport that I could enjoy with able-bodied friends and family, and then as the sport grew it gave me the opportunity to compete at the highest levels. (‘Founder of Wheelchair Tennis’ 2010, 18 November) Sponsored by Everest & Jennings, the world’s largest manufacturers of wheelchairs, Parks witnessed the sport, and its international circuit, grow rapidly in its first two decades, bringing in junior members and, by 1986, including a women’s division.Two years later, the International Wheelchair Tennis Federation (IWTF) was founded at the US Open and by 1992 the first ITF Wheelchair Tennis Tour included 11 international tournaments. By 1994, the Japanese info-tech company NEC sponsored the inaugural NEC Wheelchair Masters event in the Dutch city of Eindhoven for the top eight male and female competitors, the first International Junior Camp convened in Paris during the French Open, and the FESPIC Games (Far East and South Pacific Games for the Disabled) included wheelchair tennis for the first time. When the IWTF became fully integrated into the International Tennis Federation (ITF) in 1998, history was made in the sports world as wheelchair tennis became the first sport to achieve such a union at the international level. It was also then that the two-bounce rule was implemented for times that wheelchair players were competing against able-bodied players.The inaugural ITF Quad Wheelchair World Championship was initiated in 2017, with David Wagner named as its first winner. Starting with the most recent recipients,Table 44.1 lists winners of the ITF’s wheelchair championship. In terms of the Paralympic Games, wheelchair tennis was introduced as an exhibition sport in 1988 for the Seoul event, and then deemed a full-medal sport by the time of 1992 in Barcelona, when the American Randy Snow and Monique van den Bosch from the Netherlands took both singles and doubles titles. In keeping with the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) code, the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) instituted its own anti-doping program in 2000 at the Sydney Games, according to its website, ‘to promote and protect the integrity of sport and the health of athletes’.2 At the Athens Games in 2004, a Quad division was added to the traditional contests of men and women’s singles and doubles, with the eligibility requirement being impairment in three or more limbs. The real excitement came from exponential interest, with the number of nations having their own National Paralympic Committees (NPC) increasing from 16 at the 1992 Barcelona Games to 29 at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Games, and the number of participants in wheelchair tennis doubling in that time to where there were 100 qualifying participants/teams across the six events at the 2016 Rio Games. Gold medal winners of those contests from the last quarter-century are listed in Table 44.2. The introduction of wheelchair tennis into the programs for Paralympic Games was aided by the fact that it is played on the same courts and surfaces as (able-bodied) tennis, so it fit easily and consequently has seen its popularity continue to grow over the years. Its first tournament on grass was played in 2005 at the Wimbledon Championships, and now competitions take place in venues all around the world. At the highest level, those tournaments include Grand Slams (the Australian Open, Roland Garros, Wimbledon and the US Open), in addition to singles and doubles Masters tournaments. The Johan Cruyff Foundation, which works with both able-bodied and disabled youth, sponsors the ITF Wheelchair Tennis Development Fund3 and 452

Wheelchair tennis Table 44.1 International Tennis Federation male and female wheelchair tennis champions 2017 2016 2015 2014 2013 2012 2011 2010 2009 2008 2007 2006 2005 2004 2003 2002 2001 2000 1999 1998 1997 1996 1995 1994 1993 1992 1991

Gustavo Fernandez (ARG) Gordon Reid (GBR) Shingo Kunieda (JPN) Shingo Kunieda (JPN) ShingoKunieda (JPN) Stephane Houdet (FRA) Maikel Scheffers (NED) Shingo Kunieda (JPN) Shingo Kunieda (JPN) Shingo Kunieda (JPN) Shingo Kunieda (JPN) Robin Ammerlaan (NED) Michael Jeremiasz (FRA) David Hall (AUS) David Hall (AUS) David Hall (AUS) Ricky Molier (NED) David Hall (AUS) Stephen Welch (USA) David Hall (AUS) Ricky Molier (NED) Ricky Molier (NED) David Hall (AUS) Laurent Giammartini (FRA) Kai Schrameyer (GER) Laurent Giammartini (FRA) Randy Snow (USA)

Yui Kamiji (JPN) Jiske Griffioen (NED) Jiske Griffioen (NED) Yui Kamiji (JPN) Aniek van Koot (NED) Esther Vergeer (NED) Esther Vergeer (NED) Esther Vergeer (NED) Esther Vergeer (NED) Esther Vergeer (NED) Esther Vergeer (NED) Esther Vergeer (NED) Esther Vergeer (NED) Esther Vergeer (NED) Esther Vergeer (NED) Esther Vergeer (NED) Esther Vergeer (NED) Esther Vergeer (NED) Daniela Di Toro (AUS) Daniela Di Toro (AUS) Chantal Vandierendonck (NED) Chantal Vandierendonck (NED) Monique Kalkman-van den Bosch (NED) Monique Kalkman-van den Bosch (NED) Monique Kalkman-van den Bosch (NED) Monique van den Bosch (NED) Chantal Vandierendonck (NED)

Source: https://www.itftennis.com

other supporters include the European banking/financial services company BNP Paribas and the sportswear giant UNIQLO.

Case studies of wheelchair tennis players Few wheelchair tennis players over the years have become celebrities in their respective homelands, but Esther Vergeer is probably the closest thing to a national celebrity. According to the Guinness World Records, the Dutch wheelchair tennis champion holds a record for winning 21 singles Grand Slams (48 Grand Slams if combining singles and doubles) and four Gold medals in the Paralympics (2000 Sydney, 2004 Athens, 2008 Beijing and 2012 London). She also holds the record for most consecutive wheelchair singles matches won, which is an incredible 470. These statistics put her right up there as one of the most dominant players in professional sports (DeWitt 2008, 27 July). ‘Ranked No. 1 in the world in wheelchair tennis since 1999, Vergeer has not lost a match since 2003,’ The New York Times reported in 2010 (Corbin 2010, 11 September). With ten consecutive world titles and a 96 percent winning record in singles, she even outshines Roger Federer who has won 81 percent of his matches. ‘In short, she owns her sport’, remarked Corbin (2010, 11 September). Vergeer lost the use of her legs at age eight when she had surgery to repair blood vessels around her spine due to a vascular myelopathy around the spinal cord. Beginning as a 453

Linda K. Fuller Table 44.2 Wheelchair Tennis Results from Paralympic Games, 1992–2016 1992  Barcelona Paralympic Games: Wheelchair tennis gold medalists: Men’s singles: Randy Snow (USA) Men’s doubles: Brad Parks & Randy Snow (USA) Women’s singles: Monique van den Bosch (NED) Women’s doubles: Monique van den Bosch & Chantal Vandierendonck (NED) 1996  Atlanta Paralympic Games: Wheelchair tennis gold medalists: Men’s singles: Ricky Molier (NED) Men’s doubles: Vance Parmelly & Stephen Welch (USA) Women’s singles: Maaike Smit (NED) Women’s doubles: Monique Kalkman-van den Bosch & Chantal Vandierendonck (NED) 2000  Sydney Paralympic Games: Wheelchair tennis gold medalists: Men’s singles: David Hall (AUS) Men’s doubles: Robin Ammerlaan & Ricky Molier (NED) Women’s singles: Esther Vergeer (NED) Women’s doubles: Maaike Smit & Esther Vergeer (NED) 2004  Athens Paralympic Games: Wheelchair tennis gold medalists: Men’s singles: Robin Ammerlaan (NED) Men’s doubles: Shingo Kuneida & Satoshi Saida (JPN) Women’s singles: Esther Vergeer (NED) Women’s doubles: Maaike Smit & Esther Vergeer (NED) Mixed singles quad: Peter Norfolk (GBR) Mixed doubles quad: Nick Taylor & David Wagner (USA) 2008  Beijing Paralympic Games: Wheelchair tennis gold medalists: Men’s singles: Shingo Kunieda (JPN) Men’s doubles: Stephane Houdet & Michael Jeremiasz (FRA) Women’s singles: Esther Vergeer (NED) Women’s doubles: Korie Homan & Sharon Walraven (NED) Mixed singles quad: Peter Norfolk (GBR) Mixed doubles quad: Nick Taylor & David Wagner (USA) 2012  London Paralympic Games: Wheelchair tennis gold medalists: Men’s singles: Shingo Kunieda (JPN) Men’s doubles: Stefan Olsson & Peter Vikstrom (SWE) Women’s singles: Esther Vergeer (NED) Women’s doubles: Marjolein Buis & Esther Vergeer (NED) Quad singles: Noam Gershony (ISR) Quad doubles: Nicholas Taylor & David Wagner (USA) 2016  Rio de Janeiro Paralympic Games: Wheelchair tennis gold medalists: Men’s singles: Gordon Reid (GBR) Men’s doubles: Stephane Houdet & Nicolas Peifer (FRA) Women’s singles: Jiske Griffioen (NED) Women’s doubles: Jiske Griffioen & Aniek van Koot Quad singles: Dylan Alcott (AUS) Quad doubles: Dylan Alcott & Heath Davidson (AUS) Source: https://m.paralympic.org

wheelchair basketball player, she switched to tennis instead and played her first tour match at age 13; by 1999, she had become the world-number-one ranked female player. Her retirement in 2013 prompted much kudos but one of her proudest accomplishments was posing nude for ESPN The Magazine’s “Body Issue” in 2010, which was one of the first times it had featured a disabled athlete. She said of her achievements: 454

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My parents brought me up to be a good goal-setter. I know what I want to achieve and I know what I have to do for it. Of course it’s hard to say if I would have this same spirit, the same abilities, and the same talent if I was an able-bodied girl, but there is a part of me that is a fighter. (ITF 2012) Another player who has made a name for himself, particularly in his home nation of Japan, is Shingo Kunieda, who was ranked number one in the world as ITF Champion from 2007 to 2010. Wheelchair-bound since the age of nine due to a spinal tumor, he became winner of the Grand Slam singles five times (2007, 2009, 2010, 2014 and 2015) and doubles in 2007. To date, Kunieda remains the only male player to win back-to-back gold medals at the Paralympic Games (2008, Beijing & 2012, London), and his winning streaks have spanned three years and 106 matches, and then another 77 matches. He is working as an ambassador for the 2020 Tokyo Paralympic campaign. In 2010, the ITF put together a list of Wheelchair Tennis Ambassadors to help promote the sport. As stated on the ITF website, Manager Mark Bullock was quoted as saying: For many years the ITF has sought to develop closer links between wheelchair tennis and the wider tennis community in order to promote the sport and ultimately expand the base of players of all ages and abilities around the world.4 Therefore, in addition to the various winners previously listed, there are a number of ambassadors for wheelchair tennis that have made an important impact on the sport. Jonas Bjorkman (SWE) and Tommy Robredo (ESP) are both former top-ten players on the men’s (able-bodied) tennis circuit who have a close connection to the sport, alongside elite-level coach Sven Groeneveld (NED). Also considered ambassadors for the sport are Jiske Griffioen (NED), David Hall (AUS), Monique Kalkman-van den Bosch (NED), Nick Taylor (USA) and Chantal Vandierendonck (NED), who are all players or former players of wheelchair tennis; not only are they considered leading figures in the sport, but many are also former champions.

Wheelchair tennis in the literature While the subject of disability sport has enjoyed some increased attention from scholars over the past 20 or so years, wheelchair tennis as a specific context for analysis has had very little attention. Virtually all of the major published histories of tennis have ignored the sport. While not an historical or sociological analysis, wheelchair tennis was discussed in Greenwood, Dzewaltowski and French’s (1990) article comparing self-efficacy and psychological wellbeing between wheelchair tennis and non-tennis players, and they found that the former were more confident in performing general wheelchair mobility tasks. As to research on athletes in wheelchairs in general, Marie Hardin (2003; 2004; 2005; 2006; 2007), has been the most prolific, as well as empathetic, reporter. Early on, she brought attention to how people with disabilities have historically been excluded from media attention and advertising as, in sport, they invariably fail to meet standards of the “ideal sporting body” that is the norm in capitalist hegemony. Lake (2015, p.261) made a similar comment regarding the structures working against people with disabilities, ‘as their bodies were objectified and defined according to predetermined notions of appropriate behaviour’. Hardin et al. (2006) examined gendered depictions of disability in Sports ‘n Spokes, a magazine that covers wheelchair sports, and found that women were depicted as active almost as often as were men, but were less likely to be presented as sports competitors. 455

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Applying feminist post-structural thinking to identify differences between male and female wheelchair racers in terms of identity construction, Kim Wickman’s (2008) doctoral dissertation from Umea University compared their responses to representations in the Swedish sports media, finding the term “disabled” concealed and neutralized into a discourse on “able-ism”, despite many of the athletes self-describing as empowered, or “being able” to perform as sportspersons. Piecing together the small amount of literature on the subject, one is left to conclude that the sport has been marginalised somewhat, not only by tennis scholars but also by disability sport scholars. This is despite its ranking, arguably, as one of the leading and most recognisable disability/wheelchair sports, as previously highlighted, and as one of the fastest growing sections or areas within tennis. In the absence of serious scholarly attention on the subject, what is left to examine are mainly what might be termed “coffee-table” histories, autobiographical accounts and coaching guides. One of the leading texts was authored by Sarah Bunting (2001) entitled: More than Tennis: The First 25 Years of Wheelchair Tennis. While devoid of some of the critical analysis that would be welcome to scholars reviewing this field, it nevertheless describes and commemorates the sport’s early days and, according to its brief review in BlazeSports America,5 this early chronicle ‘has captured the feelings and passion of the sport in this historical record of wheelchair tennis to date’. Probably the most inspiring book is Danny Quintana’s (2013) Overcoming Adversity: Adventures in Wheelchair Tennis, which the attorney/author introduces with the seemingly innocuous, but deeply layered, comment: Tennis isn’t just a game, it is the game. … Life can be very frustrating, especially in a wheelchair. Hitting a tennis ball over a three-foot net is not a logical or rational physical activity, but it is great fun. (p.1) Coaching resources for wheelchair tennis are far more plentiful (see Lamontagne-Muller 1997; Moore & Snow 1994; Polic 2000; Snow & Moore n.d.), but as they are aimed at both players and coaches for the primary purpose of enhancing performance, they offer little of value for scholars seeking to develop further knowledge on critical socio-historical issues in the sport.

Wheelchair tennis in a broader context of disability sport In the context of the lack of attention afforded to wheelchair tennis in both academic circles and within what might be termed mainstream publications, it is apparent that, for far too long, disability sports, like the athletes they represent, have been invisible to the public. They are presented as “Others”, and thus they are “symbolically annihilated” by their absence (DePauw 2012). It is this notion of “the Other” that has helped to ‘magnify differences and undervalue similarities’ (Silva & Howe 2012, p.178), which is explored here. ‘While sports opportunities for persons with disabilities continue to emerge in many international communities’, Ian Brittain (2009, p.56) explains, ‘athletes with disabilities and disability-specific sports remain segregated and invisible from the mainstream sports environment’. Most of the tennis that is typically described in books and the mainstream media has been played by athletes in their prime, able to do so by their own abilities, ambitions and self-authorities. Less-abled tennis players, like their counterparts in a wider societal perception, might fit somewhere in a spectrum ranging from pitiful/pitiable, to what has been termed “supercrip”. The notion of the “supercrip” has been put forward in the mainstream media as a model according to which all athletes with disabilities should conform, or at least aim to try to conform. Adopting either the “restitution” or “quest” narratives, many stories position the athlete 456

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who has sustained a disability on a journey back to full recovery or in the midst of a transition toward a new destination (Smith & Sparkes 2004). This can create tensions, however, as such narratives position all outcomes as within the realms of human agency, and thus immune to structural impositions. Arguing that the “supercrip” athlete is antithetical to some disabled persons’ interests, Berger (2008) interviewed wheelchair basketball players and saw that, indeed, tensions exist between elite athletes and non-athletes within the disability community. Equally, Hardin and Hardin (2004) were concerned that the model might set the bar too high for some persons with disabilities, which may ultimately compound, rather than alleviate or overcome, some of the social-psychological problems experienced through their disability. To offer further detail, Amit Kama (2004, p.449) submits this distinction relative to the supercrip’s being able to do “superhuman feats”. She defined a “regular supercrip” as: a disabled person who can accomplish mundane, taken-for-granted tasks as if they were great accomplishments. While these routine achievements attest to the disabled person’s unusual gifts, the apotheosis of such minor successes indicates that all disabled people are not actually expected to perform at all. Conversely, Kama (2004, p.449) continued: The glorified supercrip who performs highly extraordinary deeds – climbing a mountain, sailing the ocean, etc. – fascinates the media and triggers two insights: (a) Disability is not socially constructed, but is equivalent to a physical impairment which can and must be overcome by resolute dedication; (b) By default, all disabled people who cannot perform well in their daily endeavors seem to be lacking in willpower and self-discipline. In other words, supercrips eclipse their peers who are thus negatively judged. Once ergonomically responsive prostheses were brought into the picture, along with aerodynamic and feather-light wheelchairs, the technology transformed both the performers and their performances, and the term “cyborg” became part of the disability lexicon (Howe 2011; Howe & Silva 2017). Of this framing, Kama (2004, p.448) states: ‘Whereas the traditional starting point frames disability as a personal tragedy, generating pity and compassion, the progressive category of images frames the narrative in terms of a political struggle for equality and inclusion’. Although disability sports are infrequently displayed and discussed in media, when they are, the stories are all too often presented as beyond inspirational in terms of overcoming adversity (Schantz & Gilbert, 2012). Hodges et al (2014) summarise these frequently used stereotypes relative to athletes participating in disability sport as follows: •• •• •• •• ••

Vulnerable and pitiable: portrayals of disabled people as childlike dependants who need help and charity from others “Supercrip”: inspirational stories of determination and personal courage to overcome ‘adversity’ Portrayals of disabled people as less than human (e.g., “freak shows”, “exotic”) Characters primarily defined by their disability rather than other aspects of their identity Disabled people presented as unable to participate fully in everyday life

Too often, the biomedical model is invoked, which is concerned with curing or correcting issues such that the person is made as “normal” as possible by whatever treatment is available. It is suggested, however, that it is critical to consider wheelchair tennis players linguistically. 457

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Jill M. LeClair’s (2012) Transformed identity: From disabled person to global Paralympian offers a good starting point in sensitising us to the language of disability. She points out this passage, Article 30 at the 2006 UN Conference on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities: ‘The historical framing of disability as a social welfare issue, charity-based and medically defined, was replaced by a rights-based approach to support inclusion’ (p.4). It begs the question: is disability the opposite of ableism? A good place to start might be my developing theory of Gendered Critical Discourse Analysis (see Fuller 2012; forthcoming), whereby norms between men and women are accepted and ongoing rhetorical, economic and socio-political power plays between the sexes are recognised, such that other-abled athletes might not be discriminated against racially, religiously and/or relative to human rights. In terms of disabled athletes being “inspirational”, many have voiced their disapproval of the term, preferring to be known, like able-bodied athletes, simply as sportspeople, their sport simply adaptive (Schpigel 2016, 17 September). Discussing the paradox of it all, Purdue and Howe (2012) invite us to ‘see the sport, not the disability’, as the title of their paper suggests. Concerned that these athletes will continue to have the label “disabled” added to their names and their sporting events, it behooves everyone, regardless of their (dis)ability status, to monitor the rhetoric of wheelchair tennis. Beyond identifying players using terms like “freaks of nature” or “supercrips”, or describing their performances as “inspirational”, “incredible” or “unbelievable”, perhaps narratives can be more neutral and their efforts can be simply respected.

Notes 1 ITF Rules and Regulations determine eligibility of a medically diagnosed permanent mobility-related physical disability that results in a loss of function in one or both lower extremities. Players might have conditions such as limb loss, cerebral palsy, brain injury, joint restrictions, spinal injury or nerve damage. Quad players use strapping that secures the racket in their hand and some are allowed to use electric-powered wheelchairs. ‘Let’s roll’ (www.letsrollwheelchairtennis.com) is an online resource on wheelchair tennis run by the Australian player David Hall, and offers much more detail on the operating rules. The latest regulations are available at: https://www.itftennis.com/wheelchair/organisation/ rules-regulations.aspx (accessed 15 May 2018) 2 See: https://m.paralympic.org/athletics/anti-doping 3 The Johan Cruyff Foundation is a charitable organisation set up by the Dutch former professional football player upon retirement, with the aim of stimulating the development of children’s health and well-being through sport. For more information see: https://www.cruyff-foundation.org/en/ (accessed 23 August 2018) 4 See: https://www.itftennis.com/wheelchair/ambassadors/overview.aspx 5 www.blazesports.org

References Berger, R.J. (2008) Disability and the Dedicated Wheelchair Athletes: Beyond the ‘Supercrip’ Critique, Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, 37(6), 647–78. Brittain, I. (2016) The Paralympic Games Explained (2nd ed). London: Routledge. Bunting, S. (2001) More Than Tennis: The First 25 Years of Wheelchair Tennis. London: International Tennis Federation. Corbin, B. (2010, 11 September) A Champ Has Rivals, But No Equals. The New York Times. DePauw, K.P. (2012) The (In)visibility of Disability: Cultural Contexts and ‘Sporting Bodies’, Quest, 49(4), 416–30. DeWitt, B. (2008, 27 July) Esther Vergeer is the world’s most dominant athlete. The Bleacher Report. Available at: https://bleacherreport.com/articles/41482-esther-vergeer-is-the-worlds-most-dominant-athlete (accessed August 2018) Founder of Wheelchair Tennis Brad Parks Selected as ITF Wheelchair Tennis Ambassador. (2010, 18 November) Long Island Tennis Magazine. Available at: https://longislandtennismagazine.com/ 458

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article1166/founder-wheelchair-tennis-brad-parks-selected-itf-wheelchair-tennis-ambassador (accessed 24 August 2018) Fuller, L.K. (2012) Mediated Cover-Ups and Coverage of the Penn State Scandal: A Gendered Critical Discourse Analysis. Paper presented at a panel on Mediated Celebrity: The Sports Version, Stockholm: Sweden. Fuller, L.K. (2018) Female Olympian and Paralympian events: Analyses, Backgrounds and Timelines. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Fuller, L.K. (forthcoming) Sportswomen in wheelchairs: Doubly discriminated against but duly impressive. In Kiuchi, Y. (ed.), Playing on an Uneven Field: Essays on Exclusion and Inclusion in Sports, Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company. Greenwood, M.C., Dzewaltowski, D.A. & French, R. (1990) Self-efficacy and Psychological Well-being of Wheelchair Tennis Participants and Wheelchair Non-tennis Participants, Adapted Physical Activity Quarterly, (7), 12–21. Hardin, M. (2003) Marketing the Acceptably Athletic Image:Wheelchair Athletes, Sport-related Advertising and Capitalist Hegemony, Disability Studies Quarterly, 23(1), 108–25. Hardin, M. (2007) “I Consider Myself an Empowered Women”: The Interaction of Sport, Gender and Disability in the Lives of Wheelchair Basketball Players, Women in Sport and Physical Activity Journal, 16(1), 39–52. Hardin, M. & Hardin, B. (2004) The “Supercrip” in Sport Media:Wheelchair Athletes Discuss Hegemony’s Disabled Hero, Sociology of Sport Online, 7(1). Hardin, M. & Hardin, B. (2005) Performance or Participation … Pluralism or Hegemony? Images of Disability and Gender, Sports ‘n Spokes Magazine. Disability Studies Quarterly, 25(4). Hardin, M., Lynn, S. & Walsdorf, K. (2006) Depicting the Sporting Body: The Intersection of Gender, Race and Disability in Women’s Sport/Fitness Magazines, Journal of Magazine and New Media Research, 8(1), 1–15. Hodges, C.E., Jackson, D., Scullion, R., Thompson, S. & Molesworth, M. (2014) Tracking Changes in Everyday Experiences of Disability and Disability Sport within the Context of the 2012 London Paralympics. Los Angeles: CMC Publishing. Howe, P.D. (2011) Cyborg and Supercrip: The Paralympics Technology and the (Dis)empowerment of Disabled Athletes, Sociology 45(5), 868–82. Howe, P.D. & Silva, C.F. (2017) The Cyborgification of Paralympic Sport, Movement & Sport Sciences, 97, 17–25. ITF (2002). Aspire, Inspire: Celebrating Tennis at the Olympics 2012. London: International Tennis Federation. Kama, A. (2004) Supercrips Versus the Pitiful Handicapped: Reception of Disabling Images by Disabled Audience Members, Communications, 29(4), 447–66. Lake, R.J. (2015). A Social History of Tennis in Britain. London: Routledge. Lamontagne-Muller, L. (1997). Wheelchair Tennis Doubles. Toronto: Tennis Canada. LeClair, J.M. (ed.) (2012) Disability in the Global Sport Arena: A Sporting Chance. London: Routledge. Moore, B. & Snow, R. (1994) Wheelchair Tennis: Myth to Reality. Dubuque, IA: Kendall Hunt. Polic, M. (2000). Wheelchair Tennis Coaches Manual. London: International Tennis Federation. Purdue, D.E.J. & Howe, P.D. (2012) See the Sport, Not the Disability: Exploring the Paralympic Paradox, Qualitative Research in Sport, Exercise and Health, 4(2), 189–205. Purdue, D.E.J. & Howe, P.D. (2013) Who’s In and Who is Out? Legitimate Bodies Within the Paralympic Games, Sociology of Sport Journal, 30, 24–40. Quintana, D. (2013) Overcoming Adversity: Adventures in Wheelchair Tennis. Schaumburg, IL: eBooks2go. Schantz, O.J. & Gilbert, K. (eds.) (2012) Heroes or Zeroes? The Media’s Perceptions of Paralympic Sport. Champaign, IL: Common Ground. Schpigel, B. (2016, 17 September) Paralympic athletes’ least favorite word: Inspiration. The New York Times. Silva, C.F. & Howe, P.D. (2012) The (In)validity of Supercrip Representation of Paralympian Athletes, Journal of Sport and Social Issues, 36(2), 174–94. Smith, B. & Sparkes, A.C. (2004) Men, Sport and Spinal Cord Injury: An Analysis of Metaphors and Narrative Types, Disability & Society, 19(6), 613–26. Snow, R. & Moore, B. (n.d.) USPTA Guide to Teaching Wheelchair Tennis. Orlando, FL: United States Professional Tennis Association. Tomlinson, M. (1987) State Intervention Involuntary Sport:The Inner City Policy Context, Leisure Studies, 6, 329–45. Wickman, K. (2008) Bending Mainstream Definitions of Sport, Gender and Ability: Representations of Wheelchair Races. Unpublished doctoral dissertation. Umea University, Sweden. 459

45 A history of social exclusion in British tennis From grass roots to the elite level Robert J. Lake1

Contemporary broader government policy surrounding “social exclusion” has tended to characterise it in largely negative terms, linked to societal conditions like poverty and social deprivation that are largely viewed as deplorable and socially, culturally and politically unacceptable. Contemporary sport policy in tennis, as in other sports, is no different in how it negatively views “social exclusion”, though its focus over time has been slightly different. From the perspective of the Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) in Britain, every potential player excluded from grassroots participation in schools and clubs represents a wasted opportunity to develop talent. Thus, ‘inclusion” and “accessibility” feature today, and for almost two decades have been explicitly at the core of the LTA’s talent development policy. As an organisation, the LTA has come to judge itself - and be judged by others - based on key criteria like numbers of children regularly playing the sport, numbers of new members in clubs and numbers of British players, male and female, in the world’s top 100. British government funding for sport emerged in the early 1960s after the publication of the Wolfenden Report, which preached the importance of sport in providing health and psychological benefits, alongside its potential to provide alternative attractions for would-be juvenile delinquents (Collins 2003). Into the 1980s, economic concerns in society came to demand greater attention; thus, sport came to be seen as a means of regenerating urban areas and providing employment (Collins 2003). Walker (1997) argued that poverty for the poorest sections of British society increased during Margaret Thatcher and John Major’s Conservative governments. New Labour focused on reversing this trend by promoting “social inclusion” through policies directed at providing better education and employment opportunities (Lister 1998). It is not surprising that removing barriers to participation and preventing the social exclusion of particular groups from participating in tennis also became goals of the LTA around this time. Talent development programmers in tennis first emerged in the late 1940s. They expanded slowly over the following decades, but always remained disconnected with wider policy objectives, and were imprecise with their target demographic. The programs were geared towards children for the most part, but only made explicit their focus on those from specifically lowerclass backgrounds in the mid-to-late 1990s. Within the 1995 LTA Development Strategy, the overall emphasis was on progress at the elite level, however, there was considerable stress put on greater opportunities for school-children generally (LTA 1995). In 1999, social inclusion 460

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was made an explicit target objective in clubs, with specific mention made of the need to ‘offer high quality coaching and junior development programs at reasonable cost, without a playingin requirement or prohibitive dress codes’ (LTA 1999, p.12). The goal of improving access for inner-city working-class children was implicit in the LTA’s City Tennis Clubs scheme that commenced in 2001:‘To many, tennis is perceived as a largely white, middle-aged, middle-class sport. No longer.The LTA is determined that everyone, from all social and ethnic backgrounds, has the opportunity to play tennis (LTA 2003, p.15). John Crowther, LTA Chief Executive from 1997 to 2006, made it clear throughout his tenure that the continuous exclusion of lower classes and children, particularly in tennis clubs, was one of the most problematic issues for British tennis. This was reflected in their two-pronged overall strategy at this time: i) to identify and advance children’s talent and to remove barriers for those with the potential to reach elite-level standard, and ii) to change the culture of clubs, making them more competition-oriented and accessible, and to enable them to fulfil the LTA’s talent development programs (LTA 2002). As sport came to be recognised as a tool for the enhancement of national prowess and of fulfilling social objectives linked to health, crime-prevention, education and social capital (Coalter 2007), and as more funding became available from government via Sport England in the midlate 1990s, it is noticeable that the LTA began to align their own objectives with wider political aims. The mirroring of LTA policy with broader government/Sport England policy is unsurprising given that funding and other benefits were bestowed upon national associations often because of their alignment with government ideology (Bramham 2008; Green 2004; Oakley & Green 2001). Clubs and other voluntary-sector organisations were also pushed to act in the interests of government to secure small-scale funding for its own micro-scale projects (Garrett 2004; Harris, et al. 2009), which included building clubhouses, resurfacing or constructing new courts, adding floodlighting or simply expanding club grounds. It is suggested that what has tended to be missed from much LTA policy of late, which Lake (2010b) characterised as little more than “quantitative box-ticking”, is a full understanding of how aspects of “social exclusion” in tennis have changed throughout history: that is, which groups have been excluded, how exclusion has actually manifested itself over time, what sustained it and from where and when it was rooted. This level of understanding can only be obtained through extensive qualitative research, much of it historically rooted. Lake’s (2013) ethnographic study of social exclusion within tennis club culture has provided a contemporary platform to put the issue in a historical context. Thus, the aim of this chapter is to argue that an historical examination of what we now understand to be “social exclusion” in British tennis offers an opportunity to consider critically how the actions and outcomes inherent within our understanding of the term itself have come to be tarnished with a strong negative connotation that has made any meaningful, critical and balanced analysis of its effects very difficult to achieve. How can we gain a full understanding of how and why certain groups in tennis clubs are denied access or why certain members of our society are simply “put off ” by the sport, when our approaches to these and other similar issues are from the standpoint of considering those excluded as victims, and those who hold the power to include, but have hitherto failed to do so, as perpetrators? Arguably, it is our deep-rooted emotional attachment to the issue of social exclusion that can make it difficult to formulate effective policy recommendations. From a left-leaning socio-political perspective, we are led to feel sorrow and regret when young players are reported as having been denied access to tennis clubs because they could not afford it, or from a breach of rules regarding clothing, footwear or behaviour. Equally, negative judgment is passed on unforgiving club committee members who enforce such rules (see, for example, Mott 1999; 2000). However, adopting this perspective as a matter of course can blind policy-makers to the actual issue and prevent them from seeing other issues and also alternative solutions, as research by Lake (2010b; 2013) revealed. 461

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The key objective here is to provide an alternative perspective on the issue of restricted access – what we now consider “social exclusion” – in tennis. What is argued, in effect, is that the restricted access of certain groups in society from participating in tennis actually helped the sport survive in its infancy, and helped characterise some important and enduring features which today are celebrated rather than condemned. Only from attempting to understand such arguably “positive” roots of exclusion can we begin to appreciate present challenges. Such a perspective helps to avoid present-centered analyses of the past that judge the actions of people in the past – often unfairly – according to present-day standards of behaviour. Crucially, another aim is to discuss how, why and when social exclusion came to be considered an issue and, specifically, for whom. Indeed, what is a “positive” outcome for some is “negative” for others, and from a more balanced and informed vantage point policy-makers may well find themselves theoretically in a stronger position to make more reliable claims as to what possible impacts or effects such policies that attempt to remove exclusive features of tennis might actually bring, for all concerned. Thus, as Lake (2010b) advocated, a more emotionally detached and historically rooted perspective to both analyse issues and make recommendations offers the best chance of creating policies that actually deliver what they set out to achieve. This research paper formed part of a larger and more comprehensive study of the social history of tennis in Britain, of which social exclusion forms a central thread (see Lake 2015). Leading tennis magazines, most notably Pastime and Lawn Tennis and Badminton, and newspapers like the Daily Telegraph and The Times, were analysed from the 1870s onwards. Player biographies and autobiographies were also consulted, alongside documents published directly by the LTA and other related organizations.

Early discourses of social exclusion How did the exclusion of certain groups in society from access to tennis actually help the sport survive in its infancy? Tennis, or lawn tennis as originally called, developed as a hybrid of earlier racket games in the 1870s, with the distinguishing feature that it was played outdoors on smooth lawns, which meant that only those with the available land and sufficient idle time could indulge in it. Major Walter Wingfield, who is typically credited with the sport’s “reinvention”, explicitly marketed the game to the titled aristocracy, and in his fifth edition of the rules included a complete list of aristocracy who had purchased one of his Sphairistiké box sets. This alone lent the game an air of prestige, as did its historical connections with Real Tennis and racquets, which were both popular games among the landed and titled classes at this time (Lake 2009). Because tennis was conceived as more of a recreational activity than a sport, its primary setting of a garden-party and its initial inclusion of women meant that its play demanded restrained “gentlemanly” qualities of chivalry, courtesy, honesty, magnanimity and self-restraint – all hallmarks of the 19th-century sporting ethos of “amateurism” (Lake 2012; 2015). Historical research has shown that early proponents of tennis actually celebrated the exclusion of certain classes as a positive factor. The most socially aspirational among the upper-middle-class playing demographic, in particular, took pleasure in the notion that their game was not only too expensive and time-consuming for those in full-time work whom they deemed socially inferior, but also inaccessible through strict membership restrictions in clubs, its unavailability in state schools and, except for a handful of cities, its unavailability in public parks until just before World War I. It was in autonomous, voluntary-run tennis clubs, which offered both social and spatial segregation, where one can see most clearly the sport’s potential to act as a status symbol and, for some, an opportunity for social mobility. For example, according to its advertisement in Pastime (23 April 1884, p.261), Sittingbourne and Gore Court Archery and 462

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Lawn Tennis Club maintained its exclusivity through personal invitations to certain ‘ladies and gentleman of the neighbourhood’, and they stated: ‘in order to keep the society select all new members are elected by ballot after being proposed and seconded by a member of the committee’. At meetings to decide the fate of those applying for new membership, the system of “blackballing” was common, where committee members in secret passed a bag between them and deposited either a white ball or a black ball; too many black balls meant a potentially new member’s application was denied.This method of under-the-table voting removed any sense of personal culpability (Wigglesworth 2007). Committee members were expected to consider the best interests of the club when making personal recommendations or refusals for new members, but equally, given these were elected committee members, their decision-making was considered above reproach. According to its centenary book published in 1986, West Worthing Club excluded people working 'in trade' in the late 1880s: ‘You had to be in one of the professions or services and certainly, for want of a better word, a “gentleman”’ (West Worthing Club 1986, p.20). The LTA formed in 1888 and initially catered almost exclusively to the small handful of elite southern-English clubs that had emerged. By 1900, 300 hundred clubs had become affiliated, and by 1914, the number reached just over 1000. Clubs adopted the function of representing the interests and values of the socially aspirational upper-middle classes; respectability and modesty were at their heart, but so was status-competition. In its choice of members, rival clubs often competed for prestige, and this helped make membership itself more meaningful. Playing performance was less important than ensuring a club had a titled aristocratic president for example, or committee members drawn from considerable experience. ‘Everyone loved a Lord’, argued Holt (1989, p.111), ‘[none] more than the upper-middle-class men who asked a succession of viscounts and earls to hold honorific office in their associations’. In most cases, they were not asked because of any specific tennis-related experience; they were merely personified forms of symbolic capital. When A.H. Courtenay, the reputable Honorary Secretary of the Fitzwilliam Club in Dublin intended to appear at the 1890 Wimbledon Championships, it was declared: ‘Wimbledon will never, from a lawn tennis point of view, have welcomed a more distinguished visitor’ (Pastime 11 June 1890, p.387). At this time, tennis was desperate for approval from royalty, the highest source of prestige. When, in 1884, the famous Renshaw brothers were honoured with an invitation to play before the Prince and Princess of Wales, Pastime exploited the opportunity by suggesting: ‘The game is the fashionable pastime, and it would be charming indeed if royalty would set its seal upon it by appearing, say, at the championship meeting’ (13 August 1884, p.108 emphasis in the original). They had to wait until 1907 for such an honor though, when the young Prince of Wales and his wife (the future King and Queen) visited the Championships and agreed to become Royal patrons of the AELTC. Such a symbolic connection helped assuage fears of the sport’s unsteady future; the royal seal of approval set tennis socially above most other sports and ensured its prosperity for decades to follow. Had the sport itself not been so readily associated with respectable society in the first place, and instead been popular among the masses, it is doubtful whether this would have happened. In clubs across Britain with more modest expectations of social standing, merely having a Wimbledon player among the membership had impact, but so did having beautiful, wellsituated club grounds, or a reputation for holding a successful annual tournament; success being measured not by profit or standard of play, but on enjoyment levels of players and spectators off court. In advertising for new members, for example, Gainsborough LTC mentioned its regular dances, amateur theatricals and smoking concerts, while Victoria LTC in Liverpool boasted a ‘commodious club-house, containing ladies’ room, smoking and reading rooms, a billiard room with two tables and the usual dressing and bath rooms … and a large concert room and conservatory’ (Pastime 25 May 1892, p.332). Competition featured increasingly as a means of asserting 463

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rank among clubs as the years passed, and gave meaning to the experiences of a club’s respective members. Those that considered themselves of a similar social standing agreed to play matches against each other, but the end result was often of less importance than the associated cheerful social accoutrements. Thus, host clubs made great efforts to ensure their guests were suitably wined and dined and, in this context, the presence and role of women in the club remained key (Lake 2012).Victorian sport was “amateur” and this meant those players or clubs seen to be trying too hard to win were invariably looked down upon as breaking the unwritten codes of how tennis should be played; they were essentially too “working class” in their emphasis (Holt 1989; Lowerson 1993). Social elements were paramount, so if, and only if, such conditions were met could the result have any real significance. In politically conservative, class-divided Victorian Britain, such spatial segregation was not only common but considered necessary. The social conditions and class relations of this specific context demanded it. The successful colonisation campaigns of the British Empire had proved the value of social hierarchy as a feature that helped strengthen social bonding both between and among the different classes (Cannadine 1999). To remove such barriers artificially might have produced unsettling consequences for the increasingly fragile British class system, and, at a time when sports, games, recreations and leisure activities of many varied types were being invented and codified with great regularity, the features of exclusivity found in lawn tennis ensured that its participants could enjoy the sport’s most enjoyable features, in effect, behind closed doors. Upper-middle-class mothers and fathers could send their eligible sons and daughters to private tennis clubs safe in the knowledge that they would not only be indulging in healthy exercise, but also in the comfortable social settings of class similarity, where potential marriage partners would be suitable by membership alone and where career opportunities stemming from club connections would be appropriate for “gentlemen”. Where lower-class members were allowed in club grounds, they were paid groundsmen, ball-boys or coaching-professionals. Often, these men had separate entrances to the clubhouse, were denied access to specific “club rooms” alongside the full privileges of membership; that is, they were in effect members’ servants, and were not allowed to compete in club tournaments or matches (Lake 2010a). Tennis coach and future commentator, Dan Maskell, recalled the ‘upstairs downstairs’ days at Queen’s Club in London which had survived into the interwar years. In the 1920s, he and other professionals were not allowed into the members’ dressing rooms or lounges. The professionals had their own dark and dingy basement-room beneath the clubhouse, but this evident social subordination was happily accepted (Lake 2016). Despite the poor financial remuneration and lack of job security, Maskell considered himself fortunate to be privy to the ‘charmed world of privilege’ from where most members came (Maskell 1988, p.39). After taking a job as head professional at the AELTC in 1929, the club Secretary Major Dudley Larcombe asked Maskell if he would like a locker in the members’ dressing room. His recollections of this momentous occasion suggest deeply entrenched class segregation and also hint at the subversive appearance of inclusivity between the classes: ‘I could hardly believe my ears’, wrote Maskell (1988, p.72). It is difficult today to realize the impact of Major Larcombe’s suggestion. When, later, I told my fellow professionals at Queen’s they refused to believe me. With one blow Major Larcombe had swept away centuries of protocol, redefining the social order. By the interwar years, not only had working- or lower-middle-class people come to appear more frequently in even the most prestigious clubs, but also the emphasis on and attitudes toward exclusivity had shifted. This is related in part to the emergence of new and often more inclusive clubs 464

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in the interwar period, when the number of LTA–affiliated clubs more than tripled from around one to three thousand, and to the emergence of highly talented players who were able to attract to their matches crowds of considerable size, which helped make tournament organisers and tennis governing bodies increasingly significant amounts of money. When the talismanic Frenchwoman and six-time Wimbledon singles champion, Suzanne Lenglen, signed a professional contract in 1926 to play exhibition matches across North America, she remarked in the tournament programme for her inaugural match of the ‘little incongruities in the so-called amateurs rules’ that have for some time accepted packed stands at major tournaments, which netted the ‘shrewd businessmen’ who organised them ‘handsome profits’; meanwhile, players received nothing and had to pay a ‘stiff entrance fee’ for admission. She concluded: ‘With few exceptions, the proceeds from these amateur exhibitions went into private pockets’ (Lenglen 1926, p.14–5). Charles C. Pyle, her versatile American tour promoter, summarised the situation as he saw it: Tennis has been for some years past the only major sport which though universally played and enjoyed has remained unprofessionalized. This is because its control has been in the hands of organizations which, though unquestionably devoted to tennis as a game, have striven to keep it confined to a narrow and exclusive circle.The consequent result has been either to make it impossible for any not financially independent to devote the time necessary to become proficient, or to create a class of players actually and directly dependent upon their tennis playing for their livelihood, though camouflaging their position in such a manner as to conform with amateur rulings of the various tennis associations (cited in Lenglen 1926, p.10). The seven-time US Nationals singles champion William “Bill” Tilden, similarly a major draw wherever he played, helped raise the social standing of tennis from an amateur pastime to a highly skilled professional enterprise. His posthumous biographer, Frank Deford (2004), wrote that the era in which Tilden began his amateur career was one of ‘old country clubbers’, but by the 1930s most players no longer approached tennis as a frivolous summer attraction before they took to careers. Tilden demanded first-class travel and excessive expenses wherever he played, and given the huge profits accrued by tournament organisers the vast majority were willing to accommodate his requests. By the time he retired from amateur tennis in 1930, this pampering of and pandering to the top players had become the rule rather than the exception, particularly in America and along the French Riviera (Lake 2015). The British had remained resilient to such pressures until the late 1930s, when their on-court dominance began to wane after Fred Perry, the three-time Wimbledon singles champion and member of the four-time Davis Cup winning team from Great Britain, retired from amateur competition. Although Perry was less than popular among the traditionalist establishment, he did engender among the more progressive players and administrators in British tennis a renewed enthusiasm for achieving success and developing future talent. He advocated full-time training, professional coaching and a renewed emphasis on talent development at the junior level (Jefferys 2009a). After the war, the LTA, alongside its counterpart associations in America, France and Australia, pursued more assertively objectives geared toward creating future champions.

Post-war challenges and renewed talent-development efforts The war and ensuing period of austerity had brought talent development objectives to a virtual standstill, but by the end of the 1940s, the LTA had firmly committed itself to attempting to regain its previous supremacy. Progressive LTA Councillors, the press and members of the public 465

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began to openly condemn, rather than celebrate, the sport’s historically rooted associations with elitism, inaccessibility to children and middle-class snobbery. The legacy of these elements in fact was considered increasingly as part of the overall problem for the LTA which, in the postwar era, sought to remove participation barriers and increase opportunities for especially the youngest players from the poorest backgrounds. In 1947, Dan Maskell and Fred Perry embarked on a nationwide coaching tour called “Focus on Tennis”, which was the first large-scale talent development scheme of its kind in Britain. The LTA cast its net across millions of children and by the early 1950s showed signs of progress. Fifteen-year-old Bobby Wilson won the 1951 British Junior Championship and Junior Wimbledon the following year. Seventeen-year-old Billy Knight won there in 1953 and the Junior Australian Championships in 1954. Swanseaborn Mike Davies won the Welsh Junior Championships four times as a teenager and impressed selectors enough to be included with Wilson and Knight in several tours to Australia in the early 1950s. Their successes led LTA President Viscount Templewood to boldly claim that they were the ‘best boy players in Europe’. Numbers of affiliated clubs also continued to rise year on year after the war, reaching a peak of 3,788 in 1959; tournament entries also peaked in 1950 at 14,309 per year. These were encouraging signs. By the 1960s, the tours and road-shows continued in their objectives to introduce tennis to all children, rather than those from merely the best schools and clubs, alongside teachertraining schemes, coach development programs and other LTA-initiated activities. The Lawn Tennis Foundation (LTF) was formed also as a means to ‘stimulate active public interest in the playing of lawn tennis’; in fact, Telegraph columnist Lance Tingay remarked that while one of its chief aims was to help teenagers retain their interest in tennis, a secondary aim was to ‘bring death to [the] old tradition’ of tennis being perceived as a ‘snob sport’ (Lawn Tennis & Badminton 15 February 1961, p.72). For the LTA, these efforts at promoting “tennis for the masses” sat comfortably with the broader political context of “Sport for All” that grew to prominence from the 1960s. The Wolfenden Report (1960) and the establishment of the Sports Council in 1965 reaffirmed the government’s desire to promote the educational value of sport and its potential to galvanise and unite a nation through elite-level success (Phillpots 2011). England's football World Cup victory in 1966 brought national celebration and demonstrated the political, economic and cultural significance of sport, and when the AELTC led the campaign for tennis to remove the hypocritical distinction between amateurs and professionals in 1968, British tennis seemed to beat with that same national pulse. Previously, professionals were excluded from amateur competitions and forced to play as, in effect, touring circus performers. They competed sometimes among large crowds but often in dimly lit, sub-standard stadia and their achievements were typically shunned by traditional media outlets (Jefferys 2009b). Professional touring became increasingly lucrative in the 1950s, as promoters offered enticing financial guarantees to new recruits from the amateur ranks, but this drain of amateur talent troubled the national associations, as their leading competitions, Wimbledon included, became in effect qualifying competitions for the professional tour, showcasing the next big stars (Lake 2015). The AELTC’s decision, with backing from the LTA, to open Wimbledon to all players in the face of threats of expulsion from the International Lawn Tennis Federation, proved decisive. In the post-modern era, it seems perhaps odd that certain elitist aspects of tennis tradition have come to be celebrated rather than condemned outright. In light of the advances made outside the AELTC gates, the success of Wimbledon as an apparent bastion of traditionalism and class privilege – with its all-whites rule, English garden-party atmosphere with champagne, strawberries and cream and its rejection of blatant commercialism – seems to counter these developments. However, this has only been possible through very successful, creative and clever 466

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branding over the last few decades and, of course, its ability to stage an efficiently run tournament that has retained utmost respect and prestige among top players, spectators and the press (Lake 2017). Nevertheless, by the late 1980s, the LTA felt the need to embark on a more rigorous program of reinventing the “image” of tennis in its efforts to increase participation levels, as well as spectator interest and commercial sponsorship appeal (Brasher 1986; Whannel 1986). The LTA (1986a, 8) wrote: In the dramatic growth of sport and leisure in recent years, British tennis has not kept pace with its competitors. … It is clearly the LTA’s responsibility to try to reverse these trends and, in order to do so, much has been done in connection with … the image of the game in the UK … [projecting it as a] modern, physical sport with qualities to appeal to males and females. These attempts were facilitated for the most part by the huge increase in Wimbledon profits from the sale of television rights, which went directly to the LTA; in 1981, they received just over £1 million from this special arrangement; by 1996, this had increased to over £30 million. In keeping with New Labour’s manifesto for social change, the LTA met its challenge with increasingly firm programs of redevelopment. They began to incorporate wider political aims into their own objectives, using terms like “equality” and “inclusion” when discussing the “rights” of children and the “responsibilities” of clubs, which mirrored political jargon at the time (see: Blair 1996). It was in 1999 when the objective of social inclusion was first made explicit in LTA discourse, to ‘ensure that no barriers exist to hinder those wishing to play’ (LTA 1999, p.7), and John Crowther repeated the need to ‘break down traditional barriers’ in 2002 (LTA 2002, p.5). Removing social exclusion became its key focus; thus, the sport’s elitist past sat uncomfortably with the LTA’s efforts to remove participation barriers. Even now, and despite their close working relationship and the fact that the AELTC have embarked on some very successful children’s talent development programs (e.g. Road to Wimbledon & the Wimbledon Junior Tennis Initiative), the overall “message” of Wimbledon is not entirely consistent with what the LTA are trying to achieve. As an autonomous club, the AELTC can market their tournament as they wish. Moreover, policy decisions ever since the LTA’s formation have demonstrated that sustaining the Wimbledon Championships as the world’s premier tennis tournament was as much in the LTA’s interests as in the AELTC’s (Lake 2017). The main aim of this paper was to offer a condensed historical examination of the ways in which social exclusion in British tennis have been considered differently over the years; how initially it helped to distinguish the sport, which had the overall effect of boosting participation and prestige that was crucial for attaining longevity, to a more contemporary view that sees the denial of opportunities for participation as a violation of rights for children and a renege of responsibilities for adult sports administrators. What changed? In a nutshell, the interdependent developments of professionalisation, commercialisation and globalisation of tennis and the increasing importance of sport politically as symbolic of national prowess and a means for political parties to strategically position themselves; this effectively pushed the LTA to invest more in talent development and align itself with broader government policy. Anything that went against its aims was deemed problematic. The roots of exclusion lie in the sport’s potential to mark class and prestige, and really this has changed very little over the last 150 years. Membership to an exclusive club remains a recognised status symbol and a means to accrue cultural capital and make important social contacts. Over the last two decades or so, representatives of the LTA have overlooked these important features that have helped sustain interest in the sport over time, and paid insufficient attention to crucial 467

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aspects of the sport’s enduring culture of exclusivity (Lake 2010b; 2013; 2015). In doing so, they have underestimated the importance of social exclusivity in serving valuable ends for club members, and instead have tended to label those individuals in positions of power within exclusive clubs/associations as in effect conservative, undemocratic and elitist. This has been a hindrance, both to developing a full understanding of these individuals’ motives and also to maintaining effective channels of communication between the relevant parties in order to reach satisfactory outcomes. As was revealed in Lake’s (2013) research, such a divisive standpoint has, in some cases, actually enhanced the extent of resistance toward the LTA and their policies designed to make tennis more inclusive. Clearly then, the creation of any policies related to social exclusion should commence not with an assumption that the conditions of exclusion are necessarily bad, but rather with a critical and balanced assessment of who they are actually good or bad for, who is excluded, why that might be problematic and how a historical shift in the balance of power between those implicated groups has led to the construction of the issue itself. For every person who condemns exclusion, another (perhaps quietly) celebrates it, and therefore it might be prudent, if possible, to approach the creation of policy from a more balanced and emotionally detached viewpoint from the outset.

Note 1 A modified version of this paper was published as ‘Discourses of Social Exclusion in British Tennis: Historical Changes and Continuities’, published in the International Journal of Sport and Society (2014, 4(2), pp.1–11). IJSS is published by Common Ground Publishing. Copyright permission obtained 3 March 2016 (Support #487001).

References Blair, T. (1996) New Britain: My Vision of a Young Country. London: Fourth Estate. Bramham, P. (2008) Sports Policy. In Hylton, K. & Bramham, P. (ed.), Sports Development: Policy, Process and Practice 2nd ed., (pp.10–24), London: Routledge. Brasher, K. (1986) Traditional Versus Commercial Values in Sport: The Case of Tennis. In Allison, L. (ed.), The Politics of Sport (pp.198–215), Manchester: Manchester University Press. Cannadine, D. (1999) The Rise and Fall of Class in Britain. New York: Columbia University Press. Coalter, F. (2007) A Wider Social Role for Sport:Who’s Keeping the Score? London: Routledge. Collins, M.F. (2003) Sport and Social Exclusion. London: Routledge. Deford, F. (2004) Big Bill Tilden:The Triumphs and the Tragedy. New York: Sportclassic Books. Garrett, R. (2004) The Response of Voluntary Sports Clubs to Sport England’s Lottery Funding: Cases of Compliance, Change and Resistance, Managing Leisure, 9, 13–29. Green, M. (2004) Changing Policy Priorities for Sport in England: The Emergence of Elite Sport Development as a Key Policy Concern, Leisure Studies, 23, 365–85. Harris, S., More, K. & Collins, M. (2009) Great Expectations: Voluntary Sports Clubs, and their Role in Delivering National Policy of English Sport, Voluntas, 20, 404–23. Holt, R. (1989) Sport and the British. Oxford: Clarendon. Houlihan, B. & White, A. (2002) The Politics of Sports Development. London: Routledge. Jefferys, K. (2009a) Fred Perry and British Tennis: ‘Fifty Years to Honor a Winner’, Sport in History, 29, 1–24. Jefferys, K. (2009b) The Triumph of Professionalism in World Tennis:The Road to 1968, International Journal of the History of Sport, 26, 2253–69. Lake, R.J. (2009) Real Tennis and the Civilising Process, Sport in History, 29, 553–76. Lake, R.J. (2010a) Stigmatized, Marginalized, Celebrated: Developments in Lawn Tennis Coaching, 1870– 1939, Sport in History, 30, 82–103. Lake, R.J. (2010b) ‘Managing Change’ in British Tennis 1990–2006: Unintended Outcomes of LTA Talent Development Policies, International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 45, 474–90. Lake, R.J. (2012) Gender and Etiquette in British Lawn Tennis 1870-1939: A Case Study of Mixed Doubles, International Journal of the History of Sport, 29, 691–710. 468

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Lake, R.J. (2013) ‘They Treat Me like I’m Scum’: Social Exclusion and Established-Outsider Relations in a British Tennis Club, International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 48, 112–28. Lake, R.J. (2015) A Social History of Tennis in Britain. London: Routledge. Lake, R.J. (2016) ‘That Excellent Sample of a Professional’: Dan Maskell and the Contradictions of British Amateurism in Twentieth-century Lawn Tennis, Sport in History, 36, 1–25. Lake, R.J. (2017) ‘Tennis in an English Garden Party’: Wimbledon, Englishness and British Sporting Culture. In Gibbons,T. & Malcolm, D. (eds.), Sport and English National Identity in a “Disunited Kingdom” (pp.49–64), London: Routledge. Lawn Tennis Association (1995) The Development of Tennis in Great Britain 1996–2001. London: Lawn Tennis Association. Lawn Tennis Association (1999) British Tennis and You: A Strategy for the New Millennium. London: Lawn Tennis Association. Lawn Tennis Association (2002) Annual Report. London: Lawn Tennis Association. Lawn Tennis Association (2003) Annual Report. London: Lawn Tennis Association. Lenglen, S. (1926) North American Tour Souvenir Programme. New York: C.C. Pyle. Lister, R. (1998) From Equality to Social Inclusion: New Labour and the Welfare State, Critical Social Policy, 18, 215–25. Lowerson, J. (1993) Sport and the English Middle Classes 1870–1914. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Maskell, D. (1988) From Where I Sit. London: Willow. Mott, S. (1999) Tennis Elite Lose Points by Living in the past. The Daily Telegraph. Mott, S. (2000, 17 July) Tennis Wastes Big Chance to Court Talent. The Daily Telegraph. Oakley, B. & Green, M. (2001) Still Playing the Game at Arm’s Length? The Selective Re-investment in British Sport 1995–2000, Managing Leisure, 6, 74–94. Phillpots, L. (2011) Sports Development and Young People in England. In Houlihan, B. & Green, M. (ed.), Routledge Handbook of Sports Development (pp.131–42), London: Routledge. Walker, A. (1997) Introduction: The Strategy of Inequality. In Walker, A. & Walker, C.A. (eds.), Britain Divided: The Growth of Social Exclusion in the 1980s and 1990s, (pp.1–9), London: Child Poverty Action Group. West Worthing Club (1986) West Worthing Club Centenary Year 1886–1986. Worthing: West Worthing Club. Whannel, G. (1986) The Unholy Alliance: Notes on Television and the Remaking of British Sport 1965– 85. Leisure Studies, 5, 129–45. Wolfenden Committee (1960) Sport and the Community: The Report of the Wolfenden Committee on Sport. London: Central Council of Physical Recreation.

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Index

advertising 103, 197, 315, 363, 379–80, 417, 455; corporate support 79–80, 193; gendered 226, 234–42; of products 22, 174–5, 178, 197, 416; of tennis 2, 32, 166, 189, 269, 308, 411, 462, 463; racialized 399, 444–5; see also media AECC (All England Croquet Club) see AELTC AECLTC (All England Croquet & Lawn Tennis Club) see AELTC AELTC (All England Lawn Tennis Club) 46, 121, 191, 204, 258, 276, 372, 384, 385, 463, 464, 467; 1967 professional tournament 7, 99, 377; conservatism 191, 258, 311–12, 342–3; criticism 121, 308–9, 342–3, 378–9; early formation 97, 268, 342, 372; Englishness 372–80; formulating tennis rules 21, 308, 342; support for new media 313–7; support for open tennis 7, 345–6, 377, 466–7 AELTCC (All England Lawn Tennis & Croquet Club) see AELTC Agassi, Andre 25, 76, 82, 93, 155, 165, 217–9, 379 agents 23, 290, 377, 398, 444–5 Alami, Karim 162–3 amateurism 3, 6–7, 8, 39, 62, 114, 116, 119–23, 135, 148, 183–92, 216, 219, 245, 249, 253, 278–9, 286, 314, 352, 404; anti–professionalism 5, 39, 43, 68–75, 123–8, 187, 344, 363–8; clubs/ associations 21, 23, 111–12, 246, 316, 464; decline of 2, 5, 12, 22–4, 212–13, 262–3, 311– 15, 343–9, 368–9, 378; ethos 22–4, 26, 39–42, 55, 58, 67, 123, 128, 133, 185–6, 255–7, 260–2, 266, 309, 316, 373–5, 380, 462; professional impulses 4–5, 9, 22–4, 41, 43–7, 58–65, 67–75, 187, 204–6, 208, 212, 224, 262–3, 313, 316–7, 343–9, 376–7, 412, 433, 465–6; rules 7, 23, 29, 60–1, 98–9, 185–7, 209–10, 215, 248, 344–5, 362, 411, 465 Americanization 9, 134, 137, 249 Amritraj, Anand 151, 154 Amritraj,Vijay 151, 153–4, 158 anti-semitism 168, 218, 292, 303, 394; see also Jewish players; see also race/ethnicity Arazi, Hicham 162–3 Argentina 13, 141–9, 217, 220, 252, 388 470

Ashe, Arthur 281, 283, 346, 392; tennis success 7, 10, 80, 250, 407–8; work on South African anti–apartheid 7–8, 14, 405–7; work on US race relations 249–50, 278, 392, 397, 399, 402–5, 407–9, 416, 444 ATA (American Tennis Association) 8, 14, 55, 393–4, 398 ATP (Association of Tennis Professionals) 7, 100–1, 141, 144, 154, 156, 162–3, 164, 234, 248, 334, 347, 383, 390, 398, 407, 419, 427; 1973 Wimbledon boycott 7, 347, 377; ATP Tour 24, 26, 80, 96, 104, 163, 166, 346, 348–9 Austin, Henry “Bunny” 69, 178, 186, 373, 395–6 Australia 3, 5, 6, 11, 64, 68–9, 70, 74, 100, 114, 151, 213–15, 341, 351–9, 387, 451, 466 amateur/ professional issues 5–6, 187, 212–14, 346, 363; coaching/talent development 32, 43, 46; players 3, 8, 24, 68, 212–15, 217, 219–20, 325, 396, 414–15, 433; post-war dominance 5–6, 376–7 Australian National Championships 98, 363, 412; of 1934 68; of 1935 70–1, 98; see also Australian Open Australian Open 10, 14, 77, 82, 133, 220, 229, 230, 320–1, 334, 452; equal prize money 426; of 1970 403; of 1974 216; of 1978 144; of 1979 144; of 1989 154; of 1990 252; of 1995 252; of 1998 157; of 1999 227, 228; of 2000 163, 219; of 2003 156; of 2004 163; of 2006 156, 220; of 2009 158; of 2012 229; of 2014 86, 90, 92, 334; of 2015 156, 229, 230; of 2016 158, 323, 325; of 2017 101, 329 Avory, Ted 73, 75 Azarenka,Victoria 224 badminton 2, 21, 88, 91, 154, 160, 270, 341 banal nationalism 381 Bartoli, Marion 56 baseball 9, 179, 186, 205, 286, 367, 396–7, 408, 416, 434 basketball 9, 88, 90–1, 154, 179, 196, 197, 247, 356, 362, 369, 396–7, 399, 444–5, 454, 457 Battle of the Sexes see Bobby Riggs: Battle of the Sexes; Billie Jean King: Battle of the Sexes

Index

BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) 7, 32, 46, 56, 82, 99, 100, 220, 314–7, 356, 376–7, 388; Sports Personality of the Year award 383, 389–90 Becker, Boris 12, 76–85 Belguim 197, 239, 297, 343, 425 Betjeman, John 50, 286 Betz, Pauline 188, 314 Bhupathi, Mahesh 151, 155–60 Bjorkmn, Jonas 455 Black, Cara 156, 158 Blake, James 8, 278, 396–7 Bodo, Peter 25, 287, 290 Boland, John 363 Bollettieri, Nick 8, 194, 217, 279, 380 Bopanna, Rohan 151, 159–60 Borg, Bjorn 80, 104, 144, 153, 154, 159, 217–9, 282, 287, 407 Borotra, Jean 4, 74, 113–5, 259, 365–6 Bouchard, Eugenie 56, 225, 229, 231 boxing 39, 114, 142, 186, 205, 277, 280, 304, 363, 396, 397, 404 Braasch, Karsten 425 Britain 11, 62, 82, 97, 125, 151, 197, 208, 212, 220, 226, 266, 287, 292, 385; administrative leadership 3, 7, 20–2, 108–9, 112, 114, 151, 341–3, 346, 374–6, 380; amateur ethos 6–7, 21, 39–47, 67–75, 98–9, 123, 125, 213, 215–6, 311–2, 314, 343, 373–4, 376–7; art 296–301, 303, 305–6; Brits abroad 108–11, 116, 141–2, 151–3, 156, 301–3; coaching 12, 39–47, 123–5; decline 20–1, 42–3, 189–90, 277, 376–7; early lawn tennis development 20–2, 245, 296, 351; inter–war success 6, 68–75; media/broadcasting 7, 14, 21, 23, 179, 217, 227–8, 231, 308–17, 380–1; national identity 14, 112, 383–90; parks’ tennis 32–3; players 12, 13, 50–2, 67–75, 119–21, 125–6, 183–92, 257, 260, 262, 345, 363, 383–90, 394, 395, 412, 428; public schools 20, 42, 43, 45–7, 69, 96–7, 255, 310, 372, 380; talent development 29, 39, 43–7, 213, 380–1, 460–8; tennis clubs 5, 21, 29–37, 41–2, 124, 213, 259, 341, 373, 451; workplace tennis 33–5 Brookes, Norman 3, 127, 214, 375 Broquedis, Marguerite 52, 108, 113–4 Brough, Louise 394 Brugnon, Jacques 4, 74, 114–5, 259 Brundage, Avery 365–8 Budge, Don 4, 5, 23, 72, 74, 213, 215, 279 Bueno, Maria 6, 143, 148, 187, 292 Burke, Thomas 39, 41, 124–5, 128 Burrow, Frank 260 Buxton, Angela 394 Calder, Alexander 276, 281, 304 Canada 11, 56, 141, 142, 194, 216, 334, 387 Capriati, Jennifer 93

Carlos, John 403, 405, 408 Casals, Rosie 245, 249–50, 253; feminist efforts 25, 99, 224, 250, 347, 411, 414–9; professional touring 24, 433; racialized 14, 250 Cilic, Marin 326 Chambers, Dorothea Lambert 13, 32, 40, 50–2, 175, 177, 180–1, 183–4, 259, 260–1, 373 Chatrier, Philippe 115, 315, 347, 353, 367 children/youth 29–30, 36–7, 91, 96–7, 110, 131–2, 168, 179, 186–9, 247, 299, 383, 395, 426, 443; coaching/talent development 43, 45–6, 93, 143–5, 358, 460–7 China 86–94, 101, 103, 114, 159, 218, 379 Cleather, Norah 376 coaches/coaching 52, 72–3, 81–2, 88, 91–2, 135–7, 145, 186, 189, 194, 212–4, 217, 220, 241, 247, 248, 252, 279, 283, 324, 344, 383, 388, 442, 444, 455, 466; coach/member relations 39, 45, 47, 464; early developments 8, 12, 32, 39–42, 111–5, 120, 123–5, 128, 310; gender issues 220, 227, 290, 380, 428; methods/philosophies 6, 41–3, 59, 78, 160, 184, 257–61, 456; race issues 392, 398, 445; struggles 30–1, 33, 39–47, 125, 136–7, 310, 461, 464–5; working–class 12, 39–42, 67, 123–5, 310, 464 Cochet, Henri 4, 67, 73, 74, 113–5, 259 Cold War 13, 249, 365, 367 Collins, Bud 154, 197, 315–6, 398, 408 Colonization 9, 114, 157, 196, 464; post–colonial influences 6, 13, 111, 163, 166, 464; spread of tennis 3, 42, 108, 151–3, 268, 464 commercialism 1, 5, 9, 11–3, 27, 45, 97, 134, 185, 213, 255, 262–3, 269–70, 290, 305, 312, 317, 341, 344, 349, 366–7, 374; player endorsements 6, 8, 23–6, 56, 88, 98, 101–4, 147–8, 156, 158, 165, 193, 195, 224–7, 236, 242, 249, 333, 346, 368, 399, 404, 406, 415, 427, 441, 444–6; sponsorship 11, 21–7, 32, 92, 97, 99–104, 115, 134, 164–7, 219, 223, 230, 234, 240, 246, 251, 315–6, 346–9, 353, 367–8, 379, 416–8, 445, 447, 451–2, 467 commodification 21, 23–4, 199, 365, 385, 440–1; of Black culture 197–8, 442, 444–7; of femininity/sexuality 223, 231, 235, 241; of Wimbledon 317, 380; see also tennis: players as commodities Connors, Jimmy 10, 80, 115, 144, 154, 425; behavior 216–7, 219, 248, 262, 291; versus Arthur Ashe, Wimbledon 1975 80, 407–8 consumerism 93, 96–8, 104, 131, 164, 197, 217, 235, 240–1, 329, 335–6, 404, 445, 446; emergence/growth 21–5, 51, 79, 263, 290–1, 345 Cooper, Charlotte 22, 121, 174, 373 corruption 11, 200, 277–9, 312, 365, 367; see also deviance Court, Margaret 6, 100, 352, 414, 424 471

Index

Courtenay, Arthur 121, 126, 463 Cowgill, Bryan 377 Crawford, Jack 68, 69, 72, 214–5, 375 cricket 6, 9, 19, 36, 120, 186, 278, 300, 341; connections with lawn tennis 2, 3, 29, 189, 268, 271, 342; country–club sports 35, 42, 142; fashions 178, 374; Indian obsession 151–6, 158–60; lawn tennis as a threat 269, 272, 310; professionals 39, 40; women’s participation 34 croquet 2, 21, 50, 109, 110, 112, 114, 184, 267–8, 270, 272, 372, 379 Crowther, John 461, 467 Cullman, Joseph 7, 25, 415–8 Curry, John 379 Czechoslovakia/Czech Republic 8, 13, 130–7, 151, 369, 399 Danzig, Allison 213, 315 Davenport, Lindsay 287 David, Herman 377 Davies, Mike 216, 218, 466 Davis, Dwight 343, 387, 394; see also Davis Cup Davis Cup 5, 9, 44, 81, 83, 159, 213, 246, 249, 290, 316, 344, 376, 403; amateur rules 365; American participation 217, 343; Argentinean participation 142–5, 148; Australian post–war dominance 74, 187, 214–5, 352; British participation 68–75, 383, 387–90; Czech participation 131–7; emergence 3, 22, 97–8, 119, 126–8, 259, 310, 394; French success 74, 114–5; growth 4, 67, 77, 259, 363–4; Indian participation 152–6; of 1923 59; of 1928 313; of 1933 44; of 1934 58–9, 63; of 1937 74; of 1960 262; of 2000 398; of 2001 163; of 2002 163; of 2004 163; politics/nationalism issues 4, 6, 7, 65, 278, 347–9, 405–8; sponsorship 25 de Alvarez, Lili 303–4 de Coubertin, Pierre 109, 111, 116 de Stefani, Giorgio 364–5 Decugis, Max 110, 113 Deford, Frank 59, 205, 209, 402, 408, 465 del Potro, Juan Martin 148, 220, 322 Dell, Donald 26 deviance 11, 90, 210, 227–8, 441; see also corruption; see also doping; see also match–fixing Dixon, David 24 Djokovic, Novak 82, 159, 282, 321, 323, 330, 333, 378, 387, 425, 427 Dod, Lottie 50, 179, 258, 297, 373 Doherty, Laurence 3, 22, 41, 110, 184, 310, 343, 373, 374, 376 Doherty, Reginald 3, 22, 41, 110, 124, 184, 310, 343, 373, 374, 376 doping 11, 225, 280, 283, 333, 368, 452 Drobny, Jaroslav 132, 153 Drysdale, Cliff 24, 402, 405, 406 Durr, Francoise 419, 433, 437 472

Dwight, James 40, 110, 121, 125, 256, 258, 309 Eaves, Wilberforce 42, 126 Edwards, Harry 396, 408 Egypt 114, 163–4, 168 El Aynaoui,Younes 162–3 elitism 20–3, 43, 92–3, 246, 314, 466–8; clubs 116, 303, 393, 468; see also social class Emerson, Roy 24, 153 Evert, Chris 10, 25, 54, 80, 197, 224, 227, 262, 348, 396, 399, 434 Facebook see social media Fashions 27, 51, 173, 186, 225, 250, 311, 316, 399, 415–8: American 56–7, 179–81; artistic representations 271, 296–302; British 174–9; femininity 174–6, 180–1, 238, 240, 411; French 4, 51–4, 113–4, 179–81, 184; see also Jean Patou; see also Ted Tinling Federation “Fed” Cup 9, 25, 77, 81, 83, 133, 135, 137, 347, 415 Federer, Roger 9, 104, 135, 148, 219, 220, 225, 388, 427; global icon 99, 101, 159, 329, 330; playing style 56, 281–4, 292; vs. Rafael Nadal 166, 321, 323; wealth 10, 101, 104, 165, 427 femininity 57, 173, 223: body/appearance 13, 56, 188, 223–31, 238–42; challenges of 180, 188, 190–1; compulsory heterosexuality 225–7, 240–1, 279; fashions 174–6, 180–1, 240; gender roles 91; ideals 8, 13, 113, 223–31; of Anna Kournikova 197, 226–7, 441; of Bill Tilden 207; of Gabriela Sabatini 147–8; of Helen Wills 54, 276–7; of Maria Sharapova 26, 195, 225–6, 230; of Renée Richards 433–7; of Serena Williams 26, 227–30, 441–2; of Suzanne Lenglen 261, 276; perceptions of tennis 186, 205; racialized 26, 228–9, 441; sexualization 13, 235, 239–42; see also gender; see also masculinity FFT (Fédération Française du Tennis) 115, 116, 313, 315, 347, 365, 465 First World War 97, 114, 115, 176, 180, 183–4, 259, 299, 301, 303–4, 343, 373 Fitzwilliam Lawn Tennis Club 39, 120–8, 463 Flinders Park 14, 219, 352, 354–6; see also Melbourne Park football (American) 9, 24, 210, 248, 280, 396–7, 399, 404, 434, 444 Football World Cup 4, 76, 80, 144, 145, 259, 364, 377, 384, 466 Forest Hills (West Side Tennis Club) 54, 70–1, 185, 246, 276, 278, 280–1, 393, 395, 416 Four Musketeers see Borotra, Jean; Brugnon, Jacques; Cochet, Henri; Lacoste, Rene France 4, 11, 13, 19, 20, 43, 44, 55, 64, 80, 103, 124, 130, 163, 187, 287, 304, 341, 345: art 297, 301–2; clubs 128, 451; fashion 4, 51–3, 56, 113–4, 184, 188; players 52, 74, 98, 259, 376

Index

French National Championships 6, 68, 98, 111, 363; of 1913 113; of 1914 113; of 1928 276; of 1952 215; of 1956 190, 278; of 1961 187; of 1966 187; see also French Open French Open 10, 77, 164, 281, 411, 452; boycotts 24, 346–7; equal prize money 426; of 1973 216; of 1983 396; of 1997 156, 163; of 1998 163; of 1999 82; of 2001 156, 399; of 2004 148; of 2011 86, 88, 91; of 2013 90; of 2017 159; prestige 23; social media 335; sponsorship 25, 102, 335 French Riviera 3, 41, 51–3, 108, 109–110, 112, 187, 288, 291, 292, 301–2, 343, 373, 375, 465 gambling 51, 52, 279, 288, 320, 333, 356 Garrison, Zina 26, 252, 278, 397 Gem, Major Harry 2, 270, 296 Gender 11, 13, 147, 163, 245, 253, 270, 331, 367, 374, 416, 455; criticism of women’s appearances 56; criticism of women’s play 55; feminist politics 7, 9, 15, 230, 261–2, 315, 411–20, 422– 9, 432–8, 440–7; gender hierarchies 195, 220; gender roles 91, 190, 226, 231, 250, 258–62; ideologies 1, 147, 183, 190–2, 195, 205–10, 223–4, 226–7, 250, 261, 317, 438; influences on tennis 113, 204, 247, 277, 309; intersectionality 15, 184, 186, 201, 245, 386, 399, 440–7; media representations 11, 13, 141, 229–31, 234–42, 248–9, 317; mixed–sex play 2, 34, 40, 113, 115, 126, 143, 156, 158–9, 185, 188, 247, 257–8, 261, 271, 274, 288–9, 297–9, 304, 347, 366, 386–7, 437, 454; performativity 223, 227–8, 257–9, 260–3; playing styles 14, 56, 257–9, 260–3; protesting sexism 228, 259, 315, 411–20; sexism 57, 159, 194–201, 224–6, 229–31, 257–62, 392, 415, 418, 423–4, 428, 432–3, 437; sexualization of tennis players 8, 13, 141, 193–201, 226–7, 235–6, 274, 287–93, 317, 441; sexuality 141, 203, 206; tennis as gender equitable 10, 102, 104, 114, 225; transgender issues 15, 207, 432–8; see also femininity; see also masculinity; see also politics: of gender Germany 42, 103, 130, 135, 187, 267, 279, 300, 375; art 302–3; clubs 2, 22, 124, 128; media 76–84; national identity 12, 76–8, 80–4; players 12, 76–85, 323, 363, 368, 369; politics 4, 79, 83, 115 Gibson, Althea 8, 14, 190, 196, 249, 278, 373, 394–7, 416, 444 globalization 9, 12, 84, 134, 242, 317, 352, 380, 445; influences on tennis 3–4, 96–105, 228, 315, 467 golf 2, 32, 33, 34, 36, 120, 127, 131, 163, 164, 237, 279, 280, 406, 444; attitudes toward professionals 40; clubhouses 42; competition to lawn tennis 128, 272; socio–cultural connections with lawn tennis 9–10, 29, 267, 300, 388, 399

Gonzales, Richard “Pancho” 5, 7, 14, 23, 24, 99, 213, 214, 215, 250, 291, 416; career 245–9; legacy 250–3; playing style 215, 247 Goodbody, Manliffe 125–6, 128 Goolagong–Cawley, Evonne 8, 292, 348, 396–7, 406 Gore, Arthur 119, 376 Gore, Spencer 256, 257, 300, 372, 373 Gorringe, Chris 377–8, 379 governance see ATP; see FFT; see ITF/ILTF; see LTA; see LTAA; see USTA; see WTA Graebner, Clark 278, 281 Graf, Steffi 10, 12, 76–85, 147, 323, 368, 369 Groeneveld, Sven 455 Gulyas, Istvan 402 gymnastics 9, 114, 132, 176, 362, 364 Hardwick, Derek 346 Hardwick, Mary 260 Hartwig, Rex 215 Harvey, Bagenal 377 Heathcote, C.G. 308, 342 Heathcote, J.M. 40, 223, 256, 309 Heldman, Gladys 7, 25, 99, 224, 315, 413, 415–20, 434, 435 Henman, Tim 380–1, 384–5, 386, 389 Heyman, Allan 346 Hierons, Charles 39, 43, 45 Hillyard, Brame 375 Hillyard, George W. 124, 204, 314, 373 Hingis, Martina 82, 156–8, 196, 225, 228 Hoad, Lew 5–7, 23, 214–6 Hoare, Sir Samuel (Viscount Templewood) 71, 316, 376, 466 homosexuality 148; of Bill Tilden 13, 203–11; of Gabriela Sabatini 148; see also US: homophobia; see also US: transphobia Hopman, Harry 6, 214–7 Hughesman (née Curry), Joan 183, 186–9 Hunt, Lamar 24, 218, 346, 377 Hunter, Frank 72 IOC (International Olympic Committee) 4, 97–8, 112, 133, 343–4, 362–9, 404, 426, 436–8; see also Olympic Games India 3, 13, 55, 114, 151–60, 278, 375, 379 Instagram see social media International Tennis Hall of Fame 122, 141, 143–4, 149, 247, 248, 250, 398, 422 invented traditions 77–8, 378, 379 Ireland 13, 39, 119–28, 157, 256, 299, 302, 343, 351, 363, 366, 386 Irish Lawn Tennis Championships 13, 120–8 Italian Open Tennis Championships 413 Italy 3, 19, 79, 86, 149, 159, 163, 188, 296, 315, 364; art 300–3 ITF/ILTF (International Tennis Federation/ International Lawn Tennis Federation) 14, 25, 473

Index

67, 108, 343, 347, 348–9, 387; 1973 Wimbledon boycott 7, 347, 377; amateur rules 69–70, 133, 343, 345; formation 22, 67, 97, 112–3, 343–4; issues for women 7, 315, 344, 347–8, 419; issues of race 8, 405–6; moves for open tennis 7, 24, 99, 316, 345–6; vs. IOC 4, 97–8, 133, 362–9; wheelchair tennis 452–5 Ivanovic, Ana 56, 330 Jacobs, Helen 54–6, 186 James, Lebron 197–8, 444 Japan 25, 103, 114, 154, 156, 292, 369, 380, 451, 452, 455 jeu de paume 19, 96, 108–13 Jewish players 55, 303, 394; see also anti–Semitism Johnston, Bill 205, 208, 259, 304 Jones, Ann 191, 226; efforts for equal prize money 187, 412–3, 420; professional touring 433 Jones, Henry “Cavendish” 308, 342 Jones, Perry T. 213–4 Jordan, Hamilton 348 Jordan, Michael 197–8, 444–5 journalism see media; newspapers; magazines Kerber, Angelique 9, 225, 323 Kerr, George 39, 41, 123–5, 128 Keys, Madison 397 King, Billie Jean 57, 228, 435, 437; Battle of the Sexes 15, 100, 195, 250, 315, 422–9; efforts for equal prize money 224, 315, 347, 413–20, 424–5, 427–9, 433–5; establishing Virginia Slims tour 7, 25, 99–100, 224, 348, 411–8, 424, 434–5; establishing the WTA 224, 418–20, 424; feminist efforts 10, 195, 229, 262, 414, 423–9; global icon 10; professional touring 24, 433 King (née Mudford), Phyllis 183–6, 188–9 Knight, Billy 466 Kodes, Jan 132–4, 136, 154 Konstam, Phyllis 395 Konta, Johanna 387 Kooyong Lawn Tennis Club 6, 351–7 Kournikova, Anna 8, 13, 193–201, 225, 226–7, 236, 274, 287, 441 Krajicek, Richard 135 Kramer, Jack 5, 23, 104, 190, 213; professional tour promoter 247–9, 345–7, 376–8; sexism 416, 434 Krishnan, Ramanathan 151, 153–4, 159 Kuerten, Gustavo 245 Kunieda, Shingo 453–5 Kvitova, Petra 137 Kyrgios, Nick 220–1, 325, 330 La Raza Tennis Association 250–2 La Raza Tennis Tournament 245, 251–3 Lacoste, Rene 4, 43, 53, 74, 98, 114–5, 207, 259 Laney, A.L. 55–6, 315 Lansdowne Lawn Tennis Club 39, 120–4,127 474

Larned, Bill 126, 127 Laver, Rod 153–4, 156, 221, 292, 352; Australian icon 219–20; masculinity 214–5; prize money differentials 99, 413, 424, 433; professional touring 7, 24, 346 Lavery, John 271–2, 297–300, 302, 306 Lawford, Herbert 121, 178, 181, 257, 309 Lenglen, Suzanne 4, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 56, 108, 110, 115, 184, 288, 299, 301, 311, 344, 376, 411; as a novelist 288, 291–2; fashion 37, 51–2, 173, 179–81, 301; playing style 51–3, 260–1; professional touring 4, 23, 44, 67, 98, 312, 411–2, 465; vs. Dorothea Lambert Chambers 51, 180, 185, 260–1; vs. Helen Wills 53–4, 113, 276, 301–2, 304 Leamington Lawn Tennis Club 2, 270 Lendl, Ivan 80, 132, 135–6, 282, 369, 396 LTA (Lawn Tennis Association) 5, 14, 22, 23, 29, 34, 37, 97, 112, 119, 185, 256, 305, 313, 341, 347, 380, 412; club affiliation 5, 7, 30–7, 73, 112, 259, 299, 343, 463–6; coaching/talent development 7, 12, 43–7, 185–8, 460–8; county/regional associations 29–37; media relations 310–3, 315–6, 434–4; relations with Fred Perry 68–74; support for international matches 123–5; support for open tennis 5, 7, 99, 345, 376, 412 LTAA (Lawn Tennis Association of Australia)/ Tennis Australia 5, 6, 187, 214, 352–9 Macauley, Duncan 314, 316 MacCall, George 24–5 magazines 110, 136, 174, 198, 219, 241–2, 269, 342, 399, 441, 445, 455, 462; Bill Tilden’s work for 58–60; influences on tennis 308–15; see also Gladys Heldman; see also media Mahony, Harold 122–3, 126–8, 256, 386 Mallory, Molla 53, 260 management groups 8, 26, 341, 349, 377, 380 Mandlikova, Hana 132–3, 135 Marble, Alice 8, 186, 190, 314 Marshall, Julian 308, 342–3 Masculinity 13, 113, 212–21, 235, 425; cult of 127; hegemonic 226–7, 231; men’s playing styles 248, 399; of Bill Tilden 2, 13, 203–10; of Renée Richards 432–6; of the Williams’ sisters 441–2; women’s playing styles 186, 190–1; see also femininity; see also gender Maskell, Dan 42, 44–7, 72–3, 96, 316–7, 464–6 match–fixing 11, 278–9 Mauresmo, Amélie 220, 227 MCC (Marylebone Cricket Club) 21, 268, 270, 308, 341–2 McCormack, Mark 26, 377 McEnroe, John 10, 25, 80, 81, 159, 346, 348, 378–9, 423; behavior 103–4, 216–9, 248, 263, 291, 379

Index

McKane, Kitty 260 McKelvie, Roy 311–6 media 3, 5, 9–11, 13, 23, 69, 96–104, 130, 159, 345, 355–8, 365, 369, 406, 455; disability sport 455–8; framing of athletes’ identities 10, 13, 14, 58–65, 76–83, 87–93, 113, 132, 135, 141, 144–8, 156, 193–201, 203, 209, 248–50, 330–3, 379, 440–7; gender representations 8, 10, 13, 56, 89–91, 147–8, 157–9, 191, 193–201, 223–31, 234–42, 362, 423–8; ignoring pre–open era professional tours 5, 74, 466; influence on tennis 26, 67, 76–83, 219, 283–4, 290, 308–17, 341, 349, 363, 379; issues related to Bill Tilden 13, 23, 58–65, 203, 209, 312; national identity representations 14, 76–83, 132, 135, 144–8, 228, 380, 383–90; race representations 8, 228, 242, 392, 397–9, 440–7; see also advertising; see also magazines; see also newspapers; see also social media; see also television Melbourne Park 356–8 Melville, Kerry 404–5, 411 Metreveli, Alex 402 Mexico 11, 245–53, 276, 291, 305, 306, 366, 403, 407, 436 Michelle (née Hibbert), Joy 183, 186–9 middle class 34, 108–9, 154, 205–6, 212, 308, 372; amateur ideals 14, 23, 71, 257–9, 374; democratization 4–5, 114, 116, 259–60, 291, 299, 461; exclusivity 1, 3, 39–40, 62, 461–6; fashions 173–81; institutions 42, 50, 120, 246, 260, 314, 373–8; participation/dominance 20–2, 29, 114, 137, 163, 173, 175–6, 184–91, 246, 296–9, 352; players 45, 144, 184–91, 389; roots of tennis 29, 40, 131, 299; socially aspirational 21–2, 266, 462–4 Mills, Alan 46, 378 Minnebraker, Jeff 451 MIPTC (Men’s International Professional Tennis Council) 347–8 Mirza, Sania 151, 157–60, 330 Molik, Alicia 228 Monfils, Gael 8, 397 Moore, Raymond 224–5, 405, 427 Moran, Gussie 191, 274, 279, 280 Morocco 162–4, 168 Mortimer, Angela 188–91, 226, 412–3 Mugaruza, Garbine 225 Mulloy, Gardner 215–6 Murray, Andy 14, 220, 226, 320–2, 330, 34, 380, 383–91, 428 Murray, Jamie 383, 386, 388 Myrick, Julian 58, 64 Na, Li 12, 86–93, 425 Nadal, Rafael 9, 10, 101, 144, 159, 165–6, 225, 245, 282, 320–3, 330, 427

Nalbandian, David 148, 245 Nastase, Ilie 80, 216, 218, 248, 262, 291 National Tennis Centre, Melbourne 351, 354–9 nationalism 9, 13, 14, 65, 236, 403; American 65, 365, 367; Argentinean 144–6; Australian 352; British 14, 119; Czech 130–7; Egyptian 163; French 108, 114–6; Indian 152–3, 159; inter–war rise 3, 6; Irish sectarianism 127–8; Scottish 390; Soviet 365–7; see also politics: of national identity Navratilova, Martina 10, 25, 80, 81, 132, 156, 369, 396, 425; feminist cause 262, 348; immigration 134–6; outsider status 227, 399; playing style 227 Netherlands, The 3, 19, 135, 151, 302, 343, 452 New Labour 460, 467 New Zealand 3, 40, 100, 103, 110, 114, 347, 352, 375 Newcombe, John 24, 346, 377 Newport Casino 3, 22, 58, 125, 271, 304, 342 newspapers 30, 36, 70, 73, 89–93, 109, 113, 130, 133, 174, 186, 227–8, 231, 246, 251, 386, 390, 425, 441; Bill Tilden’s work for 58–61, 344; Fred Perry’s work for 69; influences on tennis 308–17; see also media Nisbet, Harold 126 Noah,Yannick 8, 154, 396–7, 425 NTL (National Tennis League) 24–5, 433 Olympic Games 4, 9, 22, 23, 52, 63, 81, 112–3, 114, 133–4, 147–8, 163, 168, 220, 228, 246, 304, 373, 374, 375, 383, 387–8, 390, 403, 404, 436–8; 1908, London 42, 97, 112, 131, 363; 1912, Stockholm 42, 97, 113–4; 1924, Paris 4, 97–8, 113, 131, 157, 276, 362–3; 1956, Melbourne 6, 352; 1968, Mexico City 405, 436; 1984, Los Angeles 83, 88; 1988, Seoul 81, 97, 134, 147, 154, 344, 362, 367–9, 436, 452; 2016, Rio de Janeiro 426; ILTF withdrawal 14, 97–8, 343–4, 364–6; Indian participation 151–7; ITF reinstatement 366–8, 436; see also IOC open era 5, 14, 74, 99, 149, 156, 183, 220, 248, 290, 293, 412, 413, 433; changes/consequences 24, 80, 103, 216–8, 223–31, 249, 255, 262, 346–7, 378; early years 7, 24–7, 99, 347–8, 412–3, 424, 433; efforts to bring about 99, 315–6, 376–7, 345–6 Paes, Leander 151, 154–60 Palmer, Archdale 311–2, 374 Paret, J. Parmly 40, 124, 126 Parks, Brad 451–2, 454 Patou, Jean 52, 179, 180 Patterson, Gerald 375 Perera, Juan Batista Augurio 2, 270, 296

475

Index

Perry, Fred 12, 44–6, 67–75, 214, 375, 386, 465–6; amateur issues 69, 98, 345, 375; celebrity 4, 10, 68–75, 299, 311, 465; Davis Cup success 67–75, 465; outsider status 375–6; professional touring 23, 70–5; sportswear brand 74, 98 Petra,Yvon 314 Pietrangeli, Nicola 159 Pigeon, Kristy 411, 414–5, 417 Pilic, Nikki 7, 347, 377 Pim, Joshua 122, 124, 126, 128 Player, Gary 406 politics 1, 9–15, 71, 204, 287, 293, 315, 341–9: American politics 403; Argentinean politics 13, 141–9; Australian politics 351–9; British politics 46, 81, 277, 291–2, 372, 383–90, 460–2, 466–7; Chinese politics 87–8; Czech politics 13, 130–7; French politics 108–15; German politics 79–80, 83, 300; in the Arab world 13, 162–8; Irish politics 13, 178–8; Italian politics 300; of disability 451–8; of gender 7, 9, 230, 261–2, 315, 411–20, 422–9, 432–8, 440–7; of national identity 1, 4, 6, 228, 259, 378–81, 383–90; of player power 4, 7, 59, 345–9, 377; of race 7–8, 9, 392–400, 402–9, 440–7; of social class 34–7, 261–2, 460–8; Olympic politics 362–9; Spanish politics 304; Soviet/Russian politics 190, 300 Pouille, Lucas 56, 165 professionalism 10, 14, 65, 69, 97, 108, 286, 290, 317, 346, 368; coaching 47; development 7, 9, 12–3, 27, 97, 132–4, 187, 224, 263, 341, 467; ethos 9, 44, 62, 67, 133, 204; inter–war professional touring 4, 23, 44, 67, 71–4, 115, 208; post–war professional touring 5, 7, 98–9, 223, 247–9, 262, 345–6, 349, 368, 376, 377, 466; threat of 112–3, 133, 204, 312–5, 344–5, 365–6, 369; see also Kramer, Jack: professional tour promoter; see also Lenglen, Suzanne: professional touring; see also Perry, Fred: professional touring; see also Tilden, Bill: professional touring Pyle, Charles C. 4, 23, 465 Qatar 162–8 Queen’s Club 39, 42, 43, 44, 123, 127, 128, 215, 316, 347, 464

236, 396, 441–3; racism (post–war) 8, 194–201, 215, 228, 246–51, 278, 292, 392–400, 402–7, 418, 419, 442, 458; segregation 278, 393–6, 398, 400, 444; whiteness 198–200, 278, 373; see also anti–Semitism; see also politics: of race rackets/racquets (game) 2, 19, 96, 120, 142, 255, 267, 268, 269, 296, 298, 341, 462 Ralston, Dennis 407 Rankine, Claudia 277–8 Raonic, Milos 322 Raskind, Richard see Richards, Renée Real tennis 12, 19, 109, 113, 116, 123, 169–70; connections with lawn tennis 1, 2, 97, 108, 255, 266–8, 274, 296, 341–2, 462 religion 158; Catholicism 115, 127; Christianity 277, 399–401, 404; Islam 157; Judaism 55, 302, 303, 394; prejudice/discrimination 15, 127, 218, 292, 393, 416, 458; social structure 11; sporting organizations 22 Renshaw, Ernest 3, 22, 40–1, 110, 121, 122, 256, 257, 309, 373, 374, 463 Renshaw, William 3, 22, 40–1, 110, 121, 122, 123, 256, 257, 309, 373, 374, 463 Richards, Renée 15, 432–8 Richards,Vincent 4, 23 Richey, Nancy 99, 411, 414 Riggs, Bobby 5, 15, 187, 345; Battle of the Sexes 100, 194, 224, 422–5, 429 Robredo, Tommy 455 Robson, Laura 387 Roche, Tony 408, 433 Roddick, Andy 219, 282 Roland Garros 82, 111, 114, 115, 156, 452; see also French National Championships; see also French Open Roper Barrett, Herbert 44, 119, 343 Rosewall, Ken 6, 7, 24, 214–5, 217, 219–20, 346, 412 Round, Dorothy 43, 184, 260, 299 Royalty 2, 3, 19–20, 27, 52, 110, 124, 157, 163, 286; British royalty 53, 77, 185, 214, 291, 299, 373–5, 378–80, 385, 389, 463 Rubin, Chanda 394, 397 Rusedski, Greg 387

race/ethnicity 11, 14, 277, 283, 403, 414; black femininity 26, 228–36, 440–4; colorblind 194, 195, 392; desegregation 8, 196, 249, 278, 373, 395–7, 444; early racism in tennis 310, 393–5; endorsements 25, 195, 444–7; identity politics 9, 14, 224, 392–3, 398–400; ideologies 1, 224, 317, 396–7; influence on tennis 277–8, 395–6, 398–400; 405–9; intersectionality 14, 15, 194, 196, 201, 228, 245, 428–9, 440–7; protesting racism 300, 394, 402–9, 440, 447; racial hierarchy 200–1, 309; racialized bodies 228,

Sabatini, Gabriela 13, 141, 146–9, 252 Sampras, Pete 10, 282 Santana, Manuel 416 schools’ tennis see children/youth; see also Britain: public schools Scrivener, Harry S. 309, 310, 313 Second World War 4, 75, 183, 186, 213, 259, 302, 373–4, 376 Sedgman, Frank 156, 187, 214–5, 217, 219 Segal, Abe 402 Segura, Francisco “Pancho” 247, 249, 252

476

Index

Seixas,Vic 215, 219 Shakespeare, Percy 299–301 Shapovalov, Denis 56 Sharapova, Maria 9, 10 doping 225, 332–3; endorsements/wealth 26, 104, 195, 225, 234, 333; femininity/sexualization 8, 26, 56, 194–5, 198, 200–1, 226; social media presence 230, 330 Smith, Stan 403 Smith, Tommie 403, 405, 408 Smyth, John 373, 375 soccer 19, 35, 77, 80–1, 97, 114, 120, 142, 151, 162, 167–8, 189, 205, 212, 213, 278, 300, 308, 315, 380, 384, 386, 390, 428 social class 9, 11, 13, 154, 272–4, 283, 308, 314, 317, 372, 375; artistic representations 296–300; behavioral ideals 2, 23, 41, 65, 113, 204, 212–4, 216, 309; class collaboration 34–5, 43; class conflict 12, 47, 131–2, 217–8, 292; club hierarchy 123; democratization 45, 143, 352; exclusivity/elitism 1, 4, 21, 29, 39–43, 46, 51, 55, 62, 80, 98, 109, 116, 136–7, 175–6, 222–3, 266, 270, 292, 372–4, 460–8; fashions and tastes 173, 178–81; intersecting with gender 14, 104, 173–81, 183–92, 204, 206, 210, 212–8, 245, 255–63, 266, 270–1, 293, 296, 309, 386; intersecting with national identity 371–81, 389; intersecting with race/ethnicity 14, 104, 190, 204, 228, 245–50, 252–3, 393–400, 404, 440–7; participation demographics 3, 21–3, 39, 45, 108–9, 113–4, 137, 144, 163, 175, 184–9, 286, 290–2, 297, 308, 415; patronage 19–21, 50, 71, 111, 120, 286, 372–3, 378–81, 415; social aspiration 21, 266; see also middle class; see also upper class; see also working class social media 8–9, 14, 15, 104, 158–9, 195, 198–201, 220, 223, 229, 230, 329–36, 378, 390, 396, 423; cyber–bullying 228, 333–4, 386, 392; redevelopment 334; sponsorship 334–6 South Africa 3, 8, 81, 151, 196, 278, 343, 402–7 Soviet Union/Russia 8, 132, 190, 213, 300, 343, 394; Cold War politics 131, 189, 249, 300, 365–6, 402; doping 280; officials 197; players 193, 194–5 Spain 19, 80, 104, 136, 143, 163, 245, 246, 270, 303–4, 315, 343; art 300, 303–4, 305; players 2, 9, 10, 101, 144, 149, 159, 165, 166, 225, 245, 253, 282, 320–3, 330, 427 Sphairistiké 3, 20, 21, 97, 266, 267, 269, 296, 341, 462; see also Wingfield, Major Walter Clopton Stephens, Sloane 397 Stove, Betty 419 Sutton, May 179–80 Sweden 3, 41, 110, 114, 151, 187, 218, 219, 368, 407 swimming 9, 42, 123, 287, 362–4, 369, 397, 434 Switzerland 112, 135, 343; Swiss players 9, 10, 56, 87, 99, 101, 104, 135, 148, 156, 158–9, 165–6,

196, 219–20, 225, 228, 281–4, 292, 321, 323, 329–30, 388, 427, 453 television 6, 26–7, 78, 82, 90, 146, 147, 163, 212, 229, 234, 251, 356, 362, 365, 367–9, 386, 389, 399; influences on tennis 7, 24, 26–7, 76, 79–80, 99–101, 156, 216–20, 224–5, 236, 282–4 314–7, 333, 347, 349, 376–7, 379, 381, 390, 403, 416, 422, 434, 467; see also media tennis: ancient origins 19–20; application of technology/science 1, 8–9, 26, 56, 100, 256, 314, 329–36, 357, 457; artistic representations 9, 296–306; democratization 4–5, 10, 23, 45, 134, 204, 253, 259, 290–1, 342, 366, 468; garden parties 1–2, 12, 21, 33, 109, 173, 184, 258, 270–2, 286, 288, 291, 296, 299, 378–9, 380, 462, 466; in literature 9, 14, 20, 186–9, 266, 271–4, 276–84; in poetry 9, 250, 278, 286–9, 292–4; internet forums 14, 230, 319–27; mixed doubles 2, 40, 113, 115, 126, 143, 156, 158–9, 185, 188, 247, 257–8, 261, 271, 274, 288–9, 297–9, 304, 366, 386–7, 437, 454; players as commodities 13, 92, 156, 194, 197–8, 219, 226, 262–3, 290, 345; playing styles 2, 8–9, 14, 41, 77–8, 81–2, 109, 115, 155, 203, 219, 247, 255–63, 281, 309; scoring 2, 258, 268, 287, 335, 341–2; shamateurism 22–3, 67, 75, 99, 133, 224, 343–5, 377 Tilden, Bill 114–5, 259, 260, 276, 376; artistic representations 303–4; celebrity 10, 59–64, 98, 311, 465; gender dynamics 13, 203–11; playing style 205, 207–8, 259; professional touring 67–73, 208–9; shamateurism 23, 59–62, 344, 376, 465; vs. USLTA 4, 12, 58–66, 312–3, 344; writing/performing 59–65, 206–7, 210 Tingay, Lance 311, 466 Tinling, Ted 52–4, 72, 178–9, 186, 191, 214, 274, 280, 415–8 Tomic, Bernard 325 track–and–field (athletics) 9, 39, 40, 42, 114, 123, 163, 308, 363, 364, 369, 403, 405, 425, 433 Truman, Christine 183, 188–91, 412–3 Tsonga, Jo Wilfrid 8, 397 Tunisia 163–5, 168 Twitter see social media United Arab Emirates 162–8 upper class 19–22, 109, 272, 404; decline 217–8, 266, 415; early influences 21, 97, 114–6, 120, 130, 156, 176, 204, 302, 372–3, 462–3; participation 205, 272–4, 352; patronage 108–11, 120, 185, 246, 302, 374–5, 379, 385, 463; perception of tennis 55, 65, 80, 113, 175, 286, 352 US (United States) 24, 86, 88, 100, 122, 147, 190, 280, 353, 357, 365, 377, 465; amateur rules 58–65, 112–3, 187, 312–3, 343–6, 477

Index

376–7; artwork/literature 271, 276–7, 283, 301, 304–6; clubs 3, 22, 51, 110, 142, 342, 393, 398; coaching/talent development 40–1, 380; early development 22, 119, 124–5, 204, 309–10, 343; feminism 51, 186, 411–20, 422–9; homophobia 203–9, 227; masculinity 203, 215; media 40, 55, 312–5; players 3–5, 53, 58–65, 67, 68, 93, 99, 121, 125–6, 128, 135, 145, 179, 186, 190, 194–201, 205, 215–9, 227, 245–53, 259, 260, 262, 277–8, 303–4, 344–5, 373, 376, 378–9, 393–7, 399–400, 402–9, 440–7, 451–2; playing mentality/styles 3, 40–3, 119, 309–10, 378–9; post–war dominance 6, 186, 376–7; professional tours 5–6, 23–4, 67, 70, 73, 115, 262; racism 8, 14–5, 26, 55, 194–201, 228, 242, 245–53, 278, 392–400, 440–2; recent decline 92; sexism 258; transphobia 432–8 US National Championships 3, 5, 8, 54, 70, 98, 100, 343, 344, 363, 394; of 1897 126; of 1933 68; of 1937 143; of 1946 6; of 1947 6; of 1948 99; of 1949 99; of 1951 262; of 1954 219; of 1957 278; of 1958 278; prestige 345; see also US Open US Open 10, 23, 77, 164, 217, 246, 412, 417, 422, 427, 434, 447; equal prize money 7, 224, 348, 424, 426, 434; gendered media coverage 228–30; of 1968 7, 250, 403; of 1972 216; of 1973 154; of 1975 134, 135; of 1976 432, 435, 436; of 1977 144, 433, 436, 437; of 1984 133; of 1987 79; of 1988 348, 452; of 1990 147; of 1999 196; of 2002 317; of 2009 148, 203, 228; of 2010 156, 159; of 2011 331; of 2015 158, 329; of 2017 8; prestige 23; racial integration 8, 397; social media 335; sponsorship 102, 331, 335–6, 416 USLTA (United States Lawn Tennis Association) see USTA USNLTA (United States National Lawn Tennis Association) see USTA USTA (United States Tennis Association) 4, 8, 14, 22, 100, 112, 197, 213, 245, 251, 253, 279, 343, 348, 366; amateur rulings 204–6, 208–10; black representation on 397–8, 400; dealings with Bill Tilden 4, 12, 58–65, 208–10, 312–3, 344; dealings with Renée Richards 432–8; gender discrimination 8, 100, 348, 415–9, 424; race relations 8, 393–5; sponsorship 335 Van Alen II, James 26 Velvet Revolution 13, 135–6 Vergeer, Esther 453–5 Vilas, Guillermo 11, 141–9 Vines, Ellsworth 23, 68–74, 115, 206, 209, 214 Virginia Slims women’s professional tour 191, 223, 250, 377, 414, 435; creation 7, 15, 25, 99–100, 224, 348, 416–8, 424, 434; growth 25, 348, 418–20; sponsorship 315, 348 von Cramm, Gottfried 72 478

Wade,Virginia 56, 191, 226, 412–3, 433 Wallace, David Foster 277, 279–84, 286, 291 Wallis Myers, A. 42, 69, 125, 184, 259, 310–3 Ward, Holcombe 62, 127 Washington, MaliVai 278, 394 Washington, Ora 55 Watson, Maud 176, 184, 373 Wawrinka, Stan 56 WCT (World Championship Tennis) 24, 99, 133, 346–7, 377, 407 wheelchair tennis 451–8 Wightman Cup 6, 185–8, 344, 415 Wilander, Mats 154, 396 Wilberforce, Herbert W.W. 40, 110, 258, 373 Wilding, Tony 3, 40, 110, 124, 375 Williams, Richard 196, 394, 399, 442 Williams, Serena 9, 193, 225, 242, 277, 323, 333, 399, 425, 440–7; global icon 99, 159, 193, 198, 200, 228, 230, 234, 242, 329–30, 445–7; gender/ sexism issues 56, 104, 193–5, 198–201, 225, 229, 392, 423, 427–8; playing style 242; race issues 8, 26, 55, 196–7, 199–201, 228, 278, 317, 392, 394, 396–7, 428, 441–5; wealth 10, 26, 102, 104, 195, 225, 236, 333, 427 Williams,Venus 8, 14, 15, 225, 278, 336, 399, 425, 440–7; gender/sexism issues 194–6, 228, 426–7, 441–4; race issues 55, 196–8, 199, 228, 394, 441–5 Wills, Helen 10, 53–5, 113, 276–7; appearance 54, 56; artistic representations 301, 304–5; playing style 54, 276–7 Wilson, Bobby 466 Wimbledon 5, 22, 32, 40, 64, 74, 76, 81, 83, 100, 137, 143, 208, 213, 250, 270, 299, 303, 309, 334, 345, 363, 415, 419, 422, 424, 465, 467; American post–war dominance 6, 376; British post–war performances 75, 226, 380–1, 383–91, 466–7; boycotts 7, 154, 346–7, 377; criticism 56, 120–1, 215, 218, 378–9, 466–7; early British successes 40–2, 45, 68, 98, 256, 345, 372–5; emergence/growth 4, 21, 97, 111–2, 152, 256, 259, 268–71, 308, 342; English identity 14, 50, 372–81, 385–9; exalted status 22–3, 50–4, 67, 68–71, 78, 112, 115, 142, 215, 342, 362, 363, 374–5, 412; fashions 37, 142, 178–81, 185–6, 190–2, 276–7, 258, 274, 304, 374; French inter–war dominance 115, 184, 301, 465; global brand 164, 342, 377–9; iconic matches 51–4, 72, 80, 153, 179, 217, 248, 282, 375, 403, 407–8; Indian performances 152–9; Irish performances 120–8, 256–7, 386; media coverage 46, 56, 82, 100–1, 207, 228, 309–17, 333, 335, 376; of 1877 309; of 1890 463; of 1921 260; of 1922 299; of 1923 34; of 1928 276; of 1932 214; of 1946 115; of 1948 262; of 1953 219; of 1957 278; of 1958 278; of 1968 424; of 1972 216; of 1988 369; of 2002 148; of 2005 452; of 2007 426–7;

Index

of 2013 56; of 2014 231; of 2015 56; prestige 5–6, 13, 345, 463; prize money 99, 185, 224–5, 413, 424, 433; racial politics 7–8, 228, 394, 402, 405; relative to the other major championships 10, 69, 77, 412; royal patronage 185, 374–5, 379, 385; sponsorship 102, 377–8; support for open tennis 5, 7, 23, 345–6, 366, 377; women’s participation 157–8, 173, 175–6, 183–92, 224–5, 297, 299–301, 373 Winfrey, Oprah 443–4 Wingfield, Major Walter Clopton 2, 109, 116, 302, 462; inventor of sphairistiké 3, 20–2, 97, 226–7, 296, 341, 462; lawn tennis rules 142, 223, 267–70, 308, 341–2 WITC (Women’s International Tennis Council) 349 Wodehouse, P.G. 272–4 Woods, Tiger 198, 444–5 working class 21, 190, 300; approach to tennis 113, 206, 212–3, 464; as early coaching– professionals 40, 43–6, 123–5; background of Alice Marble 186; background of Don Budge

213; background of Dorothy Round 300; background of Fred Perry 71; background of Jack Kramer 213; background of Jimmy Connors 216; background of Richard “Pancho” Gonzales 213, 248–9; background of Rosie Casals 245, 250; background of the Williams’ sisters 228, 440–4; communist vision of sport 131–2; social exclusion 21, 55, 116, 204–5, 372, 461 World Team Tennis 250, 347 Wozniacki, Caroline 225, 237, 239–42 WTA (Women’s Tennis Association) 26, 86, 88, 91, 100, 104, 137, 149, 158, 162, 164, 167–8, 197, 224, 250, 334, 424; advertising 13, 234–42; dealing with sexism 197, 224–5, 229, 427; formation 7, 100, 348, 411, 418–20, 424, 434; issues with Renée Richards 432–8; minority representation 398; sponsorship 25, 100–1, 162, 167, 349, 419, 434; WTA Tour 3, 25, 96, 163, 320 YMCA (Young Men’s Christian Association) 22

479