by John Clarke
At the beginning of the second set he was officially informed by Charles Darwin that his father was dangerously ill. The remainder of the match was played in a sombre atmosphere and Munch left for Norway the moment it concluded, after first thanking Betjeman for his kind understanding.
‘Terribly difficult for poor Munch,’ said Betjeman. ‘I remember my own father’s death. One feels so much a disappointment to them, especially with one’s not wanting to take over the family firm, and one thing and another.’
By the time Marie Stopes and Annie Besant emerged from the players’ race the temperature on the ground at Centre Court was 46 degrees. Besant, the oldest competitor in the women’s draw, has plenty of experience in oppressive conditions but from the outset the Scottish Stopes handled them better.
‘Sometimes when the balls get very hot,’ she said, ‘they can swell slightly and come on to you a lot faster. What I tried to do today was get in and put them away at the net.’
Also good in the heat were Daisy Bates, who grew up playing in Australia and only took her cardigan off at 2–2 in the second set, and Josephine Baker who romped through her match against Russian icon Goncharova and then went for ‘a light run’.
French hopes were raised today when local prodigy Eric Satie hit his straps against Rudolf Carnap.
The thoughtful German looked sharp early, hitting the ball crisply and playing to a plan. Satie, however, is no mean strategist himself and doesn’t seem to mind who he’s playing. ‘In this caper,’ he said, ‘you’re really playing yourself, although this process is influenced by how others are playing.’
Carnap worked on his timing and space and kept Satie on the run in the heat. Satie did the opposite and just about drove Carnap mad, returning the ball again and again to the same point. Carnap would move, preparing himself, waiting for the inevitable change in the routine. Then back would come another shot, exactly the same.
‘It’s not actually the same shot,’ Satie explained. ‘Some are hard, some are soft, some have topspin, some have backspin, some float. And the context changes; the ninth is different from the first. It looks the same but it isn’t. It’s the ninth.’
Ira Gershwin was over the moon in the media tent this afternoon. ‘S’wonderful,’ he said. ‘Strike up the band.’ Brother George, with whom he’s playing in the doubles, had just fought his way back from two sets down and 0–4 to get up and beat the brilliant Catalonian Andrés Segovia. Inspired by the performance of his compatriots Waller, Armstrong and Ellington this week, George has been practising with them, enjoying his game more and playing more in their style. Segovia is an elegant player and has remarkable hands. Time and again he hit what looked like drives deep to the back corners but at the last minute he rolled his wrists over and they became drop shots of the greatest delicacy. In the end, however, it was Gershwin’s new style of play and sheer persistence which got him over the line.
In the most entertaining match of the day the popular Charlot had a win over Hoagland Carmichael. Carmichael’s serve lacked control, especially with Chaplin dancing around it and banging it back at his ankles as he followed it in. ‘Charlie’s got everything worked out,’ he explained, ‘but he makes it all look so simple you want to reach out and pat him on the head.’
As Chaplin attempted to leave the media conference, a camera crew barged through the door and pinned him against the wall. When the door swung back he fell flat on the floor. An official came in and Chaplin rather surprisingly kicked him firmly in the seat of the pants and fell over again. When the official turned around Chaplin was lying on the floor. The official took a swing at Hoagy who had bent over to help Chaplin and belted the concrete wall instead. Chaplin stood up, kicked the official in the pants again and fell over. This happened four times. The official finally realised it was Chaplin who was kicking him and chased him around a table at high speed until Chaplin opened the door and the hapless official hurtled back out into the main concourse and sprinted into a display of oranges.
This joyous mood did not survive the Thomas Hardy–Arthur Koestler match. Hardy once again clashed with officials over the treatment of the waitressing staff, one of whom became distressed when Koestler claimed she was making too much noise. Hardy protested that this was unfair. ‘If she goes, I go,’ he said.
After an in-camera hearing, during which Hardy kept the crowd in their seats with some haunting stories, it was revealed that Koestler will be questioned about a number of incidents involving other young women. A sobering and most unexpected development.
The night-match featured the hardworking John Steinbeck coming home to take the points in an all-out scrap with England’s Evelyn Waugh.
‘Dreadful oik,’ Waugh said. ‘Americans are of two kinds. The rich and more moronic type of show-off and the poor, many of whom are racially disadvantaged or insane. Dreadful oiks with German names fall into the latter class but with pretensions to the former.’
Steinbeck, clearly irritated, rallied in the third set. He upped the volume on his serve and hit the ball from both sides with great ferocity. Waugh seemed to lose his touch and his unforced errors gave the fifth set to the American.
‘Waugh imagines he’s quite a character,’ said Steinbeck. ‘But there are kids out there watching who’ve got no money and think they’ve got no chance of playing this game. I wanted to show them that they have. It’s a hell of a fight. But they can do it.’
There was a minor sensation late this evening when French journalist Roland Barthes was asked to step into the Committee Room, where a heated exchange took place concerning his comment in Thursday’s edition of Paris-Match. Barthes contended that the game has undergone such fundamental change that the relationship between the commentators and the crowd is now the principal intellectual contract. In effect, he said, the player is dead.
Sources say discussions with the chairman of the committee reached an impasse when Barthes was asked whether his comments were in the nature of a personal opinion. He observed that, since he was a writer employed to report on the game, his personal opinion was also going to become the personal opinion of many other people.
The chairman advanced the view that, if the age of the player was over, Mr Barthes could spare himself the trouble of attending the remainder of the tournament.
Barthes replied that, since the discussion of the event was more important than the event itself, it was immaterial whether he attended it or not. The significant thing would be what he wrote about it.
‘You won’t be able to write much about it if you don’t see it, will you, sunshine?’ said the chairman.
‘You obviously don’t know anything about the game’s history,’ retorted Barthes.
‘It is precisely because of my knowledge of such matters,’ said the chairman, ‘that I have been entrusted with the chairmanship.’
‘How can you possibly have witnessed everything that has happened since the inception of the game?’
‘I didn’t say I’d witnessed it. You asked me if I knew about it.’
‘You’ve read about it?’
‘Of course I’ve bloody read about it.’
Barthes smiled. ‘No further questions, your honour,’ he said.
‘Mr Barthes,’ said the chairman, ‘Please understand that you have no further accreditation at this event, and will be refused entry to all remaining matches.’
‘I’m not interested in attendance. I’m concerned with symbols and signifiers,’ said Barthes.
‘If attendance is not the point,’ asked the chairman, ‘where are you going to get a crowd from?’
‘The crowd is a function of the commentary, not of the game,’ said Barthes. ‘The better the commentator, the better the crowd.’
‘Your crowd wouldn’t fill a phone booth, Roland. They’re a bunch of seed-spillers who wouldn’t know if you were up them with an armful of chairs. Without the game none of you would exist. You want to wake up to yourself, son.’
‘We sell more copies of Paris-Match th
an you do of the official program,’ said Barthes. ‘You’re out of touch, pal. People are much more absorbed by what it all signifies than they are by what actually happened.’
‘And what does it all signify, as a matter of interest?’
‘Not telling,’ said Barthes. ‘Buy the magazine.’
Day 15
* * *
Muir v. Toulouse-Lautrec • Huxley v. Robeson • Wodehouse v. Chagall • Wells v. Hearn • West v. Stead • Bankhead v. Smith • Arendt v. Beach • Wittgenstein v. Lawrence • Nijinsky v. Hartley • Spock v. Diaghilev • Seurat v. Ernst • Wright v. Rilke • Derain v. Prevert
* * *
Last night world rankings were tossed in the air and fancied players treated to some of the rudest awakenings on record. Toulouse-Lautrec, Chagall, Lawrence, Diaghilev, Lloyd Wright and Ernst are all out of the men’s draw. West, Beach and Bankhead were toppled in the women’s.
Le Monde carried a large front-page photograph this morning of Edwin Muir in a tam-o’-shanter being congratulated by popular night-owl Henri Toulouse-Lautrec after their match, under the headline, SCOT THE WHOLE WORLD IN HIS HANDS. French officials were furious. They felt Lautrec had ‘wasted his chances’, had been ‘very silly and a show-off’.
Great deeds continued to mount as the bookies’ nightmare deepened. Aldous Huxley’s pedigree includes a good portion of the stud-book in his native England. Brothers Julian and Andrew and grandfather T. H. all have their names etched on the British championship and he is ranked seventy places above the man who beat him, the American Paul Robeson. ‘Paul’s good,’ said Huxley, pouring balm into his own wounds. ‘He’s a big man and he hits the ball hard but he can also hit it softly. You can prepare for the power stuff because you expect it. It’s the gentle stuff that gets you.’
‘Aldous wasn’t seeing it well,’ said Robeson, ‘but he played beautifully. I enjoyed the match. The Welsh were there, the Russians, the Africans and Asians. The only ones missing were the American Davis Cup selectors.’
Completing the night’s revels was Plum Wodehouse, whose opponent, the illustrious Russian Marc Chagall, has become almost synonymous with French tennis. Chagall flew through the first set but then tired and even had a little lie down at the top of the court. His other problem was Wodehouse, whose return of service was deadly. ‘It had to be,’ he said. ‘Friend Chagall climbs all over his first serve and if I hadn’t had a rigorous workout recently from a particularly helpful aunt, it may well have been curtains.’
On Court 4 this afternoon the Herbie Wells–Lafcadio Hearn match was in progress. Sitting at courtside was Wells’ mixed-doubles partner Rebecca West. It was clear from the way Wells glared at her between points that her comments were increasingly unsettling him.
‘Will you be quiet, please?’ he asked her at 6–3 and 3–0. ‘I know what I’m doing. Look at the board. I’m 6–3 and 3–0.’
‘You’ll lose,’ she said, and pulled her collar up.
Herbie appealed to have her removed but the umpire indicated there had been no actual offence.
‘Would it help if I left?’ asked Hearn, insistent on a gesture of some kind.
‘She’s talking while I’m trying to play,’ said Wells. ‘It’s outrageous.’
‘I’m trying to help,’ said West.
‘I don’t need help,’ said Wells. ‘I’m winning.’
‘You’ll lose,’ said West and pulled her collar higher.
‘I don’t think I can continue to play,’ said Wells.
‘What can you continue to do?’ asked West.
‘Quiet, please,’ said the umpire. ‘Mr Wells to serve.’
‘She’s looking at me,’ said Herbie.
‘Everyone’s looking at you,’ said West. ‘Isn’t that what you want?’
‘The Japanese are a serene people, devoted to ritual,’ said Hearn. ‘They would have a way of dealing with this.’
‘No argument with that,’ conceded Wells. ‘We have much to learn from the medieval warlord cultures.’
‘The English, for example,’ said West.
‘You really are a fraud,’ said Wells. ‘You’re not in the least bit interested in the Irish cause.’
‘I don’t have to be,’ said West. ‘I am Irish.’
‘Mr Wells to serve,’ said the umpire. ‘Quiet, please.’
Wells served. Hearn served. Wells served. In the fourth set he got so jumpy he sent down fifteen double-faults. In the end he escaped 7–5.
‘You’re useless,’ said West.
‘I won,’ said Herbie.
‘Lucky,’ said West.
‘I’m playing some of the best tennis of my life,’ he said.
‘Who are you playing in the next round?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Wells.
‘You’ll lose,’ said West and turned away.
Elsewhere Frida Kahlo announced she would not play any further matches with partner Diego Rivera and requested assistance in removing a tattoo of Rivera from the middle of her forehead. And Peggy Guggenheim, who had insisted to officials that she and Beckett would play together, said Beckett knew nothing of this and she now wished to compete with Max Ernst.
Later this afternoon West herself was knocked out of the singles by the promising Australian Christina Stead, who offered West her support. ‘Rebecca was distracted out there today. I know something of what she’s being put through. I’m sure most of us do.’
West issued a statement saying she was returning to London and would not appear in the mixed.
‘Typical Rebecca,’ said Wells. ‘Change your mind on the spur of the moment. No discussion. No consultation. Completely irrational.’
‘What an arsehole,’ said Stead.
‘Rebecca’s own son agrees with me,’ said Wells.
‘And what sex is her son?’ asked Stead. ‘Is he, for example, male?’
‘The point is, what am I supposed to do now?’
‘Of course,’ said Stead. ‘Of course that is the point.’
Tallulah Bankhead, beaten by Bessie Smith, explained she was really here to play in the mixed but wasn’t quite sure who would partner her. ‘Haven’t decided yet. I’m looking.’
Does she like what she sees?
‘I do. Yes. Very much.’
When does she think she’ll know?
‘Not sure. Auditions are coming along nicely.’
Does she concede that this is all a little bit unusual?
‘For whom, dear?’
Hannah Arendt, who beat Sylvia Beach today and looks very good, was in even worse trouble. She was asked if she could explain her choice of mixed-doubles partner.
‘The question is flawed. Martin Heidegger is the partner I have chosen. No one else can make my choice.’
That is acknowledged. But could she nevertheless please explain it?
‘The fact that you do not understand something does not compel me to explain it.’
How might it be possible to understand something without information?
‘You did not ask for information or for understanding, but for an explanation.’
Could she speak into the microphone, please?
‘Certainly.’
Has she known Heidegger for a long time?
‘For many years.’
And have they played together a lot?
‘Many, many times.’
How did she explain the fact that their games seemed so different?
‘Could you put that question again without the word “seem” in it?’
Would she not admit that Heidegger’s entire approach was different from her own?
‘“Admit”? What is this? I’m not allowed to select my own partner?’
Could she answer the question, please?
‘I suggest the person to ask about “Heidegger’s entire approach” is Heidegger.’
But how might Heidegger’s approach differ from her own?
‘In that it is Heidegger’s.’
Did she agree with Heidegger?
‘Heidegger believes we should go to dinner tonight. I am considering this.’
Mystery-man Ludwig Wittgenstein was matched against the combined might of the highly fancied Lawrence of Nottingham, his personal trainer Frieda, sister of the Red Baron, the entire British press and 3000 English supporters.
Frank ‘the Ferret’ and Queenie Leavis, already eliminated, have been whipping up interest in the young champion. ‘There are five great players,’ the Ferret told Roland Barthes, ‘and Lawrence is one of only two still alive; the other of course being Jane Austen.’
When it was pointed out that Austen had died in 1817, the Ferret took the view that ‘in that rather narrow and limited sense she is, certainly, not as fully alive within the conventional meaning of the term, as are, for example, a great many persons still living today.’
Wittgenstein perked up somewhat when he heard this. ‘That is interesting,’ he said and for twenty minutes he remained silent. Then he said, ‘No.’
The result of the match was never in doubt as Lawrence found himself bereft of any real defence against the deceptive angles and superb ground strokes of a top international player very much at the height of his powers. English bookmakers will have dropped a bundle today and Lawrence’s first task when he returns home is to appear before a disciplinary hearing following an outburst in the first set which obliged officials to clear the court and disinfect the area behind the baseline at the southern end.
In other matches, Nijinsky brushed Les Hartley aside, Spock took Diaghilev apart and local fervour was satisfied by the passage of Georges Seurat through the challenging waters of the Bay of Ernst.
Nijinsky continues to look fabulous, although after the match he described himself as ‘The Supreme Being’ and offered to describe how he created the world. Friends say this is not a good sign.
Diaghilev was shocked to go out of the tournament, especially to someone who has never won at this level, but the Spockster is fit and smart and read the match well. ‘Diaghilev sees this whole thing as a battle between men. He told me during the hit-up that he would crush me, so I knew he had a problem. He didn’t need to crush me. He just needed to play better tennis.’