The Tournament

by John Clarke

  Russian pin-up boy Leon Bakst was tipped out of the competition by the experienced American eccentric Ambrose Bierce, who took to him right from the start. ‘I thought I’d better get on with it,’ he said. ‘He hits the ball well but there are plenty of dead marksmen on a battlefield.’

  Furious at the result, Bakst refused to attend the press conference and it was left to Bierce to explain what might have gone wrong. ‘I naturally assume if a man is said to have the best forehand in the game, he must have a weak forehand. He’s used to people tiptoeing around his forehand as if it’s possessed of magical powers. The hell it is. Let’s slam a few in there.’

  In the first set Bierce served exclusively to the Bakst forehand and played all his lobs and drop shots into the forehand court. The Russian watched his forehand fall apart.

  ‘It didn’t fall apart,’ said Bierce. ‘He didn’t have one.’

  ‘He has one against anyone else,’ opined Norman Mailer.

  ‘And was he playing anyone else, hugebrain?’ said Bierce, who goes through to meet the colourful customs officer Rousseau in a second-round match-up commentators are already describing as ‘Beauty and the Beast’.

  Much-touted Berliner Bertolt Brecht went out to Hungarian Arthur Koestler. Near the end of the fourth set Brecht tore his shirt off and screamed, ‘I am not a tennis player or an entertainer. I am a man,’ which, as Koestler later said, ‘wasn’t as surprising as he obviously thought it was’.

  Brecht didn’t seem too bothered by the loss. ‘I have no interest whatever in the rankings and I care nothing for money. It is a means of oppression and I’ve got plenty of it in America anyway.’

  In the early afternoon Scotland’s voluble Mary Garden made an early exit against Simone de Beauvoir. An American friend of de Beauvoir, Mr Nelson Algren, was cautioned for comments he made from the players’ box.

  ‘You bitch,’ he said after she won the first set. ‘You heartless cow,’ he added after she broke Garden in the second.

  ‘Listen! Fuck you, Nelson!’ responded de Beauvoir.

  She was penalised a point.

  ‘No!’ she protested. ‘Why should I have to put up with this shit?’

  ‘Because I have to,’ said Mr Algren, who then rose and removed himself from the box.

  Facilities out at Court 13 simply couldn’t cope during Polish whiz-kid Vaslav Nijinsky’s match with the methodical German Ernst Lubitsch. Nijinsky is a joy to watch. He has the full sack of tools, astonishing leg strength and court coverage bordering on the supernatural. He is listed to play doubles with the Russian Serge Diaghilev although rumours of a split have been in currency all week and they have not trained together since Tuesday, Nijinsky instead spending time with his young wife and Diaghilev with the sort of Russians who speak French and the sort of French who put Dreyfus away.

  In another highlight of the afternoon Fyodor Chaliapin, who is as strong around the baseline as anyone in the game today, took a set from animated Swiss number 1 Carl Jung, but could do little to delay the inevitable and lost in four.

  ‘I remember seeing a game of tennis as a child,’ said Jung. ‘I think it was on a beach. There were rocks and sand but otherwise it was very like this. It seems to be a kind of ritual. There are equivalents in other cultures, of course, although I doubt that any of them would avail us of the excellent prospect of spending a couple of hours under a westering sun with a fellow like Fyodor.’

  And there was lively work on Court 16 where Hoagy Carmichael played intelligent tennis to hold out Fred Lorca, the gifted Spaniard who has had such trouble establishing himself in his own country. Carmichael plays down his all-round ability by saying he’s ‘not good at anything in particular’. He describes his serve as ‘ramshackle’ and his ground strokes as ‘an honest attempt’. Asked how he felt after the match, he said, ‘How do you think I feel? I used to be a lawyer in Indiana and here I am in Paris doing this. I feel marvellous.’

  After two days of first-round matches, betting markets are wide open. The women’s looks like a Bernhardt–de Beauvoir benefit but support has come in for Sarojini Naidu, Lillian Hellman and Willa Cather after good early showings. Ladbrokes say Einstein has firmed but there is plenty of money about for Sartre and late this afternoon a plunge on Beiderbecke brought him in from 40s to 12s.

  Van Gogh will have his odds slashed if he dispatches Constantine Cavafy. At 20s he was worth a nibble but the sports journalists have given it just short of a thrashing ever since. Wally Benjamin was shunted in from 200s to 12s, although these odds may flatter him. Anybody looking for an investment should consider Picasso at 30s, Maurice Ravel at 100s and the quiet American Cummings at 300–1. There is support for SuperTom Eliot but at 8–4 he is unbackable and will drift.

  The shorteners tomorrow will be Vladimir Nabokov, if he can get past the obstreperous Henry Miller, and the insouciant Waller, who rear-windowed Hitchcock this morning.

  Day 4

  * * *

  Melba v. Luce • Colette v. Kahlo • de Chirico v. Moore • Yeats v. Klimt • Chekhov v. Mahler • Tolstoy v. Kokoschka • Gropius v. Hasek • Léger v. Runyon • Gödel v. Spender • Mandelstam v. Reed • Hemingway v. Visconti

  * * *

  ‘How do I think it’s going?’ asked Wilde. ‘I’ve never seen anything like it on a first day. And only very seldom on a first night.’ Mr Wilde is here as an observer. ‘It was either that or come here simply to watch,’ he says.

  He and his friend Mr Whistler do not play tennis. ‘One should never perspire in white,’ opines Whistler, although Wilde once boxed for Ireland (‘as indeed who hasn’t’).

  The pair gave a press conference which began at 5.30, broke for dinner at eight, recommenced at ten and is already regarded as having the best first act in the history of modern media.

  ‘Are you with the official party?’ Wilde was asked.

  ‘No,’ replied Wilde, ‘I’m with Whistler.’

  Was Mr Whistler with the official party?

  ‘No,’ replied Whistler. ‘But I have a cousin in shipping.’

  ‘This really is a marvellous occasion,’ said Wilde. ‘I’m beginning to wish I’d entered.’

  ‘You will, Oscar,’ said Whistler. ‘You will.’

  There was action aplenty this morning. Rosa Luxemburg, the American Anna Strong and Latvia’s Lina Stern announced that they did not wish to play for their countries. ‘It’s a complete distortion,’ said Luxemburg. ‘And a trap.’

  ‘Has anyone noticed we’re run by the World Tennis Organisation?’ demanded Strong sternly. ‘This is an international body. And they make us compete for our separate nations?’

  ‘Who cares which country wins?’ agreed Stern strongly. ‘We’re being exploited.’

  ‘What we need,’ said Luxemburg, ‘is proper government of the game by a central authority elected by all the players, not a coven of pimps controlled by international corporations and media.’

  ‘What are any of us doing in this ridiculous competition?’ asked Strong. ‘I should be doing my work, back in China, coaching.’

  ‘Then why are you here?’ demanded Emmeline Pankhurst.

  ‘You, of all people, should know that, Emmeline,’ said Luxemburg. ‘Do you think we’d be having this press conference if we hadn’t come to Paris?’

  ‘Why did you chain yourself to the British parliament?’ inquired Stern. ‘Wasn’t it one of your people who disrupted the Derby?’

  ‘True,’ conceded Pankhurst. ‘But I’m supporting England in this tournament.’

  ‘You’re obviously looking for a job in management,’ said Strong, ‘by pretending to be a threat to the system.’

  ‘How dare you!’ said Pankhurst. ‘I’ll have you know I—’

  ‘Fuck off, Emily,’ said Luxemburg. ‘Go back to your knitting.’

  This exchange rather over-shadowed irresistible performances from Americans Mae West, Ruth Draper and Dorothy Parker, to say nothing of a jaw-dropper by the Australian Nellie Melba, who was down a break
in both sets against Clare Boothe Luce but came back each time.

  Playing with a brace on her back following a car accident and bandaging to both knees ‘after a weekend away with Trotsky’, fancied Mexican Frida Kahlo was always going to lack court speed in her match with Colette Claudine.

  Colette disguised her shots nicely and Kahlo was relieved when it was over. ‘It was killing me,’ she said. ‘I was only doing it for Diego. I am in pain but the coffee mugs are selling well.’

  It was business as usual for the men, with one exception. The scoreboard at Court 4 this morning read ‘G. de Chirico (Hel) v. G. Moore (Ire)’. The umpire sat in his chair and the lines-people stood at their posts as the players came out. A voice somewhere yelled, ‘Go Giorgio!’ and another answered, ‘We want Moore!’ Laughter rippled around the court as people applied suncream and made themselves comfortable.

  They needn’t have bothered. The great perfectionist, Giorgio de Chirico, turned up in spotless whites and lodged a formal complaint. Moore’s clothing bore the manufacturer’s labels on the outside, he said. This bespoke a moral weakness. ‘I have no interest in appearing on the same court as a degenerate. I shall be in my room. Let me know when you’ve got this business sorted out.’

  ‘What century is this?’ asked Moore. ‘Everybody wears clothing with sponsors’ names on it.’

  ‘If a million people do a stupid thing, it is still a stupid thing,’ said de Chirico. ‘Good sense is not democratic any more than good health is. You want to wake up to yourself, Moore.’

  ‘If you think my shirt is distracting,’ said Moore, ‘you’re going to need oxygen when you see my tennis.’

  ‘I have no intention of seeing your tennis, as you call it,’ said de Chirico. ‘I am concerned only with seeing the ball.’

  ‘I’ll endeavour to play slowly,’ said Moore.

  Meanwhile, Moore’s friend Big Bill Yeats was in trouble early against the Austrian Gustav Klimt before finding some rhythm but he doesn’t look the player of previous years, and it was only when his longtime friend Maud Gonne was absent during the tie-break in the second set that he began to concentrate. He tore off four unplayable serves and returned Klimt’s with ease, winning the tie-break to love. Gonne returned shortly afterwards but then Ludwig Wittgenstein’s sister turned up and Klimt lost control of his serve.

  The storm worsened for Austria across what became a productive morning for Russian tennis. The indefatigable Chekhov looked commanding against Mahler and the Count, Leo Tolstoy, had far too much for Oscar Kokoschka.

  Mahler pumped himself up between points and made great drama out of line calls and bad shots, carrying on as if he’d been harpooned when he left a Chekhovian cross-court return, only to see it drop in. The Mahler serve is so strong its power dominates even Mahler himself. After winning the second set he waved to the big German section of the crowd and stood with his hands in the air, his face set in defiance, his shadow thrown deep across the court. When this display was over, Chekhov carried on as if absolutely nothing had happened. Mahler’s wife, Alma, was in the players’ box at the beginning of the match but had vacated it by the end. Chekhov suggested she might have gone to Moscow but Mahler wasn’t convinced.

  It wasn’t an easy morning for players’ wives. When Anna Tolstoy arrived for husband Leo’s match the players’ box was full of other women, at least two of whom were on her own staff. Tolstoy suggested these women may have been there to support Kokoschka. This didn’t look likely since the young women were clearly rooting for the Count.

  Alma Mahler also had her hands full, monitoring the progress of her companion Kokoschka, checking on Court 17, where Walter Gropius was in all sorts of trouble against Hasek, dashing to Court 4 where Austria’s Franz Werfel was working on his service action, and visiting the recovery room where Gustav was complaining of a corked thigh. Kokoschka was upset by a line call at 2–0 in the second set and by the time Alma returned he was accusing the umpire of foot-faulting him because he wasn’t a freemason. It was all downhill from there.

  The locals turned out this afternoon to cheer Fernand Léger, one of the few players to have a two-handed backhand, a two-handed forehand and a two-handed service. He sometimes drives the ball wide but well and seems torn between the mathematical disadvantage occasioned by the loss of a point and the mechanical efficiency of striking the ball truly.

  The American Damon Runyon comes largely unheralded, although if we can judge by the number of scribes with plenty of 40–1 on him to reach the quarter-finals, there is some chance he knows what he is doing. Léger romped out to 6–2, 6–2 and, at the changeover at 5–0 in the third, Runyon told the umpire to get on him quickly since the odds were excellent and he had worked his opponent out. His good humour endeared him to the parochial crowd and nobody minded when he took the third and found another gear in the fourth to take it 6–1. At 5–0 in the fifth he offered to take any amount of anyone’s money on Léger at 50–1. This motion lapsed for want of a seconder and he served out the business at 6–0.

  There was better news for Austria on Court 11 where the very calculating Kurt Gödel looked in wonderful form against the attractive young Englishman Stephen Spender, although he seemed distracted by the umpire’s call at 1–1 in the third set.

  ‘What’s the problem?’ asked the umpire.

  ‘How many games have we played in this set?’ asked Gödel.

  ‘Two,’ said the umpire.

  ‘And we’ve won one each?’ said Gödel.

  ‘That’s right. Is there some difficulty with that?’

  ‘I take it you imagine one and one to be two.’

  ‘If you’re going to question that,’ said the umpire, ‘you’ll be flying in the face of every mathematician since Euclid.’

  ‘Euclid believed the world was flat,’ replied Gödel. ‘Euclidean ideas cannot be axiomatic.’

  ‘Until someone can prove that one and one are not two, I’ll operate on the assumption that they are.’

  ‘It is not necessary to prove that one and one are not two. It is necessary only that there be an instance in which it cannot be proven that they are.’

  ‘We’ve played two games in this set,’ repeated the umpire, ‘and the score is one all.’

  ‘This is all very fine as an assertion,’ said Gödel. ‘What I am concerned about is verifiable proof.’

  Also through to the second round today were the majestic Russian Osip Mandelstam and the Norwegian Eddie Munch, who looks as if he couldn’t pull the skin off a rice pudding. Mandelstam is a joy to watch and today he made just two unforced errors against the polished Englishman Carol Reed, only the third man this year to take a set from the Russian.

  The Rules Committee announced this evening that, in order to clarify the situation, the following pairings have been removed from the mixed doubles:

  F. Werfel (Aut) and A. Mahler (Aut)

  W. Gropius (Ger) and A. Mahler (Aut)

  G. Mahler (Aut) and A. Mahler (Aut)

  O. Kokoschka (Aut) and A. Mahler (Aut).

  There was one other withdrawal from the mixed: the W. B. Yeats (Ire) and M. Gonne-MacBride (Ire) combination will not be competing because, as Yeats put it, ‘No point. She won’t play.’

  Meanwhile Ernie Hemingway had a good hit-out tonight against panoramic Italian Luchino Visconti. Gertrude Stein watched from the players’ box until Hemingway was forced to deny that she was coaching him by the use of hand signals.

  ‘I was tired,’ he said. ‘I didn’t need the old woman telling me what to do. She wanted to help. I could see that. Could see it in her eyes. Something in me said, “Yes.” Something else said, “No.” I went with the “no”. I forget where the sun was. “Up” probably.’

  Day 5

  * * *

  Earhart v. O’Keeffe • Christie v. Oakley • Akhmatova v. Buck • Chanel v. Bara • Pickford v. Post • Gide v. Freud • Crosby v. Coward • Stanislavsky v. Picasso • Forster v. Pirandello • Miller v. Matisse • Wittgenstein v. Williams
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br />   * * *

  Five women’s seeds were on court today and all went through. Amelia Earhart was a picture of efficiency in her win over countrywoman Georgia O’Keeffe. This was a contrast in styles, Earhart in shorts and playing a strong serve and volley game, O’Keeffe in flowing drapery which fell, at rest, like soft flower petals arranged in the form of a vagina.

  Agatha Christie posed questions to which the normally accurate Annie Oakley simply didn’t have the answers. The Russian Anna Akhmatova had a good battle against Pearl Buck and, whatever was needed against the American Theda Bara, Coco Chanel had it. On Court 3, in an all-American derby, Mary Pickford shat on Emily Post.

  The crowd was put through the agonies of St Jude by the brilliant but often frustrating Frenchman André Gide. The Austrian Sigmund Freud, who may have to be spoken to about his loud grunts, said Gide must have seen his parents in the act of congress. Gide replied that his parents were dead but the Doc insisted: ‘Gide must have imagined his parents in the act of congress. It was not important how he saw them in the act of congress, simply that he did.’

  Gide was unmoved. It had never occurred to him, he said, that his parents engaged in congress at all. He described himself as a married gay red anti-communist Christian revolutionary hedonist ascetic and countered that, since it was Freud’s idea that his parents had experienced congress, it must have been Freud who imagined it.

  Next up, we saw Bing Crosby happily trouncing Noel Coward. A natural with something of Twain about him (he whistles to himself while changing ends), Crosby was untroubled by the technically accomplished Coward, who made no excuses but is well known to prefer playing doubles ‘in which we serve slightly better’.

  Constantin Stanislavsky’s method of playing is ‘to analyse the psychology’ of the player he wishes to be and, by sheer concentration, then ‘become’ that player. ‘I am not being me,’ he says. ‘I must actually become someone else.’ Precisely who he was being in his contest against Picasso was not obvious but after the second set he made a number of guttural remarks and banged himself on the head with an ice-bucket. This seemed to clarify things and he took the third set before Picasso got down to business.