WIMBLEDON HISTORY

Dominion, Volume 30, Issue 261, 31 July 1937, Page 7 (Supplement)

WIMBLEDON HISTORY

Mr. Frank Burrow Looks Back “Tiie Centre Court,” by F. R. Burrow (London: Eyre and Spottiswoode). “The Centro Court” is, of course, the court at Wimbledon, on which some of the greatest struggles in the history of lawn tennis have been fought out. There is perhaps only one other man fit to be put alongside Frank Burrow as a chronicler of the outstanding matches on that historic court, or of tracing the progress of the game—administratively and from the playing side. He is Wallis Myers. And yet Burrow has had opportunities that have not been given to Myers, for he has been referee of the English championships for eighteen years since the Great War, one of the outstanding handicappers in England, and one who was a player of the game even so far back as fifty years ago. He has seen and met almost everybody in the game down those long years who are worth seeing and meeting. In this book he tells the story of I lawn tennis for those past fifty years, | with special reference to England. He passes in review all the great plajers of that period, and he assesses their relative merits. He discusses also the oft-debated question of who is the best player of all time. Without necessarily agreeing with the method of his reasoning, or the conclusions at which he arrives, one must admit its ingenuity. To those people, however, who think that the present is Incomparably greater than the past, a course of this book would do them good. They would soon be; made to see that there were giants in those days just as there are giants to-day. Mr. Burrow has many interesting sidelights on the rapid development of the game from being a game played by a privileged few in England to. its present international rivalry as epitomised in the Davis Cup. He began his own plaving on “the hour-glass” shaped court. “The balls were uncovered rubber; the rackets were curious pear- • shaped affairs, far heavier than those in use to-day.” He speaks highly of that great maker of tennis rackets —Thos. J. Tate. “Tate’s rackets were not cheap. Forty shillings was the price—just about double the price of any other racket on tiie market in those days.” Of the tennis dress in the early days he says: “At the early Wimbledons white knickerbockers, surmounted by a horizontally striped jersey, and a diminutive cap were no uncommon sight. At a country-house tennis-party in the early days, to appear in shirtsleeves on the court was considered rather indelicate; and the daring man who ventured to take off his waistcoat as well as his coat was apt to. be crossed off his hostess's visiting list.” Tiie women wore almost trailing skirts and large “picture-hats” or straw “boaters.”

Mr. Burrow writes interestingly of the growth of “gates” for Wimbledon, and the standard of the play. The book is full of comments on outstanding matches, and the causes of victory or defeat are analysed. Among the illustrations is one of the score sheet in that memorable match when Tilden, with a straight sets victory within his grasp, was beaten by Henry Coehet in the fifth set. The Renshaws, the Dohertys, Brookes, Tim, Wilding, Patterson, Billy Johnson, J. 0. Anderson, Tilden, Coehet, Lacoste, Borotra, Perry, all pass before the reader as Mr. Burrow interestingly writes of them. Nor are the women forgotten. The great figures of the women’s -world of tennis get their due measure of comment. Invaluable, too, are the records of scores he gives of several matches of the early days.

A specially valuable section of Mr. Burrow’s book, is that in which he attempts to analyse the differences in the styles of play from the early times to the present. He also gives much valuable information and advice on how to run a tournament and how 7 to handicap. For this he describes the system in vogue at Wimbledon. He has given a list of the last eights at Wimbledon since the war, and the scores. This provides a valuable record. Altogether, the book is indispensable to the tennis enthusiast’s library, for the reason that it so completely covers the development of the game for fifty years. To add to its value there is a very complete index. SCHUBERT’S SONGS “The Songs of Schubert,” by E. G Porter (Loudon: Williams and Norgate). Mr. Porter’s study of Schubert’s songs is rather slight in its scope, but what he has to say is at once interesting and valuable. He is a keen critic and by no means an indiscriminate lover of Schubert’s work. He points frequently to faults in the songs and indeed occasionally finds shortcomings where the average musician would not. He deals adequately witli the development of Schubert’s treatment of the art song from both the analytical and appreciative points of view. Particularly valuable is his discussion of the significance of Schubert’s harmonic schemes, a subject one would like to see treated at greater length. The musical illustrations are wellchosen and the study as a whole is worthy of the attention of everyone interested in Schubert's methods and achievements. There are, however, too many mis-spelliugs in the book. A GLOBE-TROTTER “Round and About,” by G. E. Hunter (Wellington, 2/6). Experiences of a Wellington globetrotter are recorded in appropriately rambling manner in a little booklet, “Round and About,” by G. E. Hunter, published locally. The book deals with ordinary incidents of travel by land and sea between New Zealand and the United Kingdom—a tourist’s impressions of Ceylon, India, Port Said, Panama, Pitcairn, and odd aspects of England through the eyes of a visitor from New Zealand. A series of verbal sketches, unconnected by any particular plot, these anecdotes are inclined to jump from country to country, topic to topic, in a manner which is often disconcerting to the reader. The author has given free rein to digression. For these reasons it is at times difficult to follow the thread of his meditations. The book comprises a series of his random thoughts, many I of them entertaining, jotted down hupi hazard as they entered his mind.