The Right Set: A Tennis Anthology (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9780375706462)

From stately lawns and gentlemen players to Andre Agassi and Venus Williams: 65 great writings on tennis that chronicle the transformation of the sport.

Since its inception, tennis has embraced traditions more patrician than plebeian. But times--and tennis--have changed. The game once reserved for royalty has moved from estate lawns to the concrete courts of the city. Old guard amateurs have given way to prodigies plastered with corporate logos. And while barriers of gender, race, and class have been shattered, the modern plagues of self-promotion, the paparazzi, and challengers of ever-escalating talent loom large.

In The Right Set, award-winning novelist and editor Caryl Phillips presents a collection of writings on the remarkable evolution of a gentleman's pastime into a sport of jet-set players of athletic and psychological genius. Here are the stories of champions, from the Renshaw twins to "ghetto Cinderella" Venus Williams. Here, too, are volleys between tradition and innovation--debates on everything from etiquette and earnings to Andr Agassi's rejection of the customary tennis whites. Insightful, informative, wonderfully entertaining, The Right Set is as colorful and surprising as the game itself.

John McPhee on Ashe vs. Graebner
David Higdon on Venus Williams
James Thurber on Helen Wills
Martina Navratilova on Bad Losers
Martin Amis on Smashing the Rackets
and more

Author: Caryl Phillips
ISBN-10: 0375706461
ISBN-13: 9780375706462
Publisher: Knopf Publishing Group
Language: English
Published: 07/27/1999
Pages: 352
Format: Paperback
Weight: 0.64lbs
Size: 7.98h x 5.32w x 0.78d

Review Citation(s):
Library Journal 05/15/1999 pg. 101
Ingram Advance 06/01/1999 pg. 123