Tracy Austin “hit the hell out of the ball and never missed and never choked and had braces and pigtails that swung wildly around as she handed pros their asses” (David Foster Wallace). Tracy, in other words, made the big girls cry. She even made the goddesses, the legends of the sport–Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova–cry their […]
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January 15, 1941, a light rain descending on Stalag VIII-A: Jean le Boulaire on violin, Henri Akoka on clarinet, Etienne Pasquier on cello. The composer, Oliver Messiaen, plays piano. How to express the mystical truths of Catholicism in the rhythm of musical movement: bird song, Hindu talas, numerical formulas, ancient Greek meters, Gregorian chant. All […]
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Pauline works all day at an LA Department Store, then leaps into the back seat of her mother’s car. Her mother negotiates LA traffic while Pauline changes into tennis clothes. Together they will scrimp 17 dollars to travel east. Swing music on the radio drowns out the war. The next year they take out a […]
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From left to right in the picture above: Tommy Paul, Taylor Fritz, Reilly Opelka. French Open Junior Champion, US Open Junior Champion, Wimbledon Junior Champion. Great mover, Big serve and groundies, Bunyanesque serve. Teenage Trouble Maker, Video Games Guru, Contemporary Art Collector. When I saw this fantastic photo from @zootennis on twitter, I immediately thought […]
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Why “le croc?” “The machine” is a better nickname. That’s what Tilden called me because I sent every ball back like the ball machine I would invent in 1947. Invented the steel racquet, too, much later. From wood to steel. Another machine like those human beings in modernist paintings of Fernand Leger. I was called […]
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