Transcript
Claire ParnetSo, 'T" is "Tennis."
"Tennis". . . hmm?
Claire ParnetYou have always liked tennis. There is a famous anecdote about you as a child, trying to get the autograph of a great Swedish tennis player and you realized it was instead the king of Sweden.
No, I knew who it was. He was already around a hundred, and he was well protected, he had lots of bodyguards. But I did ask the king of Sweden for an autograph. There is a photo of me in Le Flgaro, where there's a little boy asking the elderly king of Sweden for an autograph. That's me.
Claire ParnetAnd who was the Swedish tennis player whom you were chasing after?
It was Borotra. He wasn't a great Swedish player, it was Borotra, who was the king's main bodyguard since he played tennis with the king, gave him lessons. He kicked me a few times to keep me away from the king, but the king was very nice, and afterwards, Borotra also got nice. That's not a very flattering moment for Borotra.
Claire ParnetThere are lots of moments, even less flattering, for Borotra. Is tennis the only sport you watch on television?
No, I adore soccer, I really like soccer. . . Yes, so it's that and tennis.
Claire ParnetDid you play tennis?
Yes, a lot up until the war, so that makes me a war victim!
Claire ParnetWhat changes occur in a body when one plays a sport a lot, and when one stops playing it after, are there things that change?
I don't think so, at least not for me. I didn't turn it into a trade. In 1939, I was 14 years old, and stopped playing tennis at 14, so that's not dramatic.
Claire ParnetDid you have a lot of talent?
Yes, for a 14 year old, I did pretty well.
Claire ParnetDid you have a ranking?
Oh, no! At 14, I was really too small, and then I did not have the kind of development they have today.
Claire ParnetAnd after, you tried other sports, I think, some French boxing?
Well, no, I did a bit, but I got hurt, so I stopped that right away, but I did try some boxing.
Claire ParnetDo you think tennis has changed a lot since your youth?
Of course, like in all sports, there are milieus of variation, and here we get back to the problem of style. Sports are very interesting for the question of positions of the body. There is a variation of positions of the body over spaces of greater or lesser length. For example, it's obvious that athletes don't jump hurdles in the same way now as they did fifty years ago. And one would have to categorize the variables in the history of sports. I see several: variables of tactics. In soccer, tactics have changed enormously since my childhood. There are position variables for the body's posture. There are variables that put into play. . . There was a moment when I was very interested in the shotput, not to do it myself, but the build of the shot putter evolved at one point with extreme rapidity. At times it was a question of force: how, with really strong shot putters, to gain back speed, At other times it was a question of speed: and how, with builds geared for speed, to gain back force? Now this is very, very interesting. It's almost. . . The sociologist [Marcel] Mauss introduced all sorts of studies on the positions of bodies in different civilizations, but sports is a domain of the variation of positions, something quite fundamental. So, in tennis, even before the war- and I still remember the champions from before the war- it's obvious that the positions were not the same, not at all. And then, what interests me greatly, again related to style, are the champions as true creators. There are two kinds of great champions, who do not have the same value for me, the creators and the non-creators. The non-creators are those who bring a pre-existing style to an unequaled level, for example Lendl. I don't consider Lendl to be fundamentally a creator in tennis. But then there are the great creators, even on very simple levels, those who invent new "moves" and introduce new tactics. And after them, all sorts of followers come flooding in, but the great stylists are inventors, something one certainly finds in all sports. So, what was the great turning point in tennis? It was its proletarization, quite relative of course. I mean, it has become a mass sport, masses of the young-executive sort rather than working-class. but we can call it the proletarization of tennis. And of course, there are deeper approaches to explain how that occurs. But it would not have occurred if not for the arrival of a genius at the same time. It was Borg who made it possible. Why? Because he brought in a particular style of mass tennis, and he had to create mass tennis from the ground up. Then, a crowd of very good champions came after him, but not creators, for example, the Vilas type, etc. So Borg appeals to me, his Christ-like head. He had this kind of Christ-like bearing, this extreme dignity, this aspect that made him so respected by all the players, etc.
Claire ParnetYou were saying you attended a lot. . .
Oh yes, I experienced a lot of things in tennis. . . But I want to finish up Borg. So, Borg was a Christ-like character. He made sport for the masses possible, created mass tennis, and with that, it was a total invention of a new game. Then there are all sorts of worthy champions, but of the Vilas-type who came rushing in and who imposed a generally soporific style onto the game, whereas-and here we always rediscover the law "You are paying me compliments, while I am 100 miles from doing what I wanted to do." Because Borg changed deliberately: when he was certain of his moves, it no longer interested him, so his style evolved tremendously, whereas the drudges stuck with the same old thing. We have to see McEnroe as the anti-Borg.
Claire ParnetWhat was this working-class style that Borg imposed?
Situated at the back of the court, at the farthest retreat possible, and twisting in place, and ball placement high over the net. Any worker could understand that game, any little manager could understand that game, not that he could succeed.
Claire ParnetThat's interesting.
So the very principle- back of court, twisting, ball high- is the opposite of aristocratic principles. These are popular principles, but what genius it had to take. Borg is exactly like Christ, an aristocrat who goes to the people. Well. . . I'm probably saying something stupid, but.. It still is quite astonishing, quite astonishing, Borg's stroke, very, very curious, a great creator in sports. And there's McEnroe, it was pure aristocrat, half Egyptian, half Russian, Egyptian service game, Russian soul, who invented moves that he knew no one could follow. So he was an aristocrat who couldn't be followed. He invented some amazing moves. He invented a move that consisted of placing the ball, very strange, not even striking it, just placing it. And he developed a service-volley combination that wasn't. . . The service-volley combination was well known, but McEnroe's was completely transformed. All this, of course, to talk about. . . Oh, another great player, but without the same importance, I believe, is the other American, but I don't recall his name. . .
Claire ParnetConnors.
Connors, with whom you really see the aristocratic principle: ball flat barely over the net, a very odd aristocratic principle, and also striking while unbalanced. He was never such a genius as when he was entirely unbalanced. Those were some really odd moves. There is a history of sports, and it has to be explained about every sport: their evolution, their creators, their followers. . . It's exactly as in art: there are creators, there are followers, there are changes, there are evolutions, there's a history, there is a becoming of sports.
Claire ParnetAnd you had started a sentence with, "I attended. . ."?
Oh, that's just another detail. I believe that I attended. . . It's sometimes difficult to be specific about when a move really originated yet I do recall that, before the war, there were some Australians. And here, there are questions of national origins, why did Australians introduce the two-handed back swing? At the beginning of the two-handed back swing, only Australians did it, at least as I recall it, I think. Anyhow, why did the Australians have. . . This relation between the two- handed back swing and the Australians, I don't know, it didn't go without saying, perhaps there was some reason. I remember one move that struck me when I was a child because it created no effect. We saw that the opponent missed the ball, but we had to wonder why. It was a rather soft blow, and after considering it closely, we saw that it was the return of service. When the opponent served the ball, the player returned it with a rather soft blow, but that had the result of falling at the tips of the server's feet as he was approaching to volley, so he received it, not even at mid-volley, and he couldn't return it. So this was a strange return because we couldn't understand very well why it succeeded so well as a move. In my opinion, the first to have systematized that was a great Australian player, who did not have much of a career on clay courts because he wasn't interested in it, called Bromwich, right before or after the war, I don't recall exactly. But he was a very great player, a true inventor of moves. But I do recall that as a child or young man, I was astounded at this move that has now become classic, that everybody does. So there you are, an invention of a move that, to my knowledge, the generation of Borotra didn't yet know in tennis, this sort of return.
Claire ParnetTo finish with tennis and McEnroe, do you think that when he complains and insults the referee, in fact insulting himself more than he does the referee- is this a matter of style, and that he is unhappy with his form of expression?
No, it's a matter of style because it belongs to his style. It's a kind of nervous recharging, yes, just like an orator can get angry, while on the contrary, there are orators who remain cold and distant. So it's fully part of McEnroe's style. It's the soul, as we say in German, the Gemut.