Literature
Numerous authors have made references to tennis over the years. It would be impossible to mention all of them, but this selection shows just how varied the authors and tennis mentions are!
Chaucer, Troilus and Criseyde, c. 1385
But kanstow pleyen raket to and fro
(NB “raket” may refer simply to a game with dice, not an early racket. The 14th century would be a surprisingly early reference to a piece of tennis equipment)
John Gower, In Praise of Peace, c. 1400:
Of the Tenetz to winne or lese a chace
Mai no lif wite er that the bal be ronne;
Al stant in god, what thing men schal pourchace,
Thende is in him er that it be begonne.
(NB This is the first known reference to tennis in English. NB also the mention of a chase as proof of this unique feature’s long association with the game)
Charles d’Orléans
Captured at Agincourt (1415) at the age of 20 and not released until the age of 45, Charles D’Orléans used tennis as an analogy to discuss aging. The result is the first known poem about tennis.
François Rabelais, Pantagruel, Book II, Chapter 2.V, 1532
The suggestion is that law students at Orleans were rather more proficient at tennis and dancing than their studies:
In his hand is always a racket,
Or his tennis-ball in his placket:
In dance he neatly can trip it;
And for law, it is all in his tippet.
Michel de Montaigne, Essays, c. 1570-1592
Montaigne experienced a tennis tragedy when his brother, at the age of 23, was hit in the head by a tennis ball and died of apoplexy some five or six hours later.
He wrote about this in his essay “That to Philosophise is to Prepare to Die”.
William Shakespeare, baptised 1564, died 1616
Shakespeare references tennis multiple times (allegedly as many as 130). Below are examples from just five plays.
Henry V, I.2. 270ff.
The most famous and most extended mention of tennis is in Henry V (c. 1599). The Dauphin mocks King Henry’s claim to the French throne by sending a gift of tennis balls. Enraged, Henry gives a powerful speechin response. Nor was this speech wholly invented by Shakespeare. Thomas Otterbourne lived during Heny V’s reign and provides the speech’s theme.
King Henry:
We are glad the Dauphin is so pleasant with us;
His present and your pains we thank you for:
When we have march’d our rackets to these balls,
We will, in France, by God’s grace, play a set
Shall strike his father’s crown into the hazard.
Tell him he hath made a match with such a wrangler
That all the courts of France will be disturb’d
With chaces. . .
Much Ado About Nothing, III.2.43-44
the old ornament of his [Benedick’s] cheek hath already stuffed tennis balls.
Hamlet, II.1.64-67
Polonius:
and as you say,
There was he gaming, there o’ertook in ‘s rouse,
There falling out at tennis
Romeo and Juliet, II.5.12-15
Juliet:
Had she affections and warm youthful blood,
She would be as swift in motion as a ball;
My words would bandy her to my sweet love,
And his to me.
(NB “bandy” is a tennis related term. To bandy a ball is to send it to and fro)
As you like it, V.1.55-57
Touchstone:
I will bandy with
thee in faction. I will o’errun thee with policy. I
will kill thee a hundred and fifty ways.
(NB “bandy” is a tennis related term. To bandy a ball is to send it to and fro)
John Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, 1690
It is not surprising that Locke was at least familiar with tennis. Christ Church, Oxford, may not have had its own court, but tennis thrived in this university (as it did in Cambridge too).
A Tennis-ball, whether in Motion by the stroke of a Racket, or lying at rest, is not by any one taken to be a free Agent. If we enquire into the reason, we shall find it is because we conceive not a Tennis-ball to think, and consequently not to have any Volition, or preference of Motion to rest, or vice versa.
Samuel Pepys, Diary, 4th January 1664
Thence to the Tennis Court, after I had spent a little time in Westminster Hall, thinking to have met with Mrs. Lane, but I could not and am glad of it, and there saw the King play at Tennis and others: but to see how the King’s play was extolled without any cause at all, was a loathsome sight, though sometimes, indeed, he did play very well and deserved to be commended; but such open flattery is beastly.
Alexandre Dumas, Les Trois Mousquetaires, 1844
A tennis match features in The Three Musketeers (set in the early 17th century). The match is short-lived, however. D’Artagnan chooses to call off the match, wary of the power of Porthos’ hitting.
