The Art of Tennis

“A masterpiece.”—L. Jon Wertheim, author of Glory Days

A celebration of the cultural influence of tennis that paved the way for the sport we love today. In its foundational years, tennis inspired paintings, ballets, music, fiction, poetry, theatre, and even clothing design. This book presents riveting exemplars from all the arts while also lovingly portraying the game of tennis as an art form of its own.

Tennis is a game of precision, timing, athleticism, strategy, and, sometimes, a little luck. Small wonder this sport attracts so many players and fans—including artists and writers who see something transcendent in hitting a ball with a racket over a net and inside a rectangular field.

As Weber writes, “The thrill of the thwack of the racquet and the perpetual state of suspense about what is coming next appeals to individuals from every walk of life….It has prompted the creation of sublime architecture and moved composers of music in wonderful new directions; it has seeded literary fantasy and been the source of hilarious cartoons. It has also, in fabulous ways, enabled human beings to demonstrate some of their most admirable qualities: courage, tenacity, generosity of heart.”

This book explores the charisma and spell the sport cast on the likes of Nabokov, Coco Chanel, Caravaggio, and Bonnard. And, of course, there is much about the players who gave the sport, in its early years, its special magic.

Weber, best known for art world biographies, has been a lifelong tennis player and takes us through his own personal relationship with the sport: from his college-age summers in the 1960s working at New Hampshire’s Tamarack Tennis Camp to a pickup game on a court in Guangzhou, China where he was struck, yet again, that tennis is its own language, understood by all who play it.

Whether a reader is fluent in the language of tennis or just admires it as an outsider, The Art of Tennis will delight all lovers of the game.