Lincoln (cont.); Gay Tennis Stars

Read the excellent paper by Lewis Gannett in the current issue of The Gay & Lesbian Review (A Double Standard in Lincoln Studies). It's a balanced summary of the controversy regarding Lincoln's attraction to men, including carnal attraction, not "those asexual 'romantic friendships' in vogue with certain scholars" (here we are again...). Very critical of Sean Wilentz's 'gargantuan (25,000-word) review-essay on Lincoln literature in the July 15, 2009, issue of The New Republic', he argues that, starting in the 1990's, 'Lincoln scholars relaxed evidentiary standards to accommodate a heterosexual story [Ann Rutledge] in order to ward off homo-romance stories [Joshua Speed]'.

***

A Terrible Splendor - Three Extraordinary Men, a World Poised for War, and the Greatest Tennis Match Ever Played (Marshall Jon Fisher, Crown Publishers, 2009, 321p) is an entertaining book, despite a few lengthy pages, ideal for a few days under the November Caribbean sun. It recounts one of the greatest tennis matches ever between American Don Budge and German Goettfried von Cramm in July 1937. US and Germany were tied 2-2 in the Davis Cup, and the fifth match was to decide who would play against a weakened England, and probably win the title.

The match happens in the context of the rise of the third Reich and the increasing persecution of Jews and homosexuals. The irony is that "the team playing for Nazi Germany, representing the highest ideals of Aryan athleticism and manliness, had a homosexual as its star and another - an American, to boot - as a coach." The coach was Bill Tilden, tennis's first idol, who dominated world tennis in the 20's, the star Goettfried von Cramm.

Fisher's descriptions of tennis matches somewhat reminded me of Witold Gombrowicz's Les envoûtés (The Possessed) which I read during the summer of 1977 when it was first published in French, serialized, in Le Monde. Also a nice read for under the sun...

2009.11.22

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The irony is that "the team playing for Nazi Germany, representing the highest ideals of Aryan athleticism and manliness, had a homosexual as its star and another - an American, to boot - as a coach.