Overview

The long-awaited sequel to the bestselling classic memoir, A Handful of Summers. Gordon Forbes played for the South African Davis Cup team in the 50s and early 60s and returned to the circuit as a writer and observer. In 'Too Soon to Panic' he takes the readers behind the scenes at the big tournaments – Wimbledon, Roland Garros and Flushing Meadows; Germany, Spain and Italy – and introduces them to many of tennis's most extraordinary and dynamic characters, including Mark McCormack, Rod Laver, Jim Courier and Andre Agassi. Crammed with riotously funny anecdotes and vivid evocations of the innocence and camaraderie of the game in Forbes's day – when tennis as still a gentlemanly, amateur and often rather ramshackle affair – and insightful observations on today's glamorous game – where money reigns and sheer strength sometimes seems to conquer skill – Forbes explores the remarkable changes that have come over the sport in the last forty years.

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9780006388104

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'The funniest tennis book ever written' THE TIMES 'Rollicking, outrageous, raucous and riveting - I laughed my head off' SUNDAY EXPRESS

‘The funniest tennis book ever written’ THE TIMES ‘Rollicking, outrageous, raucous and riveting – I laughed my head off’ SUNDAY EXPRESS

A glossy and literate paean to life on the glamorous pro tennis tour. Forbes, a former championship player from South Africa, is now best known for his occasional television commentary and written dispatches from the posh sidelines of the mercenary world of pro tennis. In this book, Forbsey, as his chums call him, holds forth on a number of topics, many only peripherally related to pro tennis: Paris during the French Open; London during Wimbledon; New York during the US Open; Rome during the Italian Open, and so forth. Unless one has had the privilege of getting out of the gallery and beyond the velvet rope, most of what Forbes commits to paper - and Forbes, admittedly coming from a family of note takers, commits a lot - is just this side of a crashing bore. Moreover, Forbes's lovely but static prose is tainted somewhat by the specter of his nation's past. While Forbes never addresses directly the subject of South Africa's history of minority rule, his unqualified admiration for Sun City (the once-whites-only South African resort that served as a lightning rod for international censure), his frequent use of pidgin English dialogue, and his inclusion of a passage that seems to lament the passing of an Anglo-Saxon London, makes this book a disquieting read. Swell reading for the swell set, perhaps, but not for the common folk or the easily offended. (Kirkus Reviews)

`The funniest tennis book ever written' THE TIMES `Rollicking, outrageous, raucous and riveting - I laughed my head off' SUNDAY EXPRESS

Author Information

Gordon Forbes played tennis for the South African Davis Cup team in the 1950s and early 1960s and returned to the circuit as a writer and observer.

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