Winner of the Lord Aberdare Literary Prize 2015- from the British Society for Sports History. From its advent in the mid-late nineteenth century as a garden-party pastime to its development into a highly commercialised and professionalised high-performance sport, the history of tennis in Britain reflects important themes in Britain’s social history. In the first comprehensive and critical account of the history of tennis in Britain, Robert Lake explains how the game’s historical roots have shaped its contemporary structure, and how the history of tennis can tell us much about the history of wider British society. Since its emergence as a spare-time diversion for landed elites, the dominant culture in British tennis has been one of amateurism and exclusion, with tennis sitting alongside cricket and golf as a vehicle for the reproduction of middle-class values throughout wider British society in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Consequently, the Lawn Tennis Association has been accused of a failure to promote inclusion or widen participation, despite steadfast efforts to develop talent and improve coaching practices and structures. Robert Lake examines these themes in the context of the global development of tennis and important processes of commercialisation and professional and social development that have shaped both tennis and wider society. The social history of tennis in Britain is a microcosm of late-nineteenth and twentieth-century British social history: sustained class power and class conflict; struggles for female emancipation and racial integration; the decline of empire; and, Britain’s shifting relationship with America, continental Europe, and Commonwealth nations. This book is important and fascinating reading for anybody with an interest in the history of sport or British social history.

Tennis is much more than Wimbledon! This story reveals the hidden history of the sport.

The first comprehensive history of tennis, Henry Gillmeister's Tennis may also be considered the first truly scholarly history of any individual sport. Supported by a startling wealth of linguistic and documentary research, Gillmeister charts the global evolution of tennis from its origins in the early Middle Ages to the appearance of the modern game in the twentieth century. Along the way, he debunks several firmly established myths about the history of the game, including those surrounding the invention of the Davis Cup. Rare photographs and never before published medieval and renaissance drawings generously adorn the text, and a treasure trove of bibliographical information provides its coda. A delight for the sports fan and the scholar alike, Tennis will prove the athorative text on tennis for years to come.

Tennis is one of the world’s most popular sports, as levels of participation and spectatorship demonstrate. Moreover, tennis has always been one of the world’s most significant sports, expressing crucial fractures of social class, gender, sexuality, race and ethnicity - both on and off court. This is the first book to undertake a survey of the historical and socio-cultural sweep of tennis, exploring key themes from governance, development and social inclusion to national identity and the role of the media. It is presented in three parts: historical developments; culture and representations; and politics and social issues, and features contributions by leading tennis scholars from North America, Europe, Asia and Australia. The most authoritative book published to date on the history, culture and politics of tennis, this is an essential reference for any course or program examining the history, sociology, politics or culture of sport.

Volume three of a bibliography documenting all that has been written in the English language on the history of sport and physical education in Britain. It lists all secondary source material including reference works, in a classified order to meet the needs of the sports historian.

This lively and deeply researched history - the first of its kind - goes beyond the great names and moments to explain how British sport has changed since 1800, and what it has meant to ordinary people. It shows how the way we play reflects not just our lives as citizens of a predominantlyurban and industrial world, but what is especially distinctive about British sport. Innovators in abandoning traditional, often brutal sports, and in establishing a code of `fair play', the British were also pioneers in popular sports and in the promotion of organized spectator events.Modern media coverage of sport, gambling, violence and attitudes towards it, nationalism, and the role of sport in sustaining male identity are also explored, and the book is rich in illuminating and entertaining anecdotes, which it combines with a serious historical understanding of a fascinatingsubject.

Given sport’s centrality in English society, what role does it play in symbolising contemporary English national identity? This comprehensive study explores the complex set of relationships between sport and what it means to be English in the twenty-first century. The bond between sport and nationalism has long been recognised, but with increasingly vociferous separatist nationalisms threatening the dismantling of the United Kingdom, a closer analysis is timely. Part one addresses key debates regarding English national identity within the specific sporting contexts of association football, cricket, tennis, cycling and rugby. Part two discusses the complex relationship between religion, sport and English national identity as well as the attitudes and experiences of traditionally marginalized groups, including women, minority ethnic groups and disabled people. Part three considers the perspectives of the other UK nations on the link between sport and English national identity. Sport and English National Identity in a 'Disunited Kingdom' is fascinating reading for all those with an interest in the sociology, politics and history of sport, and the study of nations, nationalism and national identity.