Cricket, Literature and Culture: Symbolising the Nation, Destabilising Empire

249 Pages·2016·6.483 MB·English

by  Anthony Bateman

Cricket, Literature and Culture
Symbolising the Nation, Destabilising Empire
Anthony Bateman
CRICKET, LITERATURE AND CULTURE
To my father, and in memory of my mother
Cricket, Literature and Culture
Symbolising the Nation, Destabilising Empire
ANTHONY BATEMAN
De Montfort University, UK
First published 2009 by Ashgate Publishing
Published 2016 by Routledge
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Copyright © 2009 Anthony Bateman
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any
form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented,
including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system,
without permission in writing from the publishers.
Anthony Bateman has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act,
1988, to be identified as the author of this work.
Notice:
Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used
only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Bateman, Anthony.
Cricket, literature and culture : symbolising the nation, destabilising empire.
1.Cricket in literature. 2. Cricket – Press coverage – Great Britain –
History – 19th century. 3. Cricket – Press coverage – Great Britain – History –
20th century. 4. Cricket stories – History and criticism. 5. Cricket – Social aspects –
Great Britain – History – 19th century. 6. Cricket – Social aspects – Great Britain –
History–20th century.
I. Title
820.9’3579’09034-dc22
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Bateman, Anthony, 1966–
Cricket, literature and culture : symbolising the nation, destabilising empire
/ by Anthony Bateman.
p.cm. Includes index.
ISBN 978-0-7546-6537-3 (hardback : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-7546-9699-5 (ebook)
1. English literature—20th century—History and criticism. 2. Sports in literature.
3. English literature—19th century—History and criticism. 4. Cricket in literature.
5. National characteristics, British, in literature. 6. Commonwealth literature (English)—
History and criticism. I. Title.
PR478.S66B38 2009
820.9’0091—dc22
2009019702
ISBN 9780754665373 (hbk)
ISBN 9781315574769 (ebk)
Contents
List of Figures vii
Permissions ix
Acknowledgements xi
Introduction: Writing the Cricket Field 1
1 ‘More Mighty Than the Bat, the Pen […]’: Culture, Hegemony and
the Literaturisation of Cricket 15
2 ‘England Over’?: Cricket and Literature in the Inter-War Years 55
3 ‘Guilty, m’lud, to fiction […]’: Neville Cardus and Cultural Crisis 95
4 Cricket, Literature and Empire 1850–1939 121
5 ‘From Far it Look Like Politics’: C.L.R. James and the Canon 157
6 ‘The Play is a Poem’? 197
Bibliography 205
Index 229
This page has been left blank intentionally
List of Figures
i.1 A.C. MacLaren. Source: The David Frith Collection. 9
i.2 Maurice Tate. Source: The David Frith Collection. 10
1.1 William Blake, ‘The Echoing Green’ from Songs of
Innocence and Experience (1820s). 22
1.2 Drawing of Dingley Dell versus All Muggleton cricket match by
R.W. Buss. Charles Dickens, The Pickwick Papers (1836–37),
(London, 1999), p. 102. 29
1.3 Frontispiece to the first book of cricket technique, Thomas Boxall’s
Rules and Instructions for Playing at the Game of Cricket (1801).
Source: E.V. Lucas, The Hambledon Men. 31
1.4 ‘The Conversation During The Match’. Illustration by Arthur
Hughes for Thomas Hughes, Tom Brown’s Schooldays (London:
1869), facing p. 351. 32
1.5 W.G. Grace. Source: C.B. Fry, The Great Batsmen: Their
Methods at a Glance, (London, 1905), p. 112. 38
1.6 ‘Two Gentlemen of Warwickshire’. Drawing by F.H. Townsend.
Source: Punch, 6 September 1911. Reproduced with permission of
Punch Ltd., www.punch.co.uk. 49
1.7 ‘Spoiling Sport [Most of our prominent cricketers are now
engaged as expert reporters by various journals]’. Drawing by
Bernard Partridge. Source: Punch, 18 May 1904. Reproduced
with permission of Punch Ltd., www.punch.co.uk. 53
2.1 ‘The Ghosts’. Source: Douglas Moffat, Crickety Cricket (1897),
p. 87. Reproduced by permission of The University of Manchester
John Rylands Library. 63
2.2 J.M. Barrie (in waistcoat) with the Australian cricketers Charlie
Macartney, Jack Ellis and Arthur Mailey. Source: The David Frith
Collection. 65
2.3 James Thorpe’s illustration of The Bat and Ball Inn, Hambledon,
followed by a passage from Nyren. Source: James Thorpe, A
Cricket Bag, p. 134. Reproduced with permission of the University
of Manchester, the John Rylands University Library. 75
2.4 The distribution of places where cricket matches are mentioned
in Alan Ross, The Penguin Cricketer’s Companion (London:
Penguin, 1981). Source: John Bale, Landscapes of Modern Sport,
p. 161. By kind permission of Continuum. 77
viii Cricket, Literature and Culture
2.5 ‘A model of the mythical English cricket landscape’. Source: John
Bale, Landscapes of Modern Sport, p. 158. By kind permission of
Continuum. 79
2.6 Transport & General Workers’ Union recruitment poster, 1934.
By kind permission of TUC Library Collections, London
Metropolitan University. 91
3.1 Cricket Week at Hudson’s bookshop in Birmingham, 1934.
Source: David Frith, Pageant of Cricket (London, 1987), p. 333:
The David Frith Collection. 100
3.2 The contrast between the ‘orthodox’ and the ‘two-eyed’ or ‘two-
shouldered’ stance. Source: F.A.H. Henley, The Boy’s Book of
Cricket (London, 1924), p. 10. Reproduced by permission of the
University of Manchester, the John Rylands University Library. 105
3.3 The Correct Finish Of An Off Drive. Source: Henley, p. 60.
Reproduced by permission of the University of Manchester, the
John Rylands University Library. 106
3.4 The Wrong Finish Of An Off Drive. Source: Henley, p. 61.
Reproduced by permission of University of Manchester, the John
Rylands University Library. 107
3.5 ‘Style Is A Great Deal, If Not Everything’. Illustration from
E.H.D. Sewell, Cricket Under Fire (London, 1943), facing p. 192. 109
3.6 Frank Woolley on his own threshold in Kent, 1944. Source: E.H.D.
Sewell, Who Won The Toss? (London: 1944), facing p. 81. 112
4.1 Fred Lillywhite’s scoring tent and press. Source: David Rayvern
Allen, Early Books on Cricket, p. 93. 133
4.2 ‘Spy’s’ drawing of Ranjitsinhji (1897). Source: Neville Cardus,
English Cricket (London: 1945), facing p. 65. 137
4.3 Douglas Jardine’s reconfiguration of the cricket field. Source:
Pelham Warner, Cricket Between The Wars (London: Chatto &
Windus, 1942), p. 127. 150
5.1 A.E. Morton comments on the West Indies’ heavy defeat to a
W.G. Grace XI in the first match of their 1906 tour. Source:
J. Williams, Cricket and Race. Reproduced by kind permission of
Gerry Wolstenholme. 159
5.2 Cartoon of C.B. Fry. Source: Iain Wilton, C.B. Fry: An English
Hero p. 194. By kind permission of Roger Mann. 184
5.3 Learie Constantine. Source: Learie Constantine, Cricket and I,
p. 118. 191
Permissions
Extracts from Beyond a Boundary are reproduced by permission of the Estate
of C.L.R. James. Passages from The C.L.R. James Reader appear with the
permission of Curtis Brown Group Ltd, London on behalf of the Estate of C.L.R.
James. Permission for the reproduction of quotations has also been obtained
from Punch, the Estate of Ford Madox Ford, The Provost and Scholars of King’s
College, Cambridge and The Society of Authors as the Literary Representatives
of the Estates of E.M. Forster and Virginia Woolf. Quotations from the work of
Wyndham Lewis appear by kind permission of the Wyndham Lewis Memorial
Trust (a registered charity). Every effort has been to made to contact the literary
estate of Dudley Carew and the body or individual responsible for granting
permission to reproduce the cricket writings of Sir Neville Cardus.