Big Bill Tilden: The Triumphs and the Tragedy

✍ Scribed by Frank Deford

• Publisher: Open Road Media
• Year: 2011
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 353
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

The classic biography of America’s first tennis starWhen he stepped onto the Wimbledon grass in 1920, Bill Tilden was poised to become the world’s greatest tennis star. Throughout the 1920s he dominated the sport, winning championship after championship with his trademark grace, power, and intelligence. He owned the game more completely than Babe Ruth ruled baseball, making his name, for more than a decade, synonymous with tennis. Phenomenally intelligent—he completed his first book on tennis in the three weeks before his first Wimbledon triumph—Tilden’s success came with a dark side. This classic biography by legendary sports writer Frank Deford tells of Tilden’s dominance, which was unlike anything the sport had ever seen—and the big man’s tragic fall.

✦ Table of Contents

Cover
Title Page
Dedication
Contents
Foreword
Part One
Chapter One: "I'll play my own sweet game"
Chapter Two: "Bill would adapt and lick them all"
Chapter Three: "Whatever he wanted to do, he did it, and he did it in style"
Chapter Four: "The American boy... loves a fair deal and hates a crook"
Chapter Five: "Any artist belongs to the country and to the world"
Chapter Six: "I can't do that anymore with my keystone finger gone"
Chapter Seven: "You are a parasite... a tennis gigolo"
Chapter Eight: "The Lord never meant my face for a hero!"
Chapter Nine: "I'll beat you yet, Rainy!"
Chapter Ten: "All they can do is beat him, they cannot ever be his equal"
Chapter Eleven: "Please boo me all you will between points"
Part Two
Chapter Twelve: "The only child of William T. and Linie H. Tilden"
Chapter Thirteen: "Master Junior! Master Junior!"
Chapter Fourteen: "Everything that made life worthwhile lost favor"
Chapter Fifteen: "He was starting to walk like a real fruit"
Chapter Sixteen: "You know, Arthur's the only real son I ever had"
Chapter Seventeen: "But, Bill, this time you're indicted"
Chapter Eighteen: "Judge, I can't help myself"
Chapter Nineteen: "Jesus, it was awful. The poor old son of a bitch"
Acknowledgments
Career Highlights
Index
About the Author
Copyright