Every once in a while, I run into a tennis book that I struggle with. Such is the case with The Circuit: A Tennis Odyssey by Rowan Ricardo Phillips. This book won the 2019 PEN/ESPN Award for Literary Sports Writing, which recognizes a nonfiction book about sports that achieves the strongest literary character. As a point of reference, another tennis book previously reviewed on this site that won that award is “A Terrible Splendor” by Marshall Jon Fisher. The PEN/ESPN Award for Literary Sports Writing isn’t always issued. In fact, The Circuit is the last book PEN America honored in the Literary Sports Writing category. In any case, it is exactly the kind of tennis book that I should love.
In 2017, Phillips watched every single match played on the ATP tour. Reflecting on that feat alone makes me wonder if I could similarly watch every WTA match in a calendar year. Specifically, I started into the book wondering if I could one day write an analogous book focusing on the women’s tour. By the end, my question had shifted to whether or not an interesting book was even possible along those lines. While I appreciate the depth, complexity, and lyrical touch of the storytelling, reading The Circuit felt more like a chore. While Phillips created some beautiful vignettes of the 2017 ATP season, it made me feel like I was meandering through a randomly curated collection of art pieces. It was somehow both striking and disjointed.
In fact, it isn’t clear to me why Phillips bothered to watch so many ATP matches at all. Ultimately, he organized the narrative using the “Four Seasons” literary mechanic, aligning the Grand Slam Tournaments with Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall. He also focused almost exclusively on the star players. While the casual tennis fan likely only watches those major tournaments and, more specifically, the matches of Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal, the retelling of those storylines, albeit using poetic prose, felt redundant to me.
It isn’t clear to me who the target audience was for this book other than the literary critics responsible for issuing awards. The book starts with a detailed explanation of how tennis is played along with the unique vernacular of the sport. That anticipates an audience who is unfamiliar with the game. However, I think the only people who persevere to the final pages will already be deeply involved and interested in tennis.
This was my second attempt to read and review this book. I started into it a couple of years ago but abandoned the effort because I just couldn’t stay engaged with the material. At the time, I thought my apathy was a reflection of pressing life commitments interfering with the focus required to fully consume The Circuit.
For this review, such as it is, my mental performance wasn’t much better. It took me two weeks to eventually slog through to completion. Throughout, I continued to struggle to achieve a better mindset than mustered on my previous attempt. It is so frustrating because I know The Circuit is a good book that should be right up my alley.
Despite its literary merit and Phillips’s clear passion for the sport, The Circuit: A Tennis Odyssey never fully connected with me. I kept hoping for it to enthrall me, but that moment never arrived. Books like this often reveal themselves differently with time and perspective. While it wasn’t the immersive, revelatory experience I had hoped for, I respect what Phillips set out to accomplish, and I will certainly give it another attempt at some point in the future.
For now, it feels oddly like losing a winnable match.
The Circuit: A Tennis Odyssey (<- Sponsored Link)
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