La Différence

Is there a sport other than tennis that contains so many different versions of itself, so many different worlds, within its small universe? These worlds are created, literally, at the surface level: Clay, grass, and hard courts each come with their own playing styles, their own champions and specialists, their own sounds, skills, strategies, and sneakers, and their own customs—even, in the case of how the lines are called, their own rules.

Those of us who play and follow the sport in the U.S. enjoy only a small taste of that difference. We play on unforgiving asphalt, and are rarely allowed a glimpse of the grass courts hidden behind private-club walls. As for clay, we usually settle for the green stuff, and only see the red dirt that stretches across Europe on our TV screens each spring. To go below the surface, and understand the depth of the cultural variety that tennis offers, requires a trip to Paris, and to the capital of clay that it houses, Roland Garros.

I made my first trip—it’s not an exaggeration to call it a pilgrimage—to the French Open with my family, as a fan, in 1998. I’d always loved to watch the tournament on television at home. The war-of-attrition rallies, the elegant sliding movements, the artistic slow-motion replays taken from French TV, the vehement, sometimes vicious crowd: No tournament mixes beauty with the battle the way Roland Garros does. Still, none of that prepared me for the effect that the event had when I first took it in live. For lack of a highbrow reference, it reminded me of the Star Trek episode where Kirk and Co. are transported to an alternative universe. It was like watching tennis in a mirror; everything felt the same, but in reverse.

First, there was the way the sport was played. On TV, clay-court rallies are often described as interminable by U.S. commentators. Seeing them up close, I wished they would go on even longer than they did. The elaborate Western-grip swings, the spray of red dust that flew from under a sliding sneaker, the mix of heavy topspin and delicate drop-shot touch: Here tennis, the effete sport, was hypnotically visceral.

Then there was the setting. While the scale of its show can’t match the U.S. Open’s, no tournament wrings as much drama from the game itself as the French. The center court, Court Philippe Chatrier, has tightly packed bleachers overlooking what appears to be the world’s largest and most intimidating playing surface. Lit by the sun, the court can look like a vast, rectangular sea of fire. Nowhere else is the sport’s individual, gladiatorial element so emphasized; nowhere else do the players look so alone on their side of the court, so naked in front of the audience and the world.

About that audience. The best match we watched in ’98 was a five-set comeback win by France’s own Cedric Pioline over Marat Safin in Chatrier. Coming from the U.S., where watching a tennis match is typically a laid-back, catch-some-rays type of affair, I had never heard a crowd so unified and involved. “Ced-reek!” they chanted as one, and then followed it with three brisk claps. But their relationship with the enemy, Safin, was more enlightening.

When the hotheaded teenager banged his racquet on the court, the crowd—unified in disapproval this time—booed and whistled. They produced a startlingly intense wall of noise. Safin picked up his racquet and held his arms up in apology. The crowd immediately turned its boos to applause. The spectators had, it seemed, just wanted to be part of the action, and it was hard to fault them for that. And they do have an effect. As one photographer told me, it’s hard to get a good celebration shot of a player who is facing a French opponent at Roland Garros. The last thing they want to do is rile the crowd.

Only in Australia is the sport more central to a country’s sporting culture. Which makes sense, because France can claim to the be the sport’s co-inventor. Lawn tennis began in England, but it was based on court tennis, which was first played in French monasteries a millennium ago. That history is embedded in the game’s arcane scoring structure. Six-game sets and the “sundial” 15-30-40-game system originated in court tennis, while “love” comes from l’eouf (French for egg), and deuce comes from à deux—though the French prefer the more elegant “égalité.” Sonically and poetically, their jeu decisif is an obvious improvement on our “tiebreaker.”

Gael Monfils, Alize Cornet, Yannick Noah, Amelie Mauresmo, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, Fabrice Santoro, Françoise Durr, Henri Leconte, Marion Bartoli, Richard Gasquet, René Lacoste and the Musketeers: The French haven’t dominated the game since the 1920s, but no country has contributed as much to its essential flavor. While U.S. players have been defined by the Big Game—power serve, power forehand—each French player seems to invent a style all his or her own. At the end of each season, it’s always a pleasure to see the men’s game return to Paris for the Bercy event. There, unlike so many other places, where sponsorship signs can outnumber spectators, the seats are routinely filled. No tennis audience has its collective heart broken as often as the French, and no tennis audience comes back so enthusiastically for more.

In the years since ’98 and “Ced-reek!” I’ve returned to Roland Garros as a journalist half a dozen times (only in France, by the way, is there a sports paper that employs multiple full-time tennis writers). I’m always surprised by the intensity of the place, and the drama it creates.

I’ve seen Fabio Fognini nearly start a riot while arguing his way into darkness against Monfils. I’ve seen Bartoli nearly rupture her eyeballs while getting fired up during a match. I’ve seen Safin get so excited after hitting a winning shot in the Bullring that he dropped his shorts. I’ve seen a Chatrier crowd on the verge of hysteria as Frenchwoman Virginie Razzano pulled off a first-round upset of Serena Williams. I’ve seen Tsonga hide under his towel after blowing match points against Novak Djokovic. I’ve heard Roger Federer tell his rabid Parisian fans to stuff it, only to have them cheer him more loudly. It’s tennis, as much as French tennis, that they love and appreciate.

At Roland Garros, you can see the Eiffel Tower in the distance, poking its iron crown just above the far wall of Lenglen. The first time I saw it there was in 2004. In those days, 9/11 was still in fresh in our minds in New York; with the Twin Towers gone, the Eiffel Tower meant more to me as symbol of its city. I loved seeing it there in the distance, and loved passing by it each evening on the way back to my hotel.

Twelve years later, I love Paris for its difference, and feel closer to it than ever.