From "Tenez!" to Federer: The Literary Life of Tennis

Arshad Fahoum

Tennis Fan

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We tend to think of tennis as a sport of clean lines and quiet intensity—a game defined by the "thwack" of a racket and the polite applause of a crowd.

But if you dig into its history, you find that tennis is actually a story of language, literature, and the human condition.

It turns out that "tennis" is a word that never really existed—at least, not as a name for a game.

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The Game of the Palm

The sport is French to its core (two French kings actually died at tennis courts), yet the French never called it tennis.

They called it jeu de paume—the "game of the palm"—because it was originally played with bare hands before gloves and rackets were introduced.

So where did the word come from? It was a misunderstanding.

When French players served, they shouted "Tenez!"—meaning "Take it!" or "Heads up!" Italians watching these matches overheard the shout and, by association, began calling the game "ten-ez."

It’s a lovely image: a Florentine spectator standing at a fence in a forest clearing, mishearing a warning as a name.

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The Stars’ Tennis-Balls

Once the word entered the lexicon around the 1350s, it didn't take long for poets to turn the game into a metaphor.

Because the ball is struck back and forth, unable to control its own path, tennis became the perfect symbol for fate and human helplessness.

In The Duchess of Malfi, John Webster wrote:

"We are merely the stars’ tennis-balls, struck and banded / Which way please them."

Shakespeare loved the metaphor, too. In Henry V, he uses a historical anecdote where the French Dauphin mocks the young King Henry by sending him a "tun of tennis-balls," suggesting the King is only fit for "light follies."

Henry’s response is chilling, promising that those tennis balls will turn into cannonballs that "beat the walls to the ground."

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The Writer’s Game

Centuries later, the connection between writing and tennis found its modern champion in David Foster Wallace.

Wallace, who played at a junior level, saw tennis as the perfect sport for the obsessive, brooding literary mind. It is a "physical chess," a game where you are totally isolated. Unlike boxing, you have no corner man whispering to you; unlike team sports, you have no support. You are alone with the math and the wind.

Wallace’s writing on tennis—from his essays on the heartbreaking grind of Michael Joyce to the transcendence of Roger Federer—acted like a mirror for his own mind.

He was fascinated by the "closed system" of the court, the lines that defined what was "in" and "out."

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Flesh and Not

Perhaps the peak of literary tennis writing is Wallace's 2006 essay, "Federer Both Flesh and Not."

Wallace argued that modern tennis had become a "power baseline" game—brutal, heavy-hitting, and seemingly evolved to its endpoint. Then came Roger Federer.

Federer played from within that modern power game but brought back art, finesse, and an "all-court style."

Wallace described Federer as a figure who seemed exempt from physical laws, a player who could "hypnotize" opponents.

In describing a specific 16-stroke point against Nadal, Wallace noted how Federer could hit a ball with such "demented spin" that it would simply vanish over the net.

It was a case of game recognizing game: a writer pushing the boundaries of language analyzing a player pushing the boundaries of physics.

Whether it’s a French King shouting "Tenez!" or Federer slicing a backhand at Wimbledon, the game remains the same: a beautiful, enclosed system where we try to control the uncontrollable.

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To dive deeper into Wallace's exploration of tennis as both sport and philosophy, read String Theory: David Foster Wallace on Tennis. It collects some of the most beautiful essays ever written about the game, offering Wallace's unique blend of rigorous analysis, poetic observation, and deeply personal reflection on what tennis reveals about human nature, excellence, and the struggle to transcend our own limitations.