PEOPLE AND THINGS
By HAROLD NICOLSON
THROUGHOUT my life I have suffered from being " bad at games." By this I do not mean merely that I am less proficient than are other- men at catching or propelling balls. My tragedy extends far wider and penetrates far deeper than that. In fact the phrase " bad at games " is, in my sad case, an under-statement as flagrant as if one were to refer to a deaf- mute as " bad at languages." It is not merely that the whole orbit of physical prowess eludes my mastery ; I am also bad (terrifically bad) at intellectual pastimes such as cards, chess, cross-word puzzles and party politics. I have observed that the merriment aroused, when I play a game, in my partners or opponents rapidly shades off into irritation, anger and disgust. " No man," they say, " could really be as bad as that. He is trying to be funny ; he is showing off ; he is spoiling our game." How can they understand that those rapid defensive movements which I make with my racket, those fine circular sweeps which I make with my club, are undertaken in deep earnestness and inspired by a hopeless longing to excel? The ashes of defeat are mingled for me with the vinegar of contempt ; it is many years now since I realised that, for me, games constitute what the Christian Scientists call " a false claim "; I play no games today. And yet from time to time the old tug will twitch at my heart, and the old sense of shame recur to me in its damp mist of humiliation. * *
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