Sunday Blog #4: Naipaul, Novak, and dealing with flawed heroes
Novak Djokovic chose the worst possible time to display his latest oddity
A few months back, I was talking to a friend about VS Naipaul. Naipaul features frequently in most conversations I have about the written word. I have admired his work for so long, been drawn to it in so many ways, that I can barely go through an entire discussion about great writing without mentioning his name at least once.
I’ll tell you why. Reading Naipaul’s prose often feels like watching a movie. His scene-work is so detailed and vivid, you can almost see the characters move in front of your eyes. At times, his words can make you smell the bellflower growing outside a room in Guyana. It is a quality I have come to separate my favourite writers from those who I will read, gladly, but not quite attach myself to.
After I was done waxing lyrical on our man, my friend asked me if I was aware of the other aspects of Naipaul’s life. When I admitted ignorance, she sent me this article. It is a telling read, a window into the private life of a Nobel laureate. It was a difficult read too, because I wasn’t ready to think of Naipaul as anything other than a master storyteller.
Over the last few years, the world has moved towards a more politically aware place. Through art, education, and social media, there has been a very real movement towards unlearning and relearning the implications of our words and actions. We are now more aware of what constitutes problematic behaviour; and the internet’s searchable history has thrown our lives out into the open.
But we’ve always known that flaws exist within us, haven’t we? We have learnt to live with them. We hold our heroes to higher standards, though. In the narrative we write for them in our heads, there is no scope for major personality flaws. We put them on an indestructible pedestal. Thus, when the realisation hits that the people we admire most are just as flawed as us, it is often sobering and uncomfortable.
For example, some of the revelations from the #MeToo movement were deeply unsettling at a personal level. It broke my heart to see so many artists I had liked and admired getting called out for grave, pathetic indiscretions. In my head, I had built up these great artists as great human beings. Rookie mistake, I know.
I’d like to believe I’ve improved slightly, insofar as being more aware of the point beyond which the separate art from artist theory stops holding water. When Kobe Bryant passed away earlier this year, I consciously sought out thinkpieces that called out his complicated legacy. Unlike with that Naipaul article, it helped that I had never followed Kobe or basketball enough to emotionally attach myself. I’m irrevocably attached to football, and when Cristiano Ronaldo retires, I promise to not devote an entire article to his lofty goal and medal tallies. Space and attention will be, needs to be, given to the rape accusation he has sidestepped through his power and clout for a decade now.
The last two weeks have been interesting in terms of thinking about heroes. On one end of the spectrum is Marcus Rashford. Every time his name is mentioned these days, it brings about a smile on people’s faces and a twinkle in their eye. What he has achieved over two breathless weeks this summer has ended up cementing a legacy that will go far beyond his football career, which, by the way, will probably be great too. Rashford is now someone who will be spoken of as a shining beacon for humanity at a time of desperate need.
I’m guessing the opposite must ring true for Novak Djokovic. In the same week where Rashford broadened the horizon of what people with influence can achieve, Djokovic showed the other extreme - the problems if you don’t combine your influence with the ability to read the room.
Novak entered public consciousness at a time when the defining tennis rivalry of this generation was in full bloom. Five months after Djokovic's first Grand Slam title, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer played out a 5-hour epic at Wimbledon, a match often called the greatest of all time, one on which entire books are written. By the time he won his second Grand Slam in 2011 and got into a major-winning habit, Federer had 16 Grand Slams to his name and Nadal had 9. Tennis began and ended with those two and everyone else was either a hopeful or an also-ran.
One of Novak’s great qualities as a tennis player is to find improbable angles on the court to stretch his opponent. He found one in a two-horse race through sheer defiance and indefatigable spirit. Djokovic now sits within touching distance of Federer and Nadal’s Grand Slam tallies, with positive head-to-head records against both for good measure. In a sport dominated by otherworldly geniuses, Novak represented something more human and yet made it to the very top.
Even outside the court, Djokovic ticks a lot of good boxes. In April, he drafted a plan which could generate more than $4 million for the Player Relief Fund to help the lower-ranked players. In an interview with Gustavo Kuerten this year, he spoke about the problems faced by a large chunk of ATP’s roster due to the lockdown, and how he felt responsible to help as President of the Players’ Council and a high-earning player himself. He is one of the executive producers of a documentary which urges people to try out to a plant-based - healthier, according to many - diet. Over the years, he has encouraged a much-needed conversation about spirituality and mental health. Even the ill-fated Adria Tour was organised purely for charity.
So how did we end up at a situation where the execution is completely at odds with the intention? Novak’s always been a little enigmatic, but lately, he has taken his eccentricities to another level. Or maybe we could say - he is changing the game (sorry). He believes in telepathy; he has hired coaches who believe in levitation; he moved to a gluten-free diet because he once placed a slice of white bread on his stomach and it didn’t feel good; he doubts vaccines but is confident that emotions can change the molecular structure of water. I assure you, the list is longer.
And yet, none of it has hampered the influence he holds within his fraternity. Seeing him as the figurehead for the Adria Tour, three top-rated tennis players were ready to risk their health and travel to other countries and play a tournament, at a time when people should think thrice before stepping out of their houses. Organisers set up the tournament and even got fans to visit. Every tennis fan or player in the Balkan region looks up to Novak, justifiably so, and hence placed ample trust on his decision-making process. One week, a lot of travel, and a shirtless party later, that tournament is now on the top shelf of the stupidest public decisions taken by anyone, never mind by an iconic athlete who thinks a fair bit about the world around him. Does it sound like I’m placing too much blame on Novak’s shoulders? It should.
This picture is from the Adria Tour event in Belgrade on 12th June. No amount of buck-passing to the Serbian government can justify the scale of problems with this and the organisation of the tour that led to it. A player who was once famous for taking excessive injury breaks during a match has now, single-handedly, jeopardised the health of a whole bunch of kids, fellow professionals, support staff, and fans because he refused to comply with the basic medical protocol. That’s neither funny nor trivial. COVID-19 has left too many dead bodies in its wake for anyone to take it lightly. If even one of those kids in the picture tested positive for coronavirus, we would be talking about Novak in a far harsher tone than we already are. The international standards for safety, unlike what he said here, are neither unknown nor difficult to follow.
When the next book about Novak is written, there will be a chapter dedicated to how the world’s number one tennis player, a powerful symbol of defiance, did everything he shouldn’t have in the middle of a global pandemic. No conversation about Novak Djokovic, from here on, will quite finish without a mention of June 2020; and that’s sad because out of all the never meet your heroes stories, this will be one that could’ve been so easily been avoided.
This Week
Articles
Rohit Brijnath on the mental anguish that the current suspension of regular life is causing athletes. Like always, Brijnath makes you think. I’m not sure he’s ever written a throwaway, bland article.
Hugh McIlvanney interviews Muhammed Ali just a few hours after he beat George Foreman in Kinshasa to become the World Heavyweight Champion. I’m a huge fan of McIlvanney - he was (is?) the gold standard of Brit sportswriting - and was searching for some of his work with The Observer when I stumbled onto this gem of an interview.
Liverpool have won the Premier League (sigh). Here’s an article on the kind of data analysis that goes into making them efficient at profiling and identifying players to buy/sell.
Illustrations to go with Orwell’s 1984? Yes, please.
Books
I’m currently reading L. Jon Wertheim’s This Is Your Brain On Sports. Like the title suggests, it focusses on how fans and audiences interact with different aspects of sport. Very cool.
Shows
Dark Season 3 is out. Even if you are not into cerebral thrillers, watch this show for the cinematography, the visual design, and the background score.
Until next time.