BP's fag
Philip Warner
C. Aubrey Smith, whose picture appears on the jacket of this cheerful biography, would have been unbelievable in fiction. He did not look like a Test cricketer, still less like a Hollywood filrn star. 6 ft 21/2 inches tall, with bushy eyebrows, jutting chin and piercing eyes, he was the squire who might perhaps turn out for the village team as a sporting gesture but would draw the line at amateur theatricals. Even more improbable was the fact that he lived to the age of 85 in spite of 'chestiness' (he had been forbidden by doctors to smoke but always did) and was still working to the end. In fact he was due to star as Old Jolyon in the film of The Forsyte Saga the 1 day after he died. His knighthood had beer' conferred in 1944 for services to Angles American relations and the war effort; among other activities he collected thousands of dollars by selling his signature at ten cents a time. In Who's Who in 1941 — at the age of 84 — he gave his recreation as cricket. That seemed very reasonable for in his time he had scored over 3,500 runs and taken 50 wickets in first-class cricket. He had already appeared in a hundred plays and a hundred films. But greater perhaps than all these achievements was the fact that everyone liked and admired him --- even those who only saw him in films.
None of this would have seemed vet/ probable to the young Smith, the son of an indifferent doctor, in the 1870s. Dr Smith was very ready with the cane but less so at balancing his books; philandering seems to i have been one of his more successful hob' I bies. His wife had been a promising piani511 but had unwisely eloped with the dashirti young doctor; the result was no dowry' ' Fortunately an uncle decided to finance young Aubrey's education, so in 1895 he entered Charterhouse, which had just mov ed to Godalming. For a time he was a fag 01, 1 Robert Baden Powell, later to found the
Boy Scout movement but not very flatter- ingly described here. Young Smith was often in trouble — his name appears fre- quently in the School Monitors book for a variety of offences. Eventually he was in the cricket XI for two years, though described as 'Poor field. Likely to improve as a bat.' Nevertheless he was a good enough bowler to.attract the attention of Sussex.
In 1881 he went up to Cambridge with the aim of becoming a doctor. However, he was soon making a reputation with the Col- lege Dramatic Society, and when this was followed by selection for the Cambridge cricket XI, and later for the college football XI, there was not much time for work. Eventually he scraped an ordinary B.A. degree. By that time he was also one of Sussex's most promising players. His Peculiar run-up to bowl gave him the nickname 'Round the Corner' Smith.
Next followed a tour of Australia where enthusiasm for the game was not matched by facilities. At Bowral, NSW, 'the wicket was a matting one and the outfield not only unmown and lumpy but ankle deep in cow dung.' Here he made 29 and took 9 for 15. After a 22 hour train journey the team ar- rived in Bourke where preparations had been going on for weeks. The local racecourse had been requisitioned, and a Matting wicket laid. The rest of the ground `managed to resemble a well-ploughed and harrowed seed field. The piece de resistance, however, had come when the locals set fire to the ungovernable scrub, which meant that the whole ground was coated in white ash: consequently a ball from even a fast medium bowler would stop dead on pit- ching.' The match was played in a temperature of 117°F; it ended in a draw. But they played on good grounds too.
At the beginning of the First World War he tried to join the army but he was 51 and had hammer toes. Nevertheless, a year later, he was commissioned into the Artists Rifles for guard duties.
At the age of 26 after a bout of typhoid he had read his own obituary notice; at the age of 63 he lost all his money in a business venture. The future looked bleak. But soon he would be a film star and the Grand Old Man of Hollywood. A difficult man to get out.
County Cricket has changed a lot since Sir Aubrey's day and that makes Derek Lodge's book all the more valuable. He says, 'After spending a lifetime of leisure hours in watching cricket, reading about it and arguing about it, it has been an enor- Thous and unexpected bonus to be asked to Write about it too.' But unlike most games buffs he can appreciate the needs of those With less enthusiasm and knowledge. For those who regard modern cricket as a little too clever for its own good this lucid and sympathetic book will give much pleasure. It is clear that Mr Lodge knows the merits of every form of cricket past and present, home and overseas; he also knows the strength and weakness of the players. He writes with the quiet authority of a suc- cessful umpire: he knows what he is doing
and everyone else knows it too.
There is a splendid final chapter, `If it had happened otherwise'. `Supposing Carr had held that catch' (1926). `Suppose now that Bradman had been given out' (1946 he had made 2 and went on to make 187). Just the book for when rain stops play.
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