Agassi Book Review

[Etta Lesniak]

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I have to admit that I do not follow tennis, maybe because I never played but also because the matches are so, so long. But I knew some things about Andre Agassi, probably because he was tabloid fodder for so many years. For example, I knew about his fabulous, frosted mullet; his short marriage to Brooke Shields; his second marriage to Steffi Graf; and that his foundation opened a charter school in Las Vegas around the time he retired.

He turned pro when he was a rebellious teenager. The spotlight was on him when he was still figuring out who he was and before he had developed any level of emotional maturity. He was a prodigy, but his early career was characterized by inconsistency and his entire career was steeped in fierce emotion.

Throughout his life, Agassi tried to surround himself with a supportive team of people, I assume to heal the emotional damage his father inflicted. Some of my favorite stories in the book are of his close relationships with his team members, especially his personal trainer, Gil, who became a father figure. Agassi, despite his incredible success, comes across as vulnerable and wounded, so I found myself wanting him to have good, loving people in his life.

Ultimately, he finds fulfillment in the family he starts with Steffi Graf and in the mission of the charter school that bears his name. That made me happy, too. It was a long, grueling road for him, but he seemed to finally be at peace with himself.

I suspect every celebrity memoir is an attempt to revise history, to some extent. And I suppose if I was more familiar with Agassi in his big hair and temper tantrum heyday I might be more skeptical, too. But the portrait the book painted early on of a damaged boy was always at the back of my mind as I read about the rest of his life. Maybe I let myself be manipulated by a clever writing device, but nonetheless I really liked the book!

I recently finished a book about the Wright family of Utah, several of whom are saddle bronc riders. Book is called The Last Cowboys by John Branch. I thought it was very interesting and quite well written.

As I neared the end of Andre Agassi's best-selling autobiography "Open", I had so many conflicting emotions that I thought it might help to do spreadsheet with one column for things I liked about the book and another for what I didn't like about it. It proved to be a useless attempt to organize my thoughts, because often the things I liked about it were the things I didn't like about it. In others words, my reactions are complicated and contradictory, and in many ways that mirrors the book itself.

Joel Drucker, in his excellent review of the book for the San Francisco Chronicle calls it a "confessional fairy tale," and it's hard to disagree. There are villains, heroes, foes to vanquish, heroines to woo, and it all ends happily ever after. Hanging your life story on a framework like that certainly helps to move it along, take it out of the mundane, daily diary mode, but it necessarily leads to portraying complex personalities only in the context of the roles you've assigned them.

Although I don't live with one, I have encountered some pretty scary tennis parents in the course of the past half dozen years, and yet none of them would come close to Mike Agassi if his son's portrayal of him in the book is accurate. If Nick Bollettieri is as greedy, thoughtless and selfish as he's painted here, it would be hard to imagine how he's managed to maintain the respect of the rest of the tennis world for so long.

As many other reviewers have noted, Agassi's longtime trainer Gil Reyes is cast in the hero's role, and if there's one negative thought or action assigned to him in the book, I don't recall it. And yet, after knowing his wife Steffi Graf for less than five years, it's she whom he calls "the greatest person I have ever known," at her induction into the International Tennis Hall of Fame.

An autobiography, which is I guess what we call celebrity memoirs, must be selective; in the very eventful 30 years this one covers, Agassi can't possibly go into much depth on every personality and experience that changed his life. But contrast his treatment of the two most sensational excerpts released before publication: the crystal meth use and the premature balding. The only drug scene presented is the first; the others--"too many" being the only number he'll give--aren't referenced, and the process of getting off what is a highly addictive drug isn't discussed. Yet his obsession with his hair, which is comical in a way that drug usage can never be, is explored much more thoroughly, culminating with a head-shaving scene in wife Brooke Shield's Manhattan brownstone.

This brings me to the central question that I've had since I read those excerpts, and still have now that I've read the book. Why?

Why write a memoir that casts your father as a monster, your mentor as a charlatan, your sport as a prison, your ex-wife as an airhead, your colleagues as boobs, your trainer as a saint, your wife as a goddess?

What's to be gained? Most of us who care about tennis (whether Agassi himself is that category, I still don't know) have seen the change in Agassi over the years. We've constructed our own story about his life; we've been inspired by his second act, his philanthropy, while imagining as best we can how difficult it must be to grow up in the public eye. But once he gives us all these details, and tells that this time he's telling us the truth, unlike all those other times when he was lying to us, the inspiration fades.

It's a fascinating book about a complicated personality, and ghostwriter JR Moehringer deserves much of the credit for making it a compelling read. But it's hard to shake the feeling that, after three years out of the public eye, Agassi needed to get back in the spotlight. Like one of his legendary backhand returns, he hit that target perfectly.

DISCLOSURE: I was provided a free review copy of the book as a member of the US Tennis Writers Association.

Tags: Open, Andre Agassi, Colette Lewis

Hi Colette,

I'm wondering if you read the same book I read. (You seem to have left out the parts you liked...)

If I may say so, I think you have misread. The book is in the present tense in an effort to convey what he thought at that specific time - of his father when he was a young child, of Bolletieri when he was a teenager, of other players when he was playing them. It has nothing at all to do with what he came to think later or thinks now - so it doesn't intend to say anything about how the Bolletieri academy survived, for instance, and perhaps it wouldn't have done if it had gone on being like that. I seem to recall it did nearly go under before IMG took over. (And I'd wager between the passage of 25 years since Agassi was there, multiple marriages for NB and the corporatization of the academy via IMG, that it is very different now and that's why it's survived.)

Likewise he's not trying to give "complex views" of his competitors. My daughter plays tennis and she'd be quick to tell you she hates girl a or girl b is a horror based on their fleeting interactions at tournaments - Where do you think players would get chance to get complex views of each other? He's wanting to say how he felt at the time of those matches.

Agassi's just trying to convey his perception at the whatever time.

I find it strange that you liked it better when you "imagined" how hard it is to grow up in the spotlight and you prefer what you imagined to the (brutal be it) truth. I prefer the truth myself...

And on Graf - why shouldn't he say he thinks she's the greatest person he's known (after "only" five years together). Why is that offensive? He does obviously adore her and you know I think the world would be a better place if more men openly adored their wives..

Why he 's decided to tel now? No idea and probably many reasons but I don't think desire to be in the spotlight is one - he could have done that many other ways. perhaps you know just tired of this big lie being out there - you know how the saying goes, the truth will set you free. I can imagine it's pretty liberating for him not to be hiding that.

And - $85 million raised for inner city kids later - that's no lie and it's a far worthier way to spend your time and money than most other less "mixed up" 20 somethings achieve in real adulthood...

What it made me think in fact wa about all the young people (tennis and otherwise) who come quickly to extraordinary prominence - success, fame, money, celebrity, pressure, media scrutiny etc. And wilt under it, and even start acting crazily. Maybe we'll be more sympathetic to them. Maybe we'll think how much pressure they're under so young. Maybe we'll be even more appreciative when they don't disappear (as many do) but get back ... Melanie Oudin and Ivanovic both seem to be the in the lost in the maelstrom category right now to name only two tennis examples. I'm hoping they'll be able to follow Agassi's lead and find their forward. I'd be all for all young players reading it.

@texastennismom:

Thanks for your comment. I fully realize that I'm in the minority in my opinion of the book, but yes, it is the same book you read. I enjoyed the accounts of the tennis matches and strategy sessions. I simply came away with the feeling that Agassi was not a reliable narrator, and I hoped to explain why I felt that.

I'm still trying to answer that question of why.

Well Texastennismom,it seems like you really like Agassi or you are intrigued by liars, cheaters and ungrateful people. I just hope as a tennis mom you are not raising your child that way, but that's just me. Collette I'm with you on this one, tennis is a sport of integrity, firm principles, honor and truthfullness and Agassi whether then or now has not portrayed these qualities for me to encourage young upcoming tennis to read his book. As for his dad my heart go out to him for the reproach, criticism and accusations labeled on him by his son, who today is enjoying his marriage and life due to the fruits of his father's labor. The only place I see Agassi's future is in The Tennis Hall of Shame!

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