AN EVENING AT THE ATHENAEUM
“Who’s Who” is a strange institution, simultaneously seeking to
buttress the fiction of the traditional British establishment and to
acknowledge successes in avant-garde and popular culture.
The format of the
entries includes “recreation(s)”, traditionally expected to be shooting,
fishing, golfing, sailing, rugby, cricket and so forth. One of the avant-garde
entries, Charles Marowitz, a theatre director of the 60s and 70s (recently
deceased) listed his sole recreation as “balling” – by which he didn’t mean
croquet or billiards or, indeed, dancing. “Who’s
Who” stoically allowed the somewhat tasteless subversion. (Although it
could also be the case that the sub-editors didn’t know that “balling” was a
hippy slang word for having sex.)
