Title: The Tournament Author: John Clarke Publisher: Text Publishing Imagine, if you will, a tennis tournament in France where most of the world's great Modernist figures like Freud, Dali, Joyce, Cummings, De Kooning, Einstein, Deitrich, Stein et al have gathered to whack it out on centre court, whilst in the stands Oscar Wilde serves bon motifs over champagne bubbles. Meanwhile, Roland Barthes stirs up a shitfight by asserting the player is dead and "the discussion of the event was more important than the event itself", whilst Nike CEO Nietzsche tells anyone with problems to "see gayle". Beat fans will be saddened to find out William Burroughs gets booted before round one for "testing positive to every one of twelve banned substances" and was last seen verbally bashing Hemmingway, his doubles partner, who was in turn calling Burroughs "a self-destructive little faggot." So it's grab your arts degree and follow Clarke as he writes his way through to the finals. Cultural capital is important here - the reader who doesn't understand why Frida Kahlo refuses to play doubles with Diego Rivera anymore, or Dali's appearance at a press conference dressed as Louis XIV, shouting, "I need room to masturbate" is going to be lost by the time it gets to the death of Rosa Luxemburg. Clarke, well-known to Australian TV viewers, has worked hard at his references, and readers will find much joy in the outbursts of James Joyce. However, this is where the text's problems begin - after a while, there are no real differences in the way characters react to different situations, their personalities confined to their (inter)textual/historical existences. How would George Orwell play a 5 set match in the quarter finals? Mostly the same way he played in the second round. So as joyful and rollicking as The Tournament is in its delightful absurdity a bizarre form of ennui sets in, as if the jokes have run out and it's a slog through until the cup is presented. Maybe Clarke was taking a leaf out of Beckett's book, and the tournament is really life, funny for a while, then hard work and death for the rest. If there had been fewer characters, a tighter underlying plot, The Tournament could have been a contender. Maybe next year?