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- Herausgeber: Merlin Unwin Books
- Kategorie: Lebensstil
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024
Once described as the worst golfer never to have won a major, Mortimer Merriweather is a complex character with virtually nothing to show for 60 years of golf at the lowest level.Decades of abject failure to strike the ball properly undoubtedly fuelled his frustration and led ultimately to him venting his ire on individuals, companies and organisations connected with the game of golf in this remarkable series of 100 letters.The result is this hilarious book of his bizarre, insulting, unsettling and plain mad golfing ideas, all sent to famous hapless recipients, illustrated with occasional cartoons. 'Clive Agran is golf's funniest writer.' – John Hopkins, The Times
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1
Contents
Foreword
Mortimer is busy ironing his plus fours at the moment and has therefore asked me to pen this foreword. As you can tell from the number of pages that you will shortly have to plough through, the old boy has fired off a fair few letters of late and his gnarled and aged fingers will therefore benefit from a break.
Before I go any further, there are a few things I should perhaps explain to you about Mortimer. Reading his letters, you might form the impression that here is a grumpy old geezer with too much time on his hands and nothing better to do than vent his frustration at his increasing inability to reach a fairway or escape from a bunker by annoying those in authority with his daft ideas and ridiculous suggestions. Well, you would absolutely right because that succinctly sums him up.
As his age and handicap inexorably rise, Mortimer is undoubtedly becoming somewhat disenchanted with the world. However, although some of his letters display what appears to be intolerance, please don’t be offended. A combination of gout and the yips has undoubtedly warped his mind but the upside of that is he has developed an entirely original perspective that has endowed him with a unique outlook. He’s very much a man of his time unequipped to cope with political correctness, woke awareness or anything originating much after 1957.
In any case I don’t want to sound too negative as, when you eventually get around to reading his letters, you may well be impressed with his originality and forthrightness. He thinks of things that would almost certainly never occur to any right-minded person.
4Now might be a good time to explain why there aren’t any replies to be found in the following pages. Well, with one or two honourable exceptions, they were just too dull.
Mortimer concentrates on golf because that has been the main focus of his life ever since his great grandfather Egbert left him a mashie-niblick in his will. Golf, together with Madeira wine and the occasional port, is what he lives for. Not content with having won two monthly medals and one mid-week seniors’ Stableford in his four-score years, he has sought to bolster his legacy with the letters contained in this book.
Whether the name Merriweather rightfully belongs alongside Old Tom Morris, Ben Hogan, Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods in the pantheon of golfing greats is for you to decide. It might sound a preposterous notion now but wait until you’ve read this book before you make up your mind about the merits of Mortimer Merriweather.
Clive Agran
Curated Letters
8
To Rose, who hates golf but loves me, I think.
Two Ruddy Ducks and a Partridge on a Par Three
British Trust for Ornithology
Dear British Trust for Ornithology
I desperately need your help in persuading the golf authorities around the world to adopt new nomenclature for describing how many shots have been taken over par. In case you’re not familiar with the Royal and Ancient game, I should explain that par is what a good player on a good day should score on any particular hole. For a short hole it’s three, for a medium length hole it’s four and for a very long hole it’s five.
Exceptionally good players can, of course, score lower than par. One below par is a birdie, two below par is an eagle and three below par is an albatross. Because you know pretty well everything there is to know about birds, you will note the avian nature of the terminology.
Good, bad and average players frequently take a lot more shots than they should on a hole – one, two, three, four, five or more. Bogey is not a particularly nice word but it’s the one used to describe a score of one over par. Thereafter, the game betrays a paucity of originality by describing two over par as a double bogey, three over par as a triple bogey, etc., etc.
There is surely scope for a more imaginative nomenclature here and continuing with the avian theme is clearly both desirable and easily achieved. Having given it a great deal of thought, I have come to the conclusion that one over par, which is presently a bogey, should instead be called a ‘partridge’. I like it for two principal reasons: 1) It’s just a bit more than par. In fact, it’s a ‘tridge’ more than par. And 2) It will enable players who score a four on a short hole to say, ‘I had a partridge on the par three’, which I think will cause much merriment.
10What should also provide a lot of laughs is ‘Great Tit’, which I think is an apt name for what is currently called a double bogey. Thereafter, I’m hoping for suggestions from you. In case you can’t think of any, I’ve drawn up a provisional list of what I think would work well:
Three over par – presently triple bogey – a ‘Shag’.
Four over par – presently quadruple bogey – a ‘Ruddy Duck’.
Five over par – presently quintuple bogey – a ‘Fluffy-backed Tit Babbler’.
Although with golfers anything is possible and former British Open champion David Duval recorded a nine-over par 14 on a par five in The Open at Royal Portrush in 2019, I think we should probably stop at the ‘Fluffy-backed Tit Babbler’, don’t you? At least golfers will be able to say things like, ‘I had a couple of Great Tits on the front and finished with a Shag up the last.’
Prince Harry
11Dear Prince Harry,
You and I have so much in common. We both have ginger hair for starters and both have fallen out big time with our respective elder brothers. Like you, I was said to have married beneath me when I hooked up with Mavis, a hairdresser’s assistant, on holiday in Bognor in 1952, the year your lovely grandmother ascended to the throne. My marriage only lasted 18 months and so, reluctant though I am to admit it, my family might have had a point after all. What’s more, we’re both connected with Sussex, me by residence and you by title.
And we’re both published authors. Your book costs a great deal more than mine but there are a lot of photos in yours and you had to pay the geezer who wrote it and doubtless took care of the punctuation for you. But £28 is almost as much as the green fee at Dale Hill and rather a lot for just a book, don’t you think? Copies are bound to start turning up in charity shops and car-boot sales before very long for a fraction of the price and so, if you don’t mind, I’ll pick one up later.
Until I’ve read it, I obviously don’t know why you and William fell out. I haven’t spoken to my brother since he borrowed my sand wedge in 1962 and left it in a bunker at Carnoustie. He couldn’t even remember whether it was on the front or back nine let alone which precisely of the 112 bunkers it was!
Anyway, my purpose it writing to you now is to enquire whether you would be interested in cooperating with me in writing a golf instruction book. Frankly, since I would be responsible for devising all the tips as well doing all the writing, you would have even less to do than you did with Spare. All it will involve is posing for a few photos with a golf club in your hand. Why, you might wonder, do I need you at all? To be honest, I don’t: 12but you are a Royal, albeit only just, and when it comes to book sales you now have a proven track record.
For most of us ordinary people, getting a book published is harder than it was securing an invite to one of your late Grandma and Grandpa’s legendary garden parties at Buckingham Palace. But if I go to a publisher and explain that the fifth in line to the throne is involved, they are going to prick up their well-educated ears and are likely to come up with an advance that’ll buy Meghan – who I imagine is pretty high maintenance – quite a few frocks.
Please consider my proposal urgently. You’re a relatively hot property at the moment – but for how much longer? If Meghan kicks you out or Dad cuts you off, you’ll soon fade from the public’s consciousness and Harry’s Hot Golf Tips would be even less in demand than your poor old Uncle Andy.
Mayor of Tunbridge Wells
Dear Mayor of Tunbridge Wells,
Have you ever been to Edinburgh? I wouldn’t bother going. It’s invariably cold and wet with, frankly, very little to see or do. I think they’re horribly disfiguring but I gather the city is famous for its tattoos. It probably began with the Celts painting woad onto their bodies. Then along comes Rob Roy thinking an eagle across his shoulder blades will make him look scary and a whole industry is born to rival whisky distilling.
Fast forward several hundred years and JK Rowling bursts onto the scene with her hugely successful books, films and merchandise to give the city a whole new lease of life as Harry Potter’s birthplace. Today there are countless Harry Potter 13trails, landmarks, gift-shops and the like that attract tens of thousands of Potterheads. Well, what JK Rowling did for Edinburgh I can do for Tunbridge Wells.
It’s all a bit hush-hush at the moment but I’m extremely confident that my main character is going to be every bit as big as Harry Potter. Swap quidditch for golf and Hogwarts for Dale Hill Hotel and Country Club and you’ve a taste of what I’m about.
The first challenge is to write the thing. You may be aware that JK Rowling mostly knocked out her stories in cafes. Principally because they are inhabited by nattering women, I’m not especially fond of cafes and work much better in pubs. When you consider that those Edinburgh cafes that JK Rowling frequented are now attracting millions of tourists, you can surely see the phenomenal potential extra business I could generate for the Dog and Duck, Coach and Horses, etc.
Being ruthlessly commercial for a moment, what I’m essentially looking for is a contra-deal with the aforementioned hostelries whereby they supply me with complimentary beer today in exchange for becoming tourist hot-spots tomorrow. A letter from you confirming my legitimacy would, I’m sure, help convince the relevant pub landlords of the immense value of the proposed partnership.
Assuming everything goes well, there’s every chance we will meet one another when they confer the Freedom of Tunbridge Wells on me for services to local tourism.
Sir Nick Faldo
14Dear Sir Nick Faldo,
Although you have won six more major championships than I have and have had two more divorces – three to my one – I think we have a lot in common. For a start we are both very keen on golf and both play right-handed. You are an only child and so am I, which is possibly quite significant because we were undoubtedly over-indulged by doting parents and you appear to be unbearably self-obsessed as a consequence.
Used to getting what we want, you strove to become the world’s best golfer whereas my goal is to be captain of Dale Hill.
Burning ambition and single-minded determination are not particularly attractive qualities, especially if other people are ignored or trampled on in the quest for success. Like me, I would guess you never had many friends. Who needs them? They would only have distracted you from your obsessive focus on winning. Another plus was your apparent unconcern about being enormously unpopular with your fellow competitors
It was your second wife Gill who revealed that the births of her three children by you were all induced to avoid any clashes with your playing schedule. Every bloke whose golf is severely curtailed because of ‘partner considerations’ will doff his peaked cap in admiration. Possibly still a little resentful, Gill once said of you, ‘Socially, he was a 24-handicapper.’ Hell hath no fury, eh Nick? Oops, forgive me, Sir Nick.
You were an exceptionally successful golfer, does it matter you’re a cold fish that made extraordinarily embarrassing speeches and were arguably the most incompetent Ryder Cup captain of all time? Not to you, I suspect, because you have three claret jugs on your mantelpiece and three green jackets 15in your wardrobe that would appear to vindicate your whole approach to life in general and golf in particular.
Anyway, I’m starting a golf society exclusively for those of us who are unloved, socially inept, lack empathy and ordinarily struggle to find anyone to play with. It’s called the Friendless And Letsbehonest Decidedly Odd (FALDO) golf society and I’m hoping you will consider becoming our honorary president.
R&A Rules Adjudicating Committee
Dear R&A Rules Adjudicating Committee,
There was a complicated incident in the second round of the Spring Mixed Foursomes Blenkinsopp Shield at Dale Hill Hotel and Golf Club that has baffled our in-house rules’ expert and so, in desperation, I turn to you for a definitive ruling.
I was partnering Frieda Witherspoon against Reginald and Cynthia Spleen. We were three up after only four holes when Cynthia sliced her tee shot at the fifth into a thicket just to the right of a lateral water hazard. Realising that it might be lost, Reg teed up another ball, declared it a provisional but, already somewhat annoyed, missed the ball completely. Cynthia then stepped up and stated that the tee-peg was too high for her, declared the ball unplayable, took a penalty drop within two clubs’ length and topped the proceeding shot into a flooded bunker. Reg angrily declared the ball unplayable and kicked it out of the hazard into an area designated as ‘Ground Under Repair.’ Furious with her partner, Cynthia claimed relief but mistakenly dropped the ball more than one club length away from the edge of the ‘GUR’ white line. Before the next shot 16was taken, Reg drew this infringement to our attention at which point Cynthia struck him on the head with a seven iron thereby inadvertently changing the club’s characteristics and causing a gaping wound to open in Reg’s forehead that, coincidentally, subsequently required seven stitches.
Should my partner and I have: a) claimed the hole before anyone else got hurt; b) disappeared into the thicket under the pretext of looking for the original ball and let the other pair just get on with it; or c) claimed the match under the Rules of Equity and walked in? Well, we did c) but omitted to mark our ball before retiring to the bar and the Spleens, on realising this, similarly claimed the match.
Which pair should proceed into the third round to face the formidable Fescue-Greens?
North Face
Dear North Face,
I’ve been looking in your catalogue for the very largest tent you manufacture. Am I right in thinking it’s the Summit Series Two Metre Dome? At £6,200 it’s hardly cheap. I could buy a second-hand Vauxhall Corsa for that money but, there again, it would be something of a struggle to sleep eight people inside it. Back to your tent which, frankly, is nowhere near big enough for the purpose I have in mind.
Let me explain. As anyone who has ever lived in this country for any length of time will know, potholes apart, the real problem with Britain is the weather. Maybe in 25 years’ time when global warming has really kicked in, things will be better 17but right now our weather is simply not good enough and has a serious negative impact on outdoor sporting events.
They’ve sorted it at Wimbledon by installing a roof over the Centre and Number One courts. And what a boon they’ve proved. The biggest beneficiary is TV. Watching puddles accumulate on the covers or, worse still, listening to Cliff Richard singing, is thankfully a thing of the past. Nowadays when you switch on the television to watch good old Andy Murray’s mouth wide open as he yells at his box, that’s what you get.
Although it presents unique problems, I think the next sport that would benefit most from excluding the elements when they turn hostile is golf. Not only is rain very unpleasant, it’s also a serious problem, not least because it makes the grips wet and the clubs hard to hold. Umbrellas help but they’re not the complete answer. And then there’s the wind that can make it difficult to judge which club to take. It can also blow a ball away from where you wanted it to go, which is really annoying.
The solution is an enormous tent that can be quickly erected when the weather turns nasty. Your Summit Series Two Metre Dome tent only covers a little over 15 square metres whereas, for example, the Old Course at St Andrews will require roughly 1,618,740 square metres. Presumably, there will be significant economies of scale otherwise I calculate the Summit Series 1,618,740 Metre Dome would cost an eye-watering £10 billion. Any clubs on The Open rota interested would be well advised to wait until one of Blacks’ summer sales when 25% off would save them a whopping £2.5 billion.
Mr Disney
18Dear Mr Disney,
Below is the synopsis of a feel-good movie I think you should make. It has the working title ‘Caught Cheating’. I don’t want millions for it, just a modest $100,000 and a decent part in the film.
The action takes place in Surrey, England in 2019.
To the outsider, Charles Salisbury’s life seems perfect. Married to the lovely and very much younger Linda, he has two delightful children, a secure job with a bank and is considered a pillar of the local community. His crowning moment comes at a dinner at his golf club held to celebrate his appointment as captain. However, his world starts to fall apart when, minutes before he is due to make his acceptance speech, he is caught literally with his pants down in the locker room with Geoffrey, the new assistant greenkeeper.
He’s thrown out of the marital home by his humiliated wife, sacked by the bank, expelled from his club and, worse still, he finds his favourite Ping putter (product placement opportunity) broken and stuffed in a dustbin. Although almost broken himself, this last act of wanton vandalism motivates him to fight back.
With what little money he has, he buys a caravan and camps on a strip of a wasteland adjoining the local municipal golf course. Unlike the toffs at his old club, the less stuffy working-class members of the municipal club welcome him. Driven by a burning desire to revenge his humiliation and with little else to do, he practises golf for hours every day and improves bit by bit. He captains the team at his new club in their annual match against his old club and, fired by all that has happened, 19his inspirational leadership helps his team to their first-ever success in the fixture.
Charles, however, doesn’t stop there. Despite being over 40, his handicap tumbles to scratch but, because of what happened that night, he’s never picked to play for his county. Then, against the odds, he comes through both a pre-qualifier and qualifier to earn a spot in the British Open. Despite a double-bogey six at the first hole, he has rounds of 69 and 67 to comfortably make the cut. After each round he returns to his caravan, which he tows behind his beaten-up old car. Alone, he stares at photos of his ex-wife, son and daughter, and sobs.
Another 67 in the third round puts him in contention and he tees off on the last day in the final pairing, still symbolically eschewing a caddy and pulling a trolley. As he sinks a 20-foot putt on the last hole to clinch The Open, he sees his wife, son and daughter cheering in the stands as he lifts the claret jug as the end credits roll.
I think Brad Pitt would make an excellent Charles Salisbury and Keira Knightley would be ideal as his wife. I’m not fussed about which part I’m given so long as I get to play a bit of golf.
President Putin
Dear President Putin,
At the time of writing, your decision to launch a ‘special military operation’ against Ukraine is not looking terribly clever. But we all make mistakes. In a desperate attempt to reach the green of the par five 11th hole at Dale Hill in three, 20
