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An snooker writer's request from China

Postby Winston Wang

Dear Friends,

I'm a freelance snooker writer from Beijing, China. Now I'm working on a special coverage about snooker story and World War I. As you know, it's the 100th anniversary of WWI since 1914. And we really lack of document on this topic. I do appreciate if you could provide some resource for me about snooker during WWI. I also hope more and more fans in China might share the history and culture of snooker.

Please contact me at silverfoxwzheng@gmail.com if you have any suggestions or useful resource.

Thanks!

Your sincerely,
Winston Wang

Re: An snooker writer's request from China

Postby Wildey

All i really know about that time is that the English Amataur Championship was Started during World War 1 in 1916.

The best guy to get hold of is Roger Lee a well known Snooker Historian but unfortunally i havent got any contact information for him.

Re: An snooker writer's request from China

Postby PLtheRef

As Wildey says the only tournament which was held during the War period was the English Amateur Championship which was formed in 1916. It pre dates both its World Professional (by 11 years) and World Amateur (by 47 years) equivalents.

You have to acknowledge that back in 1914 Billiards was still the game which held the most interest, and the World Championship had been in existence some 40 years whilst Snooker was still a casual game which wasn't really held on an organized scale until the English Amateur came along.

To give an example of how much Snooker was the junior to Billiards. When the first matches of the World Snooker Championships were held back for the 1927 World Championship, one of the matches between Melbourne Inman and Tom Newman was played as an ending to a long day of billiards - with one frame played each night after the billiards play had been concluded for the evening.

Newman won the billiards, but Inman won the snooker 8-5

Re: An snooker writer's request from China

Postby Winston Wang

Thanks any way guys. Just in case, I even contacted the WPBSA people. But as you can tell, they have nothing relative.

It could be really interesting to track the early history of snooker since a lot of fans in China have no idea about the origin and the culture of this activity.

In fact, I do have another translation problem. I once wrote a little story of Pat Houlihan, "the Great Unknown", and I was confused about the word "hustler", which is used to describe the life of Patsy. I know it means that a person who tries to earn money or gain an advantage from situations he is in by using some tricks. But it is very different from a fraud or a cheater, right?

Re: An snooker writer's request from China

Postby Roland

Not really. They move from town to town and at first pretend to be not very good because no one knows who they are, and then they clean up when people take them on for bigger money. So it is cheating in that sense and often fights would ensue. Watch the film The Hustler starring Paul Newman because it's brilliant and gives an idea of the life of the pool hustler. It would be much the same with Patsy and snooker.

As for the origin and culture I doubt there will be much documentation between the time the game was invented and when it got noticed by the top billiards players like Joe Davis because it was in its infancy and just a pastime for a few who had access to a billiards table.

Have you read Clive Everton's book The History of Snooker and Billiards? I've not read it for many years but I'd be surprised if anyone has covered it in more depth just from looking at the author and title.