Andre Agassi’s auto-biography Open is as outgoing, unique and controversial as its subject.
The narrative is a unique one for a sports auto biography. Agassi narrates each period of his life in the present tense and tells his story with the feelings he felt at the time instead of filtering them through perspective, adding emotional depth and a compelling rawness to the book.
Open: An Autobiography delivers exactly what it says on the cover. Agassi does not hide his feelings about his at times hatred for tennis, his rivalry with Michael Chang and his now infamous comments about Pete Sampras’ tipping skills.
Whereas many a tennis autobiography plays it safe, Open takes a gamble, the kind you would expect from a man brought up in Las Vegas, and it delivers many times over.
Open offers insight into both the life of a prodigious tennis talent, one of the first true tennis celebrities and the pain, and ecstasy, of life at the top of the tennis tree.
Agassi shares his story with the reader with his heart on his sleeve, rare for this genre, and that quality alone makes this worth giving a go.
The book is also, thanks to its novel-like narrative, not just for tennis fans. It has crossover appeal, too, and anyone interested in the, at times, reluctant climb to the top of one of the world’s most lucrative sports by one its biggest stars, and the difficult climb-down from the peak, should open up this fine autobiography with the same enthusiasm and heart Agassi opens up his life to the reader.
Score: Five out of five. Entertaining, insightful and hard to put down, what more could you want from a tennis book?
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