The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
It’s ‘Mrs.’, ‘Miss’ at Wimbledon but never ‘Mr.’
WIMBLEDON, ENGLAND — It was another win at the All England Club on Wednesday for Serena Williams — or, as she is now known here, “Mrs.” Williams.
It is a courtesy title she now shares with Wimbledon champions Mrs. L.W. King, Mrs. J.M. Lloyd and Mrs. R. Cawley. The public knows them as Billie Jean King, Chris Evert and Evonne Goolagong.
Deciphering the All England Club’s board of champions, which is displayed inside the members’ clubhouse and on a public concourse inside Centre Court, requires knowing the players’ marital histories. “Miss C.M. Evert” became Mrs. Lloyd after her first marriage to John Lloyd in 1979. King is listed under the name of a man she divorced in 1987, long after their spousal relationship ended.
Williams married Alexis Ohanian, an internet entrepreneur, last fall. And although she has not taken his name, Wimbledon is broadcasting her marital status with every match. Williams a 23-time major champion with career earnings of more than $84 million, said last week she was still figuring out how she wants to be addressed.
“It still doesn’t register that I’m married, actually,” she joked when asked about the matter. “So much has happened in the past 12 months.”
The tournament’s insistence on recording the marital status of its female participants reflects its complicated relationship with the women who play here — or, rather, the “ladies,” according to the language of Wimbledon.
In keeping with tradition, as Wimbledon is wont to do, the chair umpire followed the seven-time Wimbledon champion’s final triumphant point with the proclamation, “Game, set and match, Mrs. Williams.” She beat Viktoriya Tomova (that’s Miss Tomova, to the chair umpire) 6-1, 6-4.
About 90 minutes earlier, when Roger Federer, a married father of four who preceded Williams on Centre Court, won his match, the chair umpire said, “Game, set and match, Federer.” On the champions board, he is simply “R. Federer.”
This tournament was the last of the four Grand Slam events to award equal prize money to men and women, starting in 2007. And it won’t be until next year the women’s qualifying tournament will have the same number of spots as the men’s. It continues to manage criticism about women not getting high-profile court assignments the way men do.
Mark Leyland, a tennis fan from northwest England, brought documentation of the court-assignment disparity to Wimbledon officials. He scoured decades of newspapers, mostly on microfiche, and made note of every match played on Wimbledon’s two main show courts from 1993 to 2017. Leyland got a meeting with Wimbledon officials and told them, “I love your championship, I love your tradition, but this gender inequity is one tradition that you need to change,” Leyland said Wednesday in a telephone interview.
Still, last Wednesday, the women of Wimbledon had a conspicuously bright spotlight as they were featured in five of the seven matches held on the two biggest courts. It was a rare occurrence at a tournament where women’s matches have accounted for just 39 percent of the matches on the feature courts the past 25 years.
The showcase was such an oddity that Serena Williams’ older sister, Venus, a five-time Wimbledon champion, said she “was really overjoyed” when she saw the schedule.
“We have a lot of equal play on the main courts in the other three Grand Slams,” Venus Williams said after her three-set victory over Alexandra Dulgheru in the first match on No. 1 Court.
The balance shifted back to the men Thursday, when five men’s matches were scheduled on the two feature courts compared with two women’s matches. Tournament officials say their priority is to feature the best-known players (and top British competitors) on the biggest courts.
What won’t change is the preoccupation with classifying women. Another Grand Slam event, the French Open, also uses the courtesy titles Madame and Mademoiselle for the women — but not Monsieur for the men.
Adrian Wilson, the Wimbledon chief of officials, said the marital statuses of female players come from the Women’s Tennis Association and are put into the central tournament database, which displays on the tablet screens used by chair umpires. This year 20 women are listed under “Mrs.”, according to a document provided by the WTA. The relationship-neutral Ms. has never been used at Wimbledon. It was popularized in the United States in the 1970s, most notably with the introduction of Gloria Steinem’s Ms. magazine.
But with the courtesy titles at Wimbledon, the occasional unforced error is made. Yanina Wickmayer married Jérôme van der Zijl last year, but was called “Miss Wickmayer” by the chair umpire during her second-round win.
Wickmayer said she did not care how she was addressed. “As long as I’m winning points and games, I’m all good,” she said.
Some forms of address are permanent at the All England Club, which operates as if there’s a man in front of many great women.
If you don’t know who Mrs. R. Cawley is, you can consult a glossary in the Wimbledon Compendium, an exhaustive record of the tournament’s history. Compiled by the Wimbledon librarian, the compendium also logs the marriage history — husband, wedding date and location — of any woman who has reached the semifinals or final. No such record is kept for the men who have graced the tournament’s final four. Nor does the book appear to include any same-sex marriages, like the nine-time singles champion Martina Navratilova’s 2014 union to Julia Lemigova.