Stumped for grace.

MANNING CLARK was a keen and successful wicketkeeper-batsman at the University of Melbourne in the mid-1930s, so it was natural that he should seek to play cricket for Oxford University in 1939 when he took up his studies there. He impressed during the trial matches and was selected for the first three first-class fixtures of the season. However, as Wisden noted, "examinations and illness greatly handicapped" the Oxford eleven at the start of the season. Among those precluded by finals exams was P.H. Blagg, who had kept wicket for Oxford in the 1938 season and could have been expected to regain his place unless his substitute performed particularly well. Wisden had picked out Blagg as among the best Oxford fieldsmen, describing him as "a very reliable wicketkeeper".

In Clark's six innings, against Middlesex, Yorkshire and Gloucestershire, he scored 87 runs at an average of 14.50, batting usually at number seven. This was not a bad average, and was higher than that achieved by Blagg when he returned to the team after his finals. Clark made two stumpings and did not concede many byes, so he may have had a slight grievance. On the other hand, he failed to take opportunities to score heavily in the second eleven and so force himself back into contention for a Blue against Cambridge.

It was reasonable that Clark should have been, in the words of his closest Australian friend in England at the time, Alan Shaw, now Emeritus Professor A.G.L. Shaw, "very disappointed to be dropped". However, Clark could rarely refrain from embroidering a tale and he told Alan Shaw (with whom I discussed this recently) that he was "particularly irked by being replaced as wicketkeeper by an old Etonian". In fact Blagg had attended Shrewsbury School, not Eton College.

In his treatment of his cricketing experiences in England in Quest for Grace, Clark displayed faults that characterise so much of his work. He claimed that he and his new bride Dymphna suffered material deprivation when they were first in England. Although he conceded that one of the Balliol dons, Humphrey Sumner, not only helped them to find accommodation and lucrative tutoring work but also paid for Clark's cricket gear, he anticipated Marcuse's thesis of "repressive tolerance" by commenting on this and other kindnesses: "The English liked being Samaritans to colonials ... It made them feel good, even eased their consciences about their own conspicuous consumption of wealth."

Although he was elected to the Authentics Club and given one of their caps by the Oxford captain, Clark attributed that gesture to snobbish dislike of his Melbourne University cap as "too large and sloppy". He chided ...