Croquet: As played by the Newport Croquet Club

AnonymousProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 2.5

Word count: 59K words
Chapters: 6

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Croquet: As played by the Newport Croquet Club by AnonymousAuthor: Anonymous,Language: English, Class: GV: Geography, Anthropology, Recreation: Recreation, Leisure, Release Date: Jun 9, 2010

Editor's review

This is an early English rulebook for croquet, written by an anonymous author and centered on how the Newport Croquet Club played the game. Its value lies not in literary quality but in preserving the regulated form of a leisure sport within a particular community: details such as court layout, order of play, fouls, and scoring offer a glimpse of the punctiliousness and sense of order in nineteenth-century club life. For today's readers it is more like a small archive of social custom and sports history, suited to browsing out of curiosity rather than utility. Its rules may differ from croquet as played today, so it should be read as a historical text, noting which provisions reflect the etiquette and status consciousness of the social settings of the time. The prose is plain and the entries clearly organized, making it easy to dip into in spare moments.

Who it's for

A good fit for

History enthusiasts interested in nineteenth-century European and American leisure life and club culture
Readers who want to learn about early croquet rules and gather material for sports history
Casual readers who enjoy browsing old rulebooks and the pleasures of vintage reading
Learners who need English public-domain material and want to study how sports texts are written

Not a good fit for

Organizers who want to run a modern croquet match directly by the book's rules and need current standards
Complete beginners expecting systematic instruction with diagrams
Readers with no interest in rules or historical detail who just want a light story

Reading tips

Skim the contents and entry structure first, then read the chapters on court layout and order of play closely to build an overall picture.
Compare the rules with modern croquet as you read and note the differences—a small exercise in the evolution of sports rules.
Treat it as material on social custom and note the etiquette requirements and club social habits reflected in the rules.
When English entries are long, read them in sections and summarize each rule in your own words after finishing it.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Can the rules in this book still be used directly for matches today?

Not advisable to copy them directly. This is an early club rulebook and may differ from modern croquet in court, order of play, and penalties. For official matches, current rules should govern; this book is better used as a historical reference.

Can someone with no croquet background understand it?

Yes, but it takes some patience. The entries are mainly rule explanations and lack modern instructional diagrams and step-by-step guidance. It helps to learn the basic game first, then read this as a rule text; understanding will come more smoothly.

Why is the author anonymous?

The available information lists the author as Anonymous, which is not unusual for rulebooks published by early clubs; such texts were often written collectively or issued in the club's name. With little further author information, there is no need to reconstruct a personal biography—just focus on the text itself.

This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.

About the author

Anonymous Author

Anonymous is a collective designation used in English-language publishing for works whose authorship is unknown or unsigned, rather than the real name of a single author. The 716 titles attributed to this name include the Gospel of John, Psalms, Romans, Luke, Philippians, and 1 Corinthians from the World English Bible, as well as the Gospel of John and Psalms from the King James Version. Such texts are mainly religious classics and ancient folk traditions that were copied, translated, and compiled over long periods, making their original authors difficult to trace; they therefore circulated anonymously. Public information is limited, and neither nationality nor dates of birth and death can be confirmed. The significance of anonymity lies in focusing attention on the works themselves rather than on authorial identity, and in reminding readers of the collective and variable nature of texts in transmission.