Whist - Literary References

Literary References

• Barbey d'Aurevilly, in a story from Les diaboliques, The Underside of the Cards of a Game of Whist, traces the secret affair between a lady and an expert whist player, leading to an horrific act.
• Edgar Allan Poe briefly mentioned whist in his tale "The Murders in the Rue Morgue", alluding to the analytical mind needed to play:

" Whist has long been noted for its influence upon what is termed the calculating power; and men of the highest order of intellect have been known to take an apparently unaccountable delight in it, "

• Jules Verne uses whist playing to describe Phileas Fogg in Around the World in Eighty Days:

" His only pastime was reading the papers and playing whist. He frequently won at this quiet game, so very appropriate to his nature;"

• Whist also figures extensively in C. S. Forester's Horatio Hornblower series. Hornblower is featured as living off his winnings from playing whist while a half-pay Lieutenant, and famously playing whist with subordinate officers before a battle.
• The same is true in the Richard Sharpe series by Bernard Cornwell and was used mainly to portray gambling much the same way poker is today.
• Whist is often enjoyed by Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin whilst at sea in the Aubrey–Maturin series of novels by Patrick O'Brian.
• In Scarlett, the sequel to Gone with the Wind, Alexandra Ripley mentions several times that Scarlett O'Hara is an extremely skillful whist player.
• Miss. Elizabeth Bennett and Mr. Wickham discuss Mr. Darcy during a whist party in chapter 16 of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. The game is also mentioned in her books Mansfield Park, Emma, and Sense and Sensibility.
• In Nikolai Gogol's play The Inspector General, a character Hlestakov lies about playing whist with a group of influential ambassadors to look important. It is also prominent in Nikolai Gogol's poema, "Dead Souls".
• In the opening chapter of Leo Tolstoy's novella The Death of Ivan Ilyich the characters contrast the solemnity of the funeral ceremony with the desire to escape and play whist.
• In Middlemarch by George Eliot, the game is referenced numerous times as an aristocratic pursuit played frequently at the Vincy residence. In particular, the clergyman Mr. Farebrother supplements his income by playing for money, a pursuit looked down upon by many of his parishioners.
• In his autobiography, Groucho and Me, Groucho Marx talks about playing whist with an ex-girlfriend during a chapter on her husbands insomnia.
• In The Fiery Cross, Diana Gabaldon describes a high-stakes whist game between Jamie Fraser, "who was indeed an excellent card player. He also knew most of the possible ways of cheating at cards. However, whist was difficult, if not impossible to cheat at.", and Phylip Wylie, who had angered Fraser by making advances to his wife.
• In Life of Henry Clay, Carl Schurz notes that “his fondness for card-playing, which, although in his early years he had given up games of chance, still led him to squander but too much time upon whist.”
• In DC Comics' Starman series it is revealed that The Shade is a whist player, and enjoyed playing with Brian Savage (it was also noted that The Shade would regularly win at whist, while Savage would regularly win at poker).
• In The Leopard, by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, members of the Falconeri family and the priest play the game, much to the joy of a Piedmontese guest, reassured of their civilized ways.
• In his autobiography, Harold Bauer - His Book, pianist Harold Bauer laments his inability to play well under pressure. "I suffered similarly whenever I played chess or whist, which excited me so terribly that I always had nightmares from the thought of how I might have played."