Youthful laurels to cheer us all
IT’S been a pretty rotten summer, but there is sunshine in British hearts following Emma Raducanu’s win at the US Tennis Open in New York City. Not since Darcey Bussell first danced at Covent Garden, at the age of 19, has a teenager displayed such grace, not simply in her playing, but her composure off-court. We cheered for Andy Murray, but the dourness of his personality never quite sat comfortably with his prodigious talent. We suspect that Miss Raducanu will be more a Mendelssohn, famous for the sweetness of his early genius, rather than a narcissistic Liszt. We hope she has better luck in later life than such child stars as Judy Garland or, to judge from recent documentary The Most Beautiful Boy in the World, Björn Andrésen, cast as Tadzio…