Victor Mollo
Encyclopedia
Victor Mollo was a British
bridge
journalist and writer. He is most famous for his "Bridge in the Menagerie" series of books, depicting vivid characters of bridge players with animal names through a series of exciting and entertaining deals, bridge fable
s of a sort.
n family. When he was eight, the October Revolution
occurred and his family fled Russia, traveling by a purchased train, with forged Red Cross papers, crossing into Finland
, then Stockholm
, Paris
and finally London
.
He neglected his studies and devoted himself to bridge. As an editor in the European service of the British Broadcasting Corporation, he began to write books and articles on the game. After retirement in 1969, he started to write even more extensively, and up to his death in 1987 he wrote 30 books and hundreds of articles. He was also active in developing bridge cruises, mostly in the Mediterranean. He died in London.
His life style was exceptional. He would play rubber bridge
at his club each afternoon, enjoy a dinner and wine with his wife, The Squirrel, and then work all night until 6 AM, when he would take a brief sleep. While he occasionally successfully competed in the major duplicate bridge
tournaments, winning four national titles, he preferred rubber bridge. Many of his daily achievements at the rubber bridge table would become elements of fictional stories later in the night.
- see the Acknowledgement section in the various books.) Mollo was recognized as "the most entertaining writer of the game" in a poll among American players in the 1980s. The books describe entertaining events at a rubber bridge table in "The Griffins Club" (duplicate bridge features only occasionally), involving fictional characters, many of whom are nicknamed after the animals whom they most resemble both physically and psychologically, and who caricaturize common archetypes of real-life bridge players. Mollo often refers to the main characters by their initials. They include:
Books published in the series include (with year of first publication):
After Mollo's death, further books in the series appeared posthumously, some making use of previously uncollected articles and others containing new material by Robert and Phillip King:
Great Britain
Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...
bridge
Contract bridge
Contract bridge, usually known simply as bridge, is a trick-taking card game using a standard deck of 52 playing cards played by four players in two competing partnerships with partners sitting opposite each other around a small table...
journalist and writer. He is most famous for his "Bridge in the Menagerie" series of books, depicting vivid characters of bridge players with animal names through a series of exciting and entertaining deals, bridge fable
Fable
A fable is a succinct fictional story, in prose or verse, that features animals, mythical creatures, plants, inanimate objects or forces of nature which are anthropomorphized , and that illustrates a moral lesson , which may at the end be expressed explicitly in a pithy maxim.A fable differs from...
s of a sort.
Biography
Mollo was born in St. Petersburg into a rich RussiaRussia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
n family. When he was eight, the October Revolution
October Revolution
The October Revolution , also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution , Red October, the October Uprising or the Bolshevik Revolution, was a political revolution and a part of the Russian Revolution of 1917...
occurred and his family fled Russia, traveling by a purchased train, with forged Red Cross papers, crossing into Finland
Finland
Finland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...
, then Stockholm
Stockholm
Stockholm is the capital and the largest city of Sweden and constitutes the most populated urban area in Scandinavia. Stockholm is the most populous city in Sweden, with a population of 851,155 in the municipality , 1.37 million in the urban area , and around 2.1 million in the metropolitan area...
, Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
and finally London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
.
He neglected his studies and devoted himself to bridge. As an editor in the European service of the British Broadcasting Corporation, he began to write books and articles on the game. After retirement in 1969, he started to write even more extensively, and up to his death in 1987 he wrote 30 books and hundreds of articles. He was also active in developing bridge cruises, mostly in the Mediterranean. He died in London.
His life style was exceptional. He would play rubber bridge
Rubber bridge
Rubber bridge is a form of contract bridge and is played with four players. It is most often played for fun but is also played seriously for money...
at his club each afternoon, enjoy a dinner and wine with his wife, The Squirrel, and then work all night until 6 AM, when he would take a brief sleep. While he occasionally successfully competed in the major duplicate bridge
Duplicate bridge
Duplicate bridge is the most widely used variation of contract bridge in club and tournament play. It is called duplicate because the same bridge deal is played at each table and scoring is based on relative performance...
tournaments, winning four national titles, he preferred rubber bridge. Many of his daily achievements at the rubber bridge table would become elements of fictional stories later in the night.
The Bridge in the Menagerie series
The Bridge in the Menagerie series started with the book of the same name, originally published in 1965, and had several sequels on the same theme. (Most of the pieces in the books had previously appeared in either the British Bridge Magazine or the American The Bridge WorldThe Bridge World
The Bridge World , the oldest continuously published magazine about contract bridge, was founded in 1929 by Ely Culbertson. It has since been regarded as the game's principal journal, publicizing technical advances in bidding and the play of the cards, discussions of ethical issues, bridge politics...
- see the Acknowledgement section in the various books.) Mollo was recognized as "the most entertaining writer of the game" in a poll among American players in the 1980s. The books describe entertaining events at a rubber bridge table in "The Griffins Club" (duplicate bridge features only occasionally), involving fictional characters, many of whom are nicknamed after the animals whom they most resemble both physically and psychologically, and who caricaturize common archetypes of real-life bridge players. Mollo often refers to the main characters by their initials. They include:
- Hideous Hog (HH), by far the club's best player, but also an insufferable shark who seeks to humiliate opponents for their mistakes,
- Rueful Rabbit (RR), a small, timid man who can barely hold his cards together and can't always tell diamonds from hearts, but has such incredible luck that even the cards he accidentally drops (several at once, occasionally) become the right ones,
- Secretary Bird, who knows the laws of the game perfectly and insists that they are applied to the letter, always to his own downfall,
- Papa the Greek, a clever but exceedingly vain expert, who fancies himself as the Hog's superior despite regularly losing to him, and whose cleverness usually backfires against himself,
- Karapet, an Armenian expatriate and a fine player but the unluckiest one ever, usually Papa's partner,
- Colin the Corgi, among the club's younger members, a strong player who is often sarcastic and testy and thus has "all the makings of a future master",
- Oscar the Owl, Senior Kibitzer at the Griffins, whose role is usually limited to acting as an audience for HH's exploits,
- Peregrine the Penguin, Oscar's equivalent at the Unicorns, the Griffins' rival club,
- Walter the Walrus, whose expertise in and devotion to the WorkMilton WorkMilton Cooper Work was a noted American authority on whist, bridge whist, auction and contract bridge.- Work Point Count system :...
point-count are matched only by the utter mess he makes of bidding and play, - Molly the Mule, the lone recurring female character, who is always certain that she's right and is as stubborn as the proverbial mule,
- Timothy the Toucan, as hopeless a player as RR but without RR's engaging qualities. TT tries to make up for his shortcomings by means of an oozing deference for the Menagerie's better players,
- Charlie the Chimp would rather post mortem the last hand than play the next. He's an exponent of sharp practice at the table, once famously producing a remarkable (and impossible under normal bridge circumstances) quadruple squeeze against himself by retaining a small card in order to conceal his own revoke.
Books published in the series include (with year of first publication):
- Bridge In The Menagerie (1965)
- Bridge in the Fourth Dimension (1974)
- Masters and Monsters (1979) Reissued as Victor Mollo's Bridge Club: How to Turn Masterful Plays into Monstrous Points(1987)
- You Need Never Lose at Bridge (1983)
- Destiny at Bay (1987)
After Mollo's death, further books in the series appeared posthumously, some making use of previously uncollected articles and others containing new material by Robert and Phillip King:
- The Hog in The 21st Century (by Phillip and Robert King, 1999)
- Winning Bridge in the Menagerie (by 'Victor Mollo and Robert King'. 2001)
- Bridge in the Fifth Dimension (by 'Victor Mollo with P & R King', 2002)
- Murder in the Menagerie (by 'Robert King, Phillip King, and Victor Mollo', 2002)
- The Hog Takes to Precision (by 'Victor Mollo, collected and edited by Mark Horton', 2011)
Other books
Mollo's other books include:- Bridge Psychology
- Bridge Philosophy
- Card Play Technique: The Art of Being Lucky, co-written with Nico GardenerNico GardenerNico Gardener was a British international bridge player, born in Riga, Latvia .After the Russian Revolution his family moved to the Ukraine, and then to Moscow, where he trained as a ballet dancer. He later moved to Berlin, where he read languages and history at Berlin University, and played...
- a highly regarded instructional book on the play of the cards - The Other Side of Bridge
- Bridge a la Carte
- Victor Mollo's Bridge Quiz Book
- I Challenge You: Victor Mollo Challenges You to Improve Your Bridge Game
- Bridge: Modern Bidding
- Bridge: Case for the Defence
- The Bridge Immortals
- The Complete Bridge Player
- Bridge for Beginners, co-written with Nico Gardener
- Tomorrow's Textbook
- Winning Double: A Quizbook and Textbook with 160 Problems - The Shortest Cut to Expert Play
- Finer Arts of Bridge: A Textbook of Psychology
- Bridge Unlimited: The Fateful Years
- Play Bridge with the Experts, co-written with Derek Rimington
- Streamlined Bridge or Bidding without Tears (1947)