Serena Williams ‘paved the way’ for mothers to keep playing tennis, says Martina Navratilova
In a wide-ranging conversation with ‘The Guardian’ at a New York City hotel where she was promoting her book, the 34-year-old former No. 1 seeded tennis player talked about motherhood, her love affair with the game, her success as a top pro and where she sees the tennis world heading.
Maria Sharapova was here as one of a dozen celebrities for the launch of Serena Williams’ book, ‘No Ordinary Day’, in which she reflects on her life after she retired from tennis in 2005 and went on to become one of the world’s best-loved women’s players.
The US Open winner said the book, her first since her Wimbledon triumph in 2011, was a “love letter” to her sport and was a way of “helping me heal and [her] life move on”.
“I always wanted to do a book,” said Williams, speaking at a launch that was part of the tennis world’s biggest event, the US Open. “In a way, I felt that I was paving the way for other moms.
“I think when you are a mom, you want to be a better person, more self-aware than other women, and I think that’s the case across sports. I think it’s been a big theme and a message in sports, in all sports with women and children. It’s just something that they need to work on.”
Williams, who became No 1 in the world for the first time in her career this year, said her first book was a “whole new experience” as a parent. “There’s a lot of hard things that they deal with and you want to try to make your child a better person, help them grow as human beings. I think when you read a book like mine, the writing style is so much more real, a lot more honest”.
She added: “It’s funny because I have a few more chapters to write, but I have always wanted to write one book.”
“I feel