Amol Rajan speaks to Martina Navratilova, one of the greatest-ever tennis players, about her life and career. The story of her rise to the top of the game is as remarkable as the number of tournaments she managed to win.
Born behind the Iron Curtain in Czechoslovakia in 1956, she was 11-years-old when she watched Soviet tanks roll in to the country as Moscow sought to reassert control and quash political reform.
Navratilova, who played in her first tennis tournament when she was eight, rose to both national and international prominence in the years that followed.
But in 1975, following the Czech government’s efforts to control her tennis career, she defected. Aged 18, Navratilova sought asylum in the United States, where she later became an American citizen. During the late 1970s and 1980s she dominated the international tennis circuit, and by the time she retired, she had won 59 major singles and doubles titles.
But throughout her life, Navratilova has generated headlines on the front pages of newspapers, as well as the back. She came out as being gay in 1981, a rare thing for high-profile athletes to do at the time, and quickly became a prominent figure in the gay rights movement. More recently, however, she has found herself at odds with some groups due to her views on transgender athletes.
She has also battled cancer on two separate occasions.
Thank you to the Amol Rajan Interviews team for their help in making this programme.
The Interview brings you conversations with people shaping our world, from all over the world. The best interviews from the BBC. You can listen on the BBC World Service, Mondays and Wednesdays at 0700 GMT. Or you can listen to The Interview as a podcast, out twice a week on BBC Sounds, Apple, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
Presenter: Amol Rajan
Producers: Ben Cooper, Joel Mapp
Sound: Dave O’Neill
Editor: Nick Holland
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(Image: Martina Navratilova. Credit: Roy Rochlin/Getty Images)
