Finding Renée Richards by Julie Kliegman

Description

In 1977, tennis player Renée Richards made international headlines when she fought for the right to compete in the women’s draw of the US Open. Her legal battle marked the first time a trans athlete sued to participate in professional sports in the gender category with which they identify. Richards ultimately won her case, opening a new chapter in the history of both professional sports and transgender rights.

Finding Renée Richards tells the story behind that landmark moment and the remarkable life of the woman at its center. Julie Kliegman traces Richards’s journey from her tumultuous upbringing in Queens, New York, through a successful career as an eye surgeon and star tennis player, to her emergence as a transgender pioneer.

Richards’s story is more complicated than a simple tale of triumph. Now in her nineties, she remains a fascinating and sometimes contradictory figure, having transformed the conversation around trans athletes while later questioning their place in competitive sports herself. Drawing on intimate interviews and previously unseen archival material, Kliegman explores those contradictions rather than smoothing them away.

The result is both a biography of an extraordinary woman and an examination of the changing relationship between sports, gender, identity, and the queer community. With trans participation in athletics once again at the center of fierce public debate, Richards’s story offers an essential historical perspective on how far the conversation has traveled and how much remains unresolved.

The book includes a 20-page photo insert featuring never-before-seen archival images, bringing Richards’s pioneering career and extraordinary life into sharper focus.

Book Details

• ISBN: 0063439581
• Format: Hardcover
• Author: Julie Kliegman
• Subject: Renée Richards / Transgender History / Tennis / Sports History
• Published: 2026