2021年经济学人 体育场上的女性——冠军时刻（1）（在线收听）

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Women in sport - Championship points

体育场上的女性——冠军时刻

All In. By Billie Jean King.

《全力以赴》作者：比利·简·金

At the age of 15, Billie Jean King anticipated the trajectory of her life in a school essay. A tennis prodigy, she thought she would soon make it to Wimbledon but lose in the quarter-finals. On the flight to London she would meet a heart-throb and fall in love. In time she would be happily married, “sitting with my four wonderful children” and grateful to have an education and a husband, “instead of turning out to be a tennis bum”.

15岁时，比莉·简·金在一篇学校作文中预测了自己的人生轨迹。她认为，作为一名网球神童，自己很快就会打进温布尔登，但是输掉四分之一决赛。在飞往伦敦的航班上，她会遇到一位迷人帅哥，然后坠入爱河。一段时间后，她就会幸福地结婚，“和我四个可爱的孩子坐在一起”，感激有了教育和丈夫，“而不是变成一个网球流浪汉”。

Luckily for fans at the All England club, Ms King proved better at slicing backhands than at prophesy. Between 1961 and 1979 she won six Wimbledon singles titles and 14 in doubles in one of the 20th century’s great sporting careers. She never had children, and defended abortion rights with the example of her own terminated pregnancy. She did marry a man, but later emerged as a figurehead for gay rights.

对于全英俱乐部的球迷来说，幸运的是，金女士证明了她在反手切球方面可比在预言方面做得好。1961年到1979年间，她在20世纪最伟大的体育赛事之一温布尔登网球公开赛上赢得了6次单打冠军和14次双打冠军。她从未生过孩子，并通过终止自己的妊娠进程以身作则捍卫堕胎权。她确实嫁给了一个男人，但后来发现他是同性恋权利的名义领袖。

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In “All In”, a perceptive autobiography written with Johnette Howard and Maryanne Vollers, Ms King notes that her youthful prediction reflected the stifling boundaries that hemmed in American girls in the 1950s. Few women had careers; professional women’s sports barely existed. When she began winning tennis trophies, first near home in California, then in Europe, she encountered shocking pay disparities. To her disgust, for instance, in 1970 the Italian Open offered $3,500 to the men’s champion and $600 to the women’s.

《全力以赴》是金女士与约翰内特·霍华德和玛丽安·沃勒斯合著的一本颇具洞察力的自传，在书中金女士指出，她年轻时的预言反映了20世纪50年代美国女孩身上令人窒息的界限。极少数女性拥有事业；职业女子运动几乎不存在。当她开始赢得网球奖杯时，先是在加州的家附近，然后是在欧洲，她遭遇了令人震惊的薪酬差距。例如，令她反感的是，在1970年的意大利网球公开赛上，男子冠军和女子冠军分别获得3500美元和600美元的奖金。

Other indignities followed. Journalists focused on female athletes’ looks, not their achievements. Ms King refused to play to type and faced snide criticism. Her outspokenness was derided. Male stars offered no support, laughing off the notion that fans came for ladies’ matches.

其它的轻蔑之举随之而来。记者们关注的是女运动员的长相，而不是她们的成绩。金女士拒绝按常理出牌，因此受到了刻薄的批评。她的直言不讳遭到嘲笑。男运动员们没有提供支持，对球迷来观看女子比赛的想法一笑置之。