Subscribe
HipHopWired Featured Video
CLOSE

The father of professional tennis icons Venus and Serena Williams has always been a tough cookie in his own right, but that doesn’t mean he was cool in subjecting himself to the Donald Sterling’s of his sport.

Richard Williams’ upcoming book Black and White: The Way I See It, goes into detail about his decade-long boycott of a tournament in Indian Wells, Calif. because he and the family were victims of a racial epithet onslaught.

Via Fox Sports:

Serena Williams’ father says he won’t return to Indian Wells, Calif., the site of a tournament his daughter has skipped since 2001, when their family was booed — and subjected to racial epithets, according to his new book.

”I would never go back,” Richard Williams said in a telephone interview.

But he added that it’s up to Serena whether to play at Indian Wells again.

”She was taught to make terrific decisions,” he said. ”Any decision she makes, I would be behind, 1,000 percent.”

The book covers plenty of other ground, although there is not much that is revelatory about the professional tennis careers of Williams’ daughters Serena and Venus. He said he has another book, focused more on them, in the works.

Written with Bart Davis, the 292-page ”Black and White” reads as part autobiography, part parenting guide (”I feel that we’re way too soft on our children,” Williams says in Chapter 19), part self-help book, part tennis instructional manual.

”I released the book because Serena kept telling me to,” Williams said. ”She thought it would help a lot of people.”

At another point, he writes: ”I became fascinated with stealing at the age of eight. I don’t know if the thrill was being able to get away with a crime, or that the crime was against the white man. Either way, it was the start of a prosperous career.”

Black and White: The Way I See It hits bookshelves on May 6.

Photo: Joel Ginsburg/WENN.com