Stuart Weir wrote this review of the new book by Caster Semenya. Caster and Stuart spoke on many occasions, and Stuart, as well as your editor, came to respect the athlete who was the focal point of so much discussion during her career. The thing is, we never saw Caster lose her cool, and she was always respectful of the media, athletes, and the situations that she endured. I hope that we could be so thoughtful when the world is being so negative about your very being. -Editor’s note.
Caster Semenya: The race to be myself, Penguin Randon House, 2023
ISBN878-1-529-18636-9
There are compelling arguments why Caster Semenya, the athlete, should have been allowed to compete as a woman; there are also strong arguments against it. This is not the place to re-open that debate. What is beyond dispute is that Caster Semenya, the person, was shockingly badly treated by World Athletics (IAAF) and by Athletics South Africa.
Caster Semenya has written the story of a person growing up in a South African village but with a dream to be successful and to fly in an airplane one day, going on to win the 800m in the 2012 and 2016 Olympics and the 2009, 2011 and 2017 World Championships as well as the 800/1500 double at the 2018 Commonwealth Games. I was privileged to see all those races – among others – and to have one long conversation with her.
The book strays regularly into biology with a statement already on the second page of the book: “I am female. I have a vagina, but I do not have a uterus. I do not menstruate, and my body produces an elevated amount of testosterone… I cannot carry a child because I don’t have a womb but, contrary to what many people think, I do not produce sperm”. Elsewhere, she writes: “So many amazing performances that year and Caster Semenya’s genitals the seemed to be the main story”. She refers to the uncomfortable experience of watching people discussing her body on television and feeling that the “world talked about me like I was an alien or a monster” and “Perfect strangers would treat my body like a science experiment”. One expression she used seemed particularly poignant: “publicly humiliated daily”.
It is a book of contrasts. Throughout the book, her faith in God is mentioned repeatedly. It is a central part of her identity that she believes that God created her and…
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