In a business known for its exploitation of women, Tina Turner has managed, for over twenty years, to retain not only the adoration of her fans but the admiration of her peer group, male and female. She is nothing if not a survivor.

Born November 26th, 1939, Anna Mae Bullock first overcame abandonment by both of her parents during her childhood in rural Nut Bush, Tennessee. In the late Fifties, she began singing with Ike Turner, who renamed her Tina; alongside him, she rose to fame as the fiery star of the Ike and Tina Turner Revue. Existence in this milieu meant enduring the tortured life of a battered wife as she performed through sixteen years of physical abuse at the hands of her husband. Finally, in 1976, she walked out, buoyed by an increasing faith in Buddhism: ''I tested it, and it worked,'' she says. ''When I started practicing, something happened to me inside.'' Penniless and without career prospects, she struggled financially for the next few years, appearing on game shows and performing in cabarets. In 1979, Turner discussed management with the Los Angeles-based firm headed by Lee Kramer, who introduced her to her present manager, Roger Davies. It was he who masterminded her climb back to the top of the rock & roll heap. In 1984, their work came to fruition with the release of Private Dancer, which won three Grammys and has sold 10 million copies worldwide. Having an ambition to try screen acting, Turner accepted director George Miller's offer to star with Mel Gibson in Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome but turned down Steven Spielberg when he was casting the lead in The Color Purple. ''It was too close to what I just stepped out of,'' she says.

This year looks like another good one for Turner. Her autobiography, I, Tina, has hit the bookstores, timed to the release of a new album, Break Every Rule. The title is an apt one for Turner. At forty-six, she has the beauty of a woman years younger — particularly offstage, where a certain graciousness considerably softens her stage image. For her interview in her suite at Morgans hotel in New York, Turner's famous legs were well hidden in baggy black silk pants and an overblouse. At her throat was a single strand of pearls, which she fingered, at times, like worry beads.

Turner is clearly at a pivotal time in her life. With the publication of I, Tina, she hopes to lay to rest the curiosity about her years as a battered wife. She escaped professionally victorious and personally enlightened. If there is one quality that marks Turner, it is her extraordinary freedom from bitterness. Although she says she is still struggling for respect, the fact of the matter is she already has it.