Shena Mackay
Shena Mackay FRSL (born 6 June 1944) is a Scottish novelist born in Edinburgh. She was shortlisted for the Booker Prize for Fiction in 1996 for '' The Orchard on Fire'', and was shortlisted for the Whitbread Prize and the Orange Prize for Fiction in 2003 for ''Heligoland''. Biography Early years Mackay was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1944. After the Second World War, her family moved to Hampstead, London, and eventually settled in Shoreham, Kent, from where she attended Tonbridge Grammar School. Her writing career started with her winning a poetry competition in the ''Daily Mirror'' at the age of 16, while still at school. After leaving school, she began working in an office, before getting a job at an antique shop in Chancery Lane. The antique shop was owned by the parents of art critic David Sylvester, with whom Mackay had her daughter Cecily. Writing Mackay's first publication, in 1964, was a volume of two novellas, ''Dust Falls on Eugene Schlumburger'' and ''Toddle ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Fellow Of The Royal Society Of Literature
The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) is a learned society founded in 1820 by George IV of the United Kingdom, King George IV to "reward literary merit and excite literary talent". A charity that represents the voice of literature in the UK, the RSL has about 800 Fellows, elected from among the best writers in any genre currently at work. Additionally, Honorary Fellows are chosen from those who have made a significant contribution to the advancement of literature, including publishers, agents, librarians, booksellers or producers. The society is a cultural tenant at London's Somerset House. The RSL is an independent charity and relies on the support of its Members, Patrons, Fellows and friends to continue its work. History The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) was founded in 1820, with the patronage of George IV, to "reward literary merit and excite literary talent", and its first president was Thomas Burgess (bishop, born 1756), Thomas Burgess, Bishop of St David's (who was late ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Kent
Kent is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Essex across the Thames Estuary to the north, the Strait of Dover to the south-east, East Sussex to the south-west, Surrey to the west, and Greater London to the north-west. The county town is Maidstone. The county has an area of and had population of 1,875,893 in 2022, making it the Ceremonial counties of England#Lieutenancy areas since 1997, fifth most populous county in England. The north of the county contains a conurbation which includes the towns of Chatham, Kent, Chatham, Gillingham, Kent, Gillingham, and Rochester, Kent, Rochester. Other large towns are Maidstone and Ashford, Kent, Ashford, and the City of Canterbury, borough of Canterbury holds City status in the United Kingdom, city status. For local government purposes Kent consists of a non-metropolitan county, with twelve districts, and the unitary authority area of Medway. The county historically included south-ea ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Michèle Roberts
Michèle Brigitte Roberts FRSL (born 20 May 1949) is a British writer, novelist and poet. She is the daughter of a French Catholic teacher mother (Monique Caulle) and English Protestant father (Reginald Roberts), and has dual UK–France nationality. Early life Roberts was born to a French Catholic mother and English Protestant father in Bushey, Hertfordshire, England, but was raised in Edgware, Middlesex. She was educated at a convent, expecting to become a nun, before reading English at Somerville College, Oxford, where she lost her Catholic faith. She also studied at University College London, training to be a librarian. She worked for the British Council in Bangkok, Thailand, in this role from 1973 to 1974. Career Active in socialist and feminist politics (the Women's Liberation Movement) since the early 1970s, she formed a writers' collective with Sara Maitland, Michelene Wandor and Zoe Fairbairns. At this time, Roberts was the Poetry Editor (1975–77) at ''Spare Rib'', ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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The Scotsman
''The Scotsman'' is a Scottish compact (newspaper), compact newspaper and daily news website headquartered in Edinburgh. First established as a radical political paper in 1817, it began daily publication in 1855 and remained a broadsheet until August 2004. Its parent company, National World, also publishes the ''Edinburgh Evening News''. It had an audited print circulation of 8,762 for July to December 2022. Its website, Scotsman.com, had an average of 138,000 unique visitors a day as of 2017. The title celebrated its bicentenary on 25 January 2017. History ''The Scotsman'' was conceived in 1816 and first launched on 25 January 1817 as a liberal weekly newspaper by lawyer William Ritchie (Newspaper Editor), William Ritchie and customs official Charles Maclaren in response to the "unblushing subservience" of competing newspapers to the Edinburgh establishment. These two plus John Ramsay McCulloch were co-founders of the venture. The paper was pledged to "impartiality, firm ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Allan Massie
Allan Johnstone Massie (born 16 October 1938) is a Scottish journalist, columnist, sports writer and novelist. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. He has lived in the Scottish Borders for the last 25 years, and now lives in Selkirk. Early life Born in Singapore, where his father was a rubber planter for Sime Darby, Massie spent his childhood in Aberdeenshire. He was educated at Drumtochty Castle preparatory school and Glenalmond College in Perthshire before going on to attend Trinity College, Cambridge, where he read history. Career Journalist Massie is a journalist and critic of fiction, writing regular columns for ''The Scotsman'', ''The Sunday Times'' (Scotland) and the Scottish ''Daily Mail''. He has been ''The Scotsman's'' chief fiction reviewer for a quarter of a century and also regularly writes about rugby union and cricket for that paper. He has previously been a columnist for ''The Daily Telegraph'', the '' Glasgow Herald,'' and was the Sunday Stan ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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The Daily Telegraph
''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a British daily broadsheet conservative newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed in the United Kingdom and internationally. It was founded by Arthur B. Sleigh in 1855 as ''The Daily Telegraph and Courier''. ''The Telegraph'' is considered a newspaper of record in the UK. The paper's motto, "Was, is, and will be", was included in its emblem which was used for over a century starting in 1858. In 2013, ''The Daily Telegraph'' and ''The Sunday Telegraph'', which started in 1961, were merged, although the latter retains its own editor. It is politically conservative and supports the Conservative Party (UK), Conservative Party. It was moderately Liberalism, liberal politically before the late 1870s.Dictionary of Nineteenth Century Journalismp 159 ''The Telegraph'' has had a number of news scoops, including the outbreak of World War II by rookie reporter Clare Hollingworth, desc ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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The Times
''The Times'' is a British Newspaper#Daily, daily Newspaper#National, national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its modern name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (founded in 1821), are published by Times Media, since 1981 a subsidiary of News UK, in turn wholly owned by News Corp. ''The Times'' and ''The Sunday Times'' were founded independently and have had common ownership only since 1966. It is considered a newspaper of record in the UK. ''The Times'' was the first newspaper to bear that name, inspiring numerous other papers around the world. In countries where these other titles are popular, the newspaper is often referred to as or , although the newspaper is of national scope and distribution. ''The Times'' had an average daily circulation of 365,880 in March 2020; in the same period, ''The Sunday Times'' had an average weekly circulation of 647,622. The two ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Peter Bradshaw
Peter Nicholas Bradshaw (born 19 June 1962) is a British writer and film critic. He has been chief film critic at ''The Guardian'' since 1999, and is a contributing editor at ''Esquire'' magazine. Early life and education Bradshaw was educated at Haberdashers' Aske's Boys' School in Hertfordshire and studied English at Pembroke College, Cambridge, where he was president of the Cambridge Footlights. He was awarded a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1984, followed by postgraduate research in the Early Modern period in which he studied with Lisa Jardine and Anne Barton. He received his PhD in 1989. Career In the 1990s, Bradshaw was employed by the ''Evening Standard'' as a columnist, and during the 1997 general election campaign, editor Max Hastings asked him to write a series of parodic diary entries purporting to be by the Conservative Party MP and historian Alan Clark, which Clark thought deceptive and which were the subject of a court case resolved in January 1998, the first ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Streatham
Streatham ( ) is a district in south London, England. Centred south of Charing Cross, it lies mostly within the London Borough of Lambeth, with some parts extending into the neighbouring London Borough of Wandsworth. Streatham was in Surrey before becoming part of the County of London in 1889, and then Greater London in 1965. The area is identified in the London Plan as one of 35 major centres in Greater London. History Streatham means "the hamlet on the street". The street in question, the London to Brighton Way, was the Roman road from the capital Londinium to the south coast near Portslade, today within Brighton and Hove. It is likely that the destination was a Roman port now lost to coastal erosion, which has been tentatively identified with 'Novus Portus' mentioned in Ptolemy's Geographia (Ptolemy), Geographia. The road is confusingly referred to as Stane Street (Chichester), Stane Street (Stone Street) in some sources and diverges from the main London-Chichester road ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Publishers Weekly
''Publishers Weekly'' (''PW'') is an American weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers, and literary agents. Published continuously since 1872, it has carried the tagline, "The International News Magazine of Book Publishing and Bookselling." With 51 issues a year, the emphasis today is on book reviews. History Nineteenth century The magazine was founded by bibliographer Frederick Leypoldt in the late 1860s and had various titles until Leypoldt settled on the name ''The Publishers' Weekly'' (with an apostrophe) in 1872. The publication was a compilation of information about newly published books, collected from publishers and from other sources by Leypoldt, for an audience of booksellers. By 1876, ''The Publishers' Weekly'' was being read by nine tenths of the booksellers in the country. In 1878, Leypoldt sold ''The Publishers' Weekly'' to his friend Richard Rogers Bowker, in order to free up time for his other bibliographic endeavors. Augu ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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The Observer
''The Observer'' is a British newspaper published on Sundays. First published in 1791, it is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper. In 1993 it was acquired by Guardian Media Group Limited, and operated as a sister paper to ''The Guardian'' and '' The Guardian Weekly''. In December 2024, Tortoise Media acquired the paper from the Scott Trust Limited, with the transition taking place on 22 April 2025. History Origins The first issue was published on 4 December 1791 by W.S. Bourne, making ''The Observer'' the world's oldest Sunday newspaper. Believing that the paper would be a means of wealth, Bourne instead soon found himself facing debts of nearly £1,600. Though early editions purported editorial independence, Bourne attempted to cut his losses and sell the title to the government. When this failed, Bourne's brother (a wealthy businessman) made an offer to the government, which also refused to buy the paper but agreed to subsidise it in return for influence over its editori ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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David Sylvester
Anthony David Bernard Sylvester (21 September 1924 – 19 June 2001) was a British art critic and curator. Although he received no formal education in the arts, during his long career he was influential in promoting modern artists, in particular Francis Bacon, Joan Miró, and Lucian Freud. Life and career Born in London, his father was a Russian-Jewish antiques dealer. Sylvester had trouble as a student at University College School and was thrown out of the family home. He wrote for the paper ''Tribune'' and went to Paris in 1947 where he met Alberto Giacometti, one of the strongest influences on him. Sylvester is credited with coining the term '' kitchen sink'' originally to describe a strand of post-war British painting typified by John Bratby. Sylvester used the phrase negatively but it was widely applied to other art forms including literature and theatre. During the 1950s, Sylvester worked with Henry Moore, Freud and Bacon but also supported Richard Hamilton and the ot ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |