The combative broadcaster’s memoir mixes engaging snapshots of his early career with some score-settling and a robust defence of his interviewing styleJohn Humphrys is the first to admit he doesn’t deal well with authority. He inherited it from his father, who refused to use the service entrance at the grand houses where he worked as a French polisher and, as a child, once watched his aunt get a humiliating dressing-down from the vicar for missing church. Humphrys had his own brush with condescending authority figures when he was in hospital with a cyst on his spine at 13, and an “arrogant posh bastard consultant” told his retinue of trainees it was because he didn’t wash regularly. “I don’t like being defined or told what to do, whoever is in charge,” he notes, a stance that has proved useful for grilling politicians (he has interviewed eight prime ministers), though it has also landed him in hot water.His memoir mixes engaging snapshots of his early career and analysis of the evolution of broadcasting with diatribes and petty score-settling. The early chapters tell of his passage from teen lackey on the Penarth Times in Wales, where his main task was standing outside the local church taking the names of those attending weddings and funerals, to being the first journalist on the scene at the Aberfan disaster, near Merthyr Tydfil, in which 116 children and 28 adults died after a colliery tip collapsed. Later he became a BBC foreign correspondent, reporting on the 1971 war... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'
[ The Guardian | 2019-10-10 06:30:10 UTC ]
The pandemic memoir “American Crisis” has become a financial and ethical headache for Penguin Random House, dragging the company into the scandals that prompted the governor’s resignation announcement. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2021-08-10 22:21:07 UTC ]
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Poet and teacher has apologised for ‘overreacting’ to scrutiny of book’s portrayals of autistic pupils and children of colourKate Clanchy is rewriting her critically acclaimed memoir after widespread criticism of her portrayal of her pupils, particularly children of colour and autistic... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2021-08-10 18:58:54 UTC ]
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In “Blind Man’s Bluff,” James Tate Hill opens up about the measures he took to avoid admitting that he had lost his eyesight. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2021-08-05 09:00:03 UTC ]
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She took the music seriously at a time when not many writers did. Among her books was a memoir of her life with one of its biggest stars, Jim Morrison. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2021-08-04 22:08:44 UTC ]
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Canongate has landed Time on Rock, an outdoor climbing guide and memoir of self-discovery by Anna Fleming. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-08-04 21:31:00 UTC ]
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Claire Wilcox has won the PEN Ackerley Prize 2021 for her "vivid" memoir Patch Work: A Life Amongst Clothes (Bloomsbury). Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-08-04 21:28:36 UTC ]
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In his memoir about being drafted into the Vietnam War, Jeff Danziger lays bare the futility and waste, as well as his own naiveté. Continue reading at The Christian Science Monitor
[ The Christian Science Monitor | 2021-08-03 20:35:22 UTC ]
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Gina Frangello had a suspicion there was a hunger to talk about women who break the rules. In advance of the release of Blow Your House Down: A Story of Family, Feminism and Treason, she admits after some prodding, “I got more letters from women before this book came out than I ever received for... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2021-07-30 11:00:00 UTC ]
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Filmmaker Rodrigo Garcia brings his memoir about his father, Nobel laureate Gabriel García Márquez, and mother, Mercedes Barcha, to the L.A. Times Book Club. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2021-07-29 20:18:15 UTC ]
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Buzzy new novels from Alexandra Kleeman, Leila Slimani and Stephen King, Billie Jean King’s memoir and plenty more. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2021-07-28 17:14:59 UTC ]
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With the help of a brilliant co-writer, a fully rounded picture may now emerge of the much-maligned royalNot since criminals were barred from profiting in this way can a publisher’s announcement of a memoir have united the British press in such disgust. Before that, even the gangster turned... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2021-07-25 07:00:45 UTC ]
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Emily St. John Mandel's 'Sea of Tranquility' goes to Knopf's Jenny Jackson, Prince Harry sold a currently untitled memoir to Random House, and more. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2021-07-23 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Oscar-winner and all-around Renaissance woman Viola Davis is going to put her life story (so far) to paper. The actor will publish a memoir, Finding Me, with HarperOne. Davis will discuss her tumultuous childhood growing up in Rhode Island, including poverty and family strife, to her rise as a... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2021-07-22 15:04:57 UTC ]
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Last week, Guto Harri, an anchor on GB News, in the United Kingdom, addressed a pressing news story: the racist abuse that Black English players faced following the final of the European soccer championships, which England lost, and the broader debate around the players’ practice of taking a... Continue reading at Columbia Journalism Review
[ Columbia Journalism Review | 2021-07-20 12:38:46 UTC ]
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Penguin Random House said the book, tentatively coming in 2022, would be “an intimate and heartfelt memoir from one of the most fascinating and influential global figures of our time.” Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2021-07-19 20:26:00 UTC ]
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Weidenfeld & Nicolson has acquired Sins of My Father: A Daughter, a Cult, a Wild Unravelling, a "dazzling" literary memoir from Lily Dunn about her attempt to unravel the mysteries of her late father's life. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-07-18 21:27:23 UTC ]
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Graeme Macrae Burnet was picked out by the literary spotlight when his second novel, His Bloody Project, was shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 2016. Published by small indie Saraband, it tells of a brutal triple murder in the remote Scottish Highlands in 1869 via witness statements, a memoir... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-07-16 17:48:55 UTC ]
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Culture Adrian Aguilera (Mexican, b. 1981) and Betelhem Makonnen (Ethiopian American, b. 1972), untitled (a flag for John Lewis or a green screen placeholder for an America that is yet to be), 2020 (installation view). Printed standard flag fabric,... Continue reading at World Literature Today
[ World Literature Today | 2021-07-15 19:45:53 UTC ]
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Chicago’s memoir, “The Flowering,” looks back at the uphill battle to make it in the art world as a woman. Continue reading at The Washington Post
[ The Washington Post | 2021-07-15 12:00:00 UTC ]
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In 'A Farewell to Gabo and Mercedes,' filmmaker Rodrigo Garcia writes about losing both parents — and the one event his renowned father couldn't record: his own death. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2021-07-07 16:19:08 UTC ]
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