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Libby Purves OBE | |
|---|---|
| Born | Elizabeth Mary Purves 2 February 1950 London, England |
| Occupation(s) | Radio presenter, journalist and author |
| Spouse | Paul Heiney |
| Children | 2 |
Elizabeth Mary Purves, OBE (born 2 February 1950) is a British radio presenter, journalist and author.
Born in London, a diplomat's daughter, Purves was raised in her mother's Catholic faith and educated at convent schools in Israel, Bangkok, South Africa and France, and at Beechwood Sacred Heart School, Royal Tunbridge Wells. [1]
Purves won a scholarship to St Anne's College, Oxford, where she was awarded a first class degree in English. [2] She was elected Librarian of the Oxford Union. In 1971, she joined the BBC as a studio manager. By the mid-1970s she was a regular presenter on BBC Radio Oxford where she could be frequently heard on the station's early morning shows. In 1976, she joined the BBC Radio 4's Today programme as a reporter and became the programme's first woman presenter, alongside Brian Redhead and John Timpson, two years later. [3] [4]
In 1983 she was editor of Tatler magazine for six months. [5]
For her column in The Times newspaper, Purves was named columnist of the year in 1999 and in the same year was appointed an OBE for services to journalism.[ citation needed ] She has written books on childcare, twelve novels including Mother Country , a memoir of religious upbringing, Holy Smoke (1998), and a travel book, One Summer's Grace (1989), about a 1,700-mile sailing journey round Britain with children aged three and five.[ citation needed ]
Purves has a monthly column in the sailing magazine Yachting Monthly and is a contributor to The Oldie magazine. She was appointed a patron of the British Art Music Series Trust [6] along with James MacMillan and John Wilson. She served ten years as a Trustee of the National Maritime Museum.
In February 2010 she was appointed The Times drama critic, succeeding Benedict Nightingale, [7] but her work for The Times in this area ended in September 2013. [8] In a press statement she released after she was fired, she said that "I have to tell you that the acting editor of The Times Mr Witherow has decreed that he does not want me to continue as Chief Theatre Critic. This is not my decision in any way. At all. … I carry on reviewing and maintaining the lists until 11 October." [9]
Two days after she finished at The Times, she announced in the London Evening Standard that her commitment to, and interest in, theatre commentary was so great that she intended to continue through theatrecat.com, a theatre review website. [10]
Purves is in favour of equal rights for gay people, and has written articles supporting this position. [11] [12] However, she has spoken out against the "coercive liberalism, one-note righteousness" of the National Trust following its "outing" of Robert Wyndham Ketton-Cremer, saying that "Crassly reducing any human being to a sexuality, posthumously enlisting him or her in a phantom regiment under your orders, is almost as belittling as persecution itself." [13]
In 2009, Purves debated at the Cambridge Union against Glenn Wilson and Rupert Myers on the motion This House Would Rather Be Gay. [14] Following a column on the anti-gay policies of Russian President Vladimir Putin, Greek businessman Demetri Marchessini took out a quarter-page advertisement in The Daily Telegraph on 28 January 2014 to criticise her views on homosexuality and religion. According to Purves, while Marchessini is "free to approve of the beatings and hangings of young men across the world in the name of what he considers religion" she is also "free to say he is a loony." [15]
On BBC Radio 4 Purves also presented Midweek for 33 years (1984–2017) and the educational programme The Learning Curve for 10 years (1998–2008). [16]
Since leaving the BBC, she has been critical of several aspects of the corporation: equal pay for newsreaders, [17] sexism and agism, [18] and "woke" comedy shows. [19]
Purves is married to broadcaster Paul Heiney. The couple have two children. [20] Their first child, Nicholas, died in 2006, at age 23. [21] A collection of his poems and sea-logs of a Pacific journey under square rig, The Silence at the Song's End, has been published, inspired a song cycle by Joseph Phibbs (2008), [22] and was broadcast on Radio 4. [23]
Today, colloquially known as the Today programme, is BBC Radio 4's long-running morning news and current-affairs radio programme. Broadcast on Monday to Saturday from 06:00 to 09:00, it is produced by BBC News and is the highest-rated programme on Radio 4 and one of the BBC's most popular programmes across its radio networks. In-depth political interviews and reports are interspersed with regular news bulletins, as well as Thought for the Day. It has been voted the most influential news programme in Britain in setting the political agenda, with an average weekly listening audience around 6 million.
Marilyn Foreman, better known as Mandy Rice-Davies, was a Welsh model and showgirl best known for her association with Christine Keeler and her role in the Profumo affair, which discredited the Conservative government of British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan in 1963.
Anne Josephine Robinson is an English television presenter and journalist, best known as the host of BBC game show The Weakest Link from 2000 to 2012, and again in 2017 for a one-off celebrity special for Children in Need. She presented the Channel 4 game show Countdown from June 2021 to July 2022, taking over from Nick Hewer. She left the programme on 13 July 2022 after recording 265 episodes.
Valerie Singleton is an English television and radio presenter best known as a regular presenter of the popular children's series Blue Peter from 1962 to 1972. She also presented the BBC Radio 4 PM programme for ten years as well as a series of radio and television programmes on financial and business issues including BBC's The Money Programme from 1980 to 1988.
Start the Week is a discussion programme broadcast on BBC Radio 4 which began in April 1970. The current presenter is Tom Sutcliffe. The previous regular presenters were Richard Baker, Russell Harty, Melvyn Bragg, Jeremy Paxman and Andrew Marr
Susan Elizabeth Perkins is an English actress, broadcaster, comedian, presenter and writer. Originally coming to prominence through her comedy partnership with Mel Giedroyc in Mel and Sue, she progressed into radio and television presenting, notably of The Great British Bake Off (2010–2016), Insert Name Here (2016–2019) and Just a Minute on BBC Radio 4.
Rachael Atlanta Stirling is an English stage, film and television actress. She has been nominated twice for the Laurence Olivier Award for her stage work. She played Nancy Astley in the BBC drama Tipping the Velvet, and Millie in the ITV series The Bletchley Circle. She has also guest starred in Lewis and one episode of Doctor Who, co-starring with her mother Diana Rigg.
Clare Victoria Balding is an English broadcast journalist and author. She currently presents for BBC Sport, Channel 4 and BT Sport and formerly presented the programme Good Morning Sunday on BBC Radio 2. Balding was appointed as the 30th president of the Rugby Football League, serving a two-year term until December 2022.
Paul Heiney is a British radio broadcaster and television reporter, most notable as a former presenter of That's Life!.
Joan Maureen "Biddy" Baxter, MBE is a British television producer, best known for editing the long-running BBC TV children's magazine show Blue Peter from 1962 to 1988. As editor of the programme, Baxter devised much of the format that is still used today.
Carolyn Quinn is a British journalist best known for her work on BBC Radio 4 as a political correspondent and for presenting the Today programme and PM.
Kathy Clugston is a Northern Irish presenter, newsreader and continuity announcer on BBC Radio 4, BBC Radio 4 Extra and the BBC World Service.
Stephanie Hope Flanders is a British economist and journalist, currently the head of Bloomberg News Economics. She was previously chief market strategist for Britain and Europe for J.P. Morgan Asset Management, and before that was the BBC News economics editor for five years. Flanders is the daughter of British actor and comic singer Michael Flanders and disability campaigner Claudia Cockburn.
The Blue Peter pets are animals that regularly appear on the long-running BBC children's television series Blue Peter. For 27 years, when not on TV, these pets were often looked after by Blue Peter's long-standing pet keeper Edith Menezes, who died in 1994. The exceptions were the dogs Petra, Shep and Goldie, who lived with Peter Purves, John Noakes and Simon Groom, respectively, for which the three presenters were paid a stipend for their upkeep.
Midweek was a British weekly radio magazine series broadcast on BBC Radio 4. It was aired on Wednesday at 09.00 and repeated later the same day at 21.00. For most of its run it was presented by Libby Purves and each week several guests discussed various topics with her. Start the Week and Stop the Week, also broadcast on Radio 4, employed similar formats. The programme ended in March 2017 as part of a schedule change.
Sunday is a radio programme currently broadcast on BBC Radio 4 on Sunday mornings between 7.10 and 7.55 am. It features discussions of religious and ethical topics, looking in particular at those currently in the news. Although broadcast on a Sunday, the programme does not restrict itself to exclusively Christian stories and perspectives, but includes guest speakers from a variety of different religions. It was first broadcast on 6 September 1970.
Rosie Wilby is an English comedian and singer songwriter based in South London.
Tatler is a British magazine published by Condé Nast Publications. It focuses on fashion and lifestyle, as well as coverage of high society and politics. Targeted towards the British and global upper class and upper-middle class, as well as those interested in society events, its readership is the wealthiest of all Condé Nast's publications.
This is a list of events from British radio in 1950.
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