Viv Groskop (born 8 July 1973) [1] is a British journalist, writer and comedian. She has written for publications including The Guardian , Evening Standard , The Observer , Daily Mail , Mail on Sunday and Red magazine. [2] She writes on arts, books, popular culture and current affairs, identifying as a feminist. [3] Groskop is a stand-up comedian, [4] MC and improviser who was a finalist in Funny Women 2012 [5] and semi-finalist in So You Think You're Funny 2012. [6] She is an agony aunt for The Pool [7] and host of the Mint Velvet clothing podcast "We are Women". [8]
Groskop was born in Hampshire and, with her younger sister Trudy, was raised in Bruton, Somerset. She won a scholarship to Bruton School for Girls, and later read Russian and French at Selwyn College, Cambridge, graduating with a first-class degree. She has an MA with distinction in Russian Studies from UCL School of Slavonic and East European Studies. [9] From her teens, Groskop believed her surname was Russian, until a Canadian cousin [10] researched her family tree and discovered that the etymology of the Groskop name was Yiddish meaning "fathead", and that her Jewish great-great-grandfather Gershon Groskop had come to Great Britain in the 1860s from Łódź in Poland. [11] Gershon Groskop was also the great-grandfather of television presenter Gethin Jones. [12]
Groskop began her career in journalism at Esquire as an editorial assistant for Rosie Boycott at the age of 22. Groskop joined the Daily Express while Boycott was editor, becoming a columnist on the Sunday Express at the age of 25. She has been described as one of the most successful freelance journalists in the UK, [13] and has twice been short-listed for the Periodical Publishers Association Columnist of the Year. [14]
Groskop is a contributing editor at Russian Vogue . For the UK press, she has interviewed Russian speakers in their mother tongue – among them Marina Litvinenko, widow of the murdered Alexander Litvinenko [15] and Beslan school hostage crisis survivor Fatima Dzgoeva. [16] She has also conducted interviews in French, including one with the surviving daughter of Suite Francaise author Irène Némirovsky. [17]
Groskop's documentaries for BBC Radio 4 include It's Just a Joke, Comrade on Russian satire, [18] and L'origine de L'Origine du monde on the painting by Gustave Courbet. [19] She was a studio guest in the first TV edition of the BBC arts show Front Row . [20] [21] She appears occasionally on the Radio 4 programme Saturday Live , [22] [23] [24] Sky News, Radio 4's Today programme, [25] Any Questions , Front Row , [26] and Woman's Hour , [27] and on Nick Ferrari's LBC 97.3 programme. She blogged about Downton Abbey and Poldark for The Guardian. [28] [29]
She is the author of five books. Her first book, I Laughed, I Cried, is an account of Groskop performing one hundred comedy gigs in one hundred nights. It is described as "an experiment in doing what you want, even if it is terrifying, without giving up the day job". It was published by Orion on 27 June 2013. [30] Her second book, The Anna Karenina Fix, Life Lessons From Russian Literature, was published by Penguin on 5 October 2017. [31] Her third book, How to Own the Room, Women and the Art of Brilliant Speaking, was published by Transworld on 1 November 2018. [32] She launched a podcast of the same name in October 2018, [33] which was nominated for the Best Business Podcast award at the British Podcast Awards in 2021. [34]
Groskop was the artistic director of the Bath Literature Festival, the first season under her charge being held in February 2014, [35] and the last in 2016 when "the much-loved chief was waved off with a raucous party". [36]
James Anthony Patrick Carr is a British-Irish comedian, presenter, writer, and actor. He is known for his deadpan delivery of controversial one-liners, for which he has been both praised and criticised, and his distinctive laugh. He began his comedy career in 1997, and he has regularly appeared on television as the host of Channel 4 panel shows such as 8 Out of 10 Cats, 8 Out of 10 Cats Does Countdown and The Big Fat Quiz of the Year.
Lauren Cecilia Fisher, known professionally as Lauren Laverne, is an English radio DJ, model, television presenter, author and singer. She was the lead singer and additional guitarist in the alternative rock band Kenickie. The group's album At The Club reached the top 10, although her greatest chart success came when she performed vocals on Mint Royale's single "Don't Falter". Laverne has presented numerous television programmes, including 10 O'Clock Live for Channel 4, and The Culture Show and coverage of the Glastonbury Festival for the BBC. She has also written a published novel entitled Candypop: Candy and the Broken Biscuits. She presents the breakfast show on BBC Radio 6 Music, and in 2018 became the host of the long-running radio show Desert Island Discs.
Lisa Appignanesi is a British-Canadian writer, novelist, and campaigner for free expression. Until 2021, she was the Chair of the Royal Society of Literature, and is a former President of English PEN and Chair of the Freud Museum London. She chaired the 2017 Booker International Prize won by Olga Tokarczuk.
Josie Isabel Long is an English comedian. She started performing as a stand-up at the age of 14 and won the BBC New Comedy Awards at 17.
Amelia Mary Bullmore is an English actress, screenwriter and playwright. She is known for her roles in Coronation Street, I'm Alan Partridge (2002), Ashes to Ashes (2008–2009), Twenty Twelve (2011–2012) and Scott & Bailey (2011–2014). Bullmore began writing in 1994. Her writing credits include episodes of This Life, Attachments, Black Cab, and Scott & Bailey.
On 7 October 2006, Russian journalist, writer and human rights activist Anna Politkovskaya was shot dead in the elevator of her apartment block in central Moscow. She was known for her opposition to the Chechen conflict and for criticism of Vladimir Putin. She authored several books about the Chechen wars, as well as Putin's Russia, and received several international awards for her work. Her murder, believed to be a contract killing, sparked a strong international reaction. Three Chechens were arrested for the murder, but were acquitted. The verdict was overturned by the Supreme Court of Russia and new trials were held. In total, six people were convicted of charges related to her death.
Alexander Valterovich Litvinenko was a British-naturalised Russian defector and former officer of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) who specialised in tackling organised crime. A prominent critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, he advised British intelligence and coined the term "mafia state".
Andrey Konstantinovich Lugovoy, also spelled Lugovoi, is a Russian politician and businessman and deputy of the State Duma, the lower house of the Russian parliament, for the LDPR. He worked as a KGB bodyguard and as head of "Ninth Wave", a security firm.
Alexander Litvinenko was an officer of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) and its predecessor, the KGB, until he left the service and fled the country.
Blowing Up Russia: Terror from Within is a book written by Alexander Litvinenko and Yuri Felshtinsky. The authors describe the Russian apartment bombings as a false flag operation that was guided by the Russian Federal Security Service to justify the Second Chechen War and bring Vladimir Putin to power. The story was initially printed by Yuri Shchekochikhin in a special issue of Novaya Gazeta in August 2001 and published as a book in 2002. In Russia the book was prohibited because it divulged state secrets, and it was included in the Federal List of Extremist Materials. However, it was published in more than twenty other countries and translated into twenty languages.
The poison laboratory of the Soviet secret services, alternatively known as Laboratory 1, Laboratory 12, and Kamera, was a covert research-and-development facility of the Soviet secret police agencies. Prior to the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the laboratory manufactured and tested poisons and was reportedly reactivated by the Russian government in the late 1990s.
Bridget Louise Christie is an English stand-up comedian, actress and writer. She has written and performed 13 solo stand-up shows and several comedy tours, in addition to radio and television work.
Stacey Jaclyn Dooley is an English television presenter, journalist, and media personality. She came to prominence in 2008 as a participant on the documentary series Blood, Sweat and T-shirts. Since then, she has made social-issue-themed television documentaries for BBC Three, concerning child labour and women in developing countries.
Susan Grace Calman is a Scottish comedian, television presenter, writer and panellist on a number of BBC Radio 4 shows including The News Quiz and I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue.
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The former Today editor turned Sunday Times columnist Rod Liddle greets me with the words: 'I have headlice. You know - nits.' So, I smile to myself, there is a God. And He is a feminist.