Interviews

William Dalrymple shares his impressions of modern India

Monday, 14 June 2010 09:23
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From the Herald Saturday magazine, June 14.

A travel writer who, after 25 years of immersion in Asia has graduated to a historian, William Dalrymple is fired up about his next project. “It’s about the First Afghan War: 2,100 East India Company troops march into Afghanistan in 1839, one single Brit rides out three years later,” he says, with obvious relish. Dalrymple has recently returned to India from a month in Afghanistan where he is excited to have found five previously untranslated Dari chronicles about the war. This, he feels, will enable him to “give the Afghan perspective” on that forgotten imperial adventure.

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Kathleen Marshall Interview

Tuesday, 21 April 2009 09:22
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What they long for is people who care' - Education Guardian

Kathleen Marshall, the first UK children's commissioner to leave office, tells Jackie Kemp she has never been a fan of playing safe

The ground-floor office a few doors up from the Scottish parliament on Edinburgh's Holyrood Road has neat venetian blinds and two doors. One is unashamedly dull. The second, smaller door, is shiny, has a bejewelled handle, and is painted with images of mermaids and enchanted forests. Just inside, where other offices have coatstands, is a cardboard wishing tree. Someone has written on one of its paper leaves in a round, firm hand: "I wish I had more one-to-one time with key children."

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Louise Richardson Interview

Tuesday, 17 March 2009 09:27
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Education Guardian.

Louise Richardson, the new head of St Andrews, will bring 'American attitudes' to admissions and to red tape, she tells Jackie Kemp. 

University of St Andrews

St Andrews University ... Louise Richardson was previously the dean of a Harvard college

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'Singing has helped me to cope and to come through'

Monday, 21 February 2005 11:55
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WHEN Rachel Brand discovered she had a brain tumour, her life was turned upside down. The management consultant, who is in her 30s, underwent surgery. Yet two years later, she had to cope with the news that the tumour was growing back and that she faced more surgery followed by radiotherapy.

Not surprisingly, she has struggled with feelings of depression and isolation. But Rachel's saving grace has been a surprising one - singing. During a period off work after her first diagnosis she decided to pursue her love of jazz and singing, an interest she had put to one side for many years. Soon she found herself heading north from her London home to Edinburgh where she took a five-day course with jazz vocalists and teachers Fionna Duncan and Sophie Bancroft. It changed her life.

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