David Astor
‘I did not let Kim Philby go. He gave me the slip’: what an MI6 spy told me over lunch
A new TV series highlights the part played by the UK intelligence service’s Nicholas Elliott in unmasking the 1960s Cambridge spy ring – events he recalled years later over lunch at his club
William Keegan
31, Dec, 2022 @3:00 PM
Reading Donald Trelford’s history of a public friend and companion
The former Observer editor’s book tells how newspapers have an existence of their own – and sometimes their lives need saving
Peter Preston
19, Nov, 2017 @7:00 AM
Observer 225 timeline: a liberal voice in a changing world
The Observer has been fighting its corner for more than two centuries. We pick through the highlights of a distinguished and controversial history
• Click here for more on the Observer at 225
• Click here for more on the Observer at 225
Euan Ferguson
04, Dec, 2016 @12:05 AM
‘There are many mysteries surrounding Kim Philby’s appointment at the Observer’
The Soviet spy and Middle East correspondent for the Observer exposed the British establishment – and not only to the Russians
• Click here for more on the Observer at 225
• Click here for more on the Observer at 225
Robert McCrum
04, Dec, 2016 @12:05 AM
‘The Observer’s women’s page pushed open the doors for the best women writers’
The days of female journalists being asked to buy presents for the editor’s wife are long gone, thanks to trailblazers after the second world war
• Click here for more on the Observer at 225
• Click here for more on the Observer at 225
Rachel Cooke
04, Dec, 2016 @12:05 AM
Patience Akumu: ‘I can express myself in ways I never could in Uganda’
The winner of the David Astor award in 2013 tells how writing for the Observer changed her career as a journalist in Africa
• Click here for more on the Observer at 225
• Click here for more on the Observer at 225
Patience Akumu
04, Dec, 2016 @12:05 AM
Neal Ascherson: ‘I was right in the middle of the 1960s convulsions throughout Europe’
The Observer’s cold war-era foreign correspondent recalls his early days as Kim Philby’s gofer, and the giants who dominated the paper’s early postwar era
Neal Ascherson
04, Dec, 2016 @12:04 AM
‘I took my appeal for help to the Observer... where words become actions’
The John’s Campaign founder tells how the Observer supported her fight for better dementia care, joining a long list of campaigns fought by the paper
• Click here for more on the Observer at 225
• Click here for more on the Observer at 225
Nicci Gerrard
04, Dec, 2016 @12:04 AM
Read all about it: the history that made the Observer’s front page
After 150 years of greeting the world with adverts, wartime newsprint rations and a new editor changed the paper’s format – it would never look the same again
• Click here for more on the Observer at 225
• Click here for more on the Observer at 225
Stephen Pritchard
03, Dec, 2016 @11:50 PM
David Astor: transformative Observer editor and founder of Amnesty International
David Astor: transformative Observer editor and founder of Amnesty International
03, Mar, 2016 @2:59 PM
David Astor by Jeremy Lewis review – definitive life of a Fleet Street great
A fine biography of the privileged amateur who gave the Observer its journalistic DNA in the postwar era
Robert McCrum
28, Feb, 2016 @7:30 AM
Why my father David Astor was right to campaign for Myra Hindley
David Astor’s support of the Moors murderer fits in with his lifetime of fighting injustice
Richard Astor
28, Feb, 2016 @12:04 AM
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