AUTHORS

Julie Burchill
3 Jul 1959, Bristol
 
Julie Burchill has been a journalist since the age of 17, first on the NME (pictured) and later on national broadsheet and tabloid newspapers.
She has published twelve books, including the best-selling Ambition, one of three novels, and an autobiography, and currently works for the Guardianand the News of the World. She has been married twice and has two sons. A play about her life and career, Julie Burchill is Away, premiered in London in the summer of 2002. Her bookSugar Rush is published by Macmillan in 2003. A story of underage lesbianism, set in Brighton where she has lived for seven years, Julie comments in her own inimitable style, "I am pleased that it has already been condemned by family-values pressure groups as an act of wickedness".

Lewis Carroll
27 Jan 1832, Cheshire
 
Educated at Rugby School and Christ Church, Oxford, the Revd Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, who wrote under the pseudonym Lewis Carroll, is best known as a writer of childrenÌs literature. His most famous story is Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, originally told to the three daughters of the Dean of Christ Church, Henry Liddell, during a boating trip. One of the girls, Alice, was the inspiration for the books eponymous heroine.
A contemporary and acquaintance of Alfred Lord Tennyson and George MacDonald, Carroll was ordained as a deacon in the Church of England in 1861 and lived most of his life in academia. His most famous work was published in 1865, followed by Through the Looking Glass in 1871 and The Hunting of the Snarkin 1876. He was a prolific author and as well as his childrens literature wrote books on mathematics, volumes of poetry and pamphlets on an eclectic range of topical subjects.
Carroll was a regular visitor to Brighton staying with his sister Henrietta at 11 Sussex Square. The communal gardens of the square contain a tunnel, which is said to be the inspiration for the beginning of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland where Alice follows the white rabbit down a rabbit hole and enters wonderland.

Graham Greene
2 Oct 1904, Berkhamsted
 
Educated at Berkhamsted School (where his father was housemaster and then headmaster) and Balliol College Oxford, Graham Greene wrote one of the most famous books about Brighton, Brighton Rock. Set in the 1930s and depicting the seedy world of vicious race gangs, the book was turned into a famous film starring fellow Walk of Fame celebrity Sir Richard Attenborough who played the lead role, Pinkie Brown.
He worked for The Times and in the 1930s had a reputation for his film and book reviews published in the Spectator. But he is best known for his powerful novels exploring human moral dilemmas, the difference between good and evil and manÌs struggle to distinguish between them. This group of novels includes famous titles such asThe Power and the Glory, The Heart of the Matter,The End of the Affair and, of course, Brighton Rock.
Greene was a prolific writer and in addition to novels wrote what he termed "Entertainments" such as Our Man in Havana and Travels with My Aunt, which was partly set in Brighton, as well as plays, essays and verse.The Third Man was originally written as a film script and Greene later converted the script into a book. Many of his books have been turned into films.

James Herbert
8 Apr 1943, London
 
James Herbert is one of Britains most imitated and influential best-selling writers. His books have sold more than 50 million copies world-wide in 37 languages.Herbert was a successful art director working in advertising with accounts such as Barclays Bank, Harp Lager, Clairol and Chanel when he decided to start writing at weekends. His first book, which entirely changed the horror genre, as well as resuscitating it, wasThe Rats. The book was an instant success.Eventually the writing took over and he left advertising to produce 19 more novels including the horror classics The Fog, The Dark and The Survivor as well as The Magic Cottage, Haunted Shrine, Sepulchre, Others(which featured Brighton) and Once.
He has been quoted as saying, 'One of my great themes is redemption. I am a Catholic so I guess that’s been ingrained in me for years. It also taught me about the supernatural'. James Herbert is happily married, with three daughters and two dogs and lives just 12 miles outside of Brighton.

Derek Jameson
1929, London
 
Derek Jameson was born into a humble background in the East End of London. At the outbreak of the Second World War he was evacuated to Hert-fordshire and came under the influence of school teacher Ernest Hare. Sensing potential in the boy Hare bought him a season ticket to the local twopenny library, "The simple act still brings tears to my eyes", Jameson has said. "The personal interest of that one teacher was the spur that carried me through life."
At 14 he worked as a messenger for Reuters and two years later became a reporter. After National Service he returned to Reuters and left ten years later as Chief Sub-Editor of the agency. Through the 1960s and 1970s he worked his way up the newspaper hierarchy to become editor of the Daily Express, Daily Star and News of the World, making a name as a circulation builder.
The 1980s saw him bankrupt and out of work, mainly due to a high-profile libel action against the BBC, which he lost. Ironically, it was the BBC that set his career off in another direction and by 1984 he was a radio presenter and the highest paid figure in television.
Derek Jameson lived on Hove seafront and wrote a regular column for the local paper, the Argus. In early 2002 he moved to America.

Rudyard Kipling
30 Dec 1865, Bombay
 
Rudyard Kipling came to England from India at the age of five. He was educated in England at the United Services College at Westward Ho! in Devon and returned to India for his early career as a journalist. He married Caroline Balestier and had three children, Josephine, Elsie and John.
In 1889 he returned to London and gained literary success on the publication of his first volume of short stories, Plain Tales from the Hills (1888) followed by a first collection of poems, Barrack-Room Ballads. In 1907 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature and during his lifetime became a personal friend of King George V.
From 1987 to 1902 Kipling lived at The Elms in Rottingdean on the outskirts of Brighton. He wrote some of his most famous books there including Kim, The Just So Stories and Stalky & Co. In 1902 he moved to Bateman's in the Sussex village of Burwash. He claimed that he had become one of Brighton's tourist attractions and wanted peace and quiet in which to write.
Apart from the Novel Prize, Kipling refused all public honours, twice turning down a Knighthood and the Order of Merit. He also declined the Poet Laureateship. He was, however, referred to as the unofficial laureate of the British Empire.

Sir Terence Rattigan
10 Jun 1911, London
 
By the age of 25 Terence Rattigan was the highest earning playwright in England. Educated at Harrow and Trinity College, Oxford, his first success came in 1936 with French Without Tears. He went on to pen over 20 plays and had a string of hits between 1936 and 1956 including The Browning Version, The Winslow Boy and Separate Tables.
In 1959 he received the Best Screenplay award at the Cannes Film Festival for the film adaptation of his own play The Browning Version. Nominated for seven Academy Awards, including Best Screenplay for Separate Tables and Breaking The Sound Barrier, he also collaborated with fellow Walk of Fame writer Graham Greene on the screen play of Brighton Rock.
Although immensely popular in the early half of the century, Rattigan began to go out of fashion in the '60s with the success of writers like John Osborne and the arrival of kitchen sink dramas.
Rattigan Is best-known character was Aunt Edna, a personality that epitomised the "common theatre goer". He described her as a "nice, respectable, middle-class, middle-aged maiden lady with time on her hands and money to help her pass it, who resides in a West Kensington hotel."
The latter part of his career looked to Hollywood, writing screen plays for classic films such as Goodbye Mr Chips. He lived in Marine Parade in Brighton for several years in the 1960s, but ill-health and tax forced him into a premature semi-retirement in Bermuda.

Dr Anthony Seldon
2 Aug 1953, London
 
Anthony Seldon is one of country's leading authorities on contemporary history. He has written and edited 20 books including the authorised biography of John Major,Major, A Political Life, The Thatcher Effect,ChurchillÌs Indian Summer and Conservative Century, published by Oxford University Press and the standard academic history of the subject.
Later books include The Powers Behind the Prime Minister, co-written with Professor Dennis Kavanagh,Britain Under Thatcher, Number 10: The Illustrated History, and The Foreign Office: A History of the Place and its People. In 2001, he published The Blair Effect, which is now the leading book on the first Blair government. In 2002 he published Brave New City, a book about Brighton and Hove that provides a vision for the city over the next 10 years. Currently he is writing Tony Blair's biography.
Dr Seldon appears frequently on radio and writes for several national newspapers. He also co-founded the Institute of Contemporary British History, an internationally respected body whose aim is to promote research into, and the study of, British history since 1945.
Dr Seldon's day job is Headmaster of Brighton College, one of the city's most prestigious independent schools. After gaining an MA at Worcester College, Oxford, and a PhD at the London School of Economics, he qualified as a teacher at King's College London. His first teaching appointment was at Whitgift School in Croydon in 1983, where he was Head of Politics. He then moved to Tonbridge and later to St DunstanÌs College in South London before taking the top job at Brighton College in 1997. He lives in Brighton with his wife, Joanna, and their three children.

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Jack Tinker
15 Feb 1938, Oldham
 
Jack Tinker was one of the most eminent British theatre critics of the late 20th century. Reviewing up to five plays a week, interviewing and producing a weekly column for the Daily Mail, his output was staggering and also included books, radio programmes, television scripts and an acclaimed one-man show.His early career included eight years on Brighton'sEvening Argus, first as court reporter and then as theatre and film critic, feature and leader writer. In 1968 he moved to the Daily Sketch and was appointed drama critic when it amalgamated with the Daily Mail in 1972.
Jack adopted Brighton as his hometown and it consistently provided the subject matter and inspiration for his work such as the radio programmes Brighton Lights, London to Brighton in Fifty Three Minutesand The Brighton Line. His one-man show, An Audience and a Critic played at the Brighton and Edinburgh Festivals and on the QE2. He also worked tirelessly for many Brighton charities including Brighton Cares.
The roll call of awards given to Jack is long and prestigious and includes West End Theatre Drama Critic of the Year (twice) and British Press Awards Critic of the Year (three times). In 2001 a Jack Tinker Award was created for the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.
He died on 28 October 1996. As a mark of respect the lights in LondonÌs West End theatres were switched off. Normally reserved for the elite of the acting profession, a theatre critic had never before been honoured in this way.

Adam Trimingha
9 Aug 1942, Abingdon
 
Adam Trimingham has spent almost his entire working life as a journalist after starting in 1960 on his local paper, the Kensington News.
He left London in 1967 to settle in Brighton and Hove. After two stints on the Brighton and Hove Herald and a brief period on the Argus in 1970, he returned to theArgus in 1974 where he has stayed.
Adam has covered local councils and politics since 1976. The following year he started writing a column which has run ever since. He also writes ostalgia pieces which appear every Saturday.
Adam is married with four children and lives in Hove.