Neal Ascherson

{{Infobox person

| name = Neal Ascherson

| image = Neal Ascherson After Dark 10th July 1987.JPG

| alt = Neal Ascherson appearing on the television programme After Dark in 1987

| caption = Neal Ascherson on After Dark in 1987

| birth_name = Charles Neal Ascherson

| birth_date = {{birth date and age|1932|10|5}}

| birth_place = Edinburgh, Scotland

| nationality = Scottish

| alma_mater = King's College, Cambridge

| occupation = Journalist, writer, academic

| years_active = 1950s–present

| notable_works = Black Sea (1995)

| spouse = {{marriage|Corinna Adam|1958|1982|reason=divorced}}
{{marriage|Isabel Hilton|1984}}

| children = 4

| relatives = Renée Asherson (aunt)

}}

Charles Neal Ascherson (born 5 October 1932) is a Scottish journalist and writer. In his youth he fought for the British in the Malayan Emergency. He has been described by Radio Prague as "one of Britain's leading experts on central and eastern Europe". Ascherson is the author of several books on the history of Poland and Ukraine. His work has appeared in The Guardian and The New York Review of Books.

Early life

Ascherson was born in Edinburgh on 5 October 1932,{{Cite news | last = Wroe | first = Nicholas | date = 12 April 2003 | title = Romantic nationalist | url = https://www.theguardian.com/books/2003/apr/12/history.politics | work = The Guardian | access-date = 5 January 2016}} son of a Naval officer of Jewish ancestry and a mother from a London family of Scottish descent; his elder half-sister (by his father's first marriage) was the artist Pamela Ascherson.{{Cite web|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7dMR7_mQ33s |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211219/7dMR7_mQ33s |archive-date=2021-12-19 |url-status=live|title=Interview of Neal Ascherson – December 2016|via=www.youtube.com}}{{cbignore}} He was awarded a scholarship to Eton.{{Citation | date = 3 August 2014 | title = The SRB Interview: Neal Ascherson | url= https://www.scottishreviewofbooks.org/2014/08/the-srb-interview-neal-ascherson/ | journal = Scottish Review of Books | location = Musselburgh, Scotland | access-date = 26 January 2017 }}

= Military service =

Before going to university, he did his National Service as an officer in the Royal Marines, serving from July 1951{{London Gazette |issue= 39293 |date= 24 July 1951|page=3994}} to September 1952.{{London Gazette |issue=39657 |date= 30 September 1952 |page=5149}} During this time he fought in the Malayan Emergency against pro-independence and communist guerrillas belonging to the Malayan National Liberation Army. During the Malayan Emergency he witnessed the racial oppression of the native people at the hands of British forces, and once claimed to have seen a communist guerrilla shot dead in a vain attempt to save another wounded communist during a gunfight. These experiences later pushed him towards anti-imperialist politics.{{Cite book |last=Poole |first=Dan |title=Head Hunters in the Malayan Emergency: The Atrocity and Cover-Up |publisher=Pen and Sword Military |year=2023 |isbn=978-1399057417 |pages=9}}

= University education =

He then attended King's College, Cambridge, where he read history. The Marxist historian Eric Hobsbawm was his supervisor at Cambridge and described Ascherson as "perhaps the most brilliant student I ever had. I didn't really teach him much, I just let him get on with it."

Career

After graduating Ascherson declined offers to pursue an academic career. Instead, he chose a career in journalism, first at The Manchester Guardian and then at The Scotsman (1959–60; 1975–79), The Observer (1960–75; 1979–90) and The Independent on Sunday (1990–98). He contributed scripts for the documentary series The World at War (1973–74) and the Cold War (1998). He has also been a regular contributor to the London Review of Books.

Ascherson has occasionally been actively involved in politics. In 1976, while working as the Scottish political correspondent for The Scotsman, he joined the newly-founded Scottish Labour Party (SLP), a breakaway faction which was led out of the UK Labour Party by the MP Jim Sillars following disagreements over the party's policy on Scottish devolution. Ascherson, like Sillars an enthusiastic supporter of maximalist 'Home Rule', provided much favourable coverage of the new party, but the SLP was riven by internal dissension and was wound up after the 1979 general election.Jackson, Ben, The Case for Scottish Independence: A History of Nationalist Political Thought in Modern Scotland (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020), p. 101.Drucker, H. M., Breakaway: The Scottish Labour Party (Edinburgh: EUSPB, 1978), pp. 104, 108. Twenty years later, in the first election for the Scottish Parliament, he stood as the Liberal Democrat candidate in the West Renfrewshire constituency but was not successful.{{cite news |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/static/vote_99/scotland_99/html/constituency/65.stm |title=Vote 99: Scotland Constituencies & Regions. Renfrewshire West |work=BBC News |access-date=3 March 2017}} Ascherson supported the "Yes" (pro-independence) campaign in the 2014 Scottish independence referendum.{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/20/opinion/sunday/The-Independence-Referendum-Is-a-Test-of-Scotlands-Confidence.html |title=Scottish Independence Is Inevitable |first=Neal |last=Ascherson |newspaper=New York Times |date=18 July 2014 |access-date=31 December 2019}}

Ascherson has also lectured and written extensively about Polish and Eastern Europe affairs.{{cite web | year = 2004 | url = http://www.radio.cz/en/article/53851 | title = UK writer Neal Ascherson discusses NATO, EU on Prague visit | publisher = Radio Prague | access-date = 13 May 2004}}{{cite web | year = 2004 | url = http://www.radio.cz/en/article/54735 | title = Neal Ascherson – fascinating memories of the Soviet invasion and much more | publisher = Radio Prague | access-date = 8 June 2004}}{{As of|2016}} he is a visiting professor at the Institute of Archaeology, University College London.{{cite web|title=People: Staff: Honorary |url=http://www.ucl.ac.uk/archaeology/people/staff/honorary|work=Our Staff|publisher=UCL Institute of Archaeology |access-date=5 January 2016}} He has been editor of Public Archaeology, an academic journal associated with UCL devoted to CRM and public archaeology issues and developments, since its inception in 1999.{{cite book |author=Carman, John |year=2002 |title=Archaeology and Heritage: An Introduction |location=London and New York |publisher=Continuum International Publishing Group |isbn=0-8264-5894-7 |oclc=48140490}}

Awards and honours

In 1991 Ascherson was awarded an honorary degree from the Open University as Doctor of the University.{{Cite web|url=http://www.foliosociety.com/author/neal-ascherson|title=Neal Ascherson books – Folio Biography|website=The Folio Society |access-date=2017-01-17| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171111003452/http://www.foliosociety.com/author/neal-ascherson | archive-date= 11 November 2017|url-status=dead}} In 2011 he was elected Honorary Fellow{{Cite web|url=https://www.socantscot.org/about-us/honorary-fellows|website=www.socantscot.org|access-date=2023-09-23|title=Honorary Fellows}} of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland.

Personal life

Neal Ascherson's first wife was journalist Corinna Adam; the couple first met at Cambridge University and married in 1958. They had two daughters together before separating in 1974. The couple divorced in 1982.{{cite news|url=https://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/opinion/obituaries/article3367196.ece|title=Corinna Ascherson|work=The Times|date=29 March 2015|access-date=16 September 2015}} (subscription required) Corinna Ascherson, also a journalist, died in March 2012.Pavan Amara [http://www.camdennewjournal.com/news/2012/mar/rhyl-street-flat-blaze-victim-corinna-ascherson-idealistic-socialist-once-one-half-%E2%80%98jo "Rhyl Street flat blaze victim, Corinna Ascherson, an idealistic socialist once one half of ‘journalism’s golden couple’"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120908061122/http://www.camdennewjournal.com/news/2012/mar/rhyl-street-flat-blaze-victim-corinna-ascherson-idealistic-socialist-once-one-half-%E2%80%98jo |date=8 September 2012 }}, Camden New Journal, 15 March 2012

In 1984, Ascherson married his second wife, journalist Isabel Hilton. The couple currently live in London and have two children.

His aunt was the actress Renée Asherson.{{cite news |url=http://www.scotsman.com/news/obituaries/obituary-renee-asherson-actress-1-3595607 |title=Obituary: Renée Asherson, actress |first=Brian |last=Pendreigh |work=The Scotsman |date=6 October 2014 |access-date=5 January 2015}}

Bibliography

{{cite book | title=The King Incorporated: Leopold the Second and the Congo | isbn=1-86207-290-6 | year = 1963| last1=Ascherson | first1=Neal }}
{{cite book | title= The Polish August: The Self-limiting Revolution | isbn= 0-670-56305-6 | year= 1981 | url= https://archive.org/details/polishaugusts00asch | last1= Ascherson | first1= Neal }}
{{cite book | title= The Book of Lech Wałęsa | isbn= 0-671-45684-9 | year= 1982 | url= https://archive.org/details/bookoflechwaesa00asch | last1= Ascherson | first1= Neal }}
The Spanish Civil War (Granada Television serial script, 1983)
{{cite book | title=The Nazi Legacy | isbn=0-03-069303-9 | year=1984 | url=https://archive.org/details/nazilegacyklausb00link | last1=Linklater | first1=Magnus | last2=Hilton | first2=Isabel | last3=Ascherson | first3=Neal }} with Magnus Linklater and Isabel Hilton
{{cite book | title=The Struggles For Poland | isbn=0-7181-2812-5 | year=1987 | url-access=registration | url=https://archive.org/details/strugglesforpola0000asch | last1=Ascherson | first1=Neal }}
{{cite book | title=Games With Shadows | isbn=0-09-173019-8 | year = 1988| last1=Ascherson | first1=Neal }}
{{cite book | title=Black Sea | isbn=0-8090-3043-8 | year=1995 | url=https://archive.org/details/blacksea00asch | last1=Ascherson | first1=Neal }}
{{cite book | title=Stone Voices: The Search for Scotland | isbn=0-8090-8491-0 | year=2002 | url-access=registration | url=https://archive.org/details/stonevoicessearc0000asch_c3q4 | last1=Ascherson | first1=Neal }}
[https://web.archive.org/web/20120229165622/http://www.chinadialogue.net/article/summary/336-Opposition-to-Turkey-s-Ilisu-Dam-rises-again Opposition to Turkey's Ilisu Dam rises again] with Maggie Ronayne, published 27 November 2007, chinadialogue
{{cite book | title=Death of the Fronsac: A Novel | isbn=978-1786694379 | year = 2017| last1=Ascherson | first1=Neal }}
"A Mess of Tiny Principalities" (review of Simon Winder, Lotharingia: A Personal History of Europe's Lost Country, Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2019, 504 pp.), The New York Review of Books, vol. LXVI, no. 20 (19 December 2019), pp. 66–68.

References

External links

[https://www.theguardian.com/profile/nealascherson Neal Ascherson – Guardian]
[https://www.nybooks.com/contributors/neal-ascherson/ Neal Ascherson – New York Review of Books]
[https://web.archive.org/web/20060929073236/http://www.pfd.co.uk/clients/aschersn/b-aut.html Neal Ascherson's CV at PFD]
{{IMDb name | id=0038509 | name=Neal Ascherson}}
[http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/author/neal-ascherson Neal Ascherson – Prospect]
[https://www.sms.cam.ac.uk/media/2382634 Interviewed by Alan Macfarlane 14 December 2016 (video)]
[https://academic.oup.com/hwj/article/doi/10.1093/hwj/dbad020/7429464 Neal Ascheron talking to Andrew Whitehead about protest and politics in the late 1950s and 1960s]

Category:1932 births

Category:Alumni of King's College, Cambridge

Category:Living people

Category:Scottish people of German-Jewish descent

Category:People associated with the UCL Institute of Archaeology

Category:People educated at Eton College

Category:Writers from Edinburgh

Category:Scottish male novelists

Category:Scottish male essayists

Category:Scottish male journalists

Category:Journalists from Edinburgh

Category:20th-century Scottish male writers