Paul Ham

Ham was born in Sydney. From 1984 to 1998 he worked in London as a business and investment journalist for the Financial Times Group and The Sunday Times (as its investment editor, 1994–1998). In 1992 he co-founded a financial newsletter publishing company, whose titles included Governance and The Money Laundering Bulletin, which he sold in 1997. For part of that period Ham also worked part-time as the editor of Amnesty, the magazine of the British headquarters of Amnesty International. On his return to Australia in 1998, Ham was appointed the Australia correspondent for the London Sunday Times, a post he held for the next 15 years.

From 2000 to 2003 he wrote his first history, [https://www.harpercollins.com.au/9780732282325/kokoda/ Kokoda] – the story of the Kokoda Track campaign, the first land defeat of the Japanese in the Second World War; followed by Vietnam: The Australian War – a history of Australia's 15-year military involvement in Vietnam. Vietnam won the 2008 New South Wales Premier's History Award and was shortlisted for the Prime Minister's Literary Awards for non-fiction; both Vietnam and Kokoda were shortlisted for the Walkley Award for Non-Fiction. His next book, [https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250070050/hiroshimanagasaki/ Hiroshima Nagasaki], a controversial history of the atomic bomb, was shortlisted for the New South Wales Premier's History Awards, received an honorable mention in the Australian Prime Minister's Prize for History and was published to critical acclaim in the United States, Britain and Australia.{{citation needed|date=August 2024}}

In 2010, Ham co-wrote and presented the documentary [https://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/the-screen-guide/t/all-the-way-2011/28820/ All the Way], produced by November Films in conjunction with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), based on his history of the Vietnam War, which won the UN Media Peace Award. In 2008 he was involved in the production of a documentary based on Kokoda, produced by Pericles Films, the ABC and Screen Australia.{{IMDb title|qid=Q129581559|title=Kokoda|description=TV series 2010}} In 2012, Ham set up an electronic publishing business called Hampress, which published short ebooks and classic audiobooks.

In 2013, Ham published [https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/420530/1914-the-year-the-world-ended-by-paul-ham/9780552779852 1914: The Year the World Ended] in Britain and Australia, which won the Queensland Literary Award for non-fiction in 2014. His next book [https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/415265/sandakan-by-paul-ham/9781784164348 Sandakan: The Untold Story of the Sandakan Death Marches], was shortlisted for the Prime Minister's Literary Awards. In 2016–17, Penguin Random House published his books [https://www.penguin.com.au/books/passchendaele-9781864711455 Passchendaele: Requiem for Doomed Youth] and [https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/435525/young-hitler-by-paul-ham/9781784162726 Young Hitler: The Making of the Führer] in Australia and Britain. In 2017, Passchendaele won the NSW Premier's Prize for Non-Fiction.

Ham is the author of the weekly substack, [https://paulham.substack.com/ Who made our minds?], inspired by his book, The Soul. He was a regular contributor to Amazon's Kindle single platform, having published 1913, The Target Committee and, with the psychotherapist Bernie Brown, Honey, We Forgot the Kids, an examination of the state of families and childcare in the West.

{{citation needed-span|date=August 2024|text=Ham teaches narrative history at Sciences Po in France and has a master's degree in economic history from the London School of Economics and Political Science, a Bachelor of Arts (Communications) degree from Charles Sturt University and attended Scots College, Sydney. If he has time, Ham organises an annual poetry recital, The Big Fat Poetry Pig-Out, the proceeds of which go to selected charities.}}

• Kokoda, HarperCollins, 2004{{cite web|title= Kokoda by Paul Ham|publisher= National Library of Australia|url= https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/3234198 |access-date= 29 January 2025}}
• Vietnam: The Australian War, HarperCollins Australia, 2007{{cite web|title= Vietnam: The Australian War by Paul Ham|publisher= National Library of Australia|url= https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/4083257 |access-date= 29 January 2025}}
• Sandakan, Heinemann, 2012{{cite web|title= Sandakan by Paul Ham|publisher= National Library of Australia|url= https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/5815790 |access-date= 29 January 2025}}
• 1914: The Year the World Ended, Random House Australia, 2013{{cite web|title= 1914: The Year the World Ended by Paul Ham|publisher= National Library of Australia|url= https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/7288330 |access-date= 29 January 2025}}
• Yoko's Diary: The life of a young girl in Hiroshima during WWII, ABC Books, 2013 (translated by Debbie Edwards; edited by Paul Ham){{cite web|title= Yoko's Diary: The life of a young girl in Hiroshima during WWII edited by Paul Ham|publisher= National Library of Australia|url= https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record//6156072 |access-date= 29 January 2025}}
• 1913: The Eve of War (Endeavour Press 2013, Kindle single)
• Passchendaele: Requiem for Doomed Youth (Penguin Random House 2016–17)
• Young Hitler: The Making of the Führer (Penguin Random House 2017)
• The Target Committee (Endeavour Press 2018, Kindle single)
• Honey, We Forgot the Kids, with Bernie Brown (Hampress 2018, Kindle single)
• Godless (Random House Australia 2018) {{ISBN|9780143781332}}
• The Soul – A History of the Human Mind, Penguin Random House, 2024{{cite web|title= The Soul – A History of the Human Mind by Paul Ham|publisher= National Library of Australia|url= https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/10087935|access-date= 29 January 2025}}

{{reflist}}

• {{official website|https://www.paulham.com/}}

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Category:1960 births

Category:Living people

Category:Writers from Sydney

Category:Australian journalists

Category:21st-century Australian non-fiction writers