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Ken Worpole

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Ken Worpole
BornJune 1944
OccupationWriter and Social Historian
EducationSouthend High School for Boys
Brighton College of Education
Notable awardsHonorary Doctorate, Middlesex University

Fellowship, Foundation for Urban & Regional Studies

Leverhulme Emeritus Fellowship
SpouseLarraine Worpole (m.1965)
Children2

Ken Worpole (born 1944) is a writer and social historian whose many books include works of literary criticism, architectural history, and landscape aesthetics, and was one of the editors of the 2001 United Nations Centre for Human Settlements (UNCHS) report, The State of the World’s Cities. In 2005 The Independent newspaper stated that: ‘For many years, Ken Worpole has been one of the shrewdest and sharpest observers of the English social landscape.’[1] In 2014 ICON Review similarly observed that ‘For well over 40 years Ken Worpole has been one of the most eloquent and forward thinking writers in Britain.’[2]

Early life

Worpole attended Southend High School for Boys before training as an English teacher at Brighton College of Education between 1965 and 1969. On completing his training, he moved to Hackney, teaching English at Hackney Downs School from 1969 to 1973.[3] He has been married to the photographer Larraine Worpole since 1965 and they have two children.[4]

Career

On leaving teaching Worpole worked as an oral historian and publisher for the Centerprise project in Hackney. In 1984 he was appointed Director of the Cultural Industries Unit at the Greater London Enterprise Board,[5] leaving in 1986 when the Greater London Council was abolished. Between 1986 and 1989 he worked as a Policy Adviser to Mark Fisher MP, Shadow Minister for the Arts.[6] Since then he has written or edited some 18 books, contributed chapters to many others, and been responsible for researching and writing a number of influential government and independent public policy reports, including Park Life: Urban Parks & Social Renewal,[7] People, Parks & Cities,[8] 21st Century Libraries[9] and Modern Hospice Design.[10]

His study of European cemetery design, Last Landscapes, was chosen as one of the ‘Books of the Year’ by Architects' Journal,[11] The New Statesman,[12] and the Glasgow Sunday Herald;[13] in The Times, books editor Erica Wagner named it as one of her Critic’s Choice of the best six books about death.[14] His study of hospice architecture in the UK, Modern Hospice Design, was the first major study of the hospice movement in Britain from the 1960s onwards, and their influence across the world. In 2015, a reviewer for Town & Country Planning journal wrote that: ‘I’ve been forced to confront a deeper sense of spirituality in a beautiful new book called New Jerusalem: The Good City and the Good Society. It is by the hugely influential architectural critic Ken Worpole and looks as wonderful as it reads.’[15] In July 2021, the editor of The New Statesman wrote: ‘Worpole is a literary original, a social and architectural historian whose books combine the Orwellian ideal of common decency with understated erudition.’ [16] 

Offices held

Worpole was a founder member of the think-tank, Demos,[17] a member of the UK Government’s Urban Green Spaces Task Force (2001 – 2002), a member of the Expert Panel of the Heritage Lottery Fund (2003 - 2008) and an Adviser to the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (2003 – 2008).[18][19][20] In 2006 he was appointed as a Senior Professor at The Cities Institute, London Metropolitan University,[21] retiring in 2011.

Honours and awards

Publications: books

  • The Republic of Letters, (edited with Dave Morley), Comedia, 1982
  • Dockers & Detectives, Verso Books, 1983, revised edition Five Leaves Books, 2008
  • Reading by Numbers, Comedia, 1984
  • Death in the City (with Melissa Benn), Canary Books, 1986
  • Saturday Night or Sunday Morning? (with Geoff Mulgan), Comedia, 1986
  • Towns for People, Open University Press, 1992, reprinted 1993
  • Staying Close to the River, Lawrence & Wishart, 1995
  • Libraries in a World of Cultural Change, (with Liz Greenhalgh & Charles Landry), UCL Press, 1992
  • Richer Futures: fashioning a new politics, (editor Ken Worpole), Earthscan, 1999
  • Here Comes the Sun: architecture and public space in 20th century European culture, (with photographer Larraine Worpole), Reaktion, 2001
  • Last Landscapes: the architecture of the cemetery in the West, (with photographer Larraine Worpole), Reaktion, 2003
  • 350 Miles: An Essex Journey, (with photographer Jason Orton), Essex County Council, 2005
  • Modern Hospice Design, Routledge, 2009
  • The New English Landscape, (with photographer Jason Orton), Field Station: London, 2013, reprinted 2015
  • Contemporary Library Architecture, Routledge, 2015
  • New Jerusalem: The Good City and the Good Society, Swedenborg Society, 2015, reprinted 2017
  • So We Live: The novels of Alexander Baron (with Susie Thomas & Andrew Whitehead), Five Leaves, 2019
  • No matter how many skies have fallen: back to the land in wartime Britain, Little Toller Books, 2021

References

  1. ^ ‘Pick of the Picture Books’, The Independent, 23 September 2005
  2. ^ ICON Architecture
  3. ^ Gazetteer of The Staff at Hackney Downs School
  4. ^ (www.communitysites.co.uk), Community Sites. "The Mothers' Hospital | Larraine and Ken Worpole | Patient stories | From Fever to Consumption - The Story of Healthcare in Hackney". Retrieved 9 November 2018.
  5. ^ Deborah Stevenson (2013). Cities of Culture: A Global Perspective. Routledge. pp. 56–58. ISBN 9781134084357.
  6. ^ Vicki Berger; Isabel Vasseur, eds. (1997). Arcadia Revisited: the place of landscape. Black Dog Publishing. p. 203. ISBN 9781901033700.
  7. ^ Park Life
  8. ^ Greenhalgh, Liz; Ken Worpole (1996). People, parks & cities: a guide to current good practice in urban parks : a report for the Department of the Environment. London: HMSO. OCLC 39116265.
  9. ^ National web archives
  10. ^ Modern Hospice Design. ISBN 9780415451802.
  11. ^ Architects' Journal, 20 December 2004, p.28
  12. ^ New Statesman, 1/12/2003, p.48
  13. ^ Glasgow Sunday Herald, 5 December 2004, p.10
  14. ^ The Times, 29 April 2006
  15. ^ T&CPA, December 2015
  16. ^ Jason Cowley, The New Statesman, 30 July 2021
  17. ^ Demos
  18. ^ Council for the Preservation of Rural England, 2012, Interview with Ken Worpole
  19. ^ Worpole, Ken (10 November 2004). "Essex: England's frontier territory". The Guardian. Retrieved 9 November 2018.
  20. ^ "Green Spaces Investigative Committee "Scrutiny of Green Spaces in London November 2001"" (PDF). Greater London Authority.
  21. ^ See Ken Worpole, founder member of Opendemocracy & Senior Professor at London Metropolitan University
  22. ^ Peter Neal (27 November 2003). Urban Villages & the Making of Communities. Spon Press. pp. 203, ix. ISBN 9781134504114.
  23. ^ Leverhulme Awards made in 2012: Emeritus Fellowships
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