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Zoe Williams

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For the TV doctor and former Gladiators participant, see Zoe Williams (physician).

Zoe Williams
Born (1973-08-07) 7 August 1973 (age 51)[1]
Hounslow, Greater London, England
EducationLincoln College, Oxford (BA)
Occupation(s)Journalist, columnist, author
EmployerThe Guardian
Children2

Zoe Abigail Williams[2] (born 7 August 1973)[3] is a British[4] left-wing[5][6] columnist, journalist, and author.

Early life

Zoe Abigail Williams was born on 7 August 1973 in Hounslow, Greater London, England. Williams was educated at the independent Godolphin and Latymer School for girls in London and read modern history at Lincoln College, Oxford.[7] Her father, Mark Williams, was a psychologist,[8][9] and her mother was a set designer for the BBC.[10] Her parents separated in 1976 and divorced 20 years later.[11] Williams has an older sister[12] and half- and step-siblings from her father's marital and extramarital[12] relationships. Williams said her father was a petty criminal because he committed insurance fraud.[8][13]

Writing

Williams is a lifestyle, wellness and political journalist for The Guardian, with her Fitness in your 40s, family and political columns. Her work has also appeared in other publications, including the New Statesman, The Spectator, NOW Magazine,[14] the London Cycling Campaign's magazine London Cyclist, and The Times Literary Supplement.[15] She is also a columnist for the London Evening Standard, for which she was a diarist writing about being a single woman in London. She reviewed restaurants for The Sunday Telegraph magazine.[16]

In May 2011, Williams wrote about fare dodging when in her 30s while travelling on London buses. She wrote: "I actually had a lot of affection for bendy buses, mainly because evading your fare was so easy that to pay was almost missing the point. We used to call it freebussing."[17][18]

Political

In 2014, Williams defended the social policy legacy of former Labour prime minister Tony Blair and denounced those calling him a war criminal.[19] Following the death of Fidel Castro, Williams condemned his rule in Cuba, while imploring her readers to ignore his policies.[20] In August 2015, Williams endorsed Jeremy Corbyn's campaign in the Labour Party leadership election. She wrote in The Guardian: "The point is, Corbyn doesn't have to be right about everything; he doesn't have to be certain, and fully costed about everything; he doesn't even have to be responsive and listening to everything. This political moment is about breaking open the doors and letting the 21st century in."[21]

Feminism

Williams writes about her personal life from a feminist perspective, such as her seven marriages,[22] motherhood, and her abortion.[23][24]

She wrote Bring It On, Baby: How to have a dudelike pregnancy, a 2010 book of advice for mothers-to-be, which was republished in 2012 as What Not to Expect When You're Expecting.[16]

Awards

Williams was longlisted for the Orwell Prize in 2012,[25][26] and was named Columnist of the Year 2010 at the WorkWorld Media Awards.[27]

Broadcasting

Williams has appeared as a guest on television. Clive James praised her appearance in documentary Teenage Kicks: the Search for Sophistication: "The brilliant journalist Zoe Williams did a short piece to camera that was almost an aria."[28] She has presented a radio documentary, Inside the Academy School Revolution, which Miranda Sawyer found one-sided and "tame",[29] and hosted BBC Radio 4's What The Papers Say. She has been a panellist on the BBC's Any Questions[30] and Question Time.[31]

Criticism

In February 2020, Williams was criticised online and in Nation.Cymru for her comments about the Welsh language. Her article on exercise criticised a particular Canadian fitness regime as "hard and existentially pointless", continuing: "all that energy spent, no distance covered: it's like eating cottage cheese or learning Welsh."[32][4] Williams had previously praised the language on Twitter for giving Welsh speakers "a more international outlook".[4][33]

In 2020, Kent Live reported criticism of Williams following an altercation that resulted in Williams being told to leave a Wetherspoons pub in Ramsgate, on the basis that she had broken the COVID-19 lockdown rules then in force.[34] Williams had written about the incident in The Guardian.[35]

Personal life

Williams lives in South London with her second husband, Will Higham, and his daughter from another marriage, as well as her son, Thurston,[36] and daughter, Harper,[37] who were fathered by her first husband before she married him.[38] Williams married the father, a geologist,[39] of her son and daughter[40] in 2013, after ten years together, and wrote about the wedding from a feminist perspective in her column for The Guardian.[41][42] In 2018, after a divorce, Williams married for the second time.[38]

Williams became a trustee of the Butler Trust[43]—which was established to recognise the achievements of prison service staff—in November 2013.[2]

She is a patron of Humanists UK.[44]

References

  1. ^ Williams, Zoe (7 August 2023). "I am 50 today – and I no longer care what anyone thinks about my age". The Guardian.
  2. ^ a b "Zoe Abigail WILLIAMS - Personal Appointments (free information from Companies House)". find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk.
  3. ^ England & Wales, Civil Registration Birth Index, 1916-2007. General Register Office; United Kingdom; Reference: Volume 5c, p. 1094.
  4. ^ a b c "Guardian criticised after suggesting Welsh language is pointless". Nation.Cymru. 2 February 2020. Retrieved 30 April 2020.
  5. ^ Williams, Zoe (27 September 2018). "Do you boast about your fitness? Watch out – you'll unavoidably become rightwing". The Guardian.
  6. ^ Williams, Zoe (27 November 2016). "Forget Fidel Castro's policies. What matters is that he was a dictator". The Guardian.
  7. ^ Marrin, Minette (17 May 2009). "When today's left speaks it is right-wing bigotry we hear". The Sunday Times. Archived from the original on 17 May 2009. Retrieved 30 April 2020 – via Times Online.
  8. ^ a b "Boris Johnson's county court judgment actually made me feel sorry for him | Zoe Williams". The Guardian. 14 May 2021.
  9. ^ "Cost of living? What about the cost of being dead? | Zoe Williams". The Guardian. 21 January 2014.
  10. ^ "Zoe Williams decides to call in the dog therapist". The Guardian. 14 October 2005.
  11. ^ Williams, Zoe (1 June 2007). "Talking heads". Marie Claire. Archived from the original on 1 April 2012. Retrieved 30 April 2020.
  12. ^ a b "Zoe Williams on Ian McEwan's discovery of a long-lost brother". The Guardian. 18 January 2007.
  13. ^ "Was my grandfather really Britain's top communist? | Zoe Williams". The Guardian. 20 June 2018.
  14. ^ "Now price cut and celeb boost follows rival launch". Press Gazette. 9 October 2002. Archived from the original on 24 June 2013.
  15. ^ "All-Out Wars," TLS (20 December 2019), p. 26.
  16. ^ a b "Zoe Williams". Goldsmiths, University of London. Retrieved 16 May 2021.
  17. ^ Maguire, Kevin (27 October 2011). "Champagne or sham pain". New Statesman. Retrieved 30 April 2020.
  18. ^ Williams, Zoe (27 May 2011). "Boris Johnson and the Routemaster: soft edges and cheerful demeanour". The Guardian. Retrieved 30 April 2020.
  19. ^ Zoe Williams (8 April 2014). "Stop calling Tony Blair a war criminal. The left should be proud of his record". The Guardian. Retrieved 30 April 2020.
  20. ^ Williams, Zoe (27 November 2016). "Forget Fidel Castro's policies. What matters is that he was a dictator". The Guardian. Retrieved 25 February 2017.
  21. ^ Williams, Zoe (16 August 2015). "Corbynomics must smash this cosy consensus on debt". The Guardian. Retrieved 30 April 2020.
  22. ^ "Why I married late: a feminist's guide". The Guardian. 24 August 2013.
  23. ^ "Zoe Williams: Is the right to abortion under threat?". The Guardian. 27 October 2006.
  24. ^ "Zoe Williams: I have. I'm not ashamed". The Guardian. 4 July 2006.
  25. ^ "Zoe Williams". Orwell Prize. Orwell Foundation. Retrieved 30 April 2020.
  26. ^ "Orwell prize: four Guardian journalists nominated". The Guardian. 31 March 2012. Retrieved 30 April 2020.
  27. ^ "David Cohen named reporter of the year at WorkWorld Media Awards". Press Gazette. 19 January 2011. Retrieved 30 April 2020.
  28. ^ James, Clive (7 October 2011). "Clive James on... Grand Designs and Dragons' Den". The Telegraph. Telegraph Media Group. Retrieved 30 April 2020.(subscription required)
  29. ^ Sawyer, Miranda (9 December 2012). "Rewind radio: The Kitchen Cabinet; The Budget; Inside the Academy School Revolution; Breakfast; The Atkinson People – review". The Observer. Retrieved 30 April 2020 – via The Guardian.
  30. ^ "BBC Radio 4 - Any Questions? and Any Answers?, AQ: Lord Heseltine, Suzanne Evans, Tristram Hunt MP, and Zoe Williams". BBC.
  31. ^ "BBC One - Question Time, 03/03/2016". BBC.
  32. ^ Fit in my 40s: Canada's Air Force fitness drills are a retro, noisy tonic, The Guardian, 1 February 2020
  33. ^ @zoesqwilliams (8 February 2019). "Interesting factette: of actual Welsh speakers, only 16 percent voted Leave. There's a hypothesis that learning a l…" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  34. ^ James, John (2 November 2020). "'Gobsmacked' writer kicked out of Spoons for 'social distancing infractions'". KentLive. Retrieved 21 April 2021.
  35. ^ Williams, Zoe (1 November 2020). "Think the coronavirus rules aren't being enforced? My Wetherspoon's run-in says otherwise". The Guardian.
  36. ^ "Guardian staff test out the US trend of bringing baby to work". The Guardian. 8 April 2008.
  37. ^ "Caesareans are not the posh option". The Guardian. 8 October 2009.
  38. ^ a b "I do, again: 'There is nothing as deadly serious as a second marriage'". The Guardian. 5 May 2018. Retrieved 1 March 2021.
  39. ^ "Zoe Williams: 'I'd choose the school play over interviewing Barack Obama'". www.managementtoday.co.uk.
  40. ^ "Live chat on parenting with Zoe Williams". The Guardian. 8 June 2010. Retrieved 30 April 2020.
  41. ^ Zoe Williams (24 August 2013). "Why I married late: a feminist's guide". The Guardian. Retrieved 30 April 2020.
  42. ^ Zoe Williams (11 April 2008). "Zoe Williams: My boyfriend is right". The Guardian. Retrieved 30 April 2020.
  43. ^ "When prison works: inside New Hall, the women's prison where inmates are equals". The Guardian. 30 January 2015.
  44. ^ "Zoe Williams". Humanists UK. Retrieved 10 December 2012.
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