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Adam Nicolson

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For the Canadian football player, see Adam Nicolson (Canadian football).

Adam Nicolson
Born (1957-09-12) 12 September 1957 (age 66)
Bransgore, England
OccupationWriter
NationalityBritish
Alma materMagdalene College, Cambridge
Period1981 to present
Genrehistory, memoir, nature, place

Adam Nicolson, 5th Baron Carnock, FRSL, FSA (born 12 September 1957) is an English author who has written about history, landscape, great literature and the sea.

He is noted for his books Sea Room (about the Shiant Isles, a group of uninhabited islands in the Hebrides); God's Secretaries: the making of the King James Bible; Sissinghurst: an Unfinished History (describing his attachment to his family home and his plans to transform the landscape there); and The Mighty Dead (US title:Why Homer Matters) exploring the epic Greek poems as a powerful voice both in his own life and in European culture.

Biography

Adam Nicolson is the son of writer Nigel Nicolson and his wife Philippa Tennyson-d'Eyncourt. He is the grandson of the writers Vita Sackville-West and Sir Harold Nicolson. He was educated at Summer Fields School,[1] Eton College where he was a King's Scholar, and Magdalene College, Cambridge. He has worked as a journalist and columnist on the Sunday Times, the Sunday Telegraph and the Daily Telegraph and writes regularly for National Geographic Magazine and Granta, where he is a contributing editor. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, the Society of Antiquaries and the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland.

He has made several television series (with Keo Films) and radio series (with Tim Dee, the writer and radio producer) on subjects as diverse as the King James Bible, 17th-century literacy, Crete, Homer, the idea of Arcadia, the untold story of Britain's 20th-century whalers and the future of Atlantic seabirds.

Nicolson has three sons, Thomas (born in 1984), William (born 1986) and Ben (born 1988).[2] Since 1992 Nicolson has been married to Sarah Raven. They have two daughters, Rosie (born 1993) and Molly (born 1996) and live at Perch Hill Farm[3] in Sussex.

Between 2005 and 2009, in partnership with the National Trust, Nicolson led a project which transformed the 260 acres (110 ha) surrounding the house and garden at Sissinghurst into a productive mixed farm, growing meat, fruit, cereals and vegetables for the National Trust restaurant.[4]

In December 2008 he succeeded his cousin David Nicolson, 4th Baron Carnock as 5th Baron Carnock.[5]

Awards and recognition

Books

  • The National Trust Book of Long Walks (1981)
  • Long Walks in France (1983)
  • Frontiers (1985)
  • Wetland (1987)
  • Two Roads to Dodge City (1988) with Nigel Nicolson
  • Prospects of England (1990)
  • Restoration: Rebuilding of Windsor Castle (1997)
  • Regeneration: The Story of the Dome (1999)
  • Perch Hill: A New Life (2000)
  • Mrs Kipling (2001)
  • Sea Room (2001)
  • Power and Glory: the Making of the King James Bible (US edition title: God's Secretaries) (2003) (reissued in 2011 as When God Spoke English)
  • Seamanship (2004)
  • Men of Honour: Trafalgar and the Making of the English Hero (US edition title: Seize the Fire: Heroism, Duty, and the Battle of Trafalgar) (2005)
  • Earls of Paradise (US edition title: Quarrel with the King) (2008)
  • Sissinghurst: An Unfinished History (2008/US revised edition 2010)
  • Arcadia: The Dream of Perfection in Renaissance England (a revised paperback edition of Earls of Paradise) (2009)
  • The Smell of Summer Grass (an updated edition of Perch Hill) (2011)
  • The Gentry: Stories of the English (2011)
  • The Mighty Dead: Why Homer Matters (US edition title: Why Homer Matters) (2014)

Television

  • Atlantic Britain Channel 4, 2004
  • Sissinghurst BBC 4, 2009
  • When God Spoke English: The Making of the King James Bible BBC 4, 2011
  • The Century That Wrote Itself BBC 4, 2013
  • Britain's Whale Hunters BBC 4, 2014
  • The Last Seabird Summer? BBC 4, 2016

Radio

  • Homer’s Landscapes 3 x 45 mins, BBC Radio 3, 2008
  • A Cretan Spring 5 x 15 mins, with Sarah Raven, BBC Radio 3, 2009
  • Dark Arcadias 2 x 45 mins, BBC Radio 3, 2011

References

  1. ^ Adam Nicolson. Prepared for Anything. The Times Magazine, 25 June 1994. pages 24–30.
  2. ^ Adam Nicolson, 5th Baron Carnock
  3. ^ Perch Hill Farm
  4. ^ Sunday Times, 8 February 2009
  5. ^ rexfeatures.com Rex Features 31 January 2009, Adam Nicolson, 5th Baron Carnock at home at Sissinghurst Castle

External links

Peerage of the United Kingdom
Preceded by Baron Carnock
2008–present 		Incumbent
Heir apparent:
Hon. Thomas Nicolson
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