Jump to content

Caitlin Moran

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by KolbertBot (talk | contribs) at 01:49, 21 June 2018 (Bot: HTTP→HTTPS (v485)). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

For the Australian rugby league player, see Caitlin Moran (rugby league).

Caitlin Moran
Caitlin Moran at the 2016 Hay Festival
Born
Catherine Elizabeth Moran

(1975-04-05) 5 April 1975 (age 49)
Brighton, England
Occupation(s)Journalist, author, broadcaster
Spouse
​
(m. 1999)​
Children2

Catherine Elizabeth "Caitlin" Moran (/ˈkætlɪn məˈræn/;[1] born 5 April 1975) is an English journalist, author, and broadcaster[2] at The Times, where she writes three columns a week: one for the Saturday Magazine, a TV review column, and the satirical Friday column "Celebrity Watch".

Moran is British Press Awards (BPA) Columnist of the Year for 2010, and both BPA Critic of the Year 2011 and Interviewer of the Year 2011.[3] In 2012, she was named Columnist of the Year by the London Press Club,[4] and Culture Commentator at the Comment Awards in 2013.[5]

Early life

Moran was born in Brighton, the eldest of eight children; she has four sisters and three brothers. Her father, who is Irish, was described by Aida Edemariam in The Guardian as a former "drummer and psychedelic rock pioneer" who became "confined to the sofa by osteoarthritis".[6] Moran lived in a three-bedroom council house in Wolverhampton with her parents and siblings, an experience she described as akin to The Hunger Games.[7]

Moran attended Springdale Junior School and was then educated at home from the age of 11, having attended secondary school for only three weeks.[8] She and her siblings received no proper formal education from their parents; the local council allowed them to do so, as they were "the only hippies in Wolverhampton".[7] The children frequently occupied their time with simple games, such as throwing mud at their house.[7] Moran describes her childhood as happy, but revealed she left home as soon as she was able to do so at the age of 18.[7]

Journalism and writing career

Moran at the Hay Festival, 2016

Moran was convinced throughout her teenage years that she would become a writer.[7] At the age of 13 in October 1988 she won a Dillons young readers' contest for an essay on Why I Like Books and was awarded £250 of book tokens. At the age of 15, she won The Observer's Young Reporter of the Year.[9] She began her career as a journalist for Melody Maker, the weekly music publication, at the age of 16.[10] Moran also wrote a novel called The Chronicles of Narmo at the age of 16, inspired by having been part of a home-schooled family.

In 1992, she launched her television career, hosting the Channel 4 music show Naked City,[11] which ran for two series and featured a number of then up-and-coming British bands such as Blur, Manic Street Preachers and the Boo Radleys. Johnny Vaughan co-presented with her on Naked City.

Moran's upbringing inspired her TV drama/comedy series, Raised By Wolves, which began airing in the UK on Channel 4 in December 2013.

In July 2012, Moran became a Fellow of the University of Aberystwyth.[12] In April 2014, she was named as one of Britain's most influential women in the BBC Woman's Hour power list 2014.[13]

Moran's semi-autobiographical novel, How To Build a Girl (2014), is set in Wolverhampton in the early 1990s. It is the first of a planned trilogy, to be followed by How To Be Famous, and concluding with How To Change The World.[14]

Feminism

In 2011, Ebury Press published Moran's book How to Be a Woman in the UK. As of July 2012, it had sold over 400,000 copies in 16 countries.[15]

Moran is a supporter of the Women's Equality Party.[16]

In March 2017, in an article she wrote for the Penguin publishing house, Moran suggested that young girls should not read books written by men at all, or "at least" until they are "older, and fully-formed, and battle-ready," singling out the books written by:

...the Great White Males; Faulkner, Chandler, Hemingway, Roth. The canonically brilliant. The men in them are brilliant, clever, awkward, compelling, complex - their stories drag you in, their voices are unstoppable. The dazzle and flair is undeniable.[17]

Moran claimed that the fact she never read books by men when she was younger made her "perhaps," happier in herself, more confident about writing the truth, and less apt to run herself down for her appearance, weight, loudness and unusualness "than many, many other women."[17]

Twitter

Publicity photo by Moran's Swedish publishers Albert Bonniers Förlag, 2013

In August 2013, she organised a 24-hour boycott of Twitter in protest against the organisation's perceived failure to deal adequately with offensive content posted, sometimes anonymously, on public figures' Twitter feeds.[18]

In 2014, her Twitter feed became a controversial addition to the list of English A-Level set texts.[19] In June 2014 the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism reported she was the most influential British journalist on Twitter.[20]

Personal life

In December 1999, Moran married The Times rock critic Peter Paphides in Coventry; they have two daughters, born in 2001 and 2003.[21]

Awards and honours

Bibliography

  • Moran, Caitlin (1992). The Chronicles of Narmo. Corgi. ISBN 0-552-52724-6.
  • Moran, Caitlin (2011). How to Be a Woman. Ebury Press. ISBN 978-0-09-194073-7.
  • Moran, Caitlin (2012). Moranthology. Ebury Press. ISBN 978-0-09-194088-1.
  • Moran, Caitlin (2014). How to Build a Girl. Ebury Press. ISBN 978-0-09-194900-6.
  • Moran, Caitlin (2016). Moranifesto. Ebury Press. ISBN 978-0091949044.

References

  1. ^ "Caitlin Moran - How To Be a Woman". Penguin Random House UK. 13 December 2011. Retrieved 18 June 2018.
  2. ^ Rollman, Hans (12 November 2014). "Caitlin Moran: Lady Sex Pirate and Working Class Hero". PopMatters.
  3. ^ "Press Awards 2011: Caitlin Moran's speech". The Guardian. 6 April 2011.
  4. ^ "BBC Newsnight journalists win award for spiked Jimmy Savile investigation".
  5. ^ "2013 Winners". The Comment Awards
  6. ^ Aida Edemariam "The Saturday interview: Caitlin Moran", The Guardian, 18 June 2011.
  7. ^ a b c d e BBC Radio 4: "My Teenage Diary", First Broadcast 6:30PM Wed, 4 July 2012.
  8. ^ The Times 2, p. 2. 28 December 2011.
  9. ^ Moran, Caitlin (26 November 2007). "My glorious career? I won it in a competition". The Times. London. Retrieved 24 April 2009. {{cite news}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  10. ^ "Pop on trial". BBC Online. Retrieved 13 January 2010.
  11. ^ Davies, Huer (17 May 1994). "Atrocious mess, precocious mind: Meet Caitlin Moran, newspaper columnist, television presenter, novelist, screenwriter, pop music pundit … and typical teenage slob". The Independent. London.
  12. ^ Aberystwyth University - July
  13. ^ "Woman's Hour Power List 2014 – Game Changers". BBC Radio 4.
  14. ^ Caitlin Moran explores taboo subjects in her new book 'How to build a girl'. BBC Newsnight. 11 July 2014.
  15. ^ Doll, Jen (16 July 2012). "Caitlin Moran on How to Be a Woman, How to Be a Feminist". The Atlantic Wire.
  16. ^ Caitlin Moran (3 April 2016). Caitlin Moran @ 5x15 - Women's Equality Party (Video). 5x15 Stories via YouTube. Retrieved 28 April 2016.
  17. ^ a b "Ηow books made me a feminist" by Caitlin Moran, Penguin website, March 2017
  18. ^ "#TwitterSilence: Was Caitlin Moran's Twitter boycott an effective form of protest?". The Independent. London. 5 August 2013.
  19. ^ "English A-Level with Russell Brand and Dizzee Rascal on reading list under fire". The Guardian. London. 6 May 2014.
  20. ^ "Mainstream media 'still dominate online news'". BBC News: Technology. BBC. Retrieved 12 June 2014.
  21. ^ Moran, Caitlin (2011). How To Be a Woman. HarperCollins. p. 275. ISBN 9780062124296.
  22. ^ "Cosmo's Ultimate Women of the Year Awards 2011 announced!". Cosmopolitan UK. 4 November 2011. Archived from the original on 6 December 2013. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)

Template:Women's Equality Party (UK)

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Caitlin_Moran&oldid=846812959"