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Hold the Front Page! The Wit and Wisdom of Anne Scott-James

Writer Clare Hastings talks about her mother Anne Scott-James, a pioneering journalist and the first female star of Fleet Street.

Scott-James began her Sunday Express column in 1953 and was later a columnist for the Daily Mail. She established a new way of writing – the short, sharp column filled with views on subjects from men to children, fashion, beauty, food, interiors and anything else that took her interest. She is the mother of the former Daily Telegraph and Evening Standard editor Max Hastings. Hastings brings together a selection of her mother’s writings in Hold the Front Page! and reflects on how much the portrayal of women’s lives by women journalists has, or has not, changed and what the columns say about the times.

Hastings worked at Harpers & Queen magazine before becoming a costume designer and stylist. She is author of Gardening Notes from a Late Bloomer and The House in Little Chelsea.

Meet the Author

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Clare’s mother was the writer Anne Scott James, who inspired her to garden. Clare has lived with her partner Nick for over 30 years, and they move between the Berkshire cottage to a flat in London, where they continue to get their garden fix by humping soil and plants five floors up and onto the roof. Clare has recently turned to the pen - ‘Gardening Notes from a late Bloomer’ is due out on April 5th 2018 (published by The Pimpernel Press) and her first novel ‘The House in Little Chelsea’ was published in September 2019 (also published by Pimpernel).

“Some people are excited by constant change. I am excited by moving the familiar forward.”

— clare hastings