Kate Adie

Bestselling author and award-winning former BBC Chief News Correspondent Kate Adie reveals the ways in which women's lives changed during World War One In 1914 the world changed forever. When World War One broke out and a generation of men went off to fight, women emerged from the shadows of their domestic lives. Now a visible force in public life, they began to take up essential roles - from transport to policing, munitions to sport, entertainment, even politics. Kate Adie charts the seismic move towards equal rights with men that began a century ago and asks what these women achieved for future generations. This is history at its best - a vivid, compelling account of the pioneering women who helped win the war. 'This is history at its most celebratory... The book is chatty, personal and packed with plenty of anecdote' TELEGRAPH 'Kate Adie provides a compelling account of how women's lives changed during World War One.' IRISH TATLER

The Legacy of Women in World War One

Fighting on the Home Front

Kate Adie's story is an unusual one. Raised in post-war Sunderland, where life was 'a sunny experience, full of meat-paste sandwiches and Sunday school', she has reported memorably and courageously from many of the world's trouble spots since she joined the BBC in 1969. THE KINDNESS OF STRANGERS encompasses Adie's reporting from, inter alia, Northern Ireland, the Middle East, Tiananmen Square and, of course, the Gulf War of 1991. It offers a compelling combination of vivid frontline reporting and evocative writing and reveals the extraordinarily demanding life of the woman who is always at the heart of the action. Although an intensely private person, Kate Adie also divulges what it's like to be a woman in a man's world - an inspiration to many working women.

The Kindness of Strangers

Tony Grant

The flagship Radio 4 programme From Our Own Correspondent gives Britain's most celebrated reporters the chance to describe much more than they can in a normal report: context, history and characters encountered en route. And for the fiftieth anniversary of the programme Profile collected together the programme's best pieces. From Our Own Correspondent has been one of BBC Radio 4's flagship programmes for fifty years. And this book, containing dispatches from all around the world, shows why FOOC, as it is affectionately known, has become such a well-known and much-loved institution. It contains not only the observations of journalists covering the big news events of the day, but also their personal insights into how people around the world live their lives. There are dispatches from Misha Glenny in Russia, Mark Tully in India, Charles Wheeler in the USA, Jeremy Vine in the Congo, Ben Brown in Zimbabwe and Orla Guerin in the West Bank. All offer a unique perspective describing the background to events around the world as they happen.

A Celebration of Fifty Years of the BBC Radio Programme

From Our Own Correspondent

Kate Adie has written an account of her life as a war correspondence for the BBC, among other things.

'Reported with skill and personal insight' The Times Bestselling author and the most famous woman in a flak jacket Kate Adie sets out on a fascinating journey to discover just who is attracted to living dangerously - and why. Ever since her days as a reporter on the front line in Iraq and the Iranian Embassy siege in London, Kate Adie has earned her reputation as one of the most intrepid women of her day. Throughout her career she has regularly reported from the world's most dangerous war zones - often placing her own life at serious risk. It has given her a curiosity about the people who are attracted to danger. Why when so many are fearful of anything beyond their daily routine, are others drawn towards situations, or professions which put them in regular peril of their lives? It has proved a fascinating quest that has taken her to the four corners of the globe in pursuit of an answer. She has met those who choose a career in danger, like stuntpeople, landmine exploders, and even a 'snake man' who - aged 96 - has been bitten countless times by poisonous snakes to find venom for vaccines. She has questioned those whose actions put them in danger, like Sir Richard Leakey whose determination to speak out in Kenya nearly cost him his life, as well as criminals and prostitutes who risk all for money. And of course there are those who - through no choice of their own - have been put in danger, such as Saddam Hussein's food taster - not his career of choice. With Kate's insight, wit, and gift for illumination, this is a compelling read.

Into Danger

Imperial War Museums

(In Assoc. With Imperial

'The paciest and most entertaining history book to come my way' Ian McIntyre, The Times 'Riveting and beautifully illustrated' The Lady 'Engrossing . . . far more than a sartorial survey' The Oldie * * * * * * A vivid history of ordinary women and their extraordinary deeds through two world wars and beyond, by From Our Own Correspondent presenter Kate Adie. Uniform is universally seen as both a stamp of authority and of official acceptance. But the sight of a woman in military uniform still provokes controversy. Although more women are now taking prominent roles in combat, the status implied by uniform is often regarded as contrary to the general perception of womanhood. In association with the Imperial War Museum, this is the first book to look at the image of uniformed women, both in conflict and in civilian roles throughout the twentieth century. Kate Adie examines the extraordinary range of jobs that uniformed women have performed, from nursing to the armed services. Through contemporary correspondence and many personal stories she brings the enormous and often unsung achievements of women in uniform vividly to life, and looks at how far women have come in a century which, for them, began restricted in corsets and has ended on the battlefield in camouflage.

Kate Adie

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