Max Atkinson's Blog

Obama at OccidentalBy Margot MifflinOctober 3, 2012On February 18, 1981, a student at Occidental College, Barack Obama, delivered his first public speech. As the opening speaker at a rally protesting Occidental’s investments in companies that...

 I was delighted when John Humphrys stopped doing BBC Radio 4 Today programme when he was so obviously way past his best.But why Global’s Classic FM management thinks he knows enough about classical music to present for them escapes me. Or may...

Growing up in Yorkshire meant that there was a lot happening before snd during bonfire night. Apart from the fact that Fawkes and some of the other plotters were old boys of my old school (St Peter's School, York), all Yorkshire children knew th...

Lords debates Assisted Dying Bill at second reading22 October 2021 Members of the Lords will debate the main principles and purpose of the Assisted Dying Bill during second reading, on Friday 22 October.The Assisted Dying Bill seeks to...

This blog is from 22 years ago when the Queen opened parliament by reading a speech written for her by Gordon Brown's Labour government. I watched her reading the whole of today's specch prepared by Boris Johnson's Conservative government - not...

In my continuously failing efforts to tidy up my study, I came across a programme for a Royal Shakespeare Company production of Julius Caesar at Stratford upon Avon in 1992 (below). I'd forgotten that the RSC had asked me to write a thousand-word...

 Birthday greetings or obituary?On 3rd March, sixteen days before my birthday on the 19th, Brian Jenner (founder of the UK Speechwriters Guild & the European Speechwriters Network) chaired a Zoom meeting with the title of this blog...