Karen Bartlett
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Karen Bartlett is a writer, journalist and film maker.
Karen writes for The Times, The Sunday Times,The Guardian, WIRED and Newsweek. In broadcast Karen has made documentaries for the BBC World Service, and directed a series on the economic meltdown.
Karen’s book 'Architects of Death' about Topf and Sons will be published in March 2018. She is also the author of 'After Auschwitz', a critically acclaimed biography about Dusty Springfield, and a book about disease eradication in the Twentieth Century.
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Growing Up X
Fifty years after he was killed, the daughter of Malcolm X wants to make sure her father isn't written out of history Half way down a winding country road in New York’s wealthy Westchester County, one of America’s most famous revolutionaries lies buried under three feet of crisp white snow. I...
Newsweek
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How one man gave Congo’s women hope
Life is hell for women caught up in the conflict in the Congo. But one remarkable doctor helps survivors to build a future Why are the lives of African women worthless? It’s a question that Denis Mukwege asks every day that he works with the raped and mutilated women of the Democratic Republic...
The Times - World
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‘If they gave me a house, I’d take it tomorrow’
All I want is to die under this mountain.” Noor Ebrahim, a slightly-built former messenger for Reader’s Digest, has returned to the area where he grew up. Now retired, he likes to remember the old days; he can point out his school — “it was tough” — the mosque where his family prayed and the spot...
The Times - World
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Momma D: Dionne Warwick, the Grande Dame of Divas
She learnt her stagecraft from Marlene Dietrich; 50 years on, she’s mentor to Whitney Houston and P. Diddy Dionne Warwick opens up her arms in a stage bow: “I’m looking pretty good, don’t you think,” she says. The singer seems slightly surprised to be turning 70, and, with pearly white teeth a...
The Times - Arts
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India's Barefoot Revolution
What would it be like if women ran the world? In some parts of India, it’s already happening If all revolutions begin in unlikely locations, few could be as unpromising as Borda. It’s a poor village in the poorest district of one of the poorest states in India. Only the blasting from a nearby ...
The Times - World
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It’s murder on your mobile, says The Killing’s Sarah Lund
Hit crime drama The Killing is back for a second series, and Karen Bartlett talks mobile phone forensics with actress Sofie Gråbøl Detective Sarah Lund is a Luddite. The loner heroine of Denmark’s hit crime drama The Killing is as much of a 70s relic as her Faroe sweaters: She makes notes by h...
Technology
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Skateistan: How skateboarding took off with Afghan kids
It’s no surprise that in a world full of rules most kids want to do something with no organisation, and no adults. “This country has more restrictions than just about any other,” Oliver Percovich says, explaining how his own passion for freedom and fun led to groups of boys and girls flying acros...
The Times - World
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Life and Love with 'The Greatest': Muhammad Ali
When Yolanda “Lonnie” Williams was six years old she looked out of her front door in Louisville, Kentucky, and saw an energetic young man holding court to a wide-eyed gaggle of neighbourhood boys, including her brother. “Who’s that big man?” she asked her mother, not knowing that the answer wo...
The Times - Arts
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Polio's Last Stand
Eradicating the Last 1% of Polio Is Deadly But Essential When 40-year-old Liberian civil servant Patrick Sawyer died of Ebola earlier this year in hospital in Lagos, having carried the disease from his home country to Nigeria, global health workers feared the epidemic would spread in West Af...
Newsweek
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Bringing Anne Frank Home – to Germany
Like many people in their seventies and eighties, Buddy Elias and his wife Gertie are downsizing – clearing out the attic and getting rid of several generations’ worth of papers, clutter and possessions from their family home in Basel, Switzerland. Unlike most other pensioners, however, Elias is ...
Newsweek
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A Race Apart: the beauty queens of the apartheid era
The Miss World finalists are now at the World Cup, but the women who represented South Africa in its past have divided memories So far the game has not been beautiful for the World Cup’s “33rd official team”. They have gone largely unnoticed in South Africa’s impressive new stadiums, despite d...
The Times - World
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Maki Mandela: “As Nelson's child, I can say I am proud of him”
In the week that London marks the statesman's 90th birthday, his daughter reveals how she overcame her resentment that he was a father to the world, but not to her Nelson Mandela arrives in London today for what is likely to be his last major public appearance; a 90th birthday charity concert ...
The Times - World
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The Vagina Monologues turns ten
Eve Ensler transformed the New Orleans Superdome into ‘Superlove' for a celebrity-studded event to campaign against violence towards women Few people know that New Orleans is the vagina of America. Few would suggest it. “It is fertile. It's a delta. And everyone wants to party there,” explains...
The Times - Arts
China Debates....
I’ve just returned from China, after a gap of about 16 years, and I met these undergraduates – coming together to do British Parliamentary debating on June 3rd and 4th ( quite an anniversary for the Chinese…)
“Legalising all pornography would be wrong, it would lead to more rape and unnatural sex, I commend this measure to the house. ” Haiqiang Zeng is a would be Prime Minister. He has the David Cameron leg thrust at the dispatch box, the Gordon Brown hand chop and, at key moments, a special samba-like hand roll of his very own.
Zeng is an undergraduate at Sichuan University, and while most other students in China are burdened with the heavy exam loads on the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square uprising, Zeng is competing with 300 others in the China Open debating championship in Qinhuangdao, run by IDEA (The International Debate Educational Association).
While traditional Chinese debating takes on more philosophical topics, the China Open competitors have been cutting and thrusting across the dispatch box in a manner more commonly seen in the Oxford Union. Motions include: Should the children of government officials be banned from public jobs? Would Chinese universities be more competitive if they were privatised? Should China stop subsidising labour intensive industry? Put condom machines in schools? And yes – should China legalise porn? In British Parliamentary style they propose a motion as ‘Prime Minister’ and oppose as ‘Leader of the Opposition’. Its fair to say that when Chairman Mao infamously commanded: ‘Let a hundred flowers blossom, and let a hundred schools of thought contend’ this was not what he had in mind. (Although that phrase in the 1950s led to a crackdown).
But this is China’s new generation, finding ways around internet censorship, hooking up on Facebook despite the government’s best efforts to stop them, and outspoken: “This is a critical moment for China, and we have to develop critical thinking,” says a young law student. “Only controversial topics are meaningful now,” says a marketing undergraduate, “because only debating controversial topics will push China to develop as a society.” The kind of critical analysis, and logical assessment of arguments is not something they find in school, or with their parents: “Only in this setting do we get chance to discuss and think about these things, it widens our world.” In the safe format of debate they are assigned a role, and can talk about topics while genuinely claiming that the position they take is not necessarily their own.
These are the teenagers the government, and even western academics and China-thinkers would have us believe are all absorbed in their ipods and fluorescent trainers, and Nike t-shirts – taking advantage of economic growth and happy with China’s different model of development. So should this model of debate spread to other people and parts of China? One girl falls silent, “I don’t know how to answer that question.”
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Welcome
Welcome to my website. I hope these pages give you a flavour of some of my work in books, print, onl…
Recent News
Istanbul Arrival
Last week I was in Istanbul attending a Youth Forum for teenagers from around the world. But not eve…
Nelson Mandela Dies - Grazia
When Nelson Mandela retired after serving one five-year term as President of South Africa in 1999 he…
China Debates....
I’ve just returned from China, after a gap of about 16 years, and I met these undergraduates – comin…
Top Ten Articles
Polio's Last Stand
Eradicating the Last 1% of Polio Is Deadly But Essential
When 40-year-old Liberian civil servan…
Life and Love with 'The Greatest': Muhammad Ali
When Yolanda “Lonnie” Williams was six years old she looked out of her front door in Louisville,…
Momma D: Dionne Warwick, the Grande Dame of Divas
She learnt her stagecraft from Marlene Dietrich; 50 years on, she’s mentor to Whitney Houston and …
India's Barefoot Revolution
What would it be like if women ran the world? In some parts of India, it’s already happening
If…
How one man gave Congo’s women hope
*Life is hell for women caught up in the conflict in the Congo. But one remarkable doctor helps surv…
‘If they gave me a house, I’d take it tomorrow’
All I want is to die under this mountain.” Noor Ebrahim, a slightly-built former messenger for Rea…
It’s murder on your mobile, says The Killing’s Sarah Lund
Hit crime drama The Killing is back for a second series, and Karen Bartlett talks mobile phone foren…
Skateistan: How skateboarding took off with Afghan kids
It’s no surprise that in a world full of rules most kids want to do something with no organisation…
Growing Up X
Fifty years after he was killed, the daughter of Malcolm X wants to make sure her father isn’t writt…
Bringing Anne Frank Home – to Germany
Like many people in their seventies and eighties, Buddy Elias and his wife Gertie are downsizing –…
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