The Survivor's Story of a Gay Activist: Paul Burston on how we can all be heroes, just for one day

Keen On

EPISODE 1522: In this KEEN ON show, Andrew talks to the author of WE CAN HEROES, Paul Burston, about his survival story as a prominent British gay activist, journalist and novelist

Paul Burston was born in York, raised in South Wales and now divides his time between London and Hastings. From the age of 23, he was an AIDS activist with ACT UP London and also worked for the gay police monitoring group GALOP before becoming a journalist. For 20 years he edited what became known as the LGBT section at Time Out London, documenting the changing cultural and political landscape. In 1994 he co-founded Attitude Magazine. He has written for many other publications including the Guardian and the Times. He also wrote and presented documentaries for Channel 4. His books include 'Shameless' (shortlisted for the State of Britain Award 2001), 'Lovers and Losers' (shortlisted for the Stonewall Award 2007), 'The Gay Divorcee' (2009, optioned for television) and 'The Black Path' (long listed for the Guardian's Not The Booker Prize, 2016) His latest novel is the social media psychological thriller 'The Closer I Get'. His memoir 'We Can Be Heroes' will be published by Little A on June 1, 2023 and is available to preorder now. The podcast 'We Can Be Heroes with Paul Burston' is available now on Acast, Apple, Spotify and other platforms. He is the founder of Polari literary salon and The Polari Book Prize for LGBTQ+ writing. Visit his website at www.paulburston.net Follow him on Twitter @paulburston or Instagram @paulburston1. For information on Polari and the Polari Prize awards, please visit www.polarisalon.com

Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children.

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