Book description
From the makers of 'Who Do You Think You Are?' comes 'Empire's
Children' - a tie-in edition to a six part TV series for Channel 4 -
which tells the story of Empire, and follows the personal journeys of
six British celebrities as they retrace their steps through their
multicultural past.
British society is in every way defined by its Imperial past. It is home
to 2. 3 million British Asians, 570,000 Caribbeans and 250,000 Chinese.
Not to mention Cypriots, Australians and southern Africans. These people
represent different cultures and divergent experiences but they all
share a common heritage: they are the children (grandchildren, or great
grandchildren) of Empire; and their lives have been shaped by that legacy.
In the second part of the 20th century, Britain relinquished control of
64 countries and half a billion subjects. During that period, many
thousands of those same former British subjects fled their homes to
build new lives here.
What were they hoping to find? Why did they want to come to the very
country they'd fought so hard to free themselves from? What kinds of
lives were they leaving behind? What was the reality of their new life
here? And how was British society itself shaped by their arrival and
assimilation here? Real concerns that are very much in forefront of our
minds in the multicultural melting pot that Britain is today.
'Empire's Children' seeks to answer these questions by concentrating on
the personal and emotive journeys of six chosen celebrities as they
retrace the steps which they - or their parents or grandparents - took
in order to reach this country for the first time. The stories will
cover post colonial histories of Africa, the subcontinent, the West
Indies, Australasia, South East Asia and Cyprus. In some cases, they
will spend some time in the former colony and experience the motivations
as well as the drama of the journey itself. Anton Gill became a
full-time writer in 1984 after a few years working in the theatre, for
the Arts Council and for the BBC. He has written a number of books,
largely in the field of contemporary history, and is the author of 'Art
Lover', a highly acclaimed biography of the collector of surreal and
abstract art Peggy Guggenheim.
