Oxford and Cambridge Society of Ireland invite alumni to their ninth annual dinner at the Radisson Blu St Helen’s Hotel, Stillorgan Road, Booterstown, County Dublin on Saturday 12 May 2018.

Join the Society at 7pm for a drinks reception and hear from Alan Rusbridger (Oxford) and David Blake Knox (Cambridge). More details about both speakers are listed below. 

Dress code: Black tie (University blazers welcome!)

Speaker details

Alan Rusbridger was editor-in-chief of Guardian News & Media from 1995 to 2015 and is now Principal of Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford.  His career began on the Cambridge Evening News, where he trained as a reporter before first joining the Guardian in 1979. The paper was nominated newspaper of the year five times between 1996 and 2014. Rusbridger has been named editor of the year three times. He has won the Liberty Human Rights Award, the European Press Prize and the Ortega y Gasset award and has been honoured by CUNY, Columbia, Oslo and Syracuse Universities.

Born in Zambia, he graduated from Magdalene College, Cambridge with a degree in English in 1976. He was a visiting fellow at Nuffield College, Oxford and is a visiting professor of history at Queen Mary's College, London and Cardiff University.  A keen amateur pianist and clarinettist, Rusbridger has been chair of the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain and the Photographers' Gallery in London. He is the author of three children's books, published by Penguin. He was the co-author, with Ronan Bennett, of the BBC drama, Fields of Gold. Additionally, he has written a full-length animation film script and a play about Beethoven.

David Blake Knox won an Open Exhibition from Campbell College in his native Belfast to Jesus College, Cambridge in 1970.   He read English under Raymond Williams and, as a member of GODS, produced plays by Yeats and Synge.  After Cambridge he taught at the New University of Ulster where he was awarded a doctorate for research on the Abbey Theatre.  He was a director of an educational theatre company before joining RTE where he rose to become Director of TV Production.   After a spell with the BBC he founded Blueprint Pictures, an independent TV and film production company.   He contributes reviews and articles to newspapers and other publications and is the author of several books, including Hitler’s Irish Slaves and the Curious History of Irish Dogs, which was the book at bedtime on RTE in March.