Liz Jones | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Jones in 2014 | |
| Born | Elizabeth Ann Jones (1958-09-05)5 September 1958 (age 66) Chelmsford, England |
| Nationality | British |
| Alma mater | London College of Printing |
| Occupation(s) | Writer,journalist |
| Years active | 1981–present |
| Spouse | |
Elizabeth Ann Jones[1] (born 5 September 1958) is a Britishjournalist.
She began her career as a fashion journalist, but her work has broadened into confessional writing. Jones divides opinion. While she has gained positive responses, a "beautifully natural writer, as well as a funny one" according toDeborah Ross inThe Independent,[2] some of her articles have been fiercely criticised.[3][4]
A former editor ofMarie Claire, she has been on the staff ofThe Sunday Times and theEvening Standard. As of 2019[update] Jones writes columns for theDaily Mail andThe Mail on Sunday.
Jones is the youngest of seven children of an Army father and a former ballerina.[2][5][6] She grew up in the village ofRettendon, near Chelmsford in Essex,[7] and attendedBrentwood County High School for Girls.[8] Jones studied journalism at theLondon College of Printing.
According to Jones, "I was six when I first realised how hideous I looked",[9] and she has been ananorexic since the age of about 11.[10] By the age of 17 she wished to look like modelJanice Dickinson.[10] DiscoveringVogue magazine in Southend Public Library in August 1977, was a revelation for her. It "wasn’t just a magazine to me, its cover was a mirror: how I wanted to look, dress and be".[11]
After leaving college, she began to work forCompany in 1981, initially as a sub-editor, eventually becoming a staff writer before leaving to go freelance in 1986.
In 1989, she began an 11-year stint atThe Sunday Times Magazine, becoming deputy editor of their "Style" magazine[12] in 1998.
In April 1999, Jones was appointed editor of the UK edition ofMarie Claire. An announcement by Jones during June 2000 that the leading fashion magazines were setting up a self-regulatory body concerning the size of models was "contradicted" by the editors of rival magazines.[13] Faced by a declining circulation,[13][14] she was sacked from this post two years later[15] for refusing to use bulimic models[16] and (according to Jones) listing in the magazine the freebies she had been offered in the previous month.[2] She has continued to write about the fashion industry.
During her period atMarie Claire, Jones began to write about her life,[10] and met the journalistNirpal Singh Dhaliwal, who had been sent by BBC Radio in 2000 to interview her.[17] Jones embarked on a seven-year relationship with him, and they married in 2002; after a "disastrous" marriage, it ended in 2007.[18] In a 2011Mail column, Jones admitted tostealing Dhaliwal's sperm in a (failed) attempt to become pregnant.[19][20] In an article forThe Telegraph in July 2021, Dhaliwal wrote of their marriage ceremony as "an occasion I felt swindled into, having never proposed. She arranged it without my knowledge; I found out when I discovered a receipt for the country estate. Confronted with it, she declared she’d already told the world in her column – which I no longer read – and would look a fool. She then broke down in tears, robbing me of my anger as I comforted her and agreed."[21] Dhaliwal and Jones disputed aspects of their relationship in the press while they were still together.[22]
After four years as Life & Style editor at the LondonEvening Standard from 2002,[12] she left to join theDaily Mail as Style editor in early 2006 at twice her previous salary.[23][24] She also writes forBritish Airways'High Life magazine on destinations and hotels.
Jones says that she is disliked by the fashion industry: "The fashion industry stinks and everyone in fashion hates me. No one talks to me when I go to the shows. I'm barred from a lot of shows now. I've been barred fromArmani,Louis Vuitton, Chloe,Chanel,Marc Jacobs,Victoria Beckham..."[2] Jones has been described byDeborah Orr as a "very gifted writer and apparently very flaky human being".[25] In July 2013,Decca Aitkenhead wrote that "no one deconstructs (fashion's) futile, psychologically destructive false promises more forensically than Jones – and in a mass market tabloid at that".[10]
Often considered somewhat self-obsessed, with the veracity of her confessions questioned,[26][27] she has been defended byTanya Gold who wrote: "There are many confessional journalists in Britain, but none as forensic or as self-critical as Jones."[16] Jones wrote about an alleged current love interest, the Rock Star (RS), in her weekly diary inThe Mail on Sunday'sYou magazine from July 2010. Despite dropping many heavy hints that the "rock star" was Jim Kerr ofSimple Minds, in a November 2011 interview in theLondon Evening Standard, she finally admitted it is not Kerr.[28]
Until the end of October 2012, Jones lived inBrushford, just south ofDulverton,Somerset.[5] Her comments about the area and in the bookThe Exmoor Files angered local people. The journalist Jane Alexander thought Jones opinions were "a clichéd, stereotypical and, frankly, lazy image of the countryside."[29] After moving to theYorkshire Dales, aMail on Sunday column on her surroundings was the subject of four articles inThe Yorkshire Post in September 2016.[30]
She has reported fromBangladesh, and was sent by her newspaper to cover the famine in Somalia in the summer of 2011; her suitability for this assignment was questioned byRos Coward.[31]
In June 2012, she attracted attention by slatingHolly Willoughby for posting a photo of herself onTwitter without makeup as a "betrayal to women".This Morning TV co-presenterPhillip Schofield defended Willoughby, saying "I swear there can be no greater force against all womankind than Liz Jones. She is inconsistent, bitter, nasty and unhinged".[32]
At the beginning of January 2014, Jones became a contestant inCelebrity Big Brother 13 onChannel 5 TV with comedianJim Davidson, rapperDappy, boxerEvander Holyfield, among others.[33] She was evicted from the house on 22 January 2014 after receiving the fewest votes to remain.[34]
Her first novel,8½ Stone, was published in 2020.[35]
Jones says she has beenvegetarian since the age of eleven.[36] She was married to journalist Nirpal Singh Dhaliwal between 2002 and 2007. Jones was declared bankrupt in May 2017.[37]
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