Matthew Lewis Engel (born 11 June 1951)[1] is a British writer, journalist and editor.
Early life and education
Engel was born in
Northampton, son of solicitor Max David Engel (1912-2005) and Betty Ruth (née Lesser).[2][3] His grandfather had escaped anti-Semitic persecution in
Poland.[4]
He began his career in 1972 as a staff journalist on The Guardian newspaper for nearly 25 years, reporting on a wide range of political and sporting events including a period as Washington correspondent beginning on
9/11. He later wrote columns in the Financial Times and now contributes to both these papers. Engel edited the 1993–2000 and 2004–2007 editions of Wisden Cricketers' Almanack, with a short break when he worked in the US. He has been a strong critic of the
International Cricket Council, international cricket's ruling body.
He was elected as a councillor for
Herefordshire in October 2023 in a by-election for Golden Valley South ward.[7][8]
Personal life
Engel lives on an old farm in
Herefordshire. In 1990, he married former editorial director at
Pan Books Hilary, daughter of Laurence Davies.[9] They had a son, Laurie, and adopted a daughter, Victoria (Vika), from Russia.[10][11] Laurie died of cancer in 2005, aged 13, and Engel set up a successful charity fund in his memory, the Laurie Engel Fund, which has raised more than £1.2m in partnership with the
Teenage Cancer Trust to build a new unit for patients in Birmingham (opened 2010) and for a cancer centre scheduled for 2018. The proceeds of a book he wrote, Extracts from the Red Notebooks (Macmillan), are donated to this fund. His book, That’s The Way It Crumbles: The American Conquest of the English Language (Profile Books) was published in June 2017.
Works
The Reign - Life in Elizabeth's Britain: Part I: The Way It Was, 1952-79 (Atlantic Books, 2022)
ISBN978-1-786-49667-6
That’s The Way It Crumbles: The American Conquest of the English Language (Profile Books, 2017)
ISBN978-1-78125-668-8
Engel's England: thirty-nine counties, one capital and one man (Profile Books, 2014)
ISBN978-1-84668-571-2
Eleven Minutes Late: A Train Journey to the Soul of Britain (Macmillan, May 2009)
ISBN978-0-230-70898-3