Eminent Dragons

Poppy Adams (OD 1983) is a British television documentary director/producer and novelist.

Following her education at the Dragon, she went on to receive a degree in Natural Sciences from Durham University. Poppy has made films for the BBC, Channel 4 and The Discovery Channel. Her first novel, ‘The Behaviour of Moths’, was shortlisted for the Costa First Novel Award in the 2008 Costa Book Awards.

Robert Temple Armstrong, Baron Armstrong of Ilminster (OD 1940), was born in Headington, Oxford. He was educated at the Dragon from 1935 to 1940, at Eton, where he was a King’s scholar, and at Christ Church, Oxford, where he studied classics and philosophy. He was a British civil servant and life peer.

Lord Armstrong went on to have a long civil service career working in both the HM Treasury and the Home Office. He was knighted in 1978 and, between 1979 and 1987, he served as Cabinet Secretary under Margaret Thatcher. His full title is The Lord Armstrong of Ilminster GCB CVO.

Photo Credit: (c) Chris McAndrew Photography

Click here to read his full obituary

Michael Beloff QC (OD 1954) attended the Dragon from 1950 to 1954. He was a scholar at Eton where he was Captain of the school and Editor of the Chronicle. He was a demy open (scholar) of Magdalen College, Oxford, where he was President of the Union and was gained a first class honours degree in History.

After taking a further degree in law he was called to the Bar by Gray’s Inn in November 1967 as Atkin Scholar and, became a Queen’s Counsel in 1981. He had a broad common law practice with a main focus on administrative and sports law, and was Chairman of the former and President of the latter specialist bar associations. He has appeared in the courts of 10 Commonwealth countries and in the European Courts of Justice (Luxembourg) and Human Rights (Strasbourg). He became a bencher of Gray’s Inn in 1988 and was Treasurer in 2008. He was President of Trinity College, Oxford from 1996-2006. He was Senior Ordinary Appeal Judge in the Courts of Jersey and Guernsey from 2008-2014. He has been Chair of the disciplinary bodies of both international cricket and international athletics and, as a member of the Court of Arbitration for Sport for 25 years, served on arbitral Panels at 5 summer Olympic Games.

He was given a lifetime achievement award at the annual bar ceremony in 2008, and is holder of 4 honorary degrees. He is a member of the International Panel of the Singapore Mediation Centre.

Sir Lennox Berkeley (OD 1912) was born in Boars Hill, Oxfordshire, and attended the Dragon from 1909 through to 1912. He went on to Merton College, Oxford, where he read French, Old French, and Philology before going to Paris to study Music. He is a British composer whose works are noted for their light textures and piquant harmonies.

“He produced — in a creative life of about 65 years — no fewer than 226 works, including fine examples of music for the theatre, the concert hall, church and home. There are four symphonies; concertos for cello, flute, guitar, piano and violin; string quartets; piano pieces; four operas, a ballet, film and incidental music; Mass settings and other sacred music; and songs.” Tony Scotland

Sir Lennox Berkeley was knighted in 1974.

Photo Credit: (c) National Portrait Gallery, London

Sir John Betjeman (OD 1920) was born in London and joined the Dragon in 1917, before being educated at Marlborough College and then Magdalen College, Oxford. He was a British poet known for his nostalgia for the near past, his exact sense of place, and his precise rendering of social nuance.

In 2017, The Betjeman Society chose to mark the popular poets’ formational years at the Dragon with the gift of a plaque, to inspire future generations of Dragons ‘to have a go at writing poetry’. Sir John’s time at the Dragon awakened a lifelong love of Oxford, where he later studied, and which often featured in his poetry and prose. He was knighted in 1969, and in 1972 he succeeded C. Day-Lewis as poet laureate of Britain.

Tim Betjeman, Sir John’s grandson, said: “A lot of my grandfather’s love of architecture began here, and a lot of his fond boyhood memories are stored here. It is a great and fitting tribute that he should now be formally anchored into the brickwork of the Dragon”.

The School magazine ‘the Draconian’ published his work and he was much praised for his performances on the stage: from Gilbert and Sullivan to Shakespeare. These experiences began a life in television, as a producer and presenter, and on vinyl as he combined music with verse, likewise, as a poet, journalist and writer.

Today his statue stands outside gothic St Pancras station, one of the many places he helped to save.

Photo Credit: (c) National Portrait Gallery, London

Paul Chahidi (OD 1982) grew up in Summertown, and attended the Dragon from E through to A Block.

He is a Tony and Olivier nominated British stage and screen actor. His most recent screen work includes roles in Armando Iannucci’s feature ‘The Death of Stalin’, three seasons of the BAFTA-winning BBC comedy series ‘This Country’, and the upcoming TBS comedy series ‘Chad’. He has worked extensively in film, television and on stage, most notably with the RSC, National, Donmar, Shakespeare’s Globe and Royal Court theatres as well as on Broadway in the all-male production of ‘Twelfth Night’ opposite Mark Rylance and Stephen Fry.

In addition to his Tony and Olivier nominations, he is the winner of a Theatre World Award for outstanding Broadway debut and The Clarence Derwent Award and was nominated for an Outer Critic’s Circle Award. In 2021, Paul was nominated for a Royal Television Society Award for best Comedy Performance (Male).

Paul is also an Associate Artist of the Royal Shakespeare Company and an Ambassador for Sobell House Hospice.

Leonard was born in Chester and moved to Oxford at a young age, where he studied at the Dragon and Stowe School. He was later accepted to Merton College, Oxford University, joined the RAF and trained as a pilot.

Assigned to Bomber Command, Leonard become one of the RAF’s youngest commanding officers. His war career included eight months leading No.617 Squadron – the Dambusters. He became the most highly decorated bomber pilot when awarded the Victoria Cross in 1944.

After leaving the RAF in 1946, Leonard began a series of charitable endeavours, which sought to provide opportunities for ex-servicemen and their families. Many ventures failed until he received a call from a local hospital. An acquaintance was dying and they asked if they could come and live with him. This started a lifetime of humanitarian work with disabled people. Leonard continued to fight injustice and work towards a society in which everyone is equally valued. [1]

“We need to set our sights high, to be satisfied with nothing less than the best, and to commit ourselves totally and unreservedly to participate in the struggle to build a more liveable world.”

In 1959, he married Sue Ryder and they made their home in Cavendish. Leonard was admitted to the Order of Merit in 1981 and made a life peer in the House of Lords in 1991. In memory of his time serving RAF Woodhall Spa, Leonard took the title Baron Cheshire of Woodhall in the County of Lincolnshire.

Photo Credit: (c) National Portrait Gallery, London

Photo © Tabercil – Hugh Dancy

Jack Davenport (OD 1986) joined the Dragon aged seven and went on to attend Cheltenham College, before studying English Literature and Film at the University of East Anglia. Jack’s first role in film was as ‘Trainee Zookeeper’ in Fierce Creatures (1997), with his first major role as barrister ‘Miles’ in the BBC series This Life.

Since then, he has played roles on stage and screen including ‘Ultraviolet’ (1998), ‘The Talented Mr. Ripley’ (1999), ‘Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl’ (2003) and its sequels, ‘Dead Man’s Chest’ (2006) and ‘At World’s End’ (2007). 2018 saw Jack’s Broadway debut playing the Earl of Warwick in a revival of George Bernard Shaw’s ‘Saint Joan’. Most recently Jack appeared opposite Steve Carell and Jennifer Aniston in ‘The Morning Show’ (2020).

Alain de Botton was born in Zurich, Switzerland in 1969 and now lives in London. He is a writer of essayistic books that have been described as a ‘philosophy of everyday life.’ He’s written on love, travel, architecture and literature. His books have been bestsellers in 30 countries.

Alain also started and helps to run a school in London called ‘The School of Life‘, dedicated to a new vision of education.

Alain’s latest book, published in September 2019, is a collection of essays written for The School of Life, titled ‘The School of Life: An Emotional Education’.

Alain started writing at a young age. His first book, ‘Essays in Love’ [titled On Love in the US], was published when he was twenty-three.

Pictured above: Alain, aged 7.5 years, on his first day at the Dragon.

Profile Photograph (c) Mathias Marx

Christopher de Lerisson Cazenove (OD 1957) was born in 1943. He attended the Dragon between 1953 and 1957 before being educated at Eton, Durham University and the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School.

Christopher was an actor best known for his roles in Dynasty (1981), Three Men and a Little Lady (1990) and A Knight’s Tale (2001). He appeared as Henry Higgins in My Fair Lady from 2005 to 2008 and starred alongside Susannah York in the London West End production of The Importance of Being Earnest.

Photo Credit: Katie Chan, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

William Fiennes attended the Dragon between 1978 and 1983, then Eton, before studying at Oxford University. He is the bestselling author of ‘The Snow Geese’ and ‘The Music Room’.

He was named Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year in 2003 and elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 2009.

William Fiennes is co-founder of the charity First Story, which supports creativity and literacy in schools serving low-income communities across England, and which currently runs writer-in-residence programmes in 70 schools. He is founder of the UK’s National Writing Day, an annual campaign to promote and celebrate writing in schools and communities.

He is an Honorary Vice-President of Epilepsy Action and an Ambassador for The Woodland Trust.

Lady Antonia Fraser (née Pakenham) (OD 1944) is an award-winning historian and author. She attended the Dragon between 1940 and 1944.

“I was at the Dragon School for four years –till 1944, twice as long as I was at any other school incidentally – and the first thing I want to say is that I was intensely happy here. Also, since I was here for such a long time compared to my other two schools, or indeed university, the Dragon School must certainly have marked me for life, for better, as I certainly believe… it was so wonderful to be a Dragon girl.”

Her first fictional work was the novel ‘King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table’ published in 1954. She went on to publish several critically acclaimed works of non-fiction starting with the 1966 published work ‘A History of Toys’. Her breakout non-fiction work was the 1969 published ‘Mary, Queen of Scots’, winner of the JT Black Prize for biography, a prize which had also been won by her mother in 1964. Antonia’s latest book ‘The Case of the Married Woman: Caroline Norton: A 19th Century Heroine Who Wanted Justice for Women’ will be published in May, 2021.

Tom attended the Dragon between 2003 and 2008. During his time at the School Tom thrived as a sportsman, particularly on the rugby field and the athletics track, where he captained the 1st XV and broke numerous School athletics records. He is a member of the GB Rowing team training for the 2021 Olympic Games in Tokyo, Japan.

From the Dragon, Tom went to Radley College where his passion for sport continued, and in his 5th form year he began to find himself at home on the river. After leaving Radley, Tom went to Princeton University where he majored in politics (and wrote his senior thesis on Brexit). Whilst in the US, he continued to row competitively alongside his studies, competing in the varsity VIII every year and returning to the UK in the summer to represent Great Britain at the U23 level. Following his graduation in 2018, Tom returned to the UK permanently to train with, and represent, the GB team on a full-time basis, winning a bronze medal at the 2018 & 2019 World Rowing Championships.

During the 2020 nationwide Lockdown, Tom became the first British rower to break the 5minutes 40seconds barrier for 2000m (the Olympic race distance) on the rowing machine. He has since won bronze at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics as part of GB’s men’s eight.

Tim Henman OBE (OD 1987) is a British retired professional tennis player. He began playing tennis at the early age of two-and-a-half with his parents and two older brothers on their family’s court. Tennis has always played a large part in the Henman family as his grandfather, Henry Billington, competed at Wimbledon and reached the third round in 1948, 1950 and 1951.

During his time at the Dragon, Tim played in the first teams for hockey, football, rugby, tennis and cricket. He was the only pupil to win both junior and senior school tennis championships in the same year.

Tim went on to become the first male player from the United Kingdom since Roger Taylor in the 1970s to reach the semi-finals of the Wimbledon Men’s Singles Championship. He reached six Grand Slam semi-finals and won 15 career ATP titles, including the Paris Masters in 2003. Tim was a silver medallist at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, and reached a career high ranking of World No. 4. He finished his career on a high by leading Great Britain back into the Davis Cup World Group in his last match as a professional tennis player. Tim now gives a significant amount of time to his Foundation, The Tim Henman Foundation, supporting education and health in disadvantaged young people.

ATP titles 1997 Sydney, Tashkent; 1998 Tashkent, Basel; 2000 Vienna, Brighton; 2001 Copenhagen, Basel; 2002 Adelaide; 2003 Washington DC, TMS Paris

Brent Hoberman (OD 1982) was born in Cape Town, South Africa, and attended the Dragon from 1979 through to 1982. He went on to attend Eton College before reading Modern Languages at New College, Oxford.

Brent is Co-Founder and Executive Chairman of Founders Factory (corporate-backed venture studio and accelerator), Founders Forum (global community of founders, corporates and tech leaders), and firstminute capital ($210m seed fund with global remit, backed by over 80 unicorn founders). Previously, Brent co-founded lastminute.com in 1998, was CEO from its inception, and sold it in 2005 to Sabre for $1.1bn. Technology businesses Brent has co-founded have raised over $800 million and include Karakuri and made.com.

Brent is Chairman of the Karakuri board and sits on the advisory boards of The Royal Academy, the UK Government Digital Service, the WEF Digital Europe Group and the Imperial College Innovation Fund. He is also a Champion of Change for The Global Tech Group, has been an advisor to four UK prime ministers and in 2015 was awarded a CBE for his services to entrepreneurship.

Frances Houghton MBE (OD 1993), daughter of ‘Lofty’ (OD 1953), learnt to row at the Dragon School and went on to be the first British woman to be selected for five Olympic Games in rowing, and only the fifth woman in any sport to achieve this mark for Team GB.

Over her career, she won three Olympic silver medals, four World Championship golds, one European title, and held two world records. She was awarded MBE in the New Year Honours List 2017.

Her book, ‘Learnings From Five Olympic Games’, is a mix of pragmatic performance learnings, and stories from over her twenty-one-year career. In a completely unique ‘notebook’ style, each chapter describes a component part of performance both as an individual and in teams. Throughout, Frances shares with bracing honesty how she pieced together her experiences to create her ultimate performance for her last chance at Rio 2016, where she was a part of the first British Women’s Eight to win an Olympic medal.

Frances spoke to the Dragon about her book in November 2020, read the full interview here

Essayist and novelist Pico Iyer (OD 1970) won a King’s Scholarship to Eton, following his time at the Dragon, and then a Demyship to Magdalen College, Oxford, where he was awarded a Congratulatory Double First, with the highest marks of any English Literature student in the university.

After receiving a second master’s degree — and teaching — at Harvard, he began writing on world affairs for Time magazine and then, in 1987, moved to Kyoto, Japan, near which he still lives. By now he’s written 15 books, translated into 23 languages, on subjects ranging from the Dalai Lama to globalism, from the Cuban Revolution to Islamic mysticism. He’s also been writing up to 100 articles a year for Time, The New York Times, The New York Review of Books, the Financial Times and more than 250 other periodicals worldwide. His four TED talks have received more than 10 million views so far. In one of Pico’s recent articles for The Guardian, Pico recounts how he ended up in Japan.

Dom Joly (OD 1981) attended the Dragon between 1976 and 1981.

He is a multi-award winning comedian and travel writer. He was the creator and star of the global smash hit ‘Trigger Happy TV’ and author of best-selling books such as ‘The Dark Tourist’ and ‘The Downhill Hiking Club’. He is also a prolific columnist and keen hot-air balloonist. He lives in Cheltenham and London.

John C. Kendrew (OD 1930) attended the Dragon between 1923 and 1930 before being educated at Clifton College, Bristol (1930-1936), and then Trinity College, Cambridge in 1936 as a Major Scholar.

He was a pioneer in structural biology and a catalyst for the emergence of molecular biology in the second half of the twentieth century. He was the first person to determine the three-dimensional structure of a protein at atomic resolution and, for this, was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1962. Kendrew ultimately became an international organizer, administrator, and advocate for science, and his expansive legacy lives on today.

Kendrew was an unwavering advocate for British and European science and one of the most gifted, influential, and accomplished figures in twentieth-century science.

Nobel Prize Biography

Photo Credit: (c) National Portrait Gallery, London

Alan Macfarlane FBA FRHistS (OD 1955) attended the Dragon between 1950 and 1955.

He is an anthropologist and historian. He is an Emeritus Professor of Anthropological Science at the University of Cambridge and a Life Fellow of King’s College, Cambridge. He has now published over 50 books and numerous articles on the anthropology and history of England, Nepal, Japan and China. He has focused on comparative study of the origins and nature of the modern world. In recent years he has become increasingly interested in the use of visual material in teaching and research. He is a Fellow of the British Academy and the Royal Historical Society.

Alan’s book ‘Becoming a Dragon’ describes his life at the Dragon between 1949 and 1955.

Sir Edward Lancelot Mallalieu (OD 1918) known as Lance Mallalieu, was a British politician. He was educated at the Dragon School, before Cheltenham College and then on to Trinity College, Oxford. At the 1931 general election, Lance was elected as the Liberal Party Member of Parliament (MP) for Colne Valley. He was a member of the main Liberal group in parliament led by Sir Herbert Samuel. He followed his leader into opposition in 1933. He served until the 1935 general election, when he lost his seat to Labour’s Ernest Marklew.

After joining the Labour Party, he returned to the House of Commons in 1948, at a by-election on 24 March in the Brigg constituency, where he served as MP until he retired in 1974.

The 1979 Draconian reads:
All Mallalieus have trod Dragon ‘boards’ with distinction and in 1915 Lance was ‘Pitti Sing’ in The Mikado, with brother Bernard as ‘Peep Bo’. Prizes came Lance’s way each term – First Class Diary, Painting and Drawing in particular: his Leaving Prize was for passing the R.N.C Entrance Exam for Osborne but it was to Cheltenham that he eventually went. While still under 12 he won Swimming and Diving Prizes. Debating brought him to the fore, however, and Gym- also Shooting for the VIII- and eventually he won his ‘Grasshopper’ Cap for Rugby. ODs, Staff and Dragons remember both his masterly Chairmanship of the Centenary Debate and his courteous kindness in showing Dragon parties round the House of Parliament.

Photo Credit: (c) National Portrait Gallery, London

Henry Marsh CBE FRCS (OD 1963) joined the Dragon in 1958. He is a leading English neurosurgeon. His work in Ukraine was the subject of the documentary film ‘The English Surgeon’, which won an Emmy in 2010. He earned acclaim for his internationally bestselling, award-winning memoirs ‘Do No Harm’ and ‘Admissions’.

Henry pioneered a technique of operating on the brain while the patient is under local anaesthetic. The procedure is now standard practice. He was appointed a consultant at St George’s Hospital, London, in 1987. He has spent his career in the NHS, and has frequently worked abroad, in Ukraine, Nepal, Albania and elsewhere. Henry retired in 2015.

Photo Credit: Patrick Sherlock

Ella Mills (OD 2004) attended the Dragon between 1996 and 2004.

She is an award-winning cookery author, entrepreneur and a champion of plant-based living. She started with the popular website, deliciouslyella.com, before writing a best-selling debut cookbook in the UK. Ella has since released a further four best-selling books, and amassed a social media audience of three million people. With her husband Matthew, they have created a #1 app and podcast, opened a café in London, and launched six ranges of plant-based food products into over 7,000 stores across the UK, with customers ranging from Tesco to Boots, Waitrose and Costa.

Ella and Matthew recently won the Ernst & Young Rising Star Award at the Entrepreneur of the Year Awards in London.

Naomi Mitchison CBE (OD 1911), (née Haldane) followed her brother to the Dragon (then known as Oxford Preparatory School) in 1904, as the only girl. She qualified for the University of Oxford in 1914, via the Oxford higher local examination and entered the Society of Oxford Home Students (later renamed St Anne’s College) to pursue a degree course in science. Before she completed the course, she chose to become a nurse, for the First World War had broken out, and she joined a Voluntary Aid Detachment at St Thomas’s Hospital, London.

She was a Scottish novelist and poet. Often called the doyenne of Scottish literature, she wrote over 90 books of historical fiction, science fiction, travel writing and autobiography.

Naomi was a prolific writer, completing more than 90 books in her lifetime, across a multitude of styles and genres. These include historical novels such as her first novel ‘The Conquered’ (1923), set in Gaul in the 1st century BC, during the Gallic Wars of Julius Caesar, and her second novel ‘Cloud Cuckoo Land’ (1925) set in 5th-century BC Ancient Greece during the Peloponnesian War. She is well-known for ‘The Corn King and the Spring Queen’ (1931), which treats three different societies, including a wholly fictional one, and explores themes of sexuality that were daring for that day.

In 1952, Naomi went to Moscow as a member of the Authors’ World Peace Appeal. She frequently went to Africa, especially to Botswana. ‘Mucking Around’ (1981) best describes her haphazard travels in five continents over 50 years. Later works included further historical novels: ‘The Bull Calves’ (1947) and ‘The Young Alexander the Great’ (1960). She also turned to fantasy, such as ‘Graeme and the Dragon’ (1954), science fiction such as Memoirs of a ‘Spacewoman’ (1962) and ‘Solution Three’ (1975), fantasy such as the humorous Arthurian novel ‘To the Chapel Perilous’ (1955), non-fiction such as ‘African Heroes’ (1968), and also children’s novels, poetry, travel and a three-volume autobiography.

After her husband’s death, Naomi wrote several memoirs, published as separate titles between 1973 and 1985. She was also a good friend of the writer J. R. R. Tolkien and she was one of the proof readers of The Lord of the Rings.

Photo Credit: (c) National Portrait Gallery, London

She was appointed CBE in 1981.

Sir John Mortimer (OD 1937), was born in Hampstead, London, he joined the Dragon in 1932 and went on to be educated at Harrow and at Brasenose College, Oxford. He began writing before he was called to the bar in 1948.

Sir John was an English barrister and writer who wrote plays for the stage, television, radio, and motion pictures, as well as novels and autobiographical works. He began his writing career as a novelist, with ‘Charade’ (1947). Many of his short stories and novels drew on his legal experience, and the television production of his play ‘The Dock Brief ‘established his reputation. He wrote many other plays, including ‘The Wrong Side of the Park’ (performed 1960) and ‘The Judge’ (performed 1967).

Throughout his writing career, Sir John continued his law practice and became known as one of Great Britain’s principal defenders in free-speech and civil-rights cases. As a writer, he had popular success in the late 1970s and ’80s with the television series ‘Rumpole of the Bailey’. His novels include ‘Paradise Postponed’ (1985) and ‘Dunster’ (1992). ‘Clinging to the Wreckage’ (1982) is an autobiography. Sir John was knighted in 1998.

Source: The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica, Encyclopaedia Britannica, January 20, 2021
Photo Credit: (c) National Portrait Gallery, London

Nicholas Shakespeare (OD 1970) joined the Dragon in 1966. He is the author of seven novels, including ‘The Vision of Elena Silves’ (winner of the Somerset Maugham Award and Betty Trask Award); ‘The High Flyer’, for which he was selected as one of Granta’s Best of Young British Novelists, 1993; and ‘The Dancer Upstairs’, which was chosen as the Best Novel of 1997 by the American Libraries Association, and in 2001 made into a film by John Malkovich.

His non-fiction includes the critically acclaimed authorized biography of Bruce Chatwin; ‘In Tasmania’, winner of the 2007 Tasmania Book Prize; ‘Priscilla: The Hidden Life of an Englishwoman in Wartime France’; and ‘Six Minutes in May: How Churchill Unexpectedly Became Prime Minister’. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.

Nicholas’ new novel The Sandpit was published on 23 July 2020.

Nevil Norway (OD 1913) left the Dragon at the end of the Easter Term 1913. He went on to graduate from Balliol College, Oxford, in 1922 with a degree in Engineering Science.

Nevil was an aeronautical engineer and novelist. He used his pen name Nevil Shute to separate both careers. He joined the design team in 1924, as a calculator, of the R.100, built at the old Royal Naval Air Station at Howden, Yorkshire. In 1962, Shute was promoted to Chief Calculator, following the resignation of J.E. Temple and pursued his career as an aeronautical engineer, building up a sound reputation.

Shute’s first published novel was ‘Marazan’ in 1926, and his final work, ‘The Seafarers’ was published more than 40 years after his death. Many of his books have been adapted for the screen, including ‘A Town Like Alice’ and ‘On the Beach’.

Photo Credit: Wikimedia

Simon Tolkien (OD 1972) grew up in Oxford where he loved his time at the Dragon School and returned there to study modern history at Trinity College.

He became a solicitor and was drawn to criminal law. He transferred to the Bar and prosecuted and defended trials in London.

He had never thought he could write creatively until he began at the age of forty. He wrote two courtroom dramas, ‘Final Witness’ and ‘The Inheritance’, following advice to begin with what he knew, and then developed into historical fiction with The King of Diamonds focusing on the Holocaust and Orders from Berlin set in the London Blitz, which involves a Nazi plan to assassinate Churchill. His most recent novel is ‘No Man’s Land’ which covers a boy’s journey to manhood set in the coal mines of Edwardian England and the trenches of World War One. Its centrepiece is the Battle of the Somme in which Simon’s grandfather, J.R.R. Tolkien, fought.

Simon is a director of the Tolkien Estate and has lived in Santa Barbara, California with his wife, Tracy, for the last ten years, returning to Oxford as often as he can, where he loves to walk by the Cherwell and on Port Meadow. He is currently working on a novel about the Spanish Civil War which is due to be published in 2022.

Photo (c) Nicholas Tolkien

Emma Watson (OD 2003) was born in Paris, and moved to Oxfordshire when she was five, where she attended the Dragon. She rose to fame with her first professional acting role as Hermione Granger in the ‘Harry Potter’ film series, aged nine. Her first audition for the film took place in the Dragon School’s gym. During her time on ‘Harry Potter’, Emma acquired nominations for five awards for her performance, winning the ‘Young Artist Award for Leading Young Actress’ in a feature film. The ‘Harry Potter’ franchise won the ‘BAFTA for Outstanding British Contribution to Cinema’ in February 2011.

Emma has since starred in many feature films. Most recently, in the live-action Disney fantasy ‘Beauty and the Beast’ (2017), ‘The Circle’ (2017), and ‘Little Women’ (2019).

Further to her acting career, Emma is a Goodwill Ambassador for the UN, promoting gender equality and the empowerment of women. Emma graduated from Brown University with a degree in English Literature in May 2014.

Photo Credit: David Shankbone CC by 2.0

Nick Wheeler OBE (OD 1978) was born in Ludlow, Shropshire, and attended the Dragon from 1973 through to 1978. He went on to attend Bristol University where he read Geography.

Nick always had ambitions to run his own business and tried his hand at several different ventures, from photography and Christmas trees to bespoke shoes. It was in his second year at University witnessing his ‘scruffy’ fellow students that he had the idea for shirts, ‘better than anybody else’s and at remarkably good value.’ He spent £99 on 5000 leaflets and £199 on an Amstrad word processor, and in 1986 Charles Tyrwhitt was born.

For 33 years, Nick has overseen the company, Charles Tyrwhitt, which has now expanded from shirts to ties and suits, shoes, casualwear and accessories. There are now 45 Charles Tyrwhitt stores worldwide, with 1,300 employees.

Jack Whitehall (OD 2001) grew up in London and went to board at the Dragon, aged 10. He is an award-winning actor, comedian, presenter and writer.

Widely celebrated for his hit show ‘Travels With My Father’ (Netflix, 2017-19), his starring role in the BBC’s adaptation of ‘Decline & Fall’ (2017) and ‘Bad Education’ (BBC 2012-14), Jack has most recently been seen in Disney’s ‘The Nutcracker And The Four Realms’ (2018), Amazon’s ‘Good Omens’ (2019) and in ‘Bounty Hunters’ (Sky 2017-19). In 2020, he is set to star in Disney’s ‘Jungle Cruise’, opposite Dwayne Johnson and Emily Blunt.

An acclaimed comedian who loves the stage, Jack is currently back on the road for his biggest-ever stand-up tour, ‘Jack Whitehall: Stood Up’. He previously sold-out arenas across the UK on two tours: ‘Jack Whitehall Gets Around’ (2014) and ‘Jack Whitehall: At Large’ (2017), which was filmed for Netflix.

In fact, the stage is where it all started. Jack began his career at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 2007, where he won both ‘The Charlie Hartill Special Reserve Competition’ and ‘The Amused Moose Laugh Off’. A string of further awards followed, including ‘The British Comedy Awards’ King Of Comedy’, as voted for by the public, three years in a row. From there, Jack has increasingly appeared in films, on television, on stage and as an unlikely comedy duo with his father, Michael Whitehall.

Finally, as a presenter, Jack has hosted the ‘BRIT Awards’ (2018 and 2019) and several other prestigious award ceremonies, like the ‘BAFTA Britannia Awards’ (2015, 2017 and 2018). He became the youngest-ever host of the ‘Royal Variety Performance’ in 2015. For YouTube, he presented ‘Training Days’, where he travelled the world to interview international football stars in the lead-up to FIFA World Cup 2018. In 2019, Jack became the first (and so far, only) person to stand in as host of ‘The Graham Norton Show’.