interview
Island Life - April/May 2010
PHOTO: The crew of Morning Cloud I, after winning the Sydney-Hobart race. From left: Anthony Churchill,
Sammy Sampson, Owen Parker, Jean Berger, Edward Heath, and Duncan Kay
A little bit of
everything
YOU almost feel you need to make a list
Anthony Churchill, sportsman, sailor,
and champion of the arts, makes things
happen - and has done all his life. Roz
Whistance meets a man of action and
adventure who has a passion for music
We meet in his oh-so-appropriate
soupçon of everything.”
of his interests and achievements, but to
castellated and flinted home in Ventnor,
tie Anthony Churchill down to anything
and as Chopin plays away in another
he still has. He left Cambridge where he
so prosaic as a list is unconscionable, as
room and we sip red wine from cut-glass
had studied politics and economics and
well as nearly impossible. A map might
goblets, the life he describes seems
went into financial journalism, joining the
be better, or one of those puzzles you
so, well, unlikely. A beautiful Russian
Express Group, then Thompsons, and then
set a child, where you have to draw
ballet dancer here, a lunch with the Aga
the Financial Times group. But working
a line showing the seemingly unlikely
Khan there, getting drunk on the Prime
for other people wasn’t his cup of tea,
connection between one picture and
Minister’s pink champagne at Number 10
so he decided to go on his own, and
another. For however bizarre it may seem,
“All of these things get muddled up ,” he
started his publishing empire developing
every interest and adventure in his past
says, part apologetically. “It’s marvellous
a magazine called Seahorse, which, long
relates directly with his current passions,
because I hate doing only one thing in
since sold on, is still the technical bible of
which in turn drive his fund raising and
one’s life. You’ve only got one life so
ocean racing.
social events In Ventnor.
you might as well enjoy everything, try a
Visit our new website - www.visitislandlife.com
His career reflected all the interests that
“I thought why not have a stable of
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