Last Friday , alumni, parents, students, staff, and friends of New Hall joined us for our relaunch of our annual Literary Dinner. It was a wonderful occasion for a gathering, and for some a long-awaited reunion of friends, celebrating literature and culture over a delightful three-course meal. Author Jimmy Burns OBE was our guest for the evening, providing insight into his career as a journalist and former Foreign Correspondent and Senior Reporter of the Financial Times, covering security and intelligence, as well as that of his good friend and secret agent Walter Bell. Jimmy’s knowledge of twentieth century history, the intelligence community and the spy Walter Bell, in particular, is encyclopaedic. Jimmy spoke of how he acquired exclusive access to Bell’s papers after his death, many of them containing top-secret information, and proceeded to write a biography entitled A Faithful Spy.

Our fascinated audience heard stories of espionage, key historical figures and events of the past century, as well as humorous anecdotes that challenged our idea of what being an MI6 and MI5 agent really entails (for all 007 fans). Jimmy followed his speech with a book signing and a Q&A expertly led by our Head of History, Mrs Garside, with many questions about his own career, as well as his advice for students who may wish to pursue a career in intelligence – our Sixth Form students were especially curious. Jimmy was blown away by the enthusiastic welcome he received and was delighted that we sold all of the books that the publisher had supplied.