Kate Kellaway


Kate Kellaway is an English journalist and literary critic who writes for The Observer.

Early life

The daughter of the Australians Bill and Deborah Kellaway, she is the older sister of the journalist Lucy Kellaway. Both siblings were educated at the Camden School for Girls, where their mother was a teacher, and at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, where she read English.

Professional life

Following a period teaching in Zimbabwe between 1982 and 1986, she began her career in journalism at the Literary Review and became deputy to then editor Auberon Waugh around 1987.
Kellaway later joined The Observer, where her posts have included features writer, deputy literary editor, deputy theatre critic and children's books editor. While The Observers poetry editor, Kellaway was one of the five judges for the Booker Prize in 1995.
Kellaway is married and has four sons and two step-sons.