Last updated September 2008
Category: News; Radio 4
Printable version
Gavin Esler joined the presenting team of BBC Two's Newsnight in January 2003.
Gavin has anchored the BBC News Channel (formerly BBC News 24) since 1997 and reported for news and documentary programmes across Europe, Russia, China and North and South America.
He began his career as a reporter on the Belfast Telegraph.
He joined BBC Television as Northern Ireland reporter and then BBC Two's Newsnight as a reporter/presenter.
Gavin received a Royal Television Society award for his reports on the military build-up in the Aleutian Islands as part of the Reagan administration's New Maritime Strategy. He also won a Sony Gold Award in 2007 for a radio documentary on Sami al Hajj, a detainee held by the United States in Guantanamo Bay.
Gavin was appointed as Washington Correspondent in 1989, and then Chief North America Correspondent a year later.
In charge of shaping and directing BBC coverage from North America, he travelled extensively across the United States and was accredited to the White House to cover the Bush and Clinton administrations.
He presented BBC News 24's comprehensive coverage of the President Clinton/Lewinsky hearings, and has interviewed numerous world leaders including President Clinton, Margaret Thatcher, Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, Daniel Ortega, Thabo Mbeki, King Abdullah of Jordan and Jacques Chirac.
Gavin is also a presenter of the BBC News/BBC World News arts and culture programme HARDtalk Extra, as well as Dateline London, and is a regular presenter on BBC Radio 4 programmes.
His arts and cultural interviews have included Dolly Parton, Angelina Jolie, Penelope Cruz, Michael Frayn, Fdoris Lessing, VS Naipaul, Daniel Barenboim and Salman Rushdie.
In 2005, he was awarded an honorary doctorate of civil law from the University of Kent at Canterbury. He is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.
He writes regularly for newspapers and magazines including the Daily Mail, The Scotsman, New Statesman and The Independent.
Gavin is the author of four novels: Loyalties, Deep Blue, The Blood Brother and, most recently, A Scandalous Man, a tale of intrigue, lies and scandal at the upper reaches of power in London and Washington. He has also written an account of American discontent: The United States Of Anger.
His hobbies include camping, hiking and skiing.
