Journalism is the perfect excuse.
Want to explore how tourism is changing the hill tribe communities of Bhutan, settle down with a Nobel winner to discover how our minds consistently trick us, ask an Olympic athlete how to train to peak physical fitness or see what an orgasm guru does (and whether what he suggests works)...?
Despite the fact that it is not experiencing it’s finest hour, Rebecca never managed to shake her love of the Fourth Estate.
She is currently the Erotic Affairs Editor at GQ a post she adores. It enables her to ask any question, try anything - and have invaluable small talk at dinner parties.
She is also the Health and Beauty Editor and Contributing Editor at ES Magazine. Like an East-London based bloodhound, she tracks the city’s zeitgeist; she investigates the luxurious world of cosmetics, but also the latest physiological, nutritional and psychological advancements into ways to look and feel fantastic.
Elsewhere, she writes on travel, on seduction, and frankly on anything else for a range of publications including The Telegraph, The Times, The Financial Times, and The London Magazine. She tweets here, blogs for Harper’s Bazaar and has edited ES, specialist publications Hedge and Benchmark, as well as the People section of webzine The First Post. She cut her teeth in the world of celebrity / diary journalism, and is glad her canape days are over.
Books
Rebecca wrote the new (2013) edition of The Bluffer’s Guide to Sex.
‘brilliant’ - Rowan Pelling
‘she taught me everything I know about sex’ - Christa d’Souza
She also contributed to The Hedonist’s Guide to Life.
TV
Rebecca regularly appears on TV, commenting on sex and celebrity, as well as matters more generally relating to the London zeitgeist.
- here, on Sky discussing the Olympic opening ceremony live
- here, on Sky, discussing hookup culture
INTER ALIA
Rebecca grew up on the North Norfolk coast, a place which left her with a love of wide skies, mud and samphire (but no, not webbed feet).
She was knocked out for much of her teenage years with Chronic Fatigue, but recovered enough to study English at Trinity College Cambridge, then made up for lost time reporting on the party scene for the Telegraph and then the Mail (highlights: gate crashing the Cannes Vanity Fair party, incidental - unsuccessful but amusing - celebrity come ons, and a few front page scoops; lowlights: Bob Geldof instructing her to put her ‘fooking head through a fooking wall’ and Ralph Fiennes remarking ‘I bet your parents wished you’d died of cancer’).
Eventually, she fled the diary world to accept a scholarship to teach / study journalism at UC Berkeley (link here to San Francisco Chronicle story), and came back with her dreams set on a freelance career, writing over fat cappuccinos on a shiny Mac, just like they did in the Bay Area.
Some dreams come true - though it’s fair to say she underestimated the caffeine shakes.
She is a member of the British American Project; she is passionate about the possibilities afforded by social enterprise, and works with Ashoka; she would travel - and has - to most anywhere in the world to kite-surf, but wishes she could land more tricks.
‘Dishonourable Dispatches’ (entertaining, sadly untrue)
“For a noisy girlfriend, for example, GQ's sex columnist, Rebecca Newman (a total nom de femme, if you ask me) suggests not a gentle hint but a gag....” - LA Times
REBECCA Newman, who disappeared to the States after jacking in her job as Richard Kay's deputy on the Daily Mail diary, has returned to conquer London.
First up was a breakfast-time meeting with Condé Nast managing director Nicholas Coleridge. "So, give me an idea of what you'd like to write," said Coleridge, "and I'll put you in touch with the right editor." Newman — who has a delicious sense of humour — replied: "I want to write about bondage. I can only achieve orgasm if I have my hands tied above my head." Coleridge spluttered on his croissant and then sent her in the direction of GQ editor Dylan Jones. - Press Gazette