Early Life and Family
Born in London in 1947, Cockburn grew up in County Cork, Ireland. His father was socialist author and journalist Claud Cockburn. His mother, Patricia Evangeline Anne (née Arbuthnot), was the granddaughter of British colonial administrator Henry Arthur Blake and British politician George Arbuthnot; she had written an autobiography, Figure of Eight. Cockburn was educated at Glenalmond College, Perthshire, and Worcester College, University of Oxford, Oxford, Oxfordshire.
Cockburn has two brothers, Alexander Cockburn and Patrick Cockburn, who are also journalists, and two half-sisters. One sister, Sarah, was best known as the mystery writer Sarah Caudwell. The other sister, Claudia, worked on disability and married Michael Flanders, half of the well-known performance double-act: Flanders and Swann; the two children of this marriage are the journalists Laura Flanders and Stephanie Flanders, his half-nieces.
He married Leslie Corkhill Redlich in San Francisco in 1977 and together they have three children, Chloe Frances Cockburn (April 3, 1979), The O.C. and House M.D. actress Olivia Wilde (née Olivia Jane Cockburn) and Charles Philip Cockburn (January 31, 1993). The Cockburns are distantly "related by cousinly marriages" to Sir George Cockburn, 10th Baronet, who ordered the Burning of Washington in 1814.
Read more about this topic: Andrew Cockburn
Famous quotes containing the words early, life and/or family:
“Make-believe is the avenue to much of the young child’s early understanding. He sorts out impressions and tries out ideas that are foundational to his later realistic comprehension. This private world sometimes is a quiet, solitary
world. More often it is a noisy, busy, crowded place where language grows, and social skills develop, and where perseverance and attention-span expand.”
—James L. Hymes, Jr. (20th century)
“There a captive sat in chains
Crooning ditties treasured well
From his Afric’s torrid plains.
Sole estate his sire bequeathed,—
Hapless sire to hapless son,—
Was the wailing song he breathed,
And his chain when life was done.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Freud is all nonsense; the secret of neurosis is to be found in the family battle of wills to see who can refuse longest to help with the dishes. The sink is the great symbol of the bloodiness of family life.”
—Julian Mitchell (20th century)