Ann Treneman (born 1956) is an American journalist, currently working for ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' (f ...

'' newspaper in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

. Treneman was born in

Iowa City, Iowa Iowa City, offically the City of Iowa City is a city in Johnson County, Iowa, United States. It is the home of the University of Iowa and county seat of Johnson County, at the center of the Iowa City Metropolitan Statistical Area. At the tim ...

, but she grew up in

McMinnville, Oregon McMinnville is the county seat of and largest city in Yamhill County, Oregon, United States. The city is named after McMinnville, Tennessee. As of the 2019 census, the city had a population estimate of 34,743. McMinnville is at the confluence of ...

. She has lived in the UK since the mid-1980s.

Career in journalism

Until September 2015, she was ''

Parliament In modern politics, and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: representing the electorate, making laws, and overseeing the government via hearings and inquiries. Th ...

ary sketchwriter. In this role, her tone was pawky, frequently reducing the serious business of politics to playground spats between bickering children. Another leitmotif is the humorous written portrayal of politicians as ridiculous caricatures, in the style of a modern-day

William Hogarth William Hogarth (; 10 November 1697 – 26 October 1764) was an English painter, engraver, pictorial satirist, social critic, editorial cartoonist and occasional writer on art. His work ranges from realistic portraiture to comic strip-like ...

cartoon. A further ploy is the use of anthropomorphism to further heighten the surreal atmosphere of the

House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. T ...

. ''

Total Politics ''Total Politics'' is a British political magazine described as "a lifestyle magazine for the political community". It was first published in June 2008, and is distributed freely to all MPs, MEPs, peers, political journalists, members of the S ...

'' has referred to Treneman as "one of the sharpest wits in Westminster". In 2015, she became the chief theatre critic for ''

''. She made her debut with a one-star review of the musical ''Dusty'' at the

Charing Cross Theatre The Charing Cross Theatre is a theatre under The Arches off Villiers Street below Charing Cross station. Founded in 1936, the venue occupied several premises in the West End of London before locating to its present site. The current site was o ...

Books

Her first two books, ''Annus Horribilis: The Worst Year in British Politics'', (2009) and ''Dave and Nick: The Year of the Honeymoon'' (2011) were collections of her Parliamentary sketch pieces and refer to the Conservative Party. In October 2013 she published her third book, ''Finding the Plot: 100 Graves to Visit Before You Die''. It arose from her interest in researching the last resting places of significant characters from history; she has said that "London cemeteries have the most interesting people and that north London has more interesting dead people per square mile than anywhere in the world".

References

External links

Times Politics page, featuring her latest articles
1956 births Living people Writers from Iowa City, Iowa British journalists People from McMinnville, Oregon Artists from Oregon Writers from Oregon {{UK-journalist-stub