Rex Winsbury

Malcolm Rex Winsbury (6 May 1935 – 8 July 2015) was a British journalist and author. He worked for BBC current affairs, the ''Financial Times'' and ''Daily Telegraph'', was development director for Nation Newspapers in Nairobi, Kenya, and wrote widely on the press and technology and health issues such as AIDS and cancer.

He wrote books on politics, technology, health and Roman history. His most recent and third Roman book was a biography of Pliny the Younger, covering among other things his political concerns and anxieties, his literary style and his relationship with women: ''Pliny the Younger: A life in Roman Letters'', published in November 2013 by Bloomsbury Academic.

His first Roman history book, published by Duckworth in March 2009, was ''The Roman Book – Books, Publishing and Performance in Classical Rome'', a literary-historical reassessment of the publishing business in classical Rome.

The second, published by Duckworth in September 2010, constructs a political and military narrative for ''Zenobia of Palmyra'', one of the great women of classical antiquity. Winsbury argues that the romantic image of Zenobia as a beautiful, intellectual but chaste Arab queen of the desert and the political perception of her as a regal woman whose feminine qualities lifted her above her misfortunes, do less than justice to Palmyra's most controversial ruler. There was a dark side to her that shows her as a ruler who did what real rulers do and she should be judged on this.

Winsbury held an MA from Oxford University and a PhD from London University in classical studies. During his National Service, he was sent to Cambridge University to qualify as a Russian interpreter. He was the Labour candidate for Southend West in the 1964 General Election.

Winsbury died in Camden, London on 8 July 2015, at the age of 80. Provided by Wikipedia