John Hume – The Persuader Stephen Walker in conversation with Miriam O'Callaghan

In John Hume: The Persuader (Gill Books) author and journalist Stephen Walker combines over 100 interviews with many of Hume’s colleagues, critics and family members, with never-before-published interviews with Hume himself to present a comprehensive portrait of one of the most significant political figures in Northern Ireland and around the world. Join the author in discussion with broadcast journalist Miriam O’Callaghan about his new book, who John Hume really was, and how this titan of Irish political history should be remembered.

Photo by: Charles McQuillan

Stephen Walker has covered the politics of Northern Ireland for over 30 years. He reported on the Troubles and the peace process and is an award-winning television and radio journalist. He was a lobby correspondent at Westminster, an investigative journalist with BBC Spotlight and a former political correspondent with BBC Northern Ireland. He is the author of Forgotten Soldiers, Ireland’s Call and Hide and Seek, an Irish Times bestseller shortlisted for the Irish Non-Fiction Book of the Year. He lives in County Down.

Miriam O’Callaghan is a TV and Radio Broadcast Journalist with RTÉ, Ireland’s public service broadcaster. She was born and raised in Dublin. She qualified as a solicitor before beginning her broadcasting career on ITV’s This is your Life. She joined the BBC as a producer in 1987, and went on to become a reporter on BBC2’s Newsnight. In the early ‘90s Miriam returned to Ireland to present RTÉ’s current affairs flagship programme Prime Time, while continuing to cover the Northern Irish peace process for Newsnight. In August 2000, Miriam co-founded Mint Productions, an independent production company that specialised in documentary. Unusually for a current affairs presenter, Miriam was voted Best TV Personality at the Irish Film and Television Awards in 2003. To her surprise, she won the RTÉ Guide Style Award at the 2007 IFTAs following another public vote. In June 2013, her Prime Time interview with Praveen Halappanavar, won the Television News Category of the Justice Media Awards 2013. Outside of her work on Prime Time, Miriam presented her own chat show during the summer, Saturday Night with Miriam, and a radio programme Sundays with Miriam. She has previously presented Miriam Meets…. which won the PPI Radio Award in 2011 for best Speech Driven Magazine Programme. Miriam also supports a large number of charitable causes throughout the year.