Katharine Whitehorn CBE, dies aged 92

Oh No! The woman who gave me the right to be a "slut". RIP Katherine you are up there with all the women who campaigned for the vote and freed women from their assigned roles. You'll be welcomed with open arms.

I used to enjoy her contributions to Woman's Hour in the 60's and 70's. A really distinctive voice and style.

I and my house-mate howled with the slightly embarrassed laughter of recognition when we read Katharine Whitehorne's famous 'slut' column. We, and a generation of then 20- somethings, felt vindicated. Even if we had never changed our stockings (not tights - they came about 6 years later) in a taxi, we were grateful for the tip that an aspirin made a useful substitute for the missing rubber 'button' on a suspender. When I'd picked up my 'Observer' on a Sunday morning,hers was our first go-to column and she will be forever remembered.

Caitlin Moran is the journalist whose articles I now collect and read over and over again. We stopped buying newspapers because of covid so I now save her articles on my iPad which isn’t quite the same. I also used to love Sue Limb who wrote articles called Dulce Domum (?): not sure which paper it was. My friend used to send them to me.

I only got to know of her a few short years ago as a columnist in the Saga Magazine. Her articles were very readable.

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MaizieD I’ll show you mine if you’ll show me yours!

I enjoyed her columns too - she was a highly intelligent woman, how tragic that she was struck down by Alzheimer’s.
Her “Cooking in a bed sitter” was my first -in fact my only cook book when we married in 1970 and lived in an attic “bed sit + kitchen”. in Greenwich.

RIP Katharine Whitehorn.

I always read her columns, and like so many of my generation, used Cooking in a Bedsitter as my kitchen bible long after I had left bedsitter life behind.

It was very sad, and almost unbelievable, to read of her later decline.

I’m another one who loved her articles as did my parents. Sad to hear about the Alzheimer’s, she had such a keen mind.

My heart sinks when I read that someone like Katharine Whitehorn is a victim of Alzheimer's - goes to show that no amount of sudoko, crosswords, highbrow interests, etc will save your brain.

'How to survive Children'
'How to survive un the Kitchen'
'Cooking in a Bedsit'.
Our 'go to' books in the 1970s and 1980s as new girl friends, wives and mothers!
So sad.

Katherine Whitehorn was wonderful. But perhaps the fact that some people have never heard of her just goes to show how few people read (past tense) the so called 'leftwing' print media.

I loved her columns and I still use recipes from 'Cooking in a Bedsitter' and have a falling to pieces original paperback copy ?

Katherine Whitehorn was one of the most prominent journalist (of any gender) in the country. She wrote many insightful and many very witty articles.

This thread shows, how quickly someone's standing and reputation fades once they retire. As people live to later and later ages we are going to see more of these death announcements, where many people as old as 60 have not heard of someone who 30 or 40 years before was a Colossos in their field.

I wonder how many people who today stride the stage of public opinion and have been in the public eye - say, for arguments sake, Piers Morgan, ubiquitous, Marmite to many, but well known, if he dies in his late 90s or more, will have people saying 'Who? never heard of him'

I used to read her column in the Observer too. She was erudite and sensible simultaneously, and very readable.

I hadn’t heard of her but am intrigued and like Fanny have just bought the kindle edition of her autobiography.

I haven't read anything by her, so I've just bought the kindle editions of her autobiography and Cookies in a Bedsitter.
Very much look forward to reading them, thankyou for the recommendation.

Must confess I had never heard of her before I saw her column in the Saga magazine a few years ago, and realised she was a journalist or similar in her younger days.

She was writing a sort of agony column, but more to do with household matters I think.

I’d forgotten about the slut article. I’ll always remember my son, a teenager at the time, being horrified when I referred to myself as a slut, the reason being that I was totally useless at anything domestic. Seem to be losing a lot of the people that have made up the fabric of my life recently.

incidentally, her marvellous writing and liberating ideas, illustrate another recent theme on here, the changed meaning of some words.
she wrote about sluts in the sense of a woman who changed her tights in a taxi, in a rush somewhere, and dipped into the to-be-washed basket to grab something cleaner to wear, ie a woman who just coped with all the demands of life, and was not a domestic goddess.
to the younger generation that word has different connotation. i believe a white stale male politician used it jokingly about a woman not mopping behind the fridge and got in a lot of hot water. it was like they were talking a different language. hazardous.

Nothing makes me more aware of my age than hearing that Katherine Whitehorn has die at such an advanced age. Nir has anything more outlined the tragedy that is Alzheimers that someon with such an incisive and curious mind should fall victim to it.

In the 1960s and 70s I can remember buying The Observer just to read her column about life with a home and children and all the ther totally nondomestic problems that faced women with children.

Oh no. I loved her articles and used to save them. Still have them somewhere. My favourite one was about the wool woozies that live under the bed!