Linda Wilkinson

Linda was born in Bethnal Green in the heart of London's East End. For the first 24 years of her life she lived in a house on Columbia Road. These days it’s home to the internationally renowned Flower Market, in those days it was just for the locals who bought plants for their tiny back yards and gardens.

Her family have lived in the area for many generations and she can trace her roots in East London back to the 1650’s.  Her mother was a seamstress and her father worked for the Gas Board. Much of her writing has been about the realities and challenges she observed in the lives around her. Her own life is recounted in her memoir – Columbia Road - Of Blood and Belonging.  

Having left the area in her twenties, in 1986 she returned to live just a stone’s throw from her original home.

She has in turn been an accountant, scientist, playwright, author, radio producer and Chair of Amnesty International UK.

As an avid proponent of Human Rights’, she was a founder member of Amnesty Internationals’ LGBT networks.

She and her partner Carol were the first women to sign London’s GLA Partnership Register which kick-started the road to Same-Sex marriage in the UK.