The much-feared Vogue editor is surprisingly not averse to the truth about herself: She admitted to James Corden, "I have no gifts" Anna Wintour in a conversation with James Corden. Screen shot: j_corden/Instagram As she grows older and a…
The surprise could be more pronounced because she is the daughter of the "influential"—by most accounts—British editor Charles Wintour, synonymous with the London paper Evening Standard (even her mother Eleanor 'Nonie' Baker had been a journalist, if briefly). Her brother Patrick Wintour is also a journalist; he's the diplomatic editor with The Guardian. Despite her pedigree, she is not considered by many people in more serious journalism that is not fashion magazine writing as a true journalist, even if she attends the White House Correspondences' Dinner. She is often referred to as a "businesswoman". That Ms Wintour could hold the editor-in-chief position at Vogue for so long is all the more amazing considering that, unlike her parents, she did not pursue higher education. There is barely any account of her in primary or secondary school.
In Anna: The Biography by Amy Odell, it is stated that Ms Wintour attended the private Queen's College (whether she graduated is unknown) and then her "formal education ended when she was sixteen years old, departing North London Collegiate before completing her final year." That was in 1966. North London, according to the institution, is "the UK's oldest academic girls' school. Despite its good reputation, its offerings did not appeal to Ms Wintour, who had no interest in academic life. Except for art, apparently "most of the curriculum bored her" and she gave fake notes to the school to say she was ill and got off class to go shopping with another classmate. Her lack of paper qualifications was not, it seems, a hindrance to scoring editorial jobs that finally shot her to the top post at Vogue. (Her predecessor, the late Grace Mirabella, attended Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs and graduated with an economics degree.) One former editor told us, "try going to Her World for an editor's post and saying you don't write very well."
What does she have then that allowed her to create the "most successful Vogue" throughout the title's history, apart from organisational skill that resulted in the Met Gala and Vogue World? "What I try to do is use my platform to help others," Ms Wintour told the enthralled chat-show host James Corden, also her friend and "favourite comedian", without saying she used it to help herself first. "I admire others so much, and I want to do the best that I can to help show the world how good they are. That's really what motivates me, I think, is admiration for others who have gifts that I can't possibly understand, but I can admire." For that, she does not need to be able to sing or dance, take pictures or make a dress. She certainly doesn't require Pulitzer Prize-worthy writing skills. Anna Wintour needs to just be Anna Wintour, an ability even AI probably cannot master.
Anna Wintour on This Life of Mine with James Corden is available to listen on SiriusXM
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