in conversation with Dan Linstead, Wanderlust Magazine

Date: Sunday 3rd February

Time: 2.00pm

Location: Theatre 1

Frank’s fascination with the Middle East began as a teenager when he had a chance meeting with Wilfrid Thesiger (who extensively travelled and photographed the Middle East).

A fluent Arabist with a degree in Arabic and Islamic studies from Exeter University, Frank spent nine years as an investment banker in New York, London and Bahrain before switching to journalism and becoming the BBC’s Middle East correspondent based in Cairo. He has reported extensively on the so-called ‘War on Terror’ in Guantanamo Bay, Yemen, Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle East.

In 2004 he survived being shot six times at close range by Al Qaeda terrorists in the Riyadh suburb, Saudi Arabia. In May 2006 Frank’s first book, Blood and Sand, was published by Transworld, reaching number three in the Sunday Times Bestseller List. It is a remarkable snapshot of the Middle East over a number of years and the poignant story of what can happen to your belief system when the culture you have embraced ends up trying to kill you.

He is currently working on his second book, Far Horizons. A look at the epically hard travelling he has done over the years in an extraordinary variety of countries and how his horizons have been altered, but not diminished, by his injuries - he has since been skiing, quad-biking and scuba diving.

Frank’s first experience of scuba diving since his injuries was captured last year in a show for BBC News 24’s Fast Track programme, in which he went diving in the Red Sea. Frank is much in demand on the speaking circuit as an inspirational and motivational speaker. His own story of survival combined with his extensive knowledge of the Middle East mark him out as a zeitgeist of our time.

Frank Gardner is the BBC’s Security Correspondent, reporting for TV and radio on issues of both domestic and international security, notably on Al Qaeda related terrorism.

Interviewed by Dan Linstead:

Dan Linstead is the editor of Wanderlust, the leading magazine for independent and adventurous travellers. He worked as an advertising copywriter before taking a career break in 1999 and spending 18 months on the road in Australia and SE Asia. Since then, he’s written for and edited numerous publications, winning a British Society of Magazine Editors award in 2004. He now plans and commissions most of Wanderlust’s features – and very occasionally gets to write one.