Contributors

Dr Luisa Dillner is a doctor and a publishing director at the British Medical Journal Publishing Group. Published by the Guardian, the Observer, Cosmopolitan, Vogue and Elle, she has also written for the famous Mumsnet website where her letters for mothers have been sent out for seven years. She has four children, lives in London and most importantly has a perfect long term relationship…

Andrew Dilnot is Warden of Nuffield College, University of Oxford and former director of the Institute of Fiscal Studies.

Jonathan Dimbleby is a writer, broadcaster and film-maker. He presents Any Questions? and Any Answers? for BBC Radio 4 and presented ITV's flagship weekly political program This Week for over ten years. In 2008 his five part series on Russia was broadcast by BBC 2 accompanied by his book, Russia – A Journey to the Heart of a Land and its People; other books include Charles: the Private Man, The Public Face and The Last Governor. His 2010 seriesAn African Journey and 2011 series A South American Journey were both broadcast on BBC2. In addition to his Presidency of VSO, he is Chair of Index on Censorship and a Trustee of Dimbleby Cancer Care.

Henry Dimbleby is the co-founder of LEON, and the Director of The Sustainable Restaurant Association, which runs some of London's most successful street food markets. His work with DEFRA culminated in the National Food Strategy – a policy proposal widely praised by industry wide figures such as Yotam Ottolenghi and Sir Partha Dasgupta. In 2013 he co-authored The School Food Plan, which set out actions to transform what children eat in schools and how they learn about food.

Charles Dickens was born on 7th February 1812 in Portsmouth and grew up in London and Kent. His father was sent to a debtor's prison following financial difficulties and the young Dickens was sent temporarily to work in a boot blacking factory, until an inheritance allowed his return to school – however, he never forgot this formative experience. Dickens wrote many novels including A Tale of Two Cities, The Pickwick Papers, A Christmas Carol and Great Expectations. A leading celebrity of the Victorian Age, his short story The Signalman was likely based on a crash involving a train that Dickens was travelling on, with his mistress. Charles Dickens died in 1870.

David Dickson is Professor in Modern History at Trinity College, Dublin and has published extensively on the social, economic and cultural history of Ireland. He was elected a Member of the Royal Irish Academy in 2006.

Mihir Desai was born in India and raised in Hong Kong and New Jersey. As a professor and award-winning teacher at Harvard Business School and Harvard Law School, Desai teaches finance, tax law, entrepreneurship and has recently developed an online finance course for the HBX platform. His scholarship on corporate finance, international finance and tax policy has prompted several invitations to testify before the U.S. Congress and serves as the basis of his advisory role to leading global companies and organizations.

Marion Devine is a research associate for Ashridge Business School. She is the author or co-author of several management reports and books, including three Economist titles, Successful Mergers, Managing Uncertainty and A Sense of Mission.

Dr Bella DePaulo is an acclaimed social scientist, author and leading expert on single life. She lectures internationally and has been featured in The New York Times, Time, the Atlantic and the Guardian. She is currently an academic affiliate at the University of California.

Dr Mikel Maria Delgado is a cat behaviour consultant and animal behaviour scientist. She is co-author, with Jackson Galaxy, of the book Total Cat Mojo. Her research on cat behaviour has appeared in cat journals and veterinary textbooks, and she has been featured in The New York Times and the BBC, among other outlets.