Newsletter

Receive regular updates about forthcoming events and other news from Intelligence Squared

Thanks

You have been added to our mailing list and will now be among the first to hear about events.

Watch

Hungry for Life! An Evening with Prue Leith

Art &
Culture

From strutting the catwalk and finding love again in her seventies, to facing life’s hardest goodbyes with humour and grace

According to Great British Bake Off judge and national treasure Prue Leith the secret to a happy life lies in embracing everyday with joy while accepting our inevitable end.

Prue has had an exhilarating career. She has been a Michelin-starred restaurateur, author, broadcaster, and beloved Bake Off judge. Yet her passion for life has also been shaped by the loss of her brother and first husband. These experiences inspired her to become a leading campaigner for assisted dying in the UK.

In February 2026 Prue joined Intelligence Squared live at the Royal Geographical Society to reflect on her remarkable life and share insights from her new memoir Being Old … and Learning to Love It! Expect reflections on love, ageing, joy, and grief — from strutting the catwalk and finding love again in her seventies, to facing life’s hardest goodbyes with humour and grace.

Join us live and ask Prue your own questions about life in the audience Q&A.

Speaker

  • Prue Leith

    Bake Off Judge, Michelin-starred restauranter and author

Host

  • Mariella Frostrup

    Broadcaster, Journalist, Author

Speakers

Speaker

Prue Leith

Bake Off Judge, Michelin-starred restauranter and author

Dame Prue Leith has, over the past sixty years, risen to the top of the British food scene. She has seen huge success as a Michelin-restaurateur, founder of the renowned Leith’s School of Food and Wine, TV cook, food journalist and author. She is perhaps most well-known as a judge on the nation’s favourite TV programme, The Great British Bake Off. She was born in 1940 in South Africa, and studied at the Sorbonne in Paris, before moving to England in 1960 to study at the Cordon Bleu Cookery School.
Host

Mariella Frostrup

Broadcaster, Journalist, Author

Mariella Frostrup is one of the UK's leading journalists, broadcasters and campaigners. She co-founded the GREAT Initiative, an advocacy organisation for gender equality, and is an ambassador for Save the Children. Also a champion of literature and the arts, Mariella is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, a member of Bafta, sat on the Council for the Royal Academy for six years and has been on the judging panels of almost every significant cultural prize in the UK including the Booker, Riba and Evening Standard British Film Awards. She presents a daily news show for Times Radio.