Margaret Busby CBE, Hon. FRSL, editor, broadcaster and writer, was born in Ghana and educated in the UK. She became Britain’s youngest and first black woman publisher when in 1967 she co-founded Allison & Busby, of which she was editorial director for 20 years. She edited the pioneering anthology Daughters of Africa (1992), and 2019’s follow-up, New Daughters of Africa.
She is an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, and recipient of multiple honorary doctorates and awards, including the London Book Fair Lifetime Achievement Award, the Bocas Henry Swanzy Award, the Royal Society of Literature’s Benson Medal, and the Royal African Society’s inaugural Africa Writes Lifetime Achievement Award. Margaret Busby’s own collected writings, Part of the Story: Writings from Half a Century, will be published by Hamish Hamilton in March 2026.