Bonnie Greer, playwright and critic, says
"Stephen Bourne brings great natural scholarship and passion to a largely hidden story. He is highly accessible, accurate, and surprising. You always walk away from his work knowing something that you didn't know, that you didn't even suspect.”
Civic Award
In May 2009, at a ceremony in St. Giles's Church, Camberwell, Stephen received a Civic Award from the London Borough of Southwark in recognition of his voluntary work, particularly Black History Month and Southwark Police. Also mentioned in the Citation was his biography of Dr. Harold Moody and the Keep Smiling Through exhibition at the Cuming Museum in which Stephen acknowledged the part played by Black Londoners in the Second World War.
Stephen's 11th book
Mother Country - Britain's Black Community on the Home Front 1939-1945 will be published by The History Press in August 2010. Mother Country will include chapters about Dr. Harold Moody, Learie Constantine and other community leaders, Esther Bruce, evacuees, Civil Defence, Adelaide Hall, Ken 'Snakehips' Johnson, cinema, Una Marson and the BBC, the Home Front in African and the Caribbean colonies, and what would have happened to Black Britons if Hitler had invaded Britain. For further information go to www.thehistorypress.co.uk
Stephen has contributed essays to two new British Film Institute DVD releases of acclaimed Black British films: Playing Away (1986) and Young Soul Rebels (1991). Buy online at www.bfi.org.uk/filmstore
Photo on home page courtesy of Robert Taylor (www.taylor-photo.co.uk)
YouTube.
Stephen’s documentary shorts Aunt Esther’s Story (Parts 1 & 2) and Changing Relations (Parts 1 & 2) are now available to view on YouTube.