{{Short description|English author (1945–2021)}} {{Use dmy dates|date=July 2025}} {{Infobox person | name = Catherine, Lady Bragg | birth_name = Catherine Haste | birth_date = {{birth date|df=yes|1945|8|6}} | birth_place = Leeds, England | death_date = {{death date and age|df=y|2021|4|29|1945|8|6}} | death_place = | alma_mater = {{Plainlist| * University of Sussex * University of Manchester }} | occupation = {{flatlist| * Author * historian * director }} | spouse = {{marriage|Melvyn Bragg|1973|2018|end=divorced}} | children = 2 }}
'''Catherine Haste, Baroness Bragg''' (6 August 1945 – 29 April 2021),<ref>{{cite news |title=Cate Haste |url=https://www.thetimes.com/uk/article/cate-haste-obituary-5c09jgkq8 |work=The Times |date=4 May 2021 |access-date=5 May 2021}} {{subscription required}}</ref> was an English author, biographer, historian and documentary film director, who worked freelance for major television networks in the UK and US over a period of 40 years.
==Early life== Haste was born in Leeds, one of three surviving daughters of Margaret (née Hodge) and Eric Haste. She spent part of her childhood in Australia from age four before returning to England seven years later. Haste attended Thornbury Grammar School in Bristol before going on to study English at the University of Sussex, graduating in 1966. She then pursued a Postgraduate Diploma in Adult Education at the Victoria University of Manchester.<ref name="tg obit"/>
==Television documentaries== Haste directed political and historical documentaries and series, including ''Munich: The Peace of Paper''.<ref name="auto2">{{cite news |last=Goodman |first=Walter |author-link=Walter Goodman (critic) |title=Review/Television; Behind the Munich Pact |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1988/09/28/arts/review-television-behind-the-munich-pact.html |newspaper=The New York Times |date=28 September 1988 |access-date=12 June 2022}}</ref> For ''Cold War'', Jeremy Isaacs' 24-part series,<ref>{{cite web |title=Cate Heste – Contact Info, Agent, Manager {{pipe}} IMDbPro |url=https://pro.imdb.com/name/nm0381656/?ref_=search_search_T1_result_1}}</ref> Haste directed five films. She directed Flashback TV's ''Hitler's Brides''<ref name="auto3">{{cite web |title=Hitler's Brides (2001 |url=https://www.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b860649eb|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190416114951/https://www.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b860649eb|url-status=live|archive-date=16 April 2019}}</ref> about women in Nazi Germany; produced ''Death of a Democrat'' in ''Secret History'', the series broadcast by Channel 4;<ref name="auto">{{cite web |title=Death of a Democrat (1992) |url=https://www.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b7bf85e4b|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190416115002/https://www.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b7bf85e4b|url-status=dead|archive-date=16 April 2019}}</ref> and ''Married to the Prime Minister'',<ref name="auto1">{{cite web |title=Married to the Prime Minister (2005) |url=https://www.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b8bfdb905|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190416114953/https://www.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b8bfdb905|url-status=dead|archive-date=16 April 2019}}</ref> presented by Cherie Blair, the wife of the then Prime Minister, Tony Blair.
==Books== Haste's first book, ''Keep the Home Fires Burning'' (1977), was described by journalist Phillip Knightley as: "One can only hope that this important book will make it more difficult for any British government so deeply to deceive its people ever again."<ref>{{cite web |title=Useful lies » 3 Dec 1977 » the Spectator Archive |url=http://archive.spectator.co.uk/article/3rd-december-1977/24/useful-lies}}</ref> Maureen Freely wrote that ''Rules of Desire'' (1997) was "as diverting and as suggestive as a very good novel.... temperate, balanced, subtle and humane".<ref>https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/book-review-at-sixties-and-sevens-rules-of-desire-sex-in-britain-since-world-war-i-cate-haste-chatto-1531432html. {{dead link|date=July 2021}}</ref> ''The Daily Telegraph'' critic wrote that ''Nazi Women: Hitler's Seduction of a Nation'' (2001) "opens up the bizarre moral universe of the Third Reich ....at once comprehensible and compelling, and at times deeply moving. It is media history at its best."<ref>{{cite news |title=Hitler's Hausfrauen |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/4722563/Hitlers-Hausfrauen.html |date=31 March 2001 |access-date=29 August 2019}}</ref> The prize-winning ''Sheila Fell: A Passion for Paint'' (2010), a biography/monograph of the Cumbrian Expressionist landscape painter, signalled Haste's shift to biography and was, according to Andrew Lambirth, "a handsome, slim volume ....elegantly and deftly put together".<ref>{{cite news |title=A Cumberland legend |url=https://www.spectator.co.uk/2011/01/a-cumberland-legend/ |date=8 January 2011}}</ref>
==Personal life and death== Haste was married from 1973 to 2018 to the broadcaster Melvyn Bragg, whom she met at a protest. The couple had two children. In June 2016 it was reported that they had separated amicably, and that Bragg now shared a home with former film assistant Gabriel Clare-Hunt, with whom he had an affair that began in 1995. The marriage was dissolved in 2018.<ref name="Foot">{{cite web |last=Foot |first=Tom |title=Cate Haste, documentary maker fell in love with arty Hampstead spirit |url=http://camdennewjournal.com/article/cate-haste-documentary-maker-fell-in-love-with-arty-hampstead-spirit |url-status=live |website=Camden New Journal |date=3 June 2021 |access-date=3 July 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210709184034/http://camdennewjournal.com/article/cate-haste-documentary-maker-fell-in-love-with-arty-hampstead-spirit |archive-date=9 July 2021 |language=en-GB}}</ref> She was a member of English PEN, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA), the Writers' Guild of Great Britain and Directors UK (formerly Directors Guild of Great Britain), and had been a trustee of Index on Censorship and World Film Collective.
She lived in Hampstead, north London, and like her former husband was a member of the Labour Party. She died from cancer in April 2021, aged 75.<ref name="tg obit">{{cite web|last=Pick|first=Hella|author-link=Hella Pick|date=7 May 2021|title=Cate Haste obituary|url=http://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/may/07/cate-haste-obituary|url-status=live|access-date=3 July 2021|website=The Guardian|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210507172930/https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/may/07/cate-haste-obituary |archive-date=7 May 2021}}</ref><ref name="Foot"/><ref>{{cite web|last=Volpe|first=Sam|date=17 June 2021|title=Friends and family remember 'marvellous' Cate Haste|url=https://www.hamhigh.co.uk/news/obituaries/cate-haste-obituary-hampstead-melvyn-bragg-tributes-8040866|access-date=3 July 2021|website=Hampstead & Highgate Express|language=en-UK}}</ref>
==Bibliography== * ''Passionate Spirit: The Life of Alma Mahler''<ref>Bloomsbury, {{ISBN|978-1-4088-7832-3}}</ref> * ''Craigie Aitchison: A Life in Colour''<ref>Lund Humphries, {{ISBN|978-1-84822-129-1}}</ref> * ''Sheila Fell: A Passion for Paint''<ref>Lund Humphries, {{ISBN|9780853319795}}</ref> * ''Clarissa Eden A Memoir: From Churchill to Ede'' (ed.)<ref>Weidenfeld and Nicolson, {{ISBN|978 0297 85193 6}}</ref> * ''The Goldfish Bowl'', with Cherie Booth<ref>Chatto & Windus, {{ISBN|0 7011 7676 8}}</ref> * ''Nazi Women: Hitler's Seduction of a Nation''<ref>Macmillan/C4, {{ISBN|0 7522 1936 7}}</ref> * ''Rules of Desire''<ref>Chatto & Windus, {{ISBN|978-0099437956}}</ref> * ''Keep The Home Fires Burning''<ref>Allen & Lane, {{ISBN|0 7139 08173}}</ref>
==Filmography== * ''Married to the Prime Minister'' (Flashback TV for Channel 4) 2005<ref name="auto1"/> * ''Hitler's Brides'' (Flashback TV for Channel 4) 2000; part of series titled ''Nazi Women''<ref name="auto3"/> * ''Millennium'' (Jeremy Isaacs Productions/CNN/BBC) 1999<ref>{{cite web |title=The Paley Center for Media |url=https://www.paleycenter.org/collection/item/?q=earth+day&p=7&item=B:90866}}</ref> * ''Cold War'' (CNN) 1998<ref>{{cite web |title=Cold War – Production & Contact Info {{pipe}} IMDbPro |url=https://pro.imdb.com/title/tt0170896/filmmakers}}</ref> * ''Cold War'' (Jeremy Isaacs Productions/CNN/BBC2) 1996–98; 24-part series<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.amazon.com/Cold-War-The-Complete-Series/dp/B00848VOGE|title = Watch Cold War: The Complete Series {{pipe}} Prime Video| website=Amazon }}</ref> * ''Secret History: Death of a Democrat'' (Brook Associates for Channel 4/Arts and Entertainment)<ref name="auto"/> * ''Munich: The Peace of Paper...'' (Brook Associates for Thames Television/ WGBH, Boston) 1988<ref name="auto2"/>
== References == {{reflist}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Haste, Cate}} Category:1945 births Category:2021 deaths Category:Alumni of the University of Manchester Category:Alumni of the University of Sussex Bragg Category:British women television directors Category:English television directors Category:English television producers Category:English women non-fiction writers Category:English women television producers Category:Mass media people from Bristol Category:Mass media people from Leeds Category:Writers from Bristol Category:Writers from Leeds Category:Spouses of life peers