Sandi Toksvig

Sandi Toksvig, born Sandra Birgitte Toksvig (born 3 May 1958), is a Danish-British broadcaster, comedian, presenter and writer on British radio, stage and television. She is also a political activist, having co-founded the now-defunct Women's Equality Party in 2015, and has written plays, novels and books for children. In 1994 she came out as a lesbian. Toksvig took over from Stephen Fry as host of the BBC quiz show QI in 2016, spent ten years hosting The News Quiz on BBC Radio 4, and from 2017 to 2020 was co-presenter of The Great British Bake Off alongside Noel Fielding.

Toksvig was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, the daughter of Danish journalist and foreign correspondent Claus Toksvig and British mother Julie Anne Toksvig. She spent most of her youth outside Denmark, mostly in New York City, and attended Tormead School near Guildford. She is a graduate of Girton College, Cambridge, where she gained a first class honours degree in archaeology and anthropology.

Toksvig began her comedy career at Girton, where she wrote and performed in the first all-woman show at the Footlights, at the same time as Stephen Fry, Hugh Laurie, Tony Slattery and Emma Thompson. She started her television career on children's television, presenting No. 73 (1982-1986), and appeared as a panellist on comedy shows such as Whose Line Is It Anyway?, Mock the Week and Have I Got News for You, where she appeared on the first episode in 1990. On radio she chaired The News Quiz from September 2006 until June 2015, when she left to enter politics to champion women's rights. She was awarded the Officer of the Order of the British Empire.