1. Abigail Thorn was born on 24April 1993 and is an English YouTuber, actress, and playwright.
44 Facts About Abigail Thorn
1. 2.
In 2019, Abigail Thorn hosted a livestream on Twitch in which she read plays from the Complete Works of Shakespeare for the mental health charity Samaritans.
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Abigail Thorn is from Newcastle upon Tyne and has two older brothers.
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Abigail Thorn later studied Philosophy and Theology at the University of St Andrews, where she participated in Mermaids and the St Andrews Revue.
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Abigail Thorn graduated with a Scottish Master of Arts in Philosophy in 2015, coming top of her year.
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Abigail Thorn then trained at East 15 Acting School, completing a Master of Arts awarded by the University of Essex in 2017 before moving to London.
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On 30 January 2021, Abigail Thorn came out as a trans woman.
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Abigail Thorn has spoken at protests in favour of transgender health care and said that transgender liberation is a more important goal than transgender representation among fictional characters or celebrities.
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Abigail Thorn cited the trans singer Kim Petras and the feminist Audre Lorde as influences in understanding her femininity.
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Abigail Thorn began her YouTube channel, Philosophy Tube, as an educational channel in 2013 in response to the English university tuition fees tripling in 2012, rendering higher education less accessible.
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Abigail Thorn made it her mission statement to "[give] away a philosophy degree for free".
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Abigail Thorn originally planned to record her lectures and upload them, rather than appearing in videos, but her university would not allow this.
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Abigail Thorn makes money from both YouTube advertisement revenue and crowdfunding on Patreon.
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In 2016, Abigail Thorn took part in the YouTube NextUp, a week-long training programme for YouTubers with under 100,000 subscribers.
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In 2018, Abigail Thorn decided to change her content creation, beginning to film at a studio with costumes and makeup.
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Abigail Thorn was inspired by the 2018 conference VidCon, the channel ContraPoints, and the ending of an abusive relationship.
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For instance, a video about the former Trump advisor and Breitbart News co-founder Steve Bannon features Abigail Thorn performing a cover of a Hadestown song, with lyrics about Bannon.
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Abigail Thorn saw it as successful due to her subscriber numbers, an invitation to be a featured creator at 2021 VidCon and other YouTube channels that were inspired by her.
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Abigail Thorn said in mid-2019 that she still received at least one email per day by a person who said the video saved their life.
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Abigail Thorn says that other issues in society like homelessness disproportionately affect the trans community.
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Abigail Thorn released Identity: A Trans Coming Out Story, which drew on the work of the American writer Audre Lorde and saw Rhys Tees acting in the role of Abigail Thorn's former self.
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Abigail Thorn told the Daily Xtra that studying works by trans philosophers helped her gain insight about her identity, but that she felt significant societal pressure as a transgender public figure.
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Abigail Thorn's messages to other trans public figures went unanswered and she fell out of contact with a trans friend who told her that being transgender was "a curse".
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Abigail Thorn had chosen to act as a man in some of her videos despite having realised she was transgender, and decided to keep her pre-transition videos public because of their educational content and artistic value, and as she did not think being transgender should be a source of shame.
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Abigail Thorn told Insider that prior to her transition, when male fans would refer to her as a positive role model for masculinity, "it always felt like they were talking about someone else".
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In 2019, Abigail Thorn aimed to read the Complete Works of Shakespeare in order to raise money for the Samaritans, a UK charity that helps people in emotional distress.
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Abigail Thorn chose the charity because she said that its telephone hotline "saved [her] life when [she] was considering suicide".
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Abigail Thorn chose Shakespeare based on the idea that "Shakespeare features every human emotion", which she attributed to Judi Dench.
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In May 2021, it was announced that Abigail Thorn would appear in a 10-episode television series, Django, a remake of the 1966 Western film of the same name.
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Abigail Thorn voiced Nocturne, a secondary character in the video game Baldur's Gate 3.
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Abigail Thorn played Ensign Eurus in the Star Wars television series The Acolyte released in June 2024, and Sharako Lohar in a House of the Dragon episode released in August 2024.
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In November 2023, it was announced that Abigail Thorn had written Dracula's Ex-Girlfriend, a short film about a dinner between two of Dracula's former partners.
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Abigail Thorn wrote and was the acting lead in the Off West End play, The Prince, at the Southwark Playhouse.
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Abigail Thorn described it as "Like The Matrix if it was written in 1600".
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Abigail Thorn said that Shakespeare is fit for trans allegory as performers were originally all male and the writing is dense with jokes about people dressing up as or being confused for other genders.
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Abigail Thorn did not see it as a "queer play", but more generally one about "characters who are trapped for all sorts of reasons".
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Abigail Thorn compared it to a period of concealing her gender on Philosophy Tube.
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Abigail Thorn was familiar with the Bond films from her childhood and believed that they are flawed "in interesting ways that say interesting things about Britain".
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Abigail Thorn saw Bond as symbolic of a "British sort of military masculinity" and commented that both she and Kelly had been army cadets as children.
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Abigail Thorn narrated the audiobook for Axiom's End by Lindsay Ellis, alongside Stephanie Willis.
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In 2022, Abigail Thorn was awarded an Off West End Theatre Award in the "OneOff" category.
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Abigail Thorn was listed among Divas Power List of 100 influential LGBT individuals in 2022,2023 and 2024.
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Abigail Thorn was nominated in the category Online Influencer for a 2021 British LGBT Award.
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Abigail Thorn declined the nomination citing moral and political disagreements with the award's sponsors.