Boynton began a career in journalism as a political reporter during the Rhodesian Bush War. His reportage in South Africa led to the apartheid government declaring him an 'undesirable alien,' after which they deported him.[1] He subsequently established himself in London, writing for international magazines. In the mid-1980s, he was appointed editor of Business Traveller magazine. In 1988, he moved to New York City where he worked as a writer and editor for Condé Nast Publications for ten years. He was an editor at Condé Nast Traveler and a contracted writer for Vanity Fair.[2] He also wrote for a number of other publications in America and the UK.
In 1998, he returned to the UK to become the travel editor of the Daily and Sunday Telegraph. A year earlier, he published Last Days in Cloud Cuckooland about the end of white minority rule in South Africa.[3] It was named as one of the Washington Post's Best Non Fiction Books of 1998.[2] He was Group Travel Editor of the Telegraph Media Group from 1998 to December 2011.
Boynton's latest book, Wild: The Life of Peter Beard: Photographer, Adventurer, Lover, was published in October 2022.[7]
Family
He is married to travel writer, Adriaane Pielou and they have two daughters together, Emma-Louise, who works in broadcast journalism, and actress Lucy Boynton.[2][8]