Campbell's diary: several million words
Alastair Campbell has kept a near-daily diary for decades and estimates he has several million words written up to the Ed Miliband era in British politics.
Snapshot · The Rest Is Politics
549. Mamdani’s Wrecking Ball and the Rise of Anti-Migrant Vigilantes
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Jul 1, 2026
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Rory's Grandmother's Diary: A 100-Year-Old Family Secret
At 40:55 · chapter starts 36:40
A listener's question about diary-keeping triggers a personal revelation from Rory Stewart: he has recently discovered his grandmother's diary, written almost exactly 100 years ago in the lead-up to her wedding. Far from a dull chronicle, it is — in his words — 'astonishingly frank' and 'pretty racy stuff', tracing a bright young thing's love life, doubts about marriage, and emotional journey through late 1920s and early 1930s London. His mother doesn't entirely approve of his reading it; his aunt suggested his grandmother probably didn't intend her grandson to find it. The diary's last entry effectively leads to Rory's own existence — his grandmother ultimately marrying his grandfather after significant ups and downs. Alastair Campbell connects this to a German novel he's reading by Charlotte Link, where a similar device — an old autobiography found in a remote Yorkshire cottage — structures the narrative. The conversation expands into Rory's ancestry DNA discoveries: suicides, an interracial marriage in the 1920s, and a cascade of family secrets that were simply never discussed.
Rory's Grandmother's Secret Diary: A 100-Year-Old Love Story
Rory Stewart discovered his grandmother's diary written almost exactly 100 years ago — a frank, racy account of her love life and thoughts on marriage in late 1920s London. The family didn't know it existed. It ends with her marriage to his grandfather, the act that eventually produced Rory himself.
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