Alastair Campbell, spin doctor once fierce, begins to feel like a "proper" writer. He has just published his third, and is reluctant to talk about politics. But there is no way out of Syria
Two versions of Alastair Campbell after Downing street car struck the back of a taxi one day last December, on the way to lunch with the head of the Socialist Party of Albania. Campbell has been a consultant Edi Rama at the next general election in Albania, including Rama duly won last week ("Having a landslide! New campaign fought suitable work"), but on the way to lunch, hit literary inspiration.
"There is a small notebook in your pocket, and do not ask me why, but I got in the taxi and wrote." My name is Ana, this is my story "Then I turned the page and wrote: "? .. My name is Kate, I did my best" Since I arrived 12 characters How it happened Edi said: "I can not believe but finally I have the idea for my next novel. "
Nine months later, here Campbell is located north of London in your living room, a copy of the hardcover My Name Is ... Cool printers on the coffee table. It is not willing to talk about the political party, let alone the whole of Syria (even if later we do), the only version of yourself you want to be today the novelist. It's so different from your old control, spin-doctor remote I think someone who always think of him as a tyrant Blair would hardly recognize this poignant excited unattended Campbell even strangely innocent.
His first two novels were perfectly respectable, but read as a former journalist fiction idea - a bit awkward and concept-heavy, too busy to make a point to let the characters come alive . But he wrote the first draft of my name is ..., about a teenager named Hannah, who becomes an alcoholic, a few days before last Christmas, "just poured out of me," marvels. A characters came to him in a dream, write some chapters moved to tears and scenes came to him while he was on the bike, and will dismount and type frantically on your BlackBerry. I do not know not where the story would go, and sometimes, as he writes, "I felt as if I was taking care of him."
He became a good writer exclaimed. "No, I'm not," he protested, but shyly admits: "It is very rare, it is a good novelist." He seems happy when I say that I loved the book when I look sheepish finish, and when you leave your phone pictures in an apartment he found exploring the north London where he thought Hannah lived, he shows a tender, almost paternal pride. Each chapter is written from the first person perspective of different people in the life of Hannah - parents, friends, brothers, police - and I am the first to comment, he said with pride that women's voices are most vividly convincing. He says he has always been more "sensitive and caring" people gave credit for, but this is a Campbell I've never seen before. He even came round to think Page 3 should be banned - despite their 19 year old daughter, Grace, a feminist campaign to take credit for it
sensitivity was not an obvious quality back in their big days of consumption. In the mid-80s in the Daily Mirror, he could drink 32 pints per day - not to mention the whiskey - and systematically "a brazen dozen" for lunch. All came to a disastrous end of the hysterics and diagnosis of alcoholism in 1986, and he has not touched a drop in 13 years. He calls himself an alcoholic more, though, and he looks a little uncomfortable with the question.
"I do not like talking about it because I think it's a bad message - .. But I have a drink from time to time, but I think I have to be honest about it, "In 1999, drank a glass of wine in private - to test, he thinks. "You know, they say that if you are a true alcoholic and a drink that goes well, I wanted to see if it was true for me. Which was very stupid thing to do when you first press secretary to the minister."
But he found he could not get one, and now drinks very rarely, and only ever came with your partner just 33 years, Fiona Millar, but he admitted to both the world two years ago. "Very often, Tony said:" There are many things that could cope with, but if you went back to drinking it would be a big problem for me, "he offered quietly" I used to be totally. honest especially with Tony. But not that. "
He still drinks rarely, because "I do not want in my normal life again now," It is, he said, was part of the point of writing this novel. "All world has a relationship with alcohol, and the country has a relationship with alcohol, and I believe the country's relationship is in a very bad place -. standardization and this is due This is not a political book, but it has a political message. standard drink at all levels of our society, I mean, I like the idea of ??looking like a middle-aged old fart, but honestly, I watch TV and I see breaks advertising during football matches and is the normalization of gambling and alcohol. "
Any other announcement, he said, is a bookmaker or a drink. When he is on the bike in London and bored count the number of places where alcohol is sold or advertised "and a bike ride three hours to see literally thousands and thousands. You see them every few seconds. " Until recently, he had always believed that drugs pose a greater threat than alcohol, but "liver disease is the single leading cause of death in the UK is increasing, and now I am absolutely convinced that the alcohol is a much more important drug "problem.
Is it recoverable? "It recoverable as they recognize the need to do so. But too many people in the Labour Party does not want to. Britain was not a disaster when Cameron took over. Commission growth LSE just said Great Britain was not ready for the worse crisis than anyone else, and had an economic success to tell. But we do not tell him. "
Campbell
The only problem I really do not want to talk, however, are the comments on Syria last week, just before parliament broke two labor movements and Tory action military. "To step aside and say we can do nothing," he told ITV Daybreak, "it would be highly irresponsible and very dangerous." I'm sure Campbell would be silent if I knew Miliband would not support the government's motion, and now you're stuck having to defend this position indiscriminately work. 
now almost hilarious. Because he does not want to criticize the leader of the Labour Party? "Well, I do not particularly want to criticize Cameron, either I have empathy and sympathy for the politicians I'm not sitting here saying.." Whack a load of cruise missiles now. But you must be very careful in a way that neither moot. can not have a position on something as important as this, where the House of Commons can never go back. Especially when the two movements have said that in certain circumstances they could use military action. government's motion was largely supported by government banks, the opposition and the movement was widely supported by the opposition benches. How can Cameron then rise and that military action on the table forever? "
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