Rory Stewart, born in 1973 in British Hong Kong, has crammed several careers into one: a spell of soldiering with the Black Watch, diplomatic postings in Indonesia and Montenegro, service with the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq’s Maysan province, the founding of the Turquoise Mountain Foundation in Afghanistan, a Harvard professorship, and nearly a decade as Conservative MP for Penrith and The Border, rising to the Cabinet as International Development Secretary. In 2019 he stood for the party leadership, refused in advance to serve under Boris Johnson, lost the whip for voting to delay Brexit, and left the party altogether, standing down at that year’s election.
The writing has always run alongside the action. His solo walk across Asia produced the bestselling The Places in Between; his 2023 memoir Politics on the Edge anatomised his Westminster years; and since 2022 he has co-hosted The Rest Is Politics with Alastair Campbell, which means a great many British listeners already know exactly what he sounds like. He now teaches at Yale.
12 hours and 43 minutes
