Diary

John McDonnell might think Churchill a villain, but he’s beloved in America. I’ve just returned from a ten-week, 18-state, 27-city, 87-speech book tour there, and can report that the enthusiasm for all things Churchillian in the USA is stronger now than at any time since his death. Merely bringing out a new biography of him secured me interviews on all the major TV morning news shows, invitations to speak at three presidential libraries, and a place on the New York Times bestseller list for nine weeks. There are active Churchill appreciation societies in 14 states and more being set up.

‘You OK?’ was the message I sent to Luciana Berger last week. As I scroll back through our previous WhatsApp chats I can see that I’ve sent this same message painfully frequently. I’ve sent it each time someone is jailed or charged in court for abusing her and threatening her for being Jewish. I’ve sent it every time the anti-Semitic abuse she receives reaches fever pitch, such as the time last month when she asked for our party to put down a vote of no confidence in the Tories. After which she was attacked as ‘the member for Liverpool Haifa,’ an ‘Israeli shill’ and more merciless racial abuse. We live in backward times.

‘There is no other country in the world, besides my own, whose way of life I like so much,’ enthused the great French couturier Christian Dior. ‘I love English traditions, English politeness, English architecture. I even love English cooking.’ And that was in the 1950s. If pre-sales for the V&A’s Christian Dior: Designer of Dreams are any indication, the English seem super keen to return the love. Though I say so myself, this is a stunning exhibition, from the post-war New Look — condemned by Stafford Cripps for its anti-austerity ethos (a rather different Labour party in those days) — to the clean, sculptural chic of Maria Grazia Chiuri.

For legal reasons I shouldn’t say much about the Alex Salmond case, but it does bolster the argument that the world right now operates beyond most fiction writers’ (and readers’?) imaginations. Fiction needs to be credible; I should persuade the reader that the events in my stories could happen, if they haven’t already. Reality, however, seems otherwise inclined. Salmond’s journey — from taking Scotland closer to independence than many thought possible to RT chatshow host — would test the mettle of most contemporary novelists, before even adding the cocktail of charges against him. Salmond, a shrewd operator and orator with a side-order of braggadocio, might seem a gift of a character to a fiction writer.

Will I be allowed to take my dog to Europe after 29 March? A trivial question, you might think, in these feverish times, but one that might be an indicator of what the EU thinks of us and how/if they’re going to make us pay for leaving. I took Boss, my Battersea rescue, across France this Christmas and it couldn’t have been easier. The dog was barely noticed on the way out and given a fast, friendly check on the way back. Why should anything change? A pet on the road doesn’t get extra germs just because of the colour of its passport and yet nobody has any idea what’s going to happen. Are UK pet owners about to be punished for no good reason? And if so, what punishments might be extended to the rest of us pour encourager les autres...?

You’ll be relieved to learn my penguin is back. ‘How long was it gone?’ you ask. About six months. ‘And sorry, it’s a real penguin?’ Actually, no. Here’s the story: back in 2005, I was staying at the 60 Thompson Street Hotel in Manhattan. On my first afternoon in town I went for a stroll along Bleecker Street and popped into a shop called Leo Design where I spotted and purchased a charming bronze penguin — three inches high, and ounces heavy. Back in my room I placed Mr Penguin among my coins and keys, and thought little of him. The next afternoon, after housekeeping had visited, I spotted Mr Penguin on top of the television. Odd, I thought, moving him to the window-sill.

The nice French doctor looked beadily at the screen. There were the results of my tests, in irrefutable detail. They had taken my blood; they had beeped in my ears; they had covered me in painful hair-pulling electrodes, and now there was no use bluffing. I tried to draw her attention to what I conceived was my Hulk-like strength, the blast furnace super bellows of my lung capacity. She wasn’t having any of it. There was the key piece of data — blinking like a Geiger counter. I have really known it, or suspected it, for decades. In the past few months I have had the joy of being back on my bike, and the reality of my physique has been obvious to all the people who have overtaken me; and when I say all, I mean all.

I recently returned from several months in Los Angeles working on one of the most popular US TV shows. American Horror Story is a mysteriously scary but fascinating series of interconnecting stories created, produced and written by Hollywood’s latest wunderkind Ryan Murphy. In the past decade, he was the brilliance behind such hits as Nip/Tuck, Glee and my particular favourite, Feud, a fascinating study of the enmity between two great legends of the silver screen, Joan Crawford and Bette Davis. More recently his output has trebled with The Assassination of Gianni Versace, a nine-part series about the tragic events involving the fabled Italian designer, and the mesmerising trial of O.J. Simpson in The People vs O.J. Simpson.

Eight years ago, in the course of doing some research into literacy teaching in London, I visited many primary schools. One thing that struck me — and I didn’t of course mention it in the pamphlet I wrote on the subject — was how many primary school teachers were severely obese. One isn’t supposed even to notice it. But it’s been worrying me ever since. Obesity inevitably involves lower energy levels, less mobility, reduced staying power — all weaknesses which, however talented a teacher may be, are likely to impair his or her ability to cope with young children. What’s more, teachers are role models. I feel great sympathy for obese people, but I would be troubled if my young child were being taught by a seriously obese teacher.

When I land on the east coast of America, people tell me they’ve never met a Trump voter. When I land in the middle, as I did last week in Kentucky, I meet lots. I chatted with my driver, who did not like Trump at first, but would vote twice for his re-election if he could, because of the jobs boom and the Brett Kavanaugh hearings. He’s a retired salesman who tutors kids from poor backgrounds in reading and maths. ‘I guess that makes me a conservative,’ he says. I had to lecture in semi-darkness in Louisville, after a power cut plunged most of the university into darkness.