The Powerful and the Damned: Private Diaries in Turbulent Times Audible Audiobook – Unabridged

Lionel Barber (Author, Narrator), Penguin Audio (Publisher)

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'As FT editor, I was a privileged interlocutor to people in power around the world, each offering unique insights into high-level decision-making and political calculation, often in moments of crisis. These diaries offer snapshots of leadership in an age of upheaval....'

Lionel Barber was editor of the Financial Times for the tech boom, the global financial crisis, the rise of China, Brexit and mainstream media's fight for survival in the age of fake news.

In this unparalleled, no-holds-barred diary of life behind the headlines, he reveals the private meetings and exchanges with political leaders on the eve of referendums, the conversations with billionaire bankers facing economic meltdown, exchanges with Silicon Valley tech gurus and pleas from foreign emissaries desperate for inside knowledge, all against the backdrop of a wildly shifting media landscape.

The result is a fascinating - and at times scathing - portrait of power in our modern age; who has it, what it takes and what drives the men and women with the world at their feet. Featuring close encounters with Trump, Cameron, Blair, Putin, Merkel and Mohammed Bin Salman and many more, this is a rare portrait of the people who continue to shape our world and who quite literally make the news.

Listening Length

14 hours and 58 minutes
Author

Lionel Barber
Narrator

Lionel Barber
Audible release date

5 November 2020
Language

English
Publisher

Penguin Audio
ASIN

B08K3MF3FS
Version

Unabridged
Program Type

Audiobook
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Product details

Listening Length	13 hours and 58 minutes
Author	Lionel Barber
Narrator	Lionel Barber
Whispersync for Voice	Ready
Audible.com.au Release Date	05 November 2020
Publisher	Penguin Audio
Program Type	Audiobook
Version	Unabridged
Language	English
ASIN	B08K3MF3FS
Best Sellers Rank	79,195 in Audible Books & Originals (See Top 100 in Audible Books & Originals) 311 in Journalism & Nonfiction Writing Reference 1,683 in Education & Learning 6,819 in Biographies & Memoirs (Audible Books & Originals)

Customer reviews

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4 star		23%
3 star		12%
2 star		3%
1 star		4%

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fashion_magpie

That the cover carries an endorsement from Tony Blair says it all.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 8 November 2020

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I was excited to read this book having read an extract published in the FT. What could Mr Barber tell us from his meeting the great and good (and not so good)? Not a tremendous amount it seems. After a tedious chapter or so covering his climbing the greasy pole, he does not really offer much depth of insight or reflection on those he has interviewed. There are some pinpoints of interest (e.g. we / I failed to see the EU referendum result) but Mr Barber fails to elaborate. Unsettling is his account of lunching with Jamal Kashoggi followed chronologically with an encounter with MBS - his lack of comment suggests a lack of backbone. I haven't gotten to the bottom of whether or not the endorsement on the cover page by Tony Blair is meant to be ironic or not. The powerful and the damned, indeed. Worth a read but left feeling like Mr Barber is a little self-consumed and could have offered the reader an awful lot more.

23 people found this helpful

paul manolache

Dreadful

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 19 December 2020

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One of the worst, if not the worst, books I ever read. The writing style is at best mediocre, which is quite surprising given that the author is an acclaimed journalist. Nevertheless, what makes it appalling is the content. It narrates 15 years of dinner parties and famous people that the author met without any insight, or at the very least, meaningful information being conveyed to the reader. The fact that the author was in charge of the Financial Times at the time of the Financial Crisis or Brexit seems to have escaped him completely, focusing on the latest restaurants around the world where the crème de la crème meets to plan how to exploit their power. Avoid! You'll waste time that you'll never get back.

11 people found this helpful

Leopold

Fascinating but flawed

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 5 December 2020

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Fascinating because Lionel Barber, as editor of the FT, had access to and interviewed the world’s most powerful men and women during his fourteen-year tenure of the post.

Presidents, Prime Ministers, oligarchs, bankers, industrialists, authors and politicians of every stripe passed through the FT office or were interviewed in their own palaces and offices. Everybody who was Anybody was interviewed By Lionel Barber,
So the reader has a ringside seat at these interviews together with Barber’ take on the interviewee.

Flawed, because Barber from his FT ivory tower too often missed the big picture.As a committed Europhile he was unable to grasp that that the British electorate might wish to regain control of their laws and their destiny rather have those decided for them by EU bureaucrats that they had never elected. So the result of the 2016 referendum was to him shocking and inexplicable.

Similarly Donald Trump’s victory in the American election later that same year came as just great a shock, as just as great a surprise. I cannot blame him for that, as the circles in which he moved, professionally and personally were wholly insulated from what may loosely be termed “the real world”.

The background to his diaries is his natural concern over the ownership and its editorial independence. Pearson, its British owners sold the title to the Japanese publishing conglomerate Nikkei and Barber’s account of his establishing an eventually successful relationship with Nikkei and a guarantee of editorial independence brings the story to a successful end, at least as far as that Barber is concerned

This is the ideal potted guide to world personalities through the eyes of the FT editor.- who rates himself quite highly - but he also has the good grace to admit his mistakes.

A thoroughly good read - recommended.

5 people found this helpful

Londoner

Couldn’t warm to this

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 30 August 2021

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I usually love diaries from journalists, and as this book covers such a momentous period of recent history I was expecting a cracking read.

The author opens by saying he didn’t actually keep a diary at the time, and so has assembled one from notes. So you get diary entries that leave you wondering how raw and honest the author is being.

Each entry is also appended by a brief italicised bit of narrative about what happened subsequently. Some of these are insightful but often it comes across a bit like a kind of ‘I was right’ justification.

To achieve what this author has is impressive. Clearly a talented journalist and editor, who turned the FT around. But I felt that he wears this a bit thickly at times - there’s sometimes a bit of an ‘I know I’m good’ air about it.

As a result of this and the inauthentic diary format, I found myself skipping through it rather than getting truly absorbed in it. It had a chilly distance about it that the best diaries don’t. An interesting read, but not a gripping one.

2 people found this helpful

Mr. M. Grossfeld

Must-read page turner for fans of serious journalism

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 8 November 2020

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I am devouring this insightful, frank and always entertaining review of 15 tumultuous years of insider reporting on the great and the good. Full disclosure: I am a big fan and faithful reader of the FT, so I may be biased. But I highly recommend this book as live history and excellent writing.

5 people found this helpful

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