Gyles Brandreth

Gyles Brandreth is a writer, broadcaster, actor, former MP and Lord Commissioner of the Treasury, now Chancellor of the University of Chester and one of Britain’s most sought-after award ceremony hosts and after-dinner speakers. A star of Celebrity Gogglebox, a veteran of QI and Have I Got News For You, a reporter on The One Show, a presenter on Pointless, a regular on This Morning, and since the 1980s one of the mainstays of Just a Minute on BBC Radio 4. His most recent book is an acclaimed biography of Queen Elizabeth II: Elizabeth: an intimate portrait – an immediate Sunday Times No 1 best-seller.

His many other books include an acclaimed childhood memoir, a Sunday Times best-seller in 2021, Odd Boy Out, as well nine detective novels (among them The Oscar Wilde Murder Mysteries), biographies (notably Philip: The Final Portrait) and three other recent best-sellers: The 7 Secrets of Happiness; a celebration of good English, punctuation, spelling and grammar, Have You Eaten Grandma?; and his anthology of poetry to learn by heart, Dancing by the Light of the Moon.

In 2022/23 Gyles Brandreth has appeared on stage with Dame Judi Dench at the Gielgud Theatre in London, at Hampton Court Palace and at the Royal Albert Hall; on TV with Sheila Hancock in Great Canal Journeys; and on tour throughout the country with his one-man show. He presents a weekly podcast with Susie Dent about words: Something Rhymes With Purple – Best Entertainment Podcast at the British Podcast Awards, 2020. And with his daughter Aphra, he co-hosts the Commonwealth Poetry Podcast, celebrating poetry and the Commonwealth, launched with HM Queen Camilla in 2022. In 2023, he launched a new podcast, Rosebud, a weekly conversation with interesting and remarkable people all about their very first memories.