The journalist and author Rod Mickleburgh discusses the new memoir he co-wrote John Horgan: In His Own Words (Harbour Publishing, 2025), with Joseph Planta.
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John Horgan: In His Own Words by John Horgan with Rod Mickleburgh (Harbour Publishing, 2025).
Click to buy this book from Amazon.ca: John Horgan |
Text of the introduction by Joseph Planta:
I am Planta: On the Line, in Vancouver, British Columbia, at TheCommentary.ca.
Rod Mickleburgh joins me again. After John Horgan resigned as premier of British Columbia in 2022, Mr. Mickleburgh began interviewing him for posterity at Royal Roads University. The conversations about Horgan’s life and times, as well as his political career, began again in 2024, when Horgan, by now Canada’s ambassador to Germany, was diagnosed with cancer for a third time. By then, a book would be put together using Horgan’s recollections prodded on by Rod, and later organised and shaped into the new book John Horgan: In His Own Words. It’s a compelling read, as Horgan is candid, honest, and leaves very little as to how he feels on various issues, as well as the variety of people he encountered in his years in public life, culminating in serving as premier from 2017 to 2022. Rarely in British Columbia’s political history has a politician been so conversational. There are marvelous insights into how to organise and run for political office, as well as how to be a member of the Legislature, and caucus member, loyal to one’s leader. The anecdotes about how to form a cabinet and manage people in the civil service are fascinating. And the inside stories of successes in the consequential Horgan government, as well as the missteps and miscues, like the Royal BC Museum or his famous temper, are invaluable. Rod Mickleburgh was a former labour reporter for the Vancouver Sun and Province, and China correspondent and senior writer at the Globe and Mail. He’s been on the program in the past with his two previous books On the Line: A History of the British Columbia Labour Movement, and The Art of the Impossible: Dave Barrett and the NDP in Power 1972-1975, which he co-authored with Geoff Meggs. Those books, as this new one are from Harbour Publishing. I spoke to Rod last Tuesday. Please welcome back to the Planta: On the Line program, Rod Mickleburgh; Mr. Mickleburgh, good morning.
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