Boris Johnson

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Boris Johnson.
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Boris Johnson.

Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson MP (born 19 June 1964 in New York City, USA), better known as Boris Johnson, is a British Conservative politician, journalist and historian. Known for his distinctively eccentric public persona, he is Member of Parliament for Henley and is also a front-bench spokesman as Shadow Minister for Higher Education. He is occasionally referred to as 'Bozzer' in the UK tabloid press and also by his colleagues in the Conservative Party, as a nickname.

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[edit] Early life

He is one of four children of Stanley Johnson and his first wife Charlotte Johnson-Wahl. He is the great-grandson of Ali Kemal, the last interior minister of the Imperial Turkish government. Boris's great grandparents came to England in 1910 to stay with his great great-grandmother and to give birth to Boris' grandfather. His great grandmother Winifred died of puerperal fever soon after. Boris's great grandfather, grandfather and great aunt lived in Wimbledon until 1912 when Ali Kemal returned to Turkey. During World War I Boris's grandfather and great aunt were given British citizenship and took their grandmother's maiden name of Johnson.

Boris was educated at Eton College, where he was a King's Scholar, (after his expulsion from The Oratory School) and read Greats at Balliol College, Oxford (his time is commemorated on a wall in the college bar as "a Balliolite who achieved more than you ever will" along with Graham Greene and Howard Marks), where he was a Brackenbury scholar, and President of the Oxford Union. It has been claimed that, tactically, to gain the Presidency he touted himself as a Social Democratic Party supporter, then a dominant current at the University, though he denies that he was more than their preferred candidate (Pandora column, The Independent, 9 August 2006). While at Oxford he was also a member of the Bullingdon Club, an exclusive student dining society known for its raucous feasts, and was involved in the British-Arab University Association.

In 1987, at the age of 23, he married Allegra Mostyn-Owen; the marriage lasted less than a year and was formally dissolved in 1993 [1]. Later in 1993 he married Marina Wheeler, a barrister (and the daughter of journalist and broadcaster Sir Charles Wheeler). They have two sons and two daughters.

[edit] Journalism

Upon graduating from Oxford he lasted a week as a management consultant ("Try as I might, I could not look at an overhead projection of a growth profit matrix, and stay conscious"), before becoming a trainee reporter for The Times. Within a year he was sacked for falsifying a quotation from his godfather, Colin Lucas, later vice-chancellor of Oxford University. After a short time as a writer for the Wolverhampton-based Express & Star, he joined The Daily Telegraph in 1987 as leader and feature writer, and from 1989 to 1994 was the paper's European Community correspondent. He served as assistant editor from 1994–1999. His association with The Spectator began with a stint as political columnist from 1994 to 1995. In 1999 he became editor of The Spectator, where he stayed until December 2005 upon being appointed Shadow Minister for Higher Education. (Incidentally he is unrelated to either of the other two Johnsons whose writings are published by The Spectator: columnist Paul Johnson, and ex-editor Frank Johnson.)

He has written an autobiographical account of his experience of the 2001 election campaign entitled Friends, Voters, Countrymen: Jottings on the Stump. He is also the author of three collections of journalism, Johnson's Column, Lend Me Your Ears and Have I Got Views For You. His first novel was Seventy-Two Virgins, published in 2004, and his latest book is The New British Revolution (2006). He was nominated in 2004 for a British Academy Television Award, and has attracted several unofficial fan clubs and sites. His official Boris Johnson website and blog started in September 2004.

[edit] Politics

In 2001, Johnson was elected MP for Henley-on-Thames, succeeding Michael Heseltine. He had previously failed to win Clwyd South in 1997. In 2004 he was appointed to the front bench as Shadow Minister for the Arts in a small reshuffle resulting from the resignation of the shadow home affairs spokesman, Nick Hawkins. He was also at one time vice-chairman of the Conservative Party, with emphasis on campaigning.

Johnson was dismissed from these high-profile posts in November 2004 over accusations that he lied about having a four-year extramarital affair with Petronella Wyatt, The Spectator's New York correspondent and former deputy editor. Johnson derided these allegations as "an inverted pyramid of piffle", but Michael Howard sacked Johnson because he believed press reports showed that Johnson had lied in this denial of the affair, rather than for the affair itself.

He was appointed Shadow Minister for Higher Education on 9 December 2005 by the new Conservative leader David Cameron, and soon resigned as editor of The Spectator. On 2 April 2006 it was alleged in the News of the World that Johnson had a second extramarital affair, with Times Higher Education Supplement journalist Anna Fazackerley. The video [1] shows him emerging from her flat and waving to her in a taxi. Subsequently, in a speech at the University of Exeter concerning student finance, he allegedly made comical remarks about his gratitude to the audience for not "raising other issues" during the talk, which may possibly have been a reference to the allegations. A report in The Times [2] stated that David Cameron regarded the possible affair as a private matter, and that Boris would not lose his job over it.

Boris stood for the University of Edinburgh Rectorial Elections in 2006 after being nominated by its students, and came in third. In September 2006 his image was used in pastiche 'Boris needs you' and 'I Love Boris' Tory promotional material in universities [3].

[edit] Historian

Johnson is also an historian and his first documentary series, The Dream of Rome, was broadcast in 2006. It compared the Roman Empire and the modern-day European Union. The first of two parts was aired on BBC Two on 29 January, and the second on 5 February. Radio Times described Johnson as a "brilliant, funny presenter" despite an "unashamedly self-serving" argument [citation needed]. He also wrote a book to accompany the programmes.

[edit] Public persona

Johnson cultivates an image as an eccentric, self deprecating, straw-haired fop, disorganised and scatty (he once explained the lateness of his work by claiming that, "Dark forces dragged me away from the keyboard, swirling forces of irresistible intensity and power"). He has also successfully got locked out of his own house in front of reporters (having just told them he would do what he could to save the marriage). His mobile phone has rung twice on BBC programmes — once on Have I Got News for You (HIGNFY), and again while being interviewed on BBC Radio 2 by Richard Allinson, who was not afraid to scold him for it.

[edit] Have I Got News for You

Boris Johnson on the set of Have I Got News For You
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Boris Johnson on the set of Have I Got News For You

Johnson has appeared on the popular British television programme Have I Got News for You four times as a guest television presenter and three times as a panelist. The tabloid press, before he became an MP, tagged him as the show's "star", even though he had by then appeared only twice on a programme that had been running for ten years. He has also taken part in the similar Radio 4 programme, The News Quiz.

His first HIGNFY appearance, in 1998, reached a peak when Ian Hislop chided Boris over his previous association with fraudster and schoolfriend Darius Guppy, quoting verbatim from a taped telephone conversation between the two that mentioned the idea of attacking a journalist who was digging into Guppy's affairs. An angry Boris later claimed the show was "fixed", though he retracted the comment when invited back as a guest for a second time. On this second appearance Boris was asked why he had come back, to which he eventually replied (to the delight of the audience) that it was "basically for the money."

By his third appearance [4] Boris had been elected to Parliament. He was then subjected to a surprise Mastermind parody round — spotlight and all — on which he was forced to answer questions about his party's leader, Iain Duncan Smith. He then said "at least this isn't as bad as last time". "I think you're underestimating how bad it was last time" rejoindered Merton. Despite claiming to be an admirer and supporter of the man, Boris proceeded to get no questions correct. It was also during this episode that he got his name "wrong", saying, "my name is Boris Johnson" and then being corrected by host Angus Deayton, who proceeded to quote his full birth name. Soon after, his mobile telephone rang (Paul Merton pointed out that he told whoever was ringing him that “I can’t speak now, I’m on television at the moment”). He also memorably admitted that he had forgotten the title of his own book as he was writing it, hence the inconsistency between the title on the hard cover (Jottings from the Stump) and the dust jacket (Jottings on the Stump).

After Deayton's sacking, Boris was one of a number of people recruited to introduce the show, and during his first attempt at keeping order and mastering the autocue, he promised Paul Merton a coconut instead of a point. Boris then retracted the offer but Merton insisted on having a coconut. At the end of the show, a stage hand rushed in with a bag of them, giving Boris a chance to say, "Coconuts, from the party that keeps its promises!" He also said that the chances of him becoming leader of the Conservative Party were about as likely as "being locked in a disused fridge". Paul Merton cheerily told him, "these things do happen."

Boris returned to front Have I Got News for You in November 2005. He admitted on the show that he once tried to snort cocaine, but sneezed and failed. He also hosted Have I Got News For You's Christmas special on 15 December 2006, his fourth appearance as host.

The appearances of Boris on the popular show remain some of the most memorable in its long history. Those appearances have earned him a large fanbase, even from audience members of opposite political inclinations. Paul Merton put on a "Vote Boris" ribbon during the week that Iain Duncan Smith had resigned as leader of the Conservative Party, saying, "Boris Johnson is the person to lead this country back into the 17th century!" Full, unedited versions of the shows can be found on the HIGNFY: Best of the Guest Presenters DVDs, on the "Full Boris" bonus disc. Unlike normal episodes, which are cut to about thirty minutes from an hour's worth of material, these both feature the entire studio recordings.

On the DVD commentary of The Very Best of Have I Got News For You, Merton and Hislop affectionately refer to Johnson as Wodehousian, and concur that "every time he's on it gets better".

[edit] Top Gear

Boris has appeared on Top Gear as a star in a reasonably priced car. Boris set a time of 1m 56s in the Suzuki Liana finishing 9 places from the bottom before they changed car. While nearing the end of his timed lap, he failed to realise that he had accidentally pressed the horn with his arm. After hearing the noise he looked around puzzled and said "Who hooted at me?"

[edit] The Dream of Rome (TV)

Boris also presented a BBC tv series titled The Dream of Rome, which set about questioning how ancient Rome managed to unite Europe in a way the modern day European Union has failed to. A book published by Harper Collins followed the series.

[edit] Bigley editorial

On 16 October 2004, The Spectator carried an unsigned editorial comment criticising a perceived trend to mawkish sentimentality by the public. Using British hostage Kenneth Bigley as an example, the editorial claimed the inhabitants of Bigley's home city of Liverpool were wallowing in a "vicarious victimhood"; that many Liverpudlians had a "deeply unattractive psyche"; and that they refused to accept responsibility for "drunken fans at the back of the crowd who mindlessly tried to fight their way into the ground" during the Hillsborough disaster, a contention at odds with the findings of the Taylor Report. The actual reaction to Bigley's murder in Liverpool consisted of no more than two minutes' silence organised by the city council (one of several held around the country) and a sparsely attended service at Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral, although overblown coverage and hyperbole was indeed rampant in the media. The editorial closed with: "In our maturity as a civilisation, we should accept that we can cut out the cancer of ignorant sentimentality without diminishing, as in this case, our utter disgust at a foul and barbaric act of murder."

Although Johnson had not written the piece (journalist Simon Heffer later said he "had a hand" in it), he accepted responsibility for its publication. Conservative leader Michael Howard condemned the editorial, saying "I think what was said in The Spectator was nonsense from beginning to end", and sent Johnson on a tour of contrition to the city. There, in numerous interviews and public appearances, Johnson defended the editorial's thesis (that the deaths of figures such as Bigley and Diana, Princess of Wales were over-sentimentalised); but he apologised for the article's wording and for using Liverpool and Ken Bigley's death as examples, saying "I think the article was too trenchantly expressed but we were trying to make a point about sentimentality". Johnson then appeared on a BBC Radio Merseyside phone-in show, in which Paul Bigley (brother of the murdered hostage) told Johnson: "You are a self-centred pompous twit — get out of public life." Michael Howard resisted calls to dismiss Johnson over the Bigley affair, but dismissed him the next month over the Wyatt revelations.

It was about this time that sections of the press started referring to Johnson as "Bozza", (in the mode of "Gazza", "Prezza" and other figures whose activities are widely reported). At a football match between Liverpool FC and Bolton Wanderers, the Bolton fans started chanting Boris Johnson, there's only one Boris Johnson in an attempt to enrage the Liverpool players.

[edit] Association Football

Boris appeared in a charity football match, on 3 May 2006, between English and German "legends" (squads comprising ex-footballers and celebrities) at the Madejski Stadium, Reading. The German side won 4-2. Playing for the final 10 minutes, Boris achieved instant notoriety with his extraordinary tackle [5] on German midfielder Maurizio Gaudino, where without warning he ran straight at Gaudino from about 10 yards, dropped his head, and clattered Gaudino around the midriff. Johnson later explained his actions: "I'm a rugby player, really, and I knew I was going to get to him, and when he was about two yards away I just put my head down. There was no malice. I was going for the ball with my head, which I understand is a legitimate move in football." Commentators later noted that the referee appeared to agree with Johnson in that Johnson was not even booked for the tackle — let alone dismissed from the field of play — and that in any case Boris did get the ball (albeit accidentally). While Gaudino went down and took some time to recover, some suggest he may have dived.

[edit] Papua New Guinea

Johnson was also criticised by Papua New Guinea for harmfully stereotyping its citizens, after referring in a newspaper column to "orgies of cannibalism and chief-killing" there similar to party leadership contests. The nation's High Commissioner invited him to visit the country and see for himself, while remarking that his comments might mean he was refused a visa [6]. Johnson suggested he would add Papua New Guinea to his global apology itinerary, and said he was sure the people there "lived lives of blameless bourgeois domesticity like the rest of us". His defence was conclusive: "My remarks were inspired by a Time Life book I have which does indeed show relatively recent photos of Papua New Guinean tribes engaged in warfare, and I'm fairly certain that cannibalism was involved."

[edit] Jamie Oliver

Johnson was recently criticised at the 2006 Tory party conference for his comments regarding the campaign for healthier school dinners headed by celebrity TV chef Jamie Oliver. He stated, "I say let people eat what they like. Why shouldn't they push pies through the railings? I would ban sweets from school - but this pressure to bring in healthy food is too much."[7] Earlier at the conference, David Cameron, the Tory party leader, had lauded Jamie Oliver's campaign as an example of "social responsibility in action".[8] Johnson has since described Oliver as a "national saint"[7] and a "messiah".[9]

[edit] Satire

Johnson is a frequent target for satirists. The satirical magazine Private Eye pictured him on the front cover of issues 1120 (26 November 2004) and 1156 (14 April 2006). He also features regularly in its cartoon strip called at various times The Has-Beano and The Old Beano as "Boris the Menace", who is often to be found bonking behind the bike-shed (this in reference to his frequent alleged extra-marital dalliances). In a recent 2006 issue, a poster was made up advertising a new film called "Boras: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Party of Conservatism" (a parody of the recently-released film Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan). Online, the news satire website DeadBrain has published over 25 articles mentioning Johnson[10], and the website Backing Boris spearheads a lighthearted campaign to advance his cause.

[edit] Bibliography

[edit] Video appearances

[edit] References

  1. ^ News of the World video clip of Boris Johnson. News of the World.
  2. ^ Johnson 'will keep his job'. The Times (2006-04-03). Retrieved on 2006-09-17.
  3. ^ Boris Johnson goes Warhol to become poster boy for Tories. Media Guardian (2006-09-06). Retrieved on 2006-09-17.
  4. ^ HIGNFY Boris Johnsons debut..... YouTube. Retrieved on 2006-09-17.
  5. ^ Boris Johnson vs Germany. YouTube. Retrieved on 2006-09-17.
  6. ^ Boris apology to Papua New Guinea. BBC News (2006-09-08). Retrieved on 2006-09-17.
  7. ^ a b Graeme Wilson and Robert Colvile. "Let them eat cake, says Boris before he has second thoughts", The Daily Telegraph, 2006-04-10. Retrieved on 2006-10-12.
  8. ^ In full: Cameron speech: The full text of David Cameron's speech to the Conservative Party conference. BBC News Online (2006-10-04). Retrieved on 2006-10-12.
  9. ^ "Cameron backs 'off message' Boris", BBC News Online, 2006-10-04. Retrieved on 2006-10-12.
  10. ^ List of satirical articles about Boris Johnson. DeadBrain. Retrieved on 2006-09-19.

[edit] External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:
Media Offices
Preceded by
Frank Johnson		 Editor of The Spectator
1999 – 2005		 Succeeded by
Matthew d'Ancona
Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by
Michael Heseltine		 Member of Parliament for Henley
2001 – present		 Incumbent
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org../../../b/o/r/Boris_Johnson_06a0.html"
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