Michael Gove has narrated this article for you to listen to.
Shortly after Boris Johnson was selected as the Conservative candidate for Henley, he invited me to lunch at The Spectator. It was, he said, to be an intimate affair. The magazine’s then proprietor, Conrad Black, had made it known that he expected Boris to stand down as editor now that he was embarking on a political career. Speculation as to who might succeed him was intense among ambitious young journalists. And I was one of those at the time who harboured secret hopes. Was this invitation a sign of favour, a laying-on of hands, the anointing of an heir? On arriving at lunch I discovered that there were other guests. Three of them. All of whom were fellow hacks who had also been either tipped as Boris’s successor or had welcomed their names being canvassed. As we sat around the table, we realised that Boris had invited us there to be teased and tested in a form of journalistic Squid Game. Who would break first? In the end it didn’t matter. By the time the last crumbs were being cleared away it had become apparent that none of us was there to be welcomed into the vacant editor’s chair, because the editor wasn’t going to vacate it. And so Boris continued to enjoy the best job in the world for several years more. And in due course he also managed to bag the second-best one. For my assessment of how he did, do read my review.
I recall that act of Johnsonian mischief because, 20 years later, I now occupy the chair he once graced. Since then the magazine has prospered mightily. Boris, Matt d’Ancona and, most recently and most powerfully, my predecessor Fraser Nelson have built circulation, grown subscriptions, broken scoops, entertained, informed and provoked to the point where The Spectator was acquired by a new proprietor for a sum five times its value when Conrad owned it. Taking over after their successes is daunting, like following Jacky Fisher at the Admiralty or De Gaulle at the Elysée. But what I hope I can do is bring the precious essence of The Spectator to even more readers – that sense of mischief, the commitment to stylish writing, incisive commentary, original and provocative opinion and love of freedom.
Freedom? Oi, Gove, I can hear some readers cry. Weren’t you the Torquemada of lockdown, the Covid Cromwell who bound this country in a web of restrictions during the pandemic that reduced the British public to the status of compliant sheeple? Well, I shan’t attempt to re-litigate now the painful compromises of that time. Good men and women can differ on what was right. But I was involved in decision-making then as a politician. I am now relieved of that responsibility, to the relief of many. I am, once more, a journalist. And it is the role of journalists, particularly Spectator editors, to challenge authority, champion liberty and above all, defend free speech. That freedom must extend to knowing the editor’s opinion is only one of many and his past as a minister is of only historical interest and certainly no sort of ideological guide. Writers in this magazine should never and will never follow any party line. The only requirement is that they should be the sort of people you’d want to invite to a party.
The best magazines are parties on paper. A tidbit of political gossip here, a whiff of glamour there, humour running throughout everything, naughtiness indulged. And you, dear readers, are the people who make the party work. Your opinions, your contributions, your orders from Jonathan Ray’s peerless Wine Club, your entries to our competitions, your presence at our events. I first joined the party (of Spectator readers that is, not the Conservative party) as a teenager in Aberdeen. Alexander Chancellor was the editor then, one of an illustrious succession that included Charles Moore, Dominic Lawson and Frank Johnson before Boris, Matt and Fraser. Alexander succeeded as editor because he knew that while The Spectator was a magazine that covered politics, indeed covered it better than any rival, it was not a political magazine. It should have the best writers on foreign affairs, food, music, new books, culture generally and human frailty everywhere. I never made it to No. 11 but Alexander is the Chancellor I most want to emulate.
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