The distinguished historian and headteacher discusses his latest book about a contemporary prime minister, a devastating – and dispiriting – account of Johnson’s chaotic reign
Sir Anthony Seldon, the famous headteacher, has been writing book-length report cards on British prime ministers for 40 years. The latest, on Boris Johnson, based on the accounts of more than 200 people who witnessed his catastrophic, clown-car time in office first-hand, is a test not only of Seldon’s method, but also his tone. In previous volumes the author has assumed a base level of gravitas in his subjects, and of structure in their government. Though he employs the same quasi-legal model for his inquiry here, gathering careful evidence, weighing judgments, the story he pieces together is often one of venal mayhem; it frequently reads like a considered constitutional appraisal of rats in a sack.
There is a telling coincidence in the fact that the first indelible report of Johnson’s behaviour was also the work of a school master. Martin Hammond’s infamous notes on Johnson at Eton, which recorded his “disgracefully cavalier attitude”, his “gross failure of responsibility” and his deep-seated belief that he “should be free of the network of obligation that binds everyone else” is the opening source of Seldon’s account. Johnson’s “end was in his beginning”, he argues. Speaking to me about his book last week, Seldon noted that Hammond – who had been the “formidable pipe-smoking” head at Tonbridge school when he started out as a teacher – was a longstanding inspiration, both as an educator and a writer. “Two things,” he says. “One is that his report was typically acute and detailed, like a psychiatrist’s analysis. And second: just how much the character is formed very early on.”
