A fully updated edition of Gimsons 2006 biography with new material covering Boriss years as Mayor of London. His distinctive appearance (Like a haystack on a bicycle) befuddled manner & ready wit have assured a high media profile & a large fanbase with the general public. In 2008 he was elected Mayor of London with over 1 million votes the largest personal mandate of any UK politician. In this the first & most authoritative biography of Boris Andrew Gimson investigates Boris twin-faced dilemma
- politics or entertainment
- & asks how deep his political ambition runs. Boris has transcended his class education & his various occupations (Mayor of London Conservative MP for Henley-on-Thames Conservative spokesman for Higher Education columnist on the Daily Telegraph motoring correspondent for GQ novelist TV presenter) to become a paradoxical character
- the old Etonian who fascinates teenagers as well as grandparents the classical scholar who is also a TV quiz-show contestant. Despite being a comic actor of genius he is not just an act & Andrew Gimsons biography covers all facets of this complex individual. There is his exotic Turkish ancestry his place among five siblings his competitive relationship with his father Stanley the distinguished university career his five years as a journalist in Brussels his first failed venture into politics (I fought Clwyd South
- & Clwyd South fought back) overseeing the Spectator during the David Blunkett affair & the Liverpool editorial fiasco which led to Boris sacking from the shadow cabinet his exile & return under David Cameron his two marriages four children & love affairs. Interviewing Boris contemporaries his family & his detractors Andrew Gimson has created a fascinating & amusing portrait of this unique man of our times.