Friends, Voters, Countrymen

2001 non-fiction book by Boris Johnson

Friends, Voters, Countrymen: Jottings on the Stump

First edition

Author| Boris Johnson
Country| United Kingdom
Language| English
Genre| Memoir
Set in| London
Publisher| HarperCollins

Publication date

| June 2002
Media type| Print: Hardback octavo
Pages| 288
ISBN| 9780007119141
Followed by| Lend Me Your Ears (2003)

Friends, Voters, Countrymen: Jottings on the Stump is a 2001 book by the politician, journalist, and former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Boris Johnson. The book recounts Johnson's successful campaign for the seat of Henley in the 2001 United Kingdom general election.[1]

Johnson sold the serialisation rights to the book to The Times despite, according to Johnson's biographer Sonia Purnell, its being the Daily Telegraph under editor Charles Moore who had 'rescued and promoted his career'. Sarah Sands recalled that Moore was '...furious that Boris had done that. I saw Boris with his head in his hands, saying that the Telegraph had simply not made a good enough offer'.[2]

Will Buckley, reviewing the book in The Guardian, wrote that "it is yet another sign of Tory decline that Boris Johnson, brightest of the new intake, has decided to publish his political memoirs within weeks of arriving at Westminster". Buckley was pessimistic regarding Johnson's future political career, writing that "There will be no Cabinet post. There is unlikely to be even a Shadow Cabinet post. His achievement in holding Henley with a reduced majority in the 2001 election may be a highlight. The crunch decision of his political career could well be having to choose between IDS and DD in a leadership contest". Buckley concludes that "His first diary is slight, the election being no more interesting in Henley than elsewhere. But the months and years to come, as our man struggles over whether to accept a job as PPS to Bill Cash and frets over the decline of his once great party, should provide sufficient material to write further diaries which are even more amusing, and insightful, than Clark's."[3]

In the book Johnson is interviewed by Jeremy Paxman, telling him that "he is motivated 30 per cent by public service, 40 per cent by 'sheer egomania' and 30 per cent [by] disapproval of 'swankpot journalists'. Paxman snorts. Johnson writes in his diary: 'He thinks I am being satirical, but I am not entirely - at least not in the point about service.'"[3]

In a 2004 profile of Johnson for Vanity Fair, Michael Wolff described the book as concerning "the ludicrousness and exasperations and low farce of campaigning — a gentle and instructive comedy", and felt it was "surely the best campaign book ever written by a politician".[4]

## References[edit]

1. ^ Purnell 2011, p. 230; Gimson 2012, pp. 145–146.
2. ^ Sonia Purnell (22 September 2011). Just Boris: A Tale of Blond Ambition - A Biography of Boris Johnson. Aurum Press. p. 371. ISBN 978-1-84513-741-0.
3. ^ a b Will Buckley (21 October 2001). "Sign of the times". The Observer. Archived from the original on 16 August 2019. Retrieved 15 August 2019.
4. ^ Michael Wolff (journalist) (September 2004). "The Boris Show". Vanity Fair. Archived from the original on 1 November 2020. Retrieved 15 August 2019.

* Gimson, Andrew (2012). Boris: The Rise of Boris Johnson (second ed.). Simon & Schuster.
* Purnell, Sonia (2011). Just Boris: Boris Johnson: The Irresistible Rise of a Political Celebrity. London: Aurum Press Ltd. ISBN 978-1-84513-665-9.

* v
* t
* e

Boris Johnson

* Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (2019–2022)
* MP for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (2015–present)
* Mayor of London (2008–2016)

Premiership|

| First
ministry|

* 2019 Conservative Party leadership election
* List of departures
* 45th G7 summit
* Prorogation controversy
* Suspension of rebel Conservative MPs

|

Second
ministry|

* List of departures
* 2020 cabinet reshuffle
* 2021 cabinet reshuffle
* EU withdrawal agreement
* Northern Ireland Protocol
* COVID-19 pandemic
* government response
* lockdown
* vaccinations
* contracts
* contract controversies
* Dominic Cummings scandal
* Partygate
* Death and funeral of the Duke of Edinburgh
* Downing Street refurbishment controversy
* 2021 State Opening of Parliament
* 47th G7 summit
* New Atlantic Charter
* Evacuations from Afghanistan
* COP26
* Irish Sea Bridge feasibility study
* Owen Paterson scandal
* Parliamentary second jobs controversy
* Levelling-up policy
* Growth deals
* White Paper
* Great British Railways
* Integrated Rail Plan
* Trade negotiation between the UK and the EU
* Trade and Cooperation Agreement
* UK cost of living crisis
* Rwanda asylum plan
* 2022 State Opening of Parliament
* 2022 Conservative Party confidence vote
* Chris Pincher scandal
* July 2022 government crisis
* 2022 cabinet reshuffle
* Conservative Party leadership election
* 2022 vote of confidence in the Johnson ministry
* Resignation Honours

* Political positions
* International trips
* Brexit

Mayoralty|

* "Boris Island"
* "Boris Bikes"
* New Routemaster
* 2011 London riots
* London Cable Car
* 2012 Summer Olympics
* 2012 Summer Paralympics
* Garden Bridge
* Night Tube
* Jennifer Arcuri

Other offices held|

* Leader of the Conservative Party (2019–2022)
* Commonwealth Chair-in-Office (2019–2022)
* Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (2016–2018)
* Shadow Minister for Higher Education (2005–2007)
* Shadow Minister for the Arts (2004)
* MP for Henley (2001–2008)

Elections|

* 2008 (Mayoral)
* 2012 (Mayoral)
* 2019 (General)
* 2021 (Local)
* 2022 (Local)

Books|

| By Johnson|

* Friends, Voters, Countrymen (2002)
* Seventy-Two Virgins (2004)
* The Dream of Rome (2006)
* The Churchill Factor (2014)

|

About Johnson|

* Boris: The Rise of Boris Johnson (2006)
* Boris v. Ken (2008)

Public
image|

| Cultural
depictions|

* Headcases (2008 TV series)
* When Boris Met Dave (2009)
* Brexit: The Uncivil War (2019)
* Spitting Image (2020 TV series)
* "Boris Johnson Is a Fucking Cunt" (2020)
* This England (2022 TV series)

|

Family|

* Allegra Mostyn-Owen (first wife)
* Marina Wheeler (second wife)
* Carrie Johnson (third wife)
* Lara Johnson-Wheeler (daughter)
* Dilyn (dog)
* Stanley Johnson (father)
* Charlotte Fawcett (mother)
* Rachel Johnson (sister)
* Jo Johnson (brother)
* Edmund Fawcett (uncle)
* James Fawcett (grandfather)
* Ali Kemal (great-grandfather)
* Elias Avery Lowe (great-grandfather)
* H. T. Lowe-Porter (great-grandmother)

* ← Theresa May
* Liz Truss →

* ← Ken Livingstone
* Sadiq Khan →

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