Stanley Johnson (writer)


Stanley Patrick Johnson is a British author and former Conservative Party politician who served as Member of the European Parliament for Wight and Hampshire East from 1979 to 1984. A former employee of the World Bank and the European Commission, he has written books on environmental and population issues.
His six children include Boris Johnson, who is the Leader of the Conservative Party and Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, and former Mayor of London; Jo Johnson, former MP for Orpington and Minister of State for Universities, Science, Research and Innovation; and Rachel Johnson, an editor, journalist, television presenter and author.

Origins and early life

Stanley Johnson was born in 1940 in Penzance, Cornwall, the son of Osman Kemal and Irene Williams. His paternal grandfather, Ali Kemal Bey, one of the last interior ministers of the Ottoman Empire government, was assassinated in 1922 during the Turkish War of Independence. Stanley's father was born in 1909 in Bournemouth, and his birth was registered as Osman Ali Wilfred Kamal. Osman's Anglo-Swiss mother Winifred Brun died shortly after giving birth. Ali Kamal returned to Turkey in 1912, whereafter Osman Wilfred and his sister Selma were brought up by their English grandmother, Margaret Brun, and took her maiden name, Johnson, Stanley's father therefore becoming simply Wilfred Johnson.
Johnson's maternal grandmother's parents were Hubert Freiherr von Pfeffel and his wife Hélène Arnous-Rivière. Hubert von Pfeffel was the son of Karl Freiherr von Pfeffel by his marriage in Augsburg on 16 February 1836 to Karolina von Rothenburg, herself said to be the illegitimate daughter of Prince Paul of Württemberg by Friederike Porth.
Johnson attended Sherborne School, Dorset. While still an undergraduate reading Greats at Exeter College, Oxford, he took part in the Marco Polo Expedition with Tim Severin and Michael de Larrabeiti, travelling on a motorcycle and sidecar from Oxford to Venice and on to India and Afghanistan. The adventure led to the publication of Severin's 1964 book Tracking Marco Polo, with photographs by de Larrabeiti.

Work and interests

Johnson has previously worked at the World Bank, has a great interest in the environment and was the Head of Prevention of Pollution Division at the European Commission from 1973 to 1979. He is a trustee of the Gorilla Organisation and a board member of Plantlife International. In 1983 he received the RSPCA Richard Martin Award for Outstanding Services to animal welfare, and in 1984 he received the Greenpeace Award for Outstanding Services to the Environment. He was for many years an ambassador for the UNEP Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals based in Bonn, Germany.
He has published a number of books dealing with environmental issues and nine novels, including The Commissioner, which was made into a 1998 film starring John Hurt. In 1962 he won the Newdigate Prize for Poetry.

Since 2005

At the 2005 general election, Johnson stood for the Conservative Party in the constituency of Teignbridge, where he came second behind Richard Younger-Ross of the Liberal Democrats.
For a time, starting on 26 May 2005, he wrote a weekly column for the G2 section of The Guardian, and continues to write for various newspapers and magazines, often on environmental topics.. He was one of the first regular hosts of the late night discussion programme The Last Word on Channel 4's More4 channel, and made an appearance on Have I Got News For You on 7 May 2004.
On 5 May 2008, it was reported that Johnson hoped to be selected to contest his son Boris's parliamentary seat of Henley for the Conservative Party. However, on 29 May it was reported that the local Conservative party had chosen three local people as possible candidates and on 30 May, local councillor John Howell was selected to fight the by-election.
He has written a memoir, Stanley I Presume, which was published in March 2009.
Having supported the Remain campaign during the 2016 European Union membership referendum, in October 2017 he came out in support of the United Kingdom leaving the European Union, stating that "the time has come to bail out" and cited the approach and attitude of the European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker as a major factor in his change of mind. He added that argument and debate over the length or detail of any transition or implementation period is expected but the ultimate "end-state" of the UK leaving the European Union is decided.
In November 2017, Johnson was confirmed as a contestant for the seventeenth series of I'm a Celebrity...Get Me Out of Here!. He was the fifth person to be eliminated from the show, finishing in seventh place. In 2018, alongside eight other celebrities, he appeared on the BBC programme The Real Marigold Hotel.

Controversy

In August 2018, Johnson said his son Boris's comments that Muslim women who wear burkas look like "letterboxes" and "bank robbers" did not go far enough, and that criticism of the comments had been "synthetic indignation" created by political opponents of Boris.
In October 2018, Johnson said that, irrespective of the solution for the border on the island of Ireland after Brexit, if the Irish people "want to shoot each other, they will shoot each other".
In early July 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, Johnson posted pictures on Instagram of himself travelling to Athens, Greece. He faced criticism after allegedly breaking "lockdown" rules, including from Liberal Democrat MPs Jamie Stone and Alistair Carmichael. At the time, Greece had reopened its borders but banned travel from the United Kingdom until 15 July.

Personal life

Johnson married the painter Charlotte Fawcett in Marylebone in 1963, with whom he had four children: Boris, Leader of the Conservative Party and Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Conservative MP for Uxbridge and South Ruislip, previously Foreign Secretary and Mayor of London; Rachel, journalist and former editor-in-chief of The Lady; Jo, former Conservative MP for Orpington, former Minister of State for Universities and former Head of the Lex Column at the Financial Times; and Leo, film-maker and entrepreneur. Johnson and Fawcett divorced in 1979. He married Jennifer Kidd in Westminster in 1981 and they had two children, Julia and Maximilian.
As revealed in 2020, he will apply for French citizenship once Brexit is done.

Works