Confessions of a literary hedonist: Christopher Hitchens is living proof that some people will say absolutely anything to sell a few more books.
In a meant-to-be-shocking article from the UK Politics section of the Telegraph for 28 February, Stephen Adams reports that Christopher is being an awful tease again.
Apparently, in his shortly-to-be-released memoir, he alludes to some youthful homosexual romps, including with two men who went on to become members of Mrs Thatcher's government — and him a Trotskist at the time. No clue is given, however, as to whether they were "wets", or if they were actually ministers in one of her numerous "kitchen cabinets".
I think we can safely rule out Gilmour, Tebbit, Lawson and Parkinson, but that still leaves a good few dozen possible partners for Hitchwatchers to guess about, William Hill to lay odds against, and the News of the World to go ferreting about.
He said these alleged encounters were a "mildly enjoyable relapse" into homosexuality that had begun for him at Leys School, the Cambridge independent where he was educated.
So that's why they call it "the Leys"!
Hitchens, 60, who studied politics, philosophy and economics at Balliol College in the late 1960s, has made his claim in his memoir Hitch-22, to be published in June.
This is precisely the sort of sordid confessional tale (minus the salacious details, mercifully!) that makes me glad refused that scholarship and went comprehensive and red brick. But hang on! Adams now tells us that Hitch isn't a direct source for the story.
An extract of the autobiography was published in The Sunday Times.
Oh bugger! I suppose we'll have to go and read that next. I wonder what younger brother Peter will make of this? Not to mention all the Hitch fanboys. Sure the girls will love him all the more for it. But this revelation will be sure to make thousands of aspiring young contrarians take a second look at their idol. They are going to experience the sort of trauma that the members of the Blackshorts would have faced had they learned that Sir Roderick Spode secretly designed ladies' lingerie.
“The enemies of intolerance cannot be tolerant." • "If it is an offense to justice to hold people who may have been victims of mistaken identity or of vendettas by other factions, then it is also an offense to justice to release psychopathic killers who believe that they have divine permission to throw acid in the faces of girls who want to attend school." • "Don't be such a lesbian!
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