Alan Watkins
{{Short description|British journalist}}
{{distinguish|Allan Watkins|Henry Watkins Allen}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=December 2014}}
{{Use British English|date=December 2014}}
Alan Rhun Watkins (3 April 1933 – 8 May 2010){{cite news|title=Alan Watkins obituary: Political colunmnist with a bloody-minded independent streak|author=Michael White|newspaper=The Guardian|location=London|date=9 May 2010|url=https://www.theguardian.com/media/2010/may/09/alan-watkins-obituary|accessdate=9 May 2010}} was for over 50 years a British political columnist in various London-based magazines and newspapers. He also wrote about wine and rugby.
Life and career
Alan Watkins was born in Tycroes, Carmarthenshire, to David John Watkins (1894–1980), a teacher (sometime headmaster at Llanedi School, near Tycroes), from a mining family, and Violet, also a teacher, daughter of Dr Edwin Harris, a GP.Ciar Byrne (12 June 2006). [https://web.archive.org/web/20100515144225/http://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/the-indestructible-journos-482007.html "The Indestructible Journos"], The Independent (London). Retrieved on 20 October 2008.Brief Lives with some memoirs, Alan Watkins, Elliot & Thompson, Ltd, 2004, pp 189-96 He was educated at Tycroes Primary School and Amman Valley Grammar School before studying law at Queens' College, Cambridge.{{Cite web|url=http://www.terrynorm.ic24.net/alan%20watkins.htm|title=Ammanford, Carmarthenshire web site}} After National Service, he was called to the Bar.
Much of his long career as a commentator on politics was spent at The Observer newspaper (1976–93), but he also wrote for The Sunday Express (1959–64), The Spectator (1964–67), the New Statesman (1967–76), the Sunday Mirror, and the London Evening Standard.
At the end of each year he wrote a piece called "Master Alan Watkins' Almanack", written in the style of a 17th-century seer and making tentative, and slightly tongue-in-cheek, predictions for the year ahead.{{Cite web |date=1 January 2006 |title=Master Alan Watkins' Almanack: Master Cameron may decide his |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/commentators/alan-watkins/master-alan-watkins-almanack-master-cameron-may-decide-his-interest-is-best-serv-d-if-master-blair-stays-put-6112959.html |website=The Independent}}
= Political language =
He coined and popularised a number of phrases that have passed into common journalistic parlance, including "chattering classes";{{Cite web|url=https://www.theguardian.com/media/2010/may/09/alan-watkins-obituary|title = Alan Watkins obituary| website=TheGuardian.com |date = 9 May 2010}} although he fleshed out the archetypal "young fogey" in The Spectator in 1984, Watkins noted that he had adopted the phrase from the journalist Terence Kilmartin, who had used it in reference to the academic John Casey, and Watkins stated that the phrase originated with Dornford Yates in 1928.{{Cite web|url=https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-young-fogey-an-elegy|title=The Young Fogey: An elegy|last=Mount|first=Harry|date=13 September 2003|work=The Spectator}}
He was noted for coining the political phrase "the men in grey suits", indicating a delegation of senior party figures (such as the Conservative Party's 1922 Committee){{cite news |last1=Eaton |first1=George |title=The 1922 Committee: how the Tories' men in grey suits wield power |url=https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/uk/2017/10/1922-committee-how-tories-men-grey-suits-wield-power |work=New Statesman |date=11 October 2017}} who come to tell a party leader that it is time to go. But as he wrote in a footnote in A Conservative Coup:
The original phrase was 'the men in suits'. It was used, for example, by the present writer in the Observer, 6 May 1990. During and before the 39 hours it became transformed into 'the men in grey suits', which stuck. As Lord Whitelaw observed on television, it was an inaccurate phrase, because on the day in question, 21 November, his interviewer could see that he was wearing a blue suit. And, indeed, the typical Conservative grandee tends to wear a dark blue or black suit, with chalk- or pin-stripes, what may be called a White's Club suit. The original phrase 'the men in suits' is the more accurate.Alan Watkins, A Conservative Coup. The Fall of Margaret Thatcher (Duckworth, 1992), pp. 6–7, n. 5.File:Grave of Alan Watkins in Highgate Cemetery.jpg]]
Death
Watkins was in failing health for several weeks prior to his death at his London home on 8 May 2010 from renal failure, aged 77. He was buried on the eastern side of Highgate Cemetery.{{cite news|title=Alan Watkins, doyen of political commentators, dies at 77|author=David Connett|location=London|newspaper=The Independent|date=9 May 2010|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/news/alan-watkins-doyen-of-political-commentators-dies-at-77-1969473.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100510185412/http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/news/alan-watkins-doyen-of-political-commentators-dies-at-77-1969473.html |archive-date=2010-05-10 |url-access=limited |url-status=live|accessdate=9 May 2010}}
Bibliography
{{Expand list|date=August 2020}}
=Books=
- {{cite book |author=Watkins, Alan |title=Brief lives |location=London |publisher=Hamish Hamilton |year=1982 }}
- Watkins, Alan (1990) A Slight Case of Libel: Meacher Versus Trelford and Others, London: Duckworth {{ISBN|0-7156-2334-6}}
- Watkins, Alan (1991) A Conservative Coup: The Fall of Margaret Thatcher, London: Duckworth {{ISBN|0-7156-2386-9}}
- Watkins, Alan (1998) The Road to Number 10: From Bonar Law to Tony Blair, London: Duckworth {{ISBN|0-7156-2815-1}}
- Watkins, Alan (2001) A Short Walk Down Fleet Street: From Beaverbrook to Boycott, London: Duckworth {{ISBN|0-7156-3143-8}}
=Articles=
- {{cite journal |author=Watkins, Alan |date=4 October 2008 |title=The end of old Labour |journal=The Spectator |volume=308 |issue=9397 |pages=40–41 |url=http://www.spectator.co.uk/the-magazine/books/2188491/the-end-of-old-labour.thtml |accessdate=23 December 2008 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20081204194722/http://www.spectator.co.uk/the-magazine/books/2188491/the-end-of-old-labour.thtml |archivedate=4 December 2008 |df=dmy}}Review of {{cite book |title=Downing Street diary : with James Callaghan in No.10 |author=Donoughue, Bernard |author-link=Bernard Donoughue, Baron Donoughue |year= 2008 |publisher=Cape }}.
References
{{Reflist}}
External links
- [https://web.archive.org/web/20100512182241/http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/alan-watkins/master-alan-watkins-almanack-master-icameroni-may-decide-his-interest-is-best-servd-if-master-iblair-istays-put-521213.html Master Alan Watkins' Almanack Jan-2006: Master Cameron may decide his Interest is best serv'd if Master Blair stays put]
- [https://web.archive.org/web/20100809094109/http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/alan-watkins/master-alan-watkins-almanac-master-blair-has-a-clever-scheam-he-is-desirous-to-make-peace-with-mr-brown-430259.html Master Alan Watkins' Almanack Dec-2006: Master Blair has a clever Scheam. He is desirous to make Peace with Mr Brown]
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Category:Burials at Highgate Cemetery
Category:Welsh-speaking journalists
Category:Alumni of Queens' College, Cambridge
Category:British male journalists
Category:Deaths from kidney failure in the United Kingdom