Alan Clark

Alan Clark

Alan Kenneth Mackenzie Clark was a British Conservative MP and diarist. He served as a junior minister in Margaret Thatcher's governments at the Departments of Employment, Trade, and Defence, and became a privy counsellor in 1991...

 started keeping a regular diary

Diary

A diary is a record with discrete entries arranged by date reporting on what has happened over the course of a day or other period. A personal diary may include a person's experiences, and/or thoughts or feelings, including comment on current events outside the writer's direct experience. Someone...

 in 1955 which lasted until August 1999, during his second spell as a Member of Parliament

Member of Parliament

A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...

, when he was incapacitated due to the onset of the brain tumour which was to be the cause of his death a month later. The last month of his life would be chronicled by his wife, Jane.

• Volume 1 Diaries: In Power 1983–1992 (1993)
• Volume 2 Diaries: Into Politics 1972–1982 (2000)
• Volume 3 Diaries: The Last Diaries 1993–1999 (2002)

Alan Clark published his diaries covering the period 1983 to 1992 after he left the House of Commons

British House of Commons

The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, which also comprises the Sovereign and the House of Lords . Both Commons and Lords meet in the Palace of Westminster. The Commons is a democratically elected body, consisting of 650 members , who are known as Members...

, deciding not to seek re-election to his Plymouth Sutton seat. Published in 1993 and known simply as Diaries (although later subtitled In Power), they have been recognised as a definitive account of the downfall of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher

Margaret Thatcher

Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher, was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990...

.

Before his death in 1999, Clark had started work on the prequel

Prequel

A prequel is a work that supplements a previously completed one, and has an earlier time setting.The widely recognized term was a 20th-century neologism, and a portmanteau from pre- and sequel...

 to the 1983–1992 Diaries to cover his entry in politics, from seeking a Conservative Association to adopt him as their Parliamentary Candidate in 1972 until the 1983 general election

United Kingdom general election, 1983

The 1983 United Kingdom general election was held on 9 June 1983. It gave the Conservative Party under Margaret Thatcher the most decisive election victory since that of Labour in 1945...

. Published a year after his death, this volume was titled Diaries: Into Politics and covered 1972 to 1983.

The final volume, covering Clark's decision not to seek re-election at the 1992 general election

United Kingdom general election, 1992

The United Kingdom general election of 1992 was held on 9 April 1992, and was the fourth consecutive victory for the Conservative Party. This election result was one of the biggest surprises in 20th Century politics, as polling leading up to the day of the election showed Labour under leader Neil...

, his regret at leaving the House of Commons and then his return to Parliament was published in 2002 and included Clark's final days dying from a brain tumour.

Throughout his diaries Clark refers admiringly to Henry "Chips" Channon

Henry Channon

Sir Henry "Chips" Channon was an American-born British Conservative politician, author and diarist. Channon moved to England in 1920 and became strongly anti-American, feeling that American cultural and economic views threatened traditional European and British civilisation. He wrote extensively...

 and his diaries. He also quotes Adolf Hitler

Adolf Hitler

Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...

, who he refers to as "Wolf".

The diaries include much reference to Clark's love of his chalet at Zermatt

Zermatt

Zermatt is a municipality in the district of Visp in the German-speaking section of the canton of Valais in Switzerland. It has a population of about 5,800 inhabitants....

, his Scottish estate at Eriboll

Eriboll

Eriboll is a village in Sutherland, Scotland on the south eastern shore of the sea loch, Loch Eriboll. It lies in the northern part of the former county of Sutherland....

 and the architecture of and country around Saltwood Castle

Saltwood Castle

Saltwood Castle is a castle in Saltwood village—which derives its name from the castle—1 mile north of Hythe, Kent, England.The castle is known as the site where the plot was hatched to assassinate Thomas Becket...

, his home in Kent. Clark's fascination with classic cars is also evident, as his enthusiasm for backgammon

Backgammon

Backgammon is one of the oldest board games for two players. The playing pieces are moved according to the roll of dice, and players win by removing all of their pieces from the board. There are many variants of backgammon, most of which share common traits...

.

The Diaries were serialised into six episodes of The Alan Clark Diaries

The Alan Clark Diaries

The Alan Clark Diaries is a 2004 BBC television serial dramatising the diaries of the controversial British Conservative politician Alan Clark.-March of the Grey Men:...

by the BBC

BBC

The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

 and shown in 2004 with John Hurt

John Hurt

John Vincent Hurt, CBE is an English actor, known for his leading roles as John Merrick in The Elephant Man, Winston Smith in Nineteen Eighty-Four, Mr. Braddock in The Hit, Stephen Ward in Scandal, Quentin Crisp in The Naked Civil Servant and An Englishman in New York...

 and Jenny Agutter

Jenny Agutter

Jennifer Ann "Jenny" Agutter is an English film and television actress. She began her career as a child actress in the mid 1960s, starring in the BBC television series The Railway Children and the film adaptation of the same book, before moving on to adult roles and relocating to Hollywood.She...

.

The identity of Clark's mistress, named only as 'X' in Vol. 3, was revealed in 2009 by the Daily Mail

Daily Mail

The Daily Mail is a British daily middle-market tabloid newspaper owned by the Daily Mail and General Trust. First published in 1896 by Lord Northcliffe, it is the United Kingdom's second biggest-selling daily newspaper after The Sun. Its sister paper The Mail on Sunday was launched in 1982...

 to be Alison Adams née Young, his one-time parliamentary secretary.

Diaries: In Power 1983–1992

The first published diaries open with Alan Clark, Conservative

Conservative Party (UK)

The Conservative Party, formally the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a centre-right political party in the United Kingdom that adheres to the philosophies of conservatism and British unionism. It is the largest political party in the UK, and is currently the largest single party in the House...

 Member of Parliament for Plymouth Sutton since February 1974

United Kingdom general election, February 1974

The United Kingdom's general election of February 1974 was held on the 28th of that month. It was the first of two United Kingdom general elections held that year, and the first election since the Second World War not to produce an overall majority in the House of Commons for the winning party,...

, about to seek re-election at the 1983 general election. The Conservatives were expected to win the election, following the recent Falklands War

Falklands War

The Falklands War , also called the Falklands Conflict or Falklands Crisis, was fought in 1982 between Argentina and the United Kingdom over the disputed Falkland Islands and South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands...

 and a disunited Labour Party

Labour Party (UK)

The Labour Party is a centre-left democratic socialist party in the United Kingdom. It surpassed the Liberal Party in general elections during the early 1920s, forming minority governments under Ramsay MacDonald in 1924 and 1929-1931. The party was in a wartime coalition from 1940 to 1945, after...

, and Clark expected to be promoted from the back benches into the Cabinet (a rank he would never in fact attain - his ministerial career peaked as a Minister of State).

Early on in the diaries, Clark records the death of his father, the author, broadcaster and art historian Kenneth Clark

Kenneth Clark

Kenneth McKenzie Clark, Baron Clark, OM, CH, KCB, FBA was a British author, museum director, broadcaster, and one of the best-known art historians of his generation...

, from whom Clark inherited Saltwood Castle

Saltwood Castle

Saltwood Castle is a castle in Saltwood village—which derives its name from the castle—1 mile north of Hythe, Kent, England.The castle is known as the site where the plot was hatched to assassinate Thomas Becket...

in Hythe, Kent.

In the very next entry in the diary, we get an insight into one of Clark's recurring lapses with the opposite sex. His opponent at the election, the Labour candidate, was 22-year-old Frances Holland, of whom Clark records;
Clark is, at this time, also carrying on an adulterous affair with Valerie Harkess, the wife of a South African judge, and her two daughters (to whom he referred collectively as "the coven"). Clark made no effort to disguise the coven's identity. The affair became public knowledge in 1992 after Clark left the House of Commons, and it was cited in the Harkess divorce case.