Summary of Sonia Purnell's Just Boris

By IRB Media

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Book Preview:

#1 Stanley’s luck was so good that he did not even realize how lucky he was. He had been born lucky, and he would go on to receive free tickets, a fellowship, and a bohemian loft apartment near the Chelsea Hotel.

#2 Boris’s self-containment may be due in part to severe deafness. He was unable to hear what people were saying when he was young, and he feared that he might say the wrong thing.

#3 Boris’s placid nature was a blessing for his mother, who led a taxing, itinerant life. Stanley and Charlotte left Oxford in 1965, and Stanley was offered a job at the World Bank. They decided not to stay in England until it was time to emigrate.

#4 In 1968, Stanley brought this golden life as a project director for a national policy panel on population control to an abrupt end. He had to seek alternative employment, which he quickly found. The family moved to New York in June 1969.

• Language: English
• Publisher: IRB Media
• Release date: Jun 4, 2022
• ISBN: 9798822509153

IRB Media

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Insights on Sonia Purnell's Just Boris

Contents

Insights from Chapter 1

Insights from Chapter 2

Insights from Chapter 3

Insights from Chapter 4

Insights from Chapter 5

Insights from Chapter 6

Insights from Chapter 7

Insights from Chapter 8

Insights from Chapter 9

Insights from Chapter 10

Insights from Chapter 11

Insights from Chapter 12

Insights from Chapter 13

Insights from Chapter 14

Insights from Chapter 1

#1

Stanley’s luck was so good that he did not even realize how lucky he was. He had been born lucky, and he would go on to receive free tickets, a fellowship, and a bohemian loft apartment near the Chelsea Hotel.

#2

Boris’s self-containment may be due in part to severe deafness. He was unable to hear what people were saying when he was young, and he feared that he might say the wrong thing.

#3

Boris’s placid nature was a blessing for his mother, who led a taxing, itinerant life. Stanley and Charlotte left Oxford in 1965, and Stanley was offered a job at the World Bank. They decided not to stay in England until it was time to emigrate.

#4

In 1968, Stanley brought this golden life as a project director for a national policy panel on population control to an abrupt end. He had to seek alternative employment, which he quickly found. The family moved to New York in June 1969.

#5

Boris’s first home was in the Exmoor river valley, where his grandparents had bought a cottage. His aunt Birdie still lives in the cottage today. His parents’ marriage was shaped by Johnny’s drinking and his family’s lack of money.

#6

Stanley’s father, Johnny, was desperately trying to put behind him events that had shaped the Johnson family and Boris in particular. The family still worried that all they had achieved might be taken from them.

#7

Boris’s family history is full of examples of how sticking to your guns can lead to disaster. His great-grandfather was arrested in 1888 for setting up a students’ society, and spent many years in exile. He was later kidnapped by a Nationalist gang and attacked with sticks, stones, and knives before being hanged.

#8

Wilfred, Boris’s grandfather, became increasingly enchanted with the idea of Englishness and the security that came with it, and he decided he wanted to blend in even more by becoming known as Johnny. He eventually married Irène Williams, who helped him blend in more.

#9

Stanley, like his father, was not known for his tact. He was unemotional and did not like public displays of emotion, and he expected his children to be as resilient as he was.

#10

Stanley’s life plan was to win a Blue playing rugby for the University, become President of the Union, and get a first in Greats, the Oxford name for Classics. He never got any of those things, but he did win the top poetry prize in 1962.

#11

Boris’s brains did not come from Stanley alone. On Charlotte’s side, he draws on an inheritance from a family who can justifiably claim to be genuine intellectuals, as well as leading lights in the Women’s Suffrage Movement.

#12

Boris’s family life was very literary and highbrow, with children’s arts program Vision On, story slot Jackanory, and BBC children’s show Blue Peter being the only TV programs allowed.

#13

The Johnsons are a family where you feel there is a culture of ambition. They are constantly competing, and they are not exactly relaxing company.

#14

The Johnsons were a very clannish family, and they did not like to mix with other people. They had little interest in seeking playmates outside the family who might not strive for such peaks of achievement.

#15

Stanley’s globetrotting continued, and he eventually bought a house in London. He joined the Conservative party, and began