Christopher Hitchens (1949- )
There is a long, semi-honourable tradition of old public schoolboys rebelling against the conformity, stolidity and authoritarian nature of their upbringings in favour of left-wing politics. It is equally traditional for such enthusiasms to be ditched in later life. With such a well-plotted career trajectory it would have been easy for Christopher Hitchens to have faded into stereotype.
His mother sent him to the Leys with the immortal justification: “If there is going to be an upper class in this country, then Christopher is going to be in it,” only for her son to devote much of his early life to obscure Trotskyite groups, anti-Vietnam protests and sundry other left-wing enthusiasms.
Following the fall of the Berlin wall, Hitchens abandoned socialism and spent much of the Nineties sniping at the Clinton administration. He topped this by aligning himself with the velociraptor tendency of the Bush administration and supporting the war against Iraq (or Saddam as he’d put it) in a largely successful bid to annoy the more drippy, sanctimonious elements of the left.
According to Martin Amis, the Hitch has maintained a gloriously snooty façade. His usual response to criticism is coruscating scorn delivered with truly aristocratic disdain. According to Martin Amis his ideal holiday is to go to bars and find people to argue with. We understand and sympathise with this: most sensitive public school alumni feel at odds with everyone.
Apparently he dislikes being described as a lush and since we’re hardly in a position to criticise we’d rather dwell on his finest achievement to date. In 2003 he was invited to play the part of devil’s advocate as the Vatican attempted to canonise that old Albanian nun people get so excited about.
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