British journalist (born 1963)
Quentin Letts
|
---|
Quentin Letts in 2009
|
Born
| Quentin Richard Stephen Letts
(
1963-02-06
)
6 February 1963
(age 61)
|
---|
Nationality
| British
|
---|
Education
| Haileybury College
|
---|
Alma mater
| |
---|
Occupation(s)
| Journalist, theatre critic
|
---|
Spouse
|
Lois Rathbone
(
m.
1996)
|
---|
Children
| 3
|
---|
Quentin Richard Stephen Letts
(born 6 February 1963) is an English
journalist
and
theatre critic
. He has written for
The Daily Telegraph
,
Daily Mail
,
Mail on Sunday
, and
The Oldie
. On 26 February 2019, it was announced that Letts would return to
The Times
.
[1]
On 1 September 2023, Letts returned to the
Daily Mail
.
[2]
Early life
[
edit
]
The son of Richard Francis Bonner Letts and Jocelyn Elizabeth (nee Adami),
[3]
he was born and raised in
Cirencester
and for a while attended Oakley Hall
Preparatory School
, which was run by his father.
[4]
[5]
He boarded at
The Elms School
in
Colwall
on the
Herefordshire
side of the
Malvern Hills
. His education continued at
Haileybury College
, before he won a scholarship to Bellarmine College,
Kentucky
(now
Bellarmine University
), which he left after a year. He returned to England and worked as a barman and part-time local journalist in
Oxford
, before going to
Trinity College, Dublin
(TCD), where he edited a number of publications including
Piranha!
, Trinity's satirical newspaper. He graduated with an
MA
degree in Medieval and Renaissance Literature. At
Jesus College, Cambridge
, he gained a
Diploma
in
Classical Archaeology
.
[5]
Career
[
edit
]
Since 1987, Letts has written for several British newspapers. His first post was with the Peterborough diary column for
The Daily Telegraph
. For two years (1995?97), he was
New York
correspondent for
The Times
. He wrote a parliamentary sketch for
The Daily Telegraph
for four years until 2001.
[6]
Letts then joined the
Daily Mail
appointed by the newspaper's editor,
Paul Dacre
, to resuscitate the paper's own parliamentary sketches, a feature which Letts has said had remained dormant at the title since 1990. He was the first person to write the
Mail
'
s pseudonymous
Clement Crabbe
column, launched in 2006,
[6]
and has also been the publication's theatre critic since 2004, again at Dacre's suggestion.
[5]
A freelance since 1997, by mid-2006, he was contributing regularly to
The News of the World
and
Horse & Hound
magazine. According to
Stephen Glover
, he has supplied gossip to numerous diary columns.
[6]
"Look, diaries are very much part of my output as a journalist" he told James Silver writing for
The Guardian
in 2006. "To me it's like a plumber mending taps. It's what I do. I send out two or three stories a day. They don't all get published, of course. It's like sending out carrier pigeons, some of them don't make it back".
[6]
In the
Daily Mail
in 2016, Letts described the BBC journalist
Andrew Marr
as "Captain-Hop-Along, growling away on BBC One, throwing his arm about like a tipsy conductor". Marr was recovering from a stroke he suffered in 2013, and Letts later apologised for the remarks.
[7]
Letts was invited to present an edition of the
BBC
current affairs programme
Panorama
broadcast on 20 April 2009, which dealt with the growing criticism of the influence of
health and safety
on various aspects of
British
life. He has also been a regular guest on BBC programmes, such as
Have I Got News For You
and
This Week
(with
Andrew Neil
). He presents a programme on
BBC Radio Four
called
What's the Point Of …?
, in which he questions the purpose of various British institutions. A 2015 programme in the series, which mocked the science behind
climate change
, was not repeated after its first broadcast and withdrawn from the BBC iPlayer after the
BBC Trust
found it to be in "serious breach" of BBC rules on impartiality and accuracy.
[8]
Letts told
The Times
: "It’s a bit Orwellian. There’s an amateurishness to their sinister attempts to control thought".
[9]
Letts has published several books including
50 People Who Buggered Up Britain
and
Bog-Standard Britain
, all with his UK publisher
Constable & Robinson
. Brandon Robshaw in
The Independent
described the latter as being "a bog-standard rant about exactly those subjects one would expect a
Daily Mail
columnist to rant about" and "a waste of everyone's time".
[10]
50 People Who Buggered Up Britain
has sold around 45,000 copies and was reviewed in
The Spectator
(a publication Letts writes for) as "an angry book, beautifully written". His 2015 novel
The Speaker's Wife
, about Parliament and the Church of England, was described as 'rollicking' by Labour politician
Chris Bryant
in
The Guardian
.
[11]
Kate Saunders
in
The Times
commented: "Frankly, I adored reading this, but for all the wrong reasons. It is absolutely dreadful from start to finish. And there is nothing funnier than a bad novel by a good writer".
[12]
His non-fiction book,
Patronising Bastards: How The Elites Betrayed Britain
, was published in October 2017 and is an attack on the British ruling elite. Interviewed on the
Today
programme on
BBC Radio 4
, he was asked why Paul Dacre, the long-serving editor of one of the best-selling newspapers in Britain (and one of Letts' employers), was absent from the book. Letts said: "He’s escaped somehow, I don’t know how...", adding: "I’m not a suicide bomber, for God’s sake".
[13]
"Lett's put-downs", wrote
Roger Lewis
in
The Times
"are hysterical and take the libel laws to the brink".
[14]
Allegations of racism and discrimination
[
edit
]
In April 2018, as part of a review of the play
The Fantastic Follies of Mrs Rich
, an adaptation by the
Royal Shakespeare Company
of the 18th-century comedy
The Beau Deceived
by
Mary Pix
, Letts suggested that actor
Leo Wringer
was miscast as the nobleman Clerimont. Letts wrote that Wringer was "too cool, too mature, not chinless or daft or funny enough" to play the character, whom Letts saw as "a honking
Hooray
of the sort that has infested the muddier reaches of England’s shires for centuries." Letts continued:
Was Mr Wringer cast because he is black? If so, the RSC’s clunking approach to
politically correct
casting has again weakened its stage product. I suppose its managers are under pressure from the
Arts Council
to tick inclusiveness boxes, but at some point they are going to have to decide if their core business is drama or social engineering.
[15]
In response, in a joint statement, the RSC's artistic director
Gregory Doran
and its executive director, Catherine Mallyon, accused Letts of holding a "blatantly racist attitude" and criticised his "ugly and prejudiced commentary". Letts' comments were also widely criticised on
Twitter
, including by actors
Samuel West
and
Robert Lindsay
; the latter said that "Quentin Letts is not a reviewer offering any sensible critique so unlike a critic of stature should be ignored".
[16]
Letts responded with a further article in the
Daily Mail
in which he argued that his critique was not racist, as he did not claim that it was Wringer's race which made him unsuitable for the role, but rather criticised what he saw as a culture in British theatre of casting actors based on their race rather than their talent or suitability for a role.
In July 2019, in a review of
David Hare's
production of
Peer Gynt
at the
National Theatre, London
, Letts made an unfavourable comparison between English actor
Oliver Ford Davies'
"fruity purr" to "the whining Scottish accents".
[17]
Scottish actor
James McArdle
, who starred in the play's title role, commented that "to go for our accents like that is something else." Fellow Scot
James McAvoy
, though not involved in the production of
Peer Gynt
, joined the criticism of Letts' remarks, which he called derogatory. McAvoy added that "the person with an English accent gets referred to by his name as an individual with fruity superlatives, whereas the people who are whining just get referred to as Scottish. Not as individuals, not as actors, just an entire nation."
[18]
Allegations of misogyny
[
edit
]
Peter Wilby
writing for
The Guardian
was of the opinion that an article by Letts about
Harriet Harman
was
misogynistic
.
[19]
The same paper's theatre critic,
Lyn Gardner
, observed of a 2007 review by Letts of a stage adaptation for children of
Looking for JJ
: "I think that this is the first time I've heard of a theatre critic arguing for censorship and demanding that a play should be removed from the stage"; the
Daily Mail
had been invoked "negatively" in the production.
[20]
Quentin Letts was accused of further misogyny in a debate with
Polly Toynbee
on
Radio 4 Today
, in which he said of Toynbee, "I wish I could pin her to the ground and tickle her under the armpits to make you smile, my dear."
[21]
Letts was later questioned on these comments by comedian
Jo Brand
, who was hosting an all-male panel on
Have I Got News for You
which was aired in 2017 following
a House of Commons sexual harassment scandal
. Brand's rebuke of the panelists' alleged trivialising of the subject received widespread support on social media, and received the most
Ofcom
complaints for the two weeks it was shown.
[22]
[23]
[24]
Personal life
[
edit
]
Letts married Lois Henrietta Rathbone in 1996.
[25]
The couple have a son and two daughters and live in
How Caple
,
[4]
Herefordshire
.
[26]
Letts is an
Anglican
, and in his writing, he has frequently criticised more modernised policies of the
Church of England
.
[27]
His uncle was the publisher and first chairman of
National Heritage
,
John Letts
.
[3]
Letts has a particular liking for old hymns by Sankey and Moody especially one titled ' Pentecostal fire is burning.' Writing in Church music today '1997 vol 1 p67 he described Sankey and Moody hymns as the greatest contribution to hymnody since Isacc Newton.
On 1 March 2019, the Companies House website published the listing of Letts, his wife Lois and his mother Jocelyn as shareholders (and thus outstanding creditors) of Ffrees Family Finance Ltd, formerly a subdivision of
NatWest
, for which an administrator was appointed on the same day.
[28]
The company was placed into administration on 29 March 2019.
References
[
edit
]
- ^
News, B. B. C. (25 February 2019).
"Labour Brexit vote move and Oscar 'queen'
"
. Retrieved
26 February
2019
.
- ^
Gazette, Press (1 September 2023).
"Quentin Letts returns to Daily Mail after five years away"
. Retrieved
1 September
2023
.
- ^
a
b
"RFB Letts"
. 18 January 2011 – via www.telegraph.co.uk.
- ^
a
b
Crow, Rachel (22 February 2010).
"Political sketch writer Quentin Letts on life in London and How Caple, Herefordshire"
.
Herefordshire Life
. Archived from
the original
on 29 December 2010.
- ^
a
b
c
Cooke, Rachel (18 October 2009).
"Quentin Letts: Is this Britain's most opinionated man"
.
The Observer
. Retrieved
1 May
2012
.
- ^
a
b
c
d
Silver, James (19 June 2006).
"The Commons touch"
.
The Guardian
. Retrieved
3 March
2018
.
- ^
"Mail columnist Letts apologises for mocking Marr's disability"
.
BBC News
. 9 May 2016.
- ^
Adam Sherwin.
"Radio 4 programme criticising Met Office over global warming was 'serious breach' of BBC impartiality rules"
.
The Independent
. Retrieved
10 January
2017
.
- ^
Webster, Ben (5 December 2015).
"Radio 4 show on climate 'broke rules'
"
.
The Times
. Retrieved
5 March
2018
.
- ^
Robshaw, Brandon (15 May 2010).
"Bog-Standard Britain, By Quentin Letts"
.
The Independent
. Retrieved
3 March
2018
.
- ^
Bryant, Chris (26 November 2015).
"The Speaker's Wife by Quentin Letts review ? 'a love song to the grand old Church of England'
"
.
The Guardian
. Retrieved
5 March
2018
.
- ^
Saunders, Kate (14 November 2015).
"Fiction in short:
The Speaker's Wife
"
.
The Times
. Retrieved
5 March
2018
.
(subscription required)
- ^
Gray, Jasmin (12 October 2018).
"Quentin Letts Takes Aim At 'La-Di-Da' Elitists In New Book... But Mysteriously Leaves Out Boss Paul Dacre"
.
HuffPost
. Retrieved
5 March
2018
.
- ^
Lewis, Roger (18 November 2017).
"Review:
Patronising Bastards: How the Elites Betrayed Britain
by Quentin Letts"
.
The Times
. Retrieved
5 March
2018
.
(subscription required)
- ^
Siddique, Haroon (8 April 2018).
"Daily Mail's Quentin Letts accused of 'racist attitude' in theatre review"
.
The Guardian
. Retrieved
8 April
2018
.
- ^
Siddique, Haroon (8 April 2018).
"Daily Mail's Quentin Letts accused of 'racist attitude' in theatre review"
.
The Guardian
. Retrieved
8 April
2018
.
- ^
Letts, Quentin (14 July 2019).
"Theatre review: Peter Gynt; Noye's Fludde"
.
The Sunday Times
. Retrieved
31 July
2019
.
- ^
"Scots actors hit back over 'whining' accent review"
.
bbc.co.uk/entertainment
. 31 July 2019
. Retrieved
31 July
2019
.
- ^
"On the press: Peter Wilby on Harriet Harman's election as Labour's deputy leader"
.
The Guardian
. London, UK. 2 July 2007
. Retrieved
22 July
2009
.
- ^
Lyn Gardner (26 October 2007).
"Children's theatre must grow up"
.
The Guardian
. London, UK
. Retrieved
28 December
2012
.
- ^
Gray, Jasmin (12 October 2017).
"Quentin Letts Reveals Why He Left Paul Dacre From List Of 'People Who Love Telling Us What To Do'
"
.
HuffPost UK
. Retrieved
25 June
2018
.
- ^
"Jo Brand silences all-male Have I Got News For You panel over House of Commons sexual harassment comments"
.
The Telegraph
. 4 November 2017
. Retrieved
25 June
2018
.
- ^
Agerholm, Harriet (4 November 2017).
"Jo Brand immediately shuts down all-male panel by explaining why sexual harassment isn't funny"
.
The Independent
. Retrieved
25 June
2018
.
- ^
Ruddick, Graham (16 November 2017).
"Have I Got News for You where Jo Brand rebuked all-male panel tops complaints"
.
The Guardian
. Retrieved
25 June
2018
.
- ^
"Letts, Quentin Richard Stephen, (born 6 Feb. 1963), freelance journalist; Parliamentary Sketchwriter, since 2000, and theatre critic, since 2004, Daily Mail".
Data
. 2007.
doi
:
10.1093/ww/9780199540884.013.U41642
.
- ^
May, Philippa (23 October 2008).
"Quentin lets rip in new book"
.
The Hereford Times
. Retrieved
31 August
2010
.
- ^
Letts, Quentin (3 July 2005).
"I'm not 'devout', that's why I'm an Anglican"
.
The Telegraph
. Retrieved
28 July
2021
.
- ^
"Confirmation statement made by Companies House on 3 February 2019 with updates"
.
Companies House
. 1 March 2019.
External links
[
edit
]