His supporters believed that Boris was walking with destiny. The mantle of inevitability passed to Johnson.

When Brexit was deadlocked in 2019 JohnsonвЂ™s association with Churchill, the assiduously spade-worked notion that, give or take some hair, they were the same man, cashed out spectacularly. By 1940 there was only one вЂњman for the momentвЂќ. He interposes himself into ChurchillвЂ™s life, like a leaf pressed between the pages of a diary, then winks at his readers.Д¬hurchill, wrote Johnson, was the вЂњinevitableвЂќ Prime Minister. More than a warlord, Churchill was the вЂњbest speaker, the best writer, the best joke-maker, the bravest, the boldest and most originalвЂќ - all qualities Johnson would like us to associate with Johnson. Johnson thinks he is attracted to Churchill because he was a hero, вЂњthe man who led my country to victory against all the oddsвЂќ. More from this author Power is corrupting the Tories Johnson can doodle silly expressions on portraits of an icon - some of them are even snigger-worthy - but he cannot get close to the man.

Churchill is the вЂњbeaver who damned the flow of eventsвЂќ he is вЂњlike some burly and hungover butler from the set of Downton AbbeyвЂќ he is simultaneously a вЂњcrowbar of destinyвЂќ and a вЂњhyper-gravitational astral bodyвЂќ. Faced with the manвЂ™s knotty and tragic life, Johnson turns away, blows raspberries with the material, and writes like P.G. The Churchill Factor was not about Winston Churchill. On the fiftieth anniversary of ChurchillвЂ™s death in 2014, Johnson one-upped them all when he wrote a bestselling biography of his hero, and the tribute act reached a new stage. Other Prime Ministers were haunted by Churchill ( Thatcher ), recklessly invoked him in wartime ( Blair ), or paid oily tributes to him ( Cameron ). Churchill proved indispensable to the climb. вЂњMy silicon chipвЂќ, he told Sue Lawley on Desert Island Discs, вЂњhas been programmed to try to scramble up this cursus honorum, this ladder of thingsвЂќ. ThatвЂ™s not to say this ambition was ever hidden. More from this author Boris Johnson's speech was a joke The clown fez he wore for the next 40 years distracted his contemporaries from this ruthless fixity of purpose. Boys in the Sixties imagined themselves piloting Spitfires over green Sussex, as the sonorous, rousing, words of Churchill echoed in their heads.Д«oris never asked if he was emulating an illusion.

Fathers read selections from the Great ManвЂ™s speeches to their sons. Boris memorised the captions of Churchill picture books. Churchill was a holy presence in post-war childhoods. Johnson decided to emulate Churchill - вЂњthe greatest statesman Britain had ever producedвЂќ - and stitch himself into this gold thread. Alexander the Great looked to Achilles Julius Caesar looked to Alexander, and wept at his tomb Napoleon looked to Caesar, and Churchill to Napoleon, whose glaring bust followed him around Westminster for decades. They are above the futile jostling of general life. Classical heroes conquer or bewitch their peers, they never compete with them.

Will lloyd unherd