Dear Bill: The Collected Letters of Denis Thatcher

The "Dear Bill" letters were a regular feature in the British satirical magazine Private Eye, purporting to be the private correspondence of Denis Thatcher, husband of the then-Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher.The concept of writing satire from the point of view of a Prime Ministerial spouse was not new to the magazine, who had published Mrs Wilson's Diary (also a collaboration between Wells and Ingrams) along the same line during the Wilson government. It allowed the writers wide rein to comment on the personal peculiarities of senior politicians without seeming overly absurd, and was presented in a context that was – whilst clearly fictional – quite plausible. The assumed characteristics of the subject – a conservative reactionary, a "buffer's buffer" surveying the world through the bottom of a glass and not liking it one inch – gave ample opportunity for a rich and identifiable style; the image of Denis portrayed in the letters – a gin-soaked half-witted layabout, whose sole activity was to try to escape the wrath of "the Boss" – was a popular one, and Denis Thatcher remained in the public imagination as a less gaffe-prone version of the Duke of Edinburgh long after both the Thatcher government and the series itself had ended. The portrayal was not entirely negative; Denis Thatcher was portrayed as having a sharp and witty tongue, and a keen eye for events around him.