As a friend of Paul Johnson’s for more than 35 years, my first recollections of him on the news of his death on January 12, at age 94, were of his kindness and wise advice to me when I arrived in London as a newspaper owner in the mid-1980s. And these recollections are only fortified by his countless acts of generous solidarity in subsequent decades. Particularly, I recalled his implacable support of me when I was under heavy attack in the British media when, as has now been determined, I was falsely accused by American prosecutors of defrauding my shareholders. We had many differences of opinion, as Paul was a man of an extraordinary range of interests and a decisive nature that formulated opinions quickly. And he had great talent as a forensic advocate, which impelled him to express his opinions constantly, without reserve, and frequently in extremely colorful, entertaining, and often perceptive terms. He also had that technique which I’ve only also seen in the upper socioeconomic echelons of New York and official Washington, of denouncing in violent strictures people with whom he was perfectly cordial face to face.

Getting On Well

I recall one occasion when he had been bombarding me for several months personally and in emails and faxes about the utter ineptitude of one of my editors. My stupefaction was considerable