Alistair Beaton (born 1947) is a Scottish left-wing political satirist, journalist, radio presenter, novelist and television writer. At one point in his career he was also a speechwriter for Gordon Brown.
Born in Glasgow, Scotland, Beaton was educated at the universities of Edinburgh, Moscow and Bochum and graduated from the University of Edinburgh with First-Class Honours in Russian and German. He lives in Holloway, London.
Contents
Works[edit]
Non-fiction[edit]
- The Little Book of Complete Bollocks (1999)
- The Little Book of New Labour Bollocks (2000)
- The Little Book of Management Bollocks (2001)
Fiction[edit]
- Don Juan on the Rocks (novel, 1994)
- Drop the Dead Donkey 2000 (novel, 1994) (co-authored with Andy Hamilton, after the British sitcom Drop the Dead Donkey)
- A Planet for the President (novel, 2004)
Stage plays[edit]
- The Ratepayer's Iolanthe (co-written with Ned Sherrin) (1984)
- The Metropolitan Mikado (also co-written with Sherrin) (1985)
- Feelgood (2001) (a satire on New Labour spin doctors)
- Follow My Leader (a 2004 play with music by Richard Blackford)
- King of Hearts (a satire) (2007)
- Caledonia (2010) (A satire about the Royal Bank of Scotland and the Scottish colonial ambitions Darien scheme of the late 17th century.)
Translations and adaptations[edit]
- Nikolai Gogol's The Government Inspector (from Russian)
- Gogol's The Nose (based on the Gogol short story of the same name)
- La Vie Parisienne (from French)
- Die Fledermaus (from German)
- The Arsonists (a 2007 translation of the 1953 play by Max Frisch play Biedermann und die Brandstifter)
Television[edit]
- Not The Nine O'Clock News (1979-1982)
- It'll All Be Over in Half an Hour (1983)
- Spitting Image (1984-1996)
- Incident on the Line and The Way, the Truth, the Video (from Tickets for the Titanic, 1987)
- Downwardly Mobile (1994)
- Mit fünfzig küssen Männer anders (screenplay, 1998; based on a novel by Dorit Zinn )
- A Very Social Secretary (2005) (about David Blunkett's affair with Kimberly Quinn)
- The Trial of Tony Blair (2007)
Radio[edit]
- Fourth Column, a BBC Radio 4 show for writers and journalists
- Electric Ink, BBC Radio 4 (2009)
- The Beaton Generation
Miscellaneous[edit]
- Additional lyrics for the song "Small Titles And Orders" in the Chichester Festival Theatre's production of The Gondoliers in the summer of 2003.
External links[edit]
- Alistair Beaton's Official Website
- Alistair Beaton: "Nanny Doesn't Know Best" (The Times, March 29, 2004) (about the war in Iraq and its treatment in Follow My Leader)
- "Lunatics in the White House? Surely not?" (Camden New Journal, November 19, 2004) (about the genesis of A Planet for the President; includes author photograph).
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