Robert the Westie. My life. By me.

15. Starring Harry Potter, Monica Lewinsky and Viagra.

For many of you, well, the younger ones amongst my readers, 1998 is probably best remembered as the first year of a phenomenon that comes in only two words, Harry Potter. The geeky boy wizard and his Hogwarts schoolmates, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger were to become the most famous literary characters in history. The authoress, one J K Rowling, became, to Steve’s amazement, the best selling writer ever and a multiple billionairess, mainly through her earnings from the seven hugely successful movies spawned by the fantasy.

Jason had joined the ranks of obsessive fans soon after his return from a family trip to Canada, where he had picked up a copy of ‘Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone’, as it was titled over there. He handed his copy on to Steve, expecting enthusiastic approval. I sat in on the debrief.

“Well?” prompted Jason, as erratic gusts of an evening windstorm rattled the windows of the apartment, stirred the Thames into waves that crashed onto the foreshore and created an appropriate atmosphere of threat and suspense.

“No, not particularly,” responded Steve with a grin. “Not well written, not well plotted, not well paced, but I don’t doubt that it will continue to sweep the globe. In these unholy times we all yearn for a bit of magic and mystery, well some of us, anyway. And I can see that Harry will endear himself to an audience that can grow up with him. But, honestly dear, I struggled to finish it.”

He never bothered to read any of the subsequent six novels, though I can confirm from up here that he did watch all of the films, many of them more than once. The fact that the books and films attracted criticism from the usual loony religious groups and were, in a few countries, banned for encouraging witchcraft, no, I’m not joking, doubtless endeared him to this dark fairy tale.

Harry’s battle with Voldemort and the forces of evil was not the only confrontation to enliven the early months of this year. For another I need to take you to the White House, in fact to the seat of power, the Oval Office, assigned to the President, currently one Bill Clinton, popular for his engaging presentation style and for the contrast he offered to his icy spouse, Hilary Roddam Clinton.

Whether that contrast helped inspire his interest in young intern, Monica Lewinsky, or whether more complex issues of political stress drove his libido in an unexpected direction, January 21 saw the Washington Post break news that this young woman was claiming to have had nine sexual encounters with Bill between November 1995 and March 1997. She further declared in her testimony, that they had involved fellatio and other sexual acts, but that none of them had extended to sexual intercourse.

Or, as Steve explained succinctly to Jason, “Bill’s been getting blowjobs on the side but not, apparently, going all the way.”

I can’t believe that ours was the only household to thrill at this scandal embracing the most powerful figure in the world. Nor, surely was it alone in greeting with hoots of derision Bill’s famous, carefully crafted declaration that “I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky. I never told anybody to lie, not a single time; never. These allegations are false. And I need to go back to work for the American people.”

At the time, he must have been unaware that Monica had confided in a colleague called Linda Tripp. Her confidences had included a list of gifts bestowed on her by Bill, including brooches, a marble bear figurine, and a copy of Walt Whitman's "Leaves of Grass." More critically, he had bestowed on her, well, on her frock, a semen stain of some magnitude. Tripp had persuaded Monica not to dry clean what was later to become infamous as “the little blue dress”.

This was to be Bill’s undoing. I’m tempted to add that his main undoing had been that of his flies in order to grant Monica access to what normally lay contained by his underwear. But that would be a cheap jibe. Okay, cheap jibe let it be. He’s getting off lightly since I’ll refrain from any references to cigar tubes and Monica’s vagina, if only because it all falls rather outside my comfort zone. Anyway, the unraveling of his denial occupied much of the year, a year of other even more serious dramas. But I’ll get around to those shortly since the unraveling tells us a lot about American politics.