Friends and enemies
Columnist’s memoir titillates with people lists
Barbara Amiel’s memoir includes lists — and we’ve got the names.
Oscar de la Renta. Margaret Atwood. Laura Ingraham. Bill Clinton. Sir Elton John. Rupert Murdoch. Anna Wintour. Sir Evelyn de Rothschild.
These are the names of power, of culture, of the media, of aristocracy. They are just a few of the 400 or so people included in “The Lists” at the back of Barbara Amiel’s new memoir, “Friends and Enemies,” which comes out in mid-October.
Publication might be a month away but the advance publication of excerpts from the book by the storied Canadian columnist and wife of Conrad Black in the Daily Mail a week ago kicked off a social media storm. Rumours began circulating there was a Friends and Enemies list.
The Star has obtained a copy of that list — three individual lists, actually, one each for the United Kingdom, the U.S. and Canada — the final chapter in the book, which was not included in most of the advance reading copies sent out to the media, even with extensive, signed nondisclosure agreements.
Amiel, was born in England but moved to Hamilton, Ont., at the beginning of her teenage years, going on to an international career as a journalist in Canada, the U.S. and England.
She was linked to many interesting men, including the writer William Goldman and businessman David Graham.
Her life changed with her marriage to Conrad Black in 1992.
Black acquired control of the Daily Telegraph in 1985, moved to Britain, renounced his Canadian citizenship and, in 2001, became Lord Black of Crossharbour; Amiel became Lady Black. He was later convicted of fraud and obstruction of justice in the management of his media empire, controlled by Hollinger Inc., and spent 3 1⁄ years 2 in a U.S. prison. He was pardoned by U.S. President Donald Trump in 2019.
“The names,” Amiel writes in the introduction to The Lists “cover the period during our worst troubles and not afterwards. So new friends after Conrad returned to prison aren’t included.”
When times are tough, you find out who your friends are.
She wants to “thank them publicly.”
Amiel does not want the lists to be seen as having “a whiff of the schoolgirl,” or evoking “blacklists” or even seen as “vulgar.” Rather, she writes, “A side effect of this sort of experience, if it continues for so many years, is that burying feelings all but buries you. There needs to be a release. An end.”
In all three countries, the enemies lists are much shorter than the Friends.
Many are now “the late” — Peter Worthington; His Grace, the Duke of Wellington (Valerian); Margaret Thatcher; William F. Buckley Jr.; Sir David Frost — all friends.
Canada has the longest “Enemies List” with 27 names, including Toronto Star journalist Rosie DiManno, as well as the now-retired Susan Kastner.
A quick troll through the Star archives shows why Kastner made the list: She and Amiel go back to university days and were once friends, if competitive in marriage and divorce — so, when Kastner took a shot in her columns, she knew where to aim for her most vulnerable spots.
Other Canadian enemies include Fred Eaton and former Hollinger executive David Radler, who became a prosecution witness against Black. One of the few heads of state to be on any of the three enemies lists is the “Rt. Honourable Stephen Harper.”
Also unique to Canada is “Enemy Lawyers (A very brief sample of the worst),” with five names mentioned.
Former prime minister Brian Mulroney and his wife, Mila, as well as next-generation Mulroneys — Ben and Jessica, Mark and Vanessa, Caroline Mulroney and her husband, Andrew Lapham — are all on the “Friends List.”
Heads of state are also featured on the other two regions’ Friends lists — Rt. Hon. Boris Johnson, the late Thatcher — and, on the U.S. list, in a special category titled “Supportive High Office Holders”: presidents Trump and Clinton.
Former Toronto Star senior features editor Dianne de Fenoyl makes it to the “Friends List.” Former Maclean’s publisher Ken Whyte is also on the “Friends List” along with his wife, Tina.
In the U.S., Laura Ingraham (of Fox News fame) is the only
“Gold Star” friend — while, unsurprisingly, Richard C. Breeden, former chair of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, is the “Villain-inChief.” Breeden, of course, launched the initial inquiry into Hollinger Inc.
Vogue editor Anna Wintour, fashion designer Oscar de la Renta, expat Canadians David and Danielle Frum (Danielle being the stepdaughter of the late Peter Worthington, daughter of his wife, Yvonne, also listed as a friend) and “Late Bloomer” friends Henry Kissinger and Rupert Murdoch are familiar friends.
The Daily Mail’s excerpt shows Amiel’s struggles to fit into “the billionaire’s club” of wives upon her marriage to Black. “Like a series of vivid tableaux vivants, the memory of those women standing in one another’s homes, just out of my reach, remains locked behind my eyes.”
Still, “the late Jayne Wrightsman” appears on the friends list, as does American investor Sid Bass, but not his ex-wife Mercedes, who is described in the excerpt as “spiteful and opinionated.”
In the U.K., friends include Sir Elton John and his Canadian husband, David Furnish; HRH Prince and Princess Michael of Kent; and Sir Tom Stoppard. Just two Enemies are listed, both journalists: Tom Bower and Geoffrey Levy.
Last, Amiel lists “My Blessed Kuvasz Support Circle”: breeders of her favoured dogs across the U.S. and veterinarians in Toronto and Palm Beach.