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Author Michael Dobbs based his Machiavellian political drama House of Cards on his time as Margaret Thatcher's chief of staff. As a US TV adaptation draws new fans to the novel, the Conservative peer still has faith that politics can do good, writes Alex McClintock.

Author Michael Dobbs may have something in common with his most his most famous character, House of Cards' Machiavellian anti-hero Francis Urquhart. The Guardian once described the then chief of staff to Margaret Thatcher as 'Westminster's baby-faced hitman'.

That was only a few months before Dobbs' fall from grace. In the weeks preceding the 1987 British election Thatcher was convinced she would lose. She fired Dobbs and attacked him publicly, convinced he was plotting against her. Luckily for House of Cards fans, the painful experience led Dobbs to write the book, which became the BBC adaptation and eventually the popular Netflix series.

People come up to me and say 'you've done so much damage to the understanding and reputation of politicians', and I say 'hang on, I thought they did that'.

'I was feeling pretty sore and after the '87 election I went on holiday with my wife ... I picked up a bottle of wine, a writing pad and a pencil and I went down to the side of the pool,' says Dobbs. 'By the time I had finished the bottle of wine I only had two letters on my writing pad, which seems like a fairly inauspicious start for a novel, but those two letters were 'FU'. So that became the name, that's why he's Francis Urquhart and that also became his character. My life changed completely.'

'This was a huge accident, it was one of the great cock-ups in life, because I didn't know really what I was doing, I had never planned to be an author, I never even planned to get the book published, it sort of had a life of its own somehow, and still has a life of its own.'

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While House of Cards' sinister portrayal of our elected officials might suggest that Dobbs has a gloomy view of politics, he returned to Westminster in 2010 when he was made a life peer in the House of Lords. Today he splits his time between writing and politics, and has published more than 20 books, including historical novels about the life of Winston Churchill.

'Half my life is spent reminding people that politics is important and that politicians can do an enormous amount of good, the other half is tongue-in-cheek, writing a bit of drama about them,' he says. 'It's not documentary, it's not the whole picture of politics, but it's an involving and interesting part of politics—the dark side. It's what Shakespeare did, he looked at the dark side of characters and that's where you learn the most about the nature and strength of characters.'

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'People come up to me and say “you've done so much damage to the understanding and reputation of politicians”, and I say "hang on, I thought they did that".'

Dobbs hardly seems surprised by the success of the American adaptation, which under the leadership of screenwriter and creator Beau Willimon has gone into far more detail than the BBC version. The US series, which stars Kevin Spacey, has had two 13-episode seasons, already making it twice as long as its three season British counterpart.

Author of House of Cards - Lord Michael Dobbs Sacked by Margaret Thatcher, Michael Dobbs sat down to channel his feelings and created a wicked tale of the pursuit of parliamentary power.

'The Americans do some fabulous television at times, they did that whole West Wing series, which is a totally different take on politics about decency and high ideals and doing the best you can, and as a contrast to that you have House of Cards, which is The West Wing for werewolves,' says Dobbs.

Not that 'the baby-faced hitman' sees anything wrong with that.

'I think that most great people that you look at in history, the people who really achieve something are obsessive and driven, they're not necessarily nice people,' he says. 'They're too busy getting on with things.'

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