This is one more classic! I have read this before, many years back. I read this again. What is brilliant, is how Jonathan Lynn has managed to combine an education with so much fun!

The workings of government, and corporations, is mercilessly laid bare. Yet, there is so much grace in the book, and he delves into the minds of the three main protagonists that it is completely brilliant.

This is a must read

And, buy the DVD as well! ( )

The supposed diaries of Jim Hacker in his role as Prime Minster of the UK. The book is interspersed with letters and memoirs. Brilliant insights into the civil service and government, although perhaps a little too close to the truth at times! ( )

This book is the ultimate clever-funny political satire. Written as the diary of Cabinet Minister James Hacker and edited by the authors Jonathan Lynn and Antony Jay. Nothing wrong with that.. .. Except, they are also the original scriptwriters for the TV series YES MINISTER (which I never saw) with licence, therefore, to write the book from both ends. From this unique point it becomes so inventive and entertaining.
It would be interesting to know how the authors gained their insight into the Civil Service “Jobs for the Boys” culture. After very well paid employment for a lifetime, from which they cannot be sacked for incompetence, they spend retirement in one of the many money wasting QUANGOs . This enables “graduates” from certain schools, mostly of very limited ability, to live in luxury at the expense of the hard working, often gifted, majority. Nothing ever changes............... ( )

The BBC Television program, "Yes Minister" won the British Academy Award and the book which followed it, The Complete Yes Minister (1981) became a bestseller. In this successive volume (of two, for a total of three), Jim Hacker has become Prime Minister, and his conflicted relationship with Sir Humprey Appleby, the new Secretary of the Cabinet, continued to reflect the actual tension and confusion on the part of public servants in a representative government.

This work is hilarious in many places, but it is not just silly. It exposes, in an entirely realistic way, the dynamics and outcomes arising from the competing interests and hidden agendas of "public servants". Exhibit A in a study of political science. ( )

My favourite thing about this collection is the framing device, that the authors are the editors of Jim Hacker's diaries. This enables the expansion of the story so that all of the events in the series can be captured. It also lifts it head and shoulders above most other script collections, as it adds details to the characters in the programme, particularly some minor members of the government.

The collection shows how wonderfully well written Yes Prime Minister was, and the incredible ability of the actors to say some very complicated lines. ( )