Life at All Sins by the man from All Souls

What next after Boris? The Spectator's new editor tells Jane Thynne about his regime in Doughty Street

When Matthew d'Ancona became a fellow of All Souls, he had to endure an exam, two interviews and a gruelling High Table dinner with inquisitorial dons. Becoming editor of The Spectator meant writing a mission statement, two interviews with Andrew Neil and continuing speculation on his suitability. But there's no doubt which he preferred. "Oh, this is the thing I've always wanted to do. Every morning I approach the door with a spring in my step. It's incredibly exciting."

If The Spectator's proprietors had actively sought a contrast with his predecessor, Boris Johnson, they could not have done better than d'Ancona. Both are Oxford-educated and both are David Cameron supporters, but there the resemblance ends.

Like Boris, whose shenanigans and those of his staff brought heaps of lurid publicity for the magazine, d'Ancona also has a particular interest in sin. But in his case it is the concept of sin in the medieval confessional, the subject of his All Souls thesis.

Unlike Boris, he speaks in perfectly sequenced paragraphs, which, after interruptions, he picks up again in mid-stream. He does not display excessive enthusiasm, nor does he drink any more. His "vice" is an encyclopaedic knowledge of cinema, specialist subject Star Wars. And it is hard to imagine the sober-suited d'Ancona featuring full length on the magazine's publicity material.

"Boris had a stellar reign but every editor has a different act. I want to make The Spectator indispensable as a treasure trove of information. Not arid facts, but nuggets of opinions and things you would never have imagined. In our first weeks, we've had Gyles Brandreth revealing what the Queen thought of Diana and Ken Clarke saying 'let's have a coalition with the Lib Dems'. I want people to read the magazine because they think it's indispensable - their weekend is going to be lesser without it."

Unlike other areas of the Barclays' empire, such as The Sunday Telegraph, from which d'Ancona was plucked, no sense of crisis is detectable behind the elegant facade of 56 Doughty Street. Circulation is at a record high - well above 70,000 - thanks to the Boris effect. "The question for me is what do you do with a successful product?" ponders d'Ancona, and his first thought is to redefine its political line. "When Boris became editor, Hague was leader of the Conservative Party and it was like an underground resistance which survived on wit and flamboyance.

"Suddenly, the Tory party is a contender for power and increasingly people will turn to The Spectator to find out what it's all about. But I don't want to be the in-house magazine of the Conservative Party. I want to surf the Cameron wave, not be part of it."

Like Cameron, d'Ancona supported the invasion of Iraq, but in this, as in other issues, there will be no crusading. "Using the magazine to promulgate a world view is not what we are about at all. It's not a stick of rock, it's a pick and mix. It should be full of diversity. To take Iraq, it was really important in our recent focus on Saddam that we had Con Coughlin, who is hawkish, but we also had Rod Liddle, so there was a balance. That is what our readers want, not wall-to-wall articles by neo-cons."

Any staff hoping The Spectator can now resume its traditional role as an oasis of genteel tranquillity while the rest of the Barclay empire grapples with pod-casting, will be disappointed. "Expectations of all media organisations are soaring and the challenge for me is how to adapt an already successful brand in a new context. Readers, viewers, surfers are just demanding more and more, and the media by which they are bombarded are proliferating at such a rate that any media organisation has to constantly raise its game."

Decoding this, it seems d'Ancona will emphasise the qualities that gave the magazine its appeal through the eras of Charles Moore and Dominic Lawson. "You have to preserve and nurture the wit, the high quality writing, the mischief and ability to create controversy."

But looks are important too. Expect big, cartoony front covers to maximise the impact on the news-stand. "I certainly want to increase the impact of the front cover, the news-stand sale is up 10 per cent since I arrived. You've got to grab the reader who's browsing."

Another sector about to be grabbed are the denizens of the Citywho have told d'Ancona that they do not believe the magazine is for them. "I went to a City dinner the other night and mostly they didn't take it. There are readers to be harvested there and we will build up our business coverage, so people in the Square Mile feel they belong and are people of intellect, wit, mischief and fun."

Attempting to turn hedge fund managers into people of mischief and fun might seem a monumental task, but appealing to women is another challenge for a magazine that is overwhelmingly male.

On this score, d'Ancona has brought in as contributing editor Anne Applebaum - "one of the best journalists in the world" - and boasts of pieces by Jemima Lewis and Frances Osborne which, he says, "have an eye to feminine voices" as well as a not-yet-funny satire Notting Hill Nobody, featuring a ditzy Tory apparatchik. But any women who find the aged Greek male chauvinist Taki an obstacle to their enjoyment of the magazine are likely to be disappointed.

"No, I'm not going to sack him. Taki is enormously popular. A lot of people on the left find him an entertaining insight in to how things are on the other side. He sits alongside Jeremy Clarke, who in Low Life describes things like shopping in down-at-heel superstores and the poverty of people there with pathos and wit."

D'Ancona is famous for possessing skills worthy of the highest echelons of the Diplomatic Service, and nowhere is this more evident than in "the Andrew Neil question". How will he handle a chief executive who has already imposed two assistant editors and seems certain to want a major editorial say?

"I like him! I admire him! Andrew was very kind to me when I started at Wapping, he brought me on and the chance to work for him was an attraction. The idea that he's always peering over my shoulder is absurd. At no point has he applied the slightest pressure to me."

One of Neil's initiatives is to remove The Spectator from its Bloomsbury location to somewhere modern and glassy in Westminster, and in this too d'Ancona enthusiastically concurs, even if it means a longer commute from his home in Victoria Park, where he lives with his two sons and his wife, Sarah Schaefer. She works for the Foreign Policy Centre having once been with the Britain in Europe campaign.

Though it has a dog underfoot, every narrow room crammed with staff and could not look less like the hub of a modern multi-media organisation, the Georgian house in Doughty Street has been integral to The Spectator's identity. But d'Ancona is no more sentimental than he was about leaving the cloistered charms of All Souls.

"I could have been an academic, but I heard the siren call of journalism. I wrote a book review for The Guardian and I remember walking into the news room and thinking 'This is great! I'd love to be here'."

Even his flourishing sideline as a novelist - his second book, Tabatha's Code, is out in May - has been put on hold. "I've started the third one but it's something I'm going to have to do in the evenings. I want to keep writing, but I'm focusing like a laser on The Spectator now. My mind cannot be on other things."

MEDIA DIARY

Freebie for hacks shock

A very gentlemanly ambush at the Evening Standard. As reported last week, managing director Bert Hardy restricted the number of free copies of the paper given to editorial staff to 50, to great mutterings of discontent. This week, letters editor Josh Neicho bought 20 copies of the paper and ostentatiously handed them out. The high-ups cracked. On Wednesday, Jim, the security guard, arrived with a trolley of papers to wild staff cheers.

Whisper it not, Iain

Following David Cameron's lead of doing a podcast for The Daily Telegraph, the Conservative old guard is jumping on the band wagon. Iain Duncan Smith and Michael Howard have both signed up to be interviewed on web-based Tory Radio. IDS's podcast is due out on Tuesday (do remember to turn the volume up on your iPods), with Howard following in the near future. Cameron is also planning an appearance. "His office is trying to find a slot in his diary," says Tory Radio founder Jonathan Sheppard.

Typecast typeface?

My man in the betting office notes that The Sportsman's masthead typeface bears a striking resemblance to the Sarah Sands' rubber-stamped masthead for the revamped Sunday Telegraph. It's only a compliment of sorts. The Sportsman classes itself as middle market.

Briefly masterful

Wow! The Daily Mail's coverage of Gordon Brown's Budget on Thursday morning was amazingly gushing, from what is usually an anti-Labour paper. Editor Paul Dacre was spotted charging round the newsroom expressing wonderment at Brown's "total mastery". Dacre apparently wanted his paper's Budget reports to be even more positive - a means of raising his middle finger at Tony Blair - but thought better of it around 8pm that evening after taking counsel from senior lieutenants. By Friday morning, the Mail had returned to slightly more predictable form, attacking the Budget. The honeymoon has peaked.

Naughtie and Rice

The US Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, is jetting into town to deliver the inaugural Today/Chatham House lecture on Friday. Her destination? The Blackburn, Lancashire, constituency of the Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, who will introduce her. The last time she was in Blackburn, he took her to a Rovers match. Should Condi fancy something a little more highbrow, she could always turn for solace to the event's chairman, Today presenter Jim Naughtie. He is a fan of classical music and she is a pianist.

If the cap fits...

News that the New Statesman is to hire a fashion columnist proves wide of the mark. Rather than offering sartorial tips to its readers, it will be a cerebral analysis of the reasons behind their choices. Sue Matthias, NS deputy editor, says: "The idea is not fashion but to look at why we wear what we wear. It might be a regular column or just a one-off, but I wouldn't describe it as a fashion." First column on the flat cap?

Green-eyed 'Guardian'

Eyebrows were arched at The Guardian table at the Press Awards when the News of the World won the Cudlipp Award for its front-page story and campaign "What about the Victims?" Much of the 7/7 bomb victim copy had been bought in from the previous day's Guardian.