When Cameron O’Reilly watched his new bride Jemima Goldsmith walk up the aisle this week, there surely were some among the congregation who must have laughed at the irony of it all.
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who → watch → it
Here was the son of Ireland’s most famous one-time press baron, Anthony ‘Tony’ O’Reilly, marrying the daughter of James Goldsmith, a prodigiously litigious man who often seemed to sue newspapers just for the fun of it.
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who → marry → it
Theirs were colourful lives, lived with the swash and buckle of those who took massive risks that didn’t always pay off.
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that → live → risks
Picture: David Levenson/Getty Images
He was the marketing genius who made Kerrygold the worldwide brand it became, the boss who turned the ailing Heinz into a multi-billion corporate behemoth, and the chief executive of Independent News and Media that saw him worth IR£1billion at one point.
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him → make → point
A bruising boardroom battle with Denis O’Brien and a futile attempt to keep Waterford Crystal afloat led to the loss of it all, his houses here and in the Bahamas included, in the financial crash.
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houses → keep → crash
James, infamous for the aphorism that ‘when a man marries his mistress, he creates a vacancy’, kept his fortune but not his health, and died of cancer in 1997 at the young age of 64.
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he → marry → 64
His feud with the satirical magazine Private Eye, which referred to him as ‘Sir Jammy Fishpaste’, was just one of the actions he took against the proprietors when they erroneously suggested he was complicit in the disappearance of Lord Lucan after he murdered nanny Sandra Rivett.
uncertain
he → refer → Rivett
James Goldsmith made his fortune as boss of Cavenham Foods.
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Goldsmith → make → Foods
The Anglo-French James, a member of the German Goldschmidt banking family, escaped Paris as a child just before the Nazis arrived in the city and sent his fellow Jews to the death camps.
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Nazis → escape → camps
He made his fortune as boss of Cavenham Foods, became an MEP for a French constituency and a media tycoon himself.
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He → make → constituency
His current affairs magazine NOW! was a lavish vanity project, but it proved expensive to produce, and folded after just 84 editions.
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it → prove → editions
James, deeply Eurosceptic and wary that Germany wielded too much influence in the bloc, became head of Britain’s Referendum Party.
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Germany → wield → Party
It took a long time, but it’s arguable he paved the way for Brexit.
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he → take → Brexit
They were distant memories as the couple’s blended families came together to celebrate what was a second marriage for both.
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what → come → both
They made for a colourful affair, one that encompassed business, politics and sport.
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that → make → business
Jemima, now 52, is the former wife of cricketer and former Pakistan prime minister Imran Khan, languishing in prison there convicted of corruption charges he denies, citing them as politically motivated by his anti-reform enemies.
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he → languish → enemies
Jemima Khan's sons Kasim and Sulaiman gave her away.
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sons → give → her
Their two sons, Sulaiman, 29, and Kasim, 27, gave her away, a clearly happy respite from the worry they must feel as their father, now 73, is seriously ill.
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father → give → worry
Jemima’s bridesmaids also included her nieces Edie and Eliza, and she also credited Bluey and Arthur for being the couple’s pageboys.
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she → include → Bluey
The bride wore an Oscar de la Renta dress and the men were in traditional morning wear, while the bridesmaids wore satin blue gowns and the ushers and pageboys were dressed in blue waistcoats and pinstripe tailored trousers.
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ushers → wear → waistcoats
On Instagram, Jemima thanked those ‘who made the day so very special & happy for both of us’, and namechecked best men, Cameron’s sons Elliot and Oscar, and ushers Frankie, Isaac, James, Gavin and Tony, the latter three brothers of the groom.
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day → thank → groom
It was a reminder, if one were needed, of the fecundity of the fathers, though the circumstances of their parentage were vastly different.
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circumstances → need → parentage
Tony had six children with his Australian wife Susan – a daughter Susan named after her mother, Anthony (known by his second name Cameron), Justine, Gavin, Caroline and St John Anthony (known as Tony Jr).
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Tony → have → Jr
Tony and Susan separated in the late 1980s and he married Chryss Goulandris, a Greek shipping heiress, in 1991.
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he → separate → 1991
James, on the other hand, had seven children by four women.
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James → have → women
His first, Isabel, was born by caesarean section after her mother, Bolivian heiress María Isabel Patiño y Borbón, became comatose, and later died, of a cerebral haemorrhage during pregnancy.
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mother → bear → pregnancy
James married again, to Ginette Léry, and had son Manes and daughter Alix Marcaccini.
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James → marry → Manes
The couple divorced in 1978, and James married his mistress Lady Annabel Birley, with whom he had already had two children, Jemima and Zacharias.
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he → divorce → children
They later had a third child, Benjamin.
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They → have → child
Zac, as he is known, became a Conservative MP and a failed London mayoral candidate, and now sits in the House of Lords and is a noted environmentalist.
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he → know → Lords
He had a complicated relationship with his father.
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He → have → father
‘There was a period, from 16 to 19, where we really hit the rocks in terms of our relationship,’ he said.
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he → be → relationship
‘But even at the worst times, following a monumental row, you couldn’t not respect him.
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you → follow → him
I always saw in him, and I would have been a fool not to have seen in him, a greatness.’
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I → see → him
His admiration wasn’t universally shared.
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admiration → share → ?
‘I remember knocking on doors in Putney, asking people to vote for him,’ he recalled.
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he → remember → him
‘Some people loved him, other people thought he was the most terrifying creature they had ever heard of, and they thought he wanted to become a sort of dictator of the country, and you can understand that.
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you → love → that
Everything he did was different.
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he → do → ?
I have never met anyone like him and I shouldn’t think I ever will meet anyone like him.
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I → meet → him
After this marriage, James continued with a familiar pattern – remember that quote – and embarked on an affair with Laure Boulay de La Meurthe, with whom he had children Charlotte and Jethro.
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he → continue → children
…and 15 more, not listed.
The Aporia
