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Michael Dobbs began working for the [[Conservative Party (UK)|Conservative Party]] in 1977, and from 1986 to 1987, served as Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's [[Chief of Staff]].<ref>{{cite web|last1=Henley|first1=Jon|title=The house of Michael Dobbs|url=https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/sep/13/michael-dobbs-house-of-cards|website=the Guardian|accessdate=21 March 2018|language=en|date=13 September 2013}}</ref> Dobbs fell out with Thatcher during a cabinet meeting on 4 June 1987, exactly one week before that year's general election. Thatcher was concerned she would lose the election, and according to one participant at the meeting, she was "almost hysterical, with her arms sweeping everywhere".<ref>{{cite web|last1=Moore|first1=Charles|title=Margaret Thatcher biography part 14: Wobbly Thursday|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/margaret-thatcher/margaret-thatcher-biography/11908715/margaret-thatcher-biography-general-election-panic.html|website=The Telegraph|accessdate=21 March 2018|date=4 October 2015}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|last1=Dobbs|first1=Michael|title=Book Versus Show: 'House of Cards'|url=https://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-dobbs/house-of-cards-book_b_4783908.html|website=Huffington Post|accessdate=21 March 2018|date=14 February 2014}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=From Fletcher to the House of Cards|url=http://now.tufts.edu/articles/fletcher-house-cards|website=Tufts Now|accessdate=21 March 2018|language=en|date=23 October 2017}}</ref> According to Dobbs, "It all started because Maggie Thatcher beat me up and was actually rather cruel to me. She took out all her pain and anger and frustration on me, when in fact I was perhaps the most innocent person in the room at the time."<ref name="NewStatesman">{{cite web|title=House of Cards creator Michael Dobbs: "I must have sold my soul"|url=https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/uk/2015/07/house-cards-creator-michael-dobbs-i-must-have-sold-my-soul|website=New Statesman|accessdate=21 March 2018|language=en}}</ref>
Shortly after leaving his post as Chief of Staff in 1987, Dobbs and his wife visited Malta on holiday. While sitting beside a swimming pool in Malta, Dobbs scribbled the letters "FU" and a drawing of two raised [[The finger|middle fingers]] on a piece of a paper. The letters would become the initials of ''House of Cards'' protagonist, Francis Urquhart.<ref name="NewStatesman"/> Dobbs stated that he had not planned to write the book saying, "None of this was planned. It was all a bit of a joke, an accident. I had no intention of being a writer, or even finishing the book. It was just a holiday distraction."<ref>{{cite web|title=What "House of Cards" creator, Lord Dobbs, can tell us about realpolitik|url=http://www.afr.com/lifestyle/arts-and-entertainment/film-and-tv/michael-dobbs-creator-of-house-of-cards-20160307-gncnmz|website=Financial Review|accessdate=21 March 2018|date=19 March 2016}}</ref> Dobbs insists that it is not a "book of revenge", but "most of the stuff I put into ''House of Cards'' was material from events I'd either seen, or participated in, or done, or watched other people do."<ref name="NewStatesman"/> Dobbs has also stated that book was not a comment on contemporary politics, and also drew inspiration from the works of Shakespeare.<ref>{{cite web|title=House Of Cards creator Michael Dobbs on the dark arts of politics|url=https://www.thenational.ae/arts-culture/television/house-of-cards-creator-michael-dobbs-on-the-dark-arts-of-politics-1.215307|website=The National|accessdate=21 March 2018|language=en}}</ref>
==Plot==
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