Jeremy Clarkson, easily among the top ten best presenters the BBC’s Top Gear automotive-themed review program ever had, announced this week on his Amazon farming show that he’s been diagnosed with cancer. During the two-episode season five finale of Clarkson’s Farm, the 66-year-old Briton admitted to the audience that he was diagnosed in May, confirming that a biopsy proved the cancer to be “aggressive” but that they caught it “really early.” The series ended its fifth season with Clarkson’s typical caustic sarcasm, “if this is all successful, I’ll see you for Season 6, and if it isn’t, I won’t.”
Clarkson said on the show that the location of the cancer wasn’t anyone’s business but his and his doctors, but went on to reveal that the disease had consumed 10% of his prostate gland. When Jeremy referred to May, we’re not talking about last month, as the series was filmed in the summer of 2025. Being that Clarkson is still quite alive and underwent surgery to remove the cancerous material, the hope is certainly that he’ll make a full recovery. His surgery followed just eight months after his heart surgery for blocked coronary arteries.
The presenter and devout conservative political opinion columnist has long railed against the United Kingdom’s National Health Services, calling it a “creaking monster” that needs a “rethink.” Following his stay in hospital, however, he gave nothing but the most glowing of reviews: “The doctors, the nurses and everyone I met were kind. It was all spotless. Lunch was kids’ food—brilliant, and they even made me better—for which I shall be eternally grateful.” Just hours before his heart surgery, Clarkson’s column had been published criticizing the NHS for claims that the program was hiring international doctors who had been banned from practice in their native countries.
Clarkson’s legacy will live on
Many readers will be quite familiar with Clarkson’s work from his time as Top Gear presenter, alongside James May and Richard Hammond for nearly 20 years. The trio was removed from the show just over a decade ago after an irate Clarkson assaulted a producer in a “fracas” that ended with him paying a £100,000 racial discrimination and injury claim. Since that time Clarkson, May, and Hammond have moved their work to Amazon Prime Video where the less successful Grand Tour aired for an additional eight years.
Clarkson is partially responsible for my own love of the automobile, as I fell deep into the rabbit hole of torrented Top Gear episodes while I was in college. There was something entertaining about his sardonic personality, particularly juxtaposed against the perceived kindness and joviality of May and Hammond. Now-legendary diatribes and eulogies of automobiles, and the incredible visuals that couldn’t be seen anywhere else at the time (but are now matched by mid-tier YouTube channels) captured my youthful imagination. I owe at least a bit of who I am as a car enthusiast to the direct influence of Jeremy Charles Robert Clarkson, and I hope he regains his full health. He might be a bit of a jerk, but I certainly wouldn’t wish cancer on even the worst of people.
Clarkson has recently taken to urging men to get their prostate checkups, saying “I’ve had too many friends go down with prostate cancer, and all it takes to get on top of the situation early is a moment or two of being a bit cross-eyed. You get the all-clear and the doc goes home happy. What’s not to like?” If you’re over 45 it’s a good idea to get one scheduled as soon as you can.
