Biography reccs

[JTG]

If you can get hold of a copy (it used to be pretty difficult, though there was a reprint not that long ago), the biography by Harry Thompson of Belgian comic strip icon Tintin is excellent, and a fine tonic against the whitewashed version proffered by those profiting from Hergé's not inconsiderable commercial estate.

Thompson - a producer of the TV show HIGNFY - was a lifelong fan, but did not let that cloud his judgement in assessing the life and works of the bequiffed boy reporter's erstwhile creator Georges Remi.

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I am shocked at your selection

 

[ringo]

Julian Cope's two-in-one autobiography, covering his early years of pop fame with Teardrop Explodes (Head-On) and then his post-band break-up years (Repossessed) is great fun.

Got this lined up for my Xmas hols reading.

 

[Bakunin]

 

[Idris2002]

Bare-Faced Messiah - the strange and terrible saga of L. RON HUBBARD. Carve his name with. . . I don't know what. It would be hilarious, if it wasn't for the fact that he actually hurt people.

I got my eldest niece Odette, about a woman wartime SOE agent and she liked it a lot, though I haven't read it.

Then there's Jessica Mitford's memoir of growing up a communist renegade from the landed gentry, Hons and Rebels. She was the "good" mitford, though given what the rest of them were like, that wasn't difficult. And a die-hard tankie to the end, AFAIK.

 

[Orang Utan]

If you can get hold of a copy (it used to be pretty difficult, though there was a reprint not that long ago), the biography by Harry Thompson of Belgian comic strip icon Tintin is excellent, and a fine tonic against the whitewashed version proffered by those profiting from Hergé's not inconsiderable commercial estate.

Thompson - a producer of the TV show HIGNFY - was a lifelong fan, but did not let that cloud his judgement in assessing the life and works of the bequiffed boy reporter's erstwhile creator Georges Remi.

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His biography of Peter Cook was great too - warts n all

 

[Ming]

The Moon is a Balloon by David Niven is a great read.

 

[toggle]

Then there's Jessica Mitford's memoir of growing up a communist renegade from the landed gentry, Hons and Rebels. She was the "good" mitford, though given what the rest of them were like, that wasn't difficult. And a die-hard tankie to the end, AFAIK.

plus, the second volume. a fine old conflict, iirc.

 

[hot air baboon]