Few writers are so beloved today as John Mortimer, the cuddly-looking creator of Rumpole and much, much more. Those familiar with Mortimer’s autobiographical writings will be familiar with many aspects of his life but there was a lot he didn’t put in, if this book is to be trusted! A passionate, vicious first marriage, lots of adultery from Mortimer (who enjoyed being spanked!), an illegitimate son – its amazing he had time to fit it all in, what with the writing and the barrister work.
Author Graham Lord originally had Mortimer’s authority to write this but then had authority withdrawn and seems to have taken if very badly – he is hard on Mortimer. But to be fair, he has done his research, and his nasty comments are more added on to the end of a paragraph of facts. Maybe when Lord calms down a little in later years and does another edition, he will be less nasty.
Lord is a little unfair on Mortimer at times – as a novelist, he should know how the creative process works for people, how people re-arrange facts about their own lives to make them sound interesting. Sometimes Lord seems dead keen to debunk Mortimer’s reminiscences, other times he takes them all at face value. And on the did-he-write-Brideshead-Revisited controversy, he should know that you can never take anyone’s word for it as to who wrote what in a screenplay, you actually have to read and compare drafts. Still, I found the book fascinating – Mortimer is a wonderful subject. A barrister on some important cases, a skilled novelist, a great TV writer, a playwright, an author of non-fiction - lots of steady work, some of it spectacularly good. A sort of career probably not possible today in the era of "massive hits".
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