The Complete Henry Root Letters

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Published in 1980, what would Henry Root of the wet fish emporium make of the A to Z listers of today. Together, they provide a powerful impression of what life must have been like in late-Seventies Britain for a retired trader in wet fish, seeing his country overrun by lesbians, lefties and other losers. com, who sent a letter to all US senators, posing as a child and asking them for their favourite joke.

H. Rochester Sneath - the fictional headmaster of the fictional British public school Selhurst, created by Humphry Berkeley. The letters were published as The Henry Root Letters and The Further Letters of Henry Root and a compilation volume, The Complete Henry Root Letters. It is very non PC and there is a wave of guilt that I should find it amusing, but nevertheless it is a good read. You Cannot Live as I Have Lived and Not End Up Like This: The Thoroughly Disgraceful Life and Times of Willie Donaldson. In short, he was the British version of Sarah Palin – but people apparently took him seriously (with the exception of Cambridge).

He established himself as a central player in the British satire boom of the early 1960s, as co-producer, with Donald Albery, of Beyond the Fringe (1960), and of dramatisations of J. The phenomenal success of the Henry Root books, especially the first, enabled Donaldson to resume his earlier chaotic lifestyle, and in the mid-1980s he began using crack cocaine. a b c "William Donaldson – Womanising satirist and novelist who squandered several fortunes on wild living". This time around Root has written an appalling soap opera about the decline of moral standards in modern Britain and put together a new volume crammed with letters to famous actors, directors and other worthies up and down the land.

Not only have so many of the people approached here faded from the memory that one can't quite remember why they were laughable, but some of the attitudes verge on bullying and prejudice in a way that's now well beyond the bounds of acceptability by today's mores.Back in 1979, people with too much time on their hands could send actual letters to leading politicians, judges and other luminaries of light entertainment, and expect a reply.

Esther Rantzen doesn't come out quite so well - there's a disagreement about whether the BBC should pay Root for some unusable script material, and Rantzen sends the same response to two different letters - the first from Root praising the show, the second, again thanking him and saying how much they appreciate viewer contributions is in response to his missive which says simply, "Dear Esther, You're a fat idiot and your show's a disgrace. Root wrote the BBC – I think Monty Python had his number, the Queen, Prince Charles, various publishing houses. Donaldson's biographical survey of roguish Britons through the ages, Brewer's Rogues, Villains and Eccentrics (2002), has been described as "a breathtaking triumph of misdirected scholarship". His experiences there formed the basis of his first novel, Both the Ladies and the Gentlemen (1975). Edna Welthorpe was a prudish middle-aged housewife who was strongly opposed to her creator Joe Orton's plays.You can change your choices at any time by visiting Cookie preferences, as described in the Cookie notice. You Cannot Live As I Have Lived and Not End Up Like This: The thoroughly disgraceful life and times of Willie Donaldson. The sender of these letters – a cantankerous crusader against pornography and modernity, and for hanging and Mrs.

Jean Rook's reply "I am certainly not a thinking man's Anna Raeburn, so you must solve your own problems. He completed his National Service in the Royal Navy in the late 1950s, reaching the rank of Sub-Lieutenant.His heroes were few, but those who were, to Root's mind, "sound" - principally Mrs Thatcher, the Dowager Lady Birdwood and James Anderton, "God's Cop", the self-appointed guardian of Greater Manchester's morals. Liz Reed - another character created by William Donaldson, Reed's TV production pitches - for shows such as 'Disabled Gladiators' and 'Anglotrash' - in the guise of Heart Felt Productions were collected in the 1998 book, The Heart Felt Letters. Donaldson's third marriage, in 1986, was to Cherry Hatrick, who survived him; they separated six months after their marriage. I love this book and his laugh out style at trying to rankle celebrities and people in the public eye. When he hits a target full on, or when the target responds with good grace or a sense of humour, it's hilarious, however.