A second volume of autobiography following on from "Clinging to the Wreckage". Extending the story, Mortimer tells of his court work and his breakthrough to fame with Rumpole and "Brideshead". Portraits of Tony Hillerman, David Niven, John Geilgud, Harold Wilson and others are included.
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Editorial Reviews
From AudioFile
John Mortimer narrates this autobiography, which details events connecting family, friends, people and places he has encountered during his career as a barrister, screenwriter, playwright and novelist. This account begins with his work as defense counsel for bizarre homicidal characters and continues through his literary occupations. In an English accent he languidly recounts the pleasures of his pursuits and discoveries. Whether describing his relationship with David Niven or his preparation for a murder case, the excitement of these moments is more in the facts than in the telling. While the reading is understated and rather droll, this is a tale filled with absorbing, if idiosyncratic, folks. B.J.L. (c)AudioFile, Portland, Maine
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4.0 out of 5 stars
"All fiction, plays...parables, myths, and religion are our attempt to provide an explanation for haphazard events in our lives",
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This review is from: Murderers and Other Friends (Paperback)
The second of John Mortimer's three autobiographies, this installment covers his life from the 1960s through 1980s, when he retired from the law following a case which took him to Singapore. The son of a barrister who specialized in divorces and contested wills, Mortimer, who was extremely close to his father, shared his father's practice, eventually taking over when his father, blind, retired from the bar. During all this time, Mortimer also wrote plays, novels, screenplays, and stories, and in 1963, he admits, he almost left the law, in favor of writing.
When he became a QC, he began accepting cases which were not purely domestic, and he tried his first murder case, a case which found its way into his immensely popular "Rumpole for the Defense" series, which he began writing in 1975. He had already written A Voyage Round My Father, which had become a successful stage play, and he memorialized his father once again as the model for Rumpole, the irascible and iconoclastic barrister who delights in challenging the status quo. According to Mortimer, the two characters are so similar that he has difficulty remembering which of Rumpole's characteristics, if any, are purely Rumpole's and which are his father's. A supporter of the Socialists and Labor, and an atheist who says he nevertheless respects Christianity as the basis of British culture, Mortimer devotes considerable time here to describing political movements and Thatcherism during this period. His friendships with David Niven, Sir John Gielgud, Harold Pinter, and other literary and theatrical lights are fully described, and his experiences in Russia, when he and a group tried to film Shakespeare there are memorable. The final section of the book involves an extended trip to South Africa to meet his father's family and explore his roots. Lovers of Mortimer's novels and of the Rumpole series will find Mortimer's own life fascinating, especially when real cases are described and the reader recognizes how these are used in the Rumpole series. The book is like a travelogue, however, moving from point to point with no real sense of thematic unity or direction. Mortimer himself addresses this issue in his conclusion, saying that to impose a theme, which would provide unity and coherence, would be the equivalent of inventing a myth to impose order on life. While this is a fine sentiment, it does lead to a somewhat disjointed book--amusing and interesting, but lacking conclusions which might make it more meaningful for the reader. n Mary Whipple The Summer of a Dormouse Rumpole and the Penge Bungalow Murders Rumpole Misbehaves: A Novel (Rumpole Novels)
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