Roger Lewis (biographer)

Last updated

Roger Lewis
Born (1960-02-26) 26 February 1960 (age 64)
Caerphilly, Glamorgan, Wales
OccupationAcademic, biographer, journalist
Education Bassaleg School, Newport
Alma mater University of St Andrews; Magdalen College, Oxford

Roger Lewis (born 26 February 1960) is a Welsh academic, biographer and journalist. [1] [2] He is best known for his biographies; The Life and Death of Peter Sellers, and Erotic Vagrancy, about Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor.

Contents

Biography

Lewis was born in Caerphilly, Glamorgan in 1960. He was raised in Bedwas, Monmouthshire, and educated at Bassaleg School in Newport. He then attended the University of St Andrews, graduating MA, then Magdalen College, Oxford, where he gained the MLitt degree, both with first class honours. He became a Fellow of Wolfson College, Oxford, in 1984. [1] [3]

Lewis has contributed literary journalism to the Daily Express, Daily Mail and Daily Telegraph. [4] He has written biographies of Peter Sellers (1994), [5] Charles Hawtrey (2001), Anthony Burgess (2003), and Laurence Olivier (2007). [1] His book on Sellers was dramatized by HBO as The Life and Death of Peter Sellers , which won a Golden Globe Award [3] and was nominated for the Palme d'Or at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival. [6]

In the introduction to his Sellers biography, Lewis admits Norman Wisdom was his first "movie love". Wisdom was displaced in the young Lewis's affections one Saturday afternoon when he chanced upon a Peter Sellers double bill on television. Lewis was full of cold and had been left at home by his parents.

"Wrapped in my mother's Glenurquart tartan travelling rug, eating custard creams and drinking Ribena through a straw, I settled, in a bored sort of way, to watch a double bill on the only channel not killing time with sports commentaries." [7]

The double bill - 'Peter Sellers Holiday Double: Two Way Stretch followed by Wrong Arm of the Law' - was broadcast on BBC2 on Saturday, 26th May 1973. [8] [9] Lewis was aged 13 at the time. Seeing these films sparked a lifelong love of Sellers, in particular his work in The Goons.

Seasonal Suicide Notes (2009) chronicles five years of the author's life. [4] It was followed up by a second volume of "dyspeptic musings", What am I Doing Here? My Years as Me, in 2012. [10]

Erotic Vagrancy, his massive joint biography of Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, took him 13 years to complete, and was published to generally positive reviews in October 2023. [11] In a talk to The Oldie Literary Lunch in January 2024, Lewis said he pitched the book to his publisher as "Roland Barthes meets The Wolf Man". [12]

In the book's author details it was revealed Erotic Vagrancy is being turned into an ITV drama series. [13] [14]

In the endpapers of Seasonal Suicide Notes (2009) Lewis listed 'forthcoming' books. These include:

Of these, only Growing Up With Comedians has since appeared in print, in 2010. [16]

Reinvention of the biography form

Lewis has claimed that he tries to find a unique structure, voice and tone suited to the subject of each of his biographies. This often results in his adoption of an idiosyncratic biographer's persona, which can sometimes be misunderstood by readers who are looking for a more conventional cradle-to-grave approach. [17] [18] This was most clearly apparent in the reaction to his experimental biography of author Anthony Burgess. [19] Following its publication Blake Morrison declared himself "appalled by Roger Lewis's 20-year quest to destroy Anthony Burgess". [20] In defense, Lewis told Stephen Moss: "What I was trying to do with all my biographies was find a form that would suit the subject matter...Anthony Burgess was a great charlatan, so the book is full of all these mock-scholarly footnotes. I thought I'd pulled it off, and then the reviews came out and they were homicidal". [4]

Journalist Tanya Gold credits Lewis with reinventing the biography as a form and genre, during a discussion about Erotic Vagrancy at the Jewish Literary Foundation in March 2024. [21]

Other controversies

Writing a book review for the Daily Mail in August 2011, Lewis expressed a dislike of the Welsh language, calling it an "appalling and moribund monkey language". Plaid Cymru politician Jonathan Edwards reported Lewis's comments to the police and to the Press Complaints Commission. [22] [23]

In 2014 comments about lesbians Lewis made in a Spectator article led to publishers Biteback Publishing withdrawing an offer of a book deal. [24] [25]

Personal life

Lewis is married – to Anna, an educational psychologist – with three sons, and lives in Hastings, with a holiday apartment in Bad Ischl, Austria. He is a lover of good art and bullfighting. [3] In 2023 he suffered a heart attack in the car park at Morrisons supermarket in Hastings and had to be airlifted to hospital. [26]

Books

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">C. S. Lewis</span> British writer, lay theologian, and scholar (1898–1963)

Clive Staples Lewis was a British writer, literary scholar, and Anglican lay theologian. He held academic positions in English literature at both Magdalen College, Oxford (1925–1954), and Magdalene College, Cambridge (1954–1963). He is best known as the author of The Chronicles of Narnia, but he is also noted for his other works of fiction, such as The Screwtape Letters and The Space Trilogy, and for his non-fiction Christian apologetics, including Mere Christianity, Miracles, and The Problem of Pain.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peter Sellers</span> English actor and comedian (1925–1980)

Peter Sellers was an English actor and comedian. He first came to prominence performing in the BBC Radio comedy series The Goon Show. Sellers featured on a number of hit comic songs, and became known to a worldwide audience through his many film roles, among them Chief Inspector Clouseau in The Pink Panther series.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Spike Milligan</span> Irish comedian and writer (1918–2002)

Terence Alan "Spike" Milligan was an Irish comedian, writer, musician, poet, playwright and actor. The son of an English mother and Irish father, he was born in British India, where he spent his childhood before relocating in 1931 to England, where he lived and worked for the majority of his life. Disliking his first name, he began to call himself "Spike" after hearing the band Spike Jones and his City Slickers on Radio Luxembourg.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anthony Burgess</span> English writer and composer (1917–1993)

John Anthony Burgess Wilson, who published under the name Anthony Burgess, was an English writer and composer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard Lester</span> American film director (born 1932)

Richard Lester Liebman is a retired American film director based in the United Kingdom, famous for his comedic and campy style of shooting movies and for his work in both US and UK cinema.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anthony Blunt</span> British art historian and Soviet spy (1907–1983)

Anthony Frederick Blunt, styled Sir Anthony Blunt from 1956 until November 1979, was a leading British art historian and Soviet spy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lynne Frederick</span> British actress and model (1954–1994)

Lynne Frederick was an English actress and model. In a career spanning ten years, she made over thirty appearances in film and television productions. She often played the girl next door and performed in a range of genres, from contemporary science fiction to slasher horror, romantic dramas, classic westerns, and occasional comedies, although her greater successes were in period films and costume dramas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Bluthal</span> Australian actor (1929–2018)

John Bluthal was a Polish-born Australian actor and comedian, noted for his six-decade career internationally in Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States.

Bedwas is a town situated two miles north-east of Caerphilly, south Wales, situated in the Caerphilly county borough, within the historic boundaries of Monmouthshire.

<i>The Life and Death of Peter Sellers</i> 2004 film by Stephen Hopkins

The Life and Death of Peter Sellers is a 2004 biographical film about the life of English comedian Peter Sellers, based on Roger Lewis's book of the same name. It was directed by Stephen Hopkins and stars Geoffrey Rush as Sellers, Miriam Margolyes as his mother Peg Sellers, Emily Watson as his first wife Anne Howe, Charlize Theron as his second wife Britt Ekland, John Lithgow as Blake Edwards, Stephen Fry as Maurice Woodruff and Stanley Tucci as Stanley Kubrick.

Anthony Burgess: A Life is the title of a biography of the novelist and critic Anthony Burgess (1917–93) by Roger Lewis.

<i>The Malayan Trilogy</i> 1956-1959 book series by Anthony Burgess

The Malayan Trilogy, also published as The Long Day Wanes: A Malayan Trilogy in the United States, is a comic 'triptych' of novels by Anthony Burgess set amidst the decolonisation of Malaya.

Joseph McGrath is a Scottish film and television director and screenwriter. He was born in Glasgow and studied at Glasgow School of Art in the late 1940s and early 1950s where his energy and talent was admired by his contemporaries.

<i>The Case of the Mukkinese Battle-Horn</i> 1956 British film by Joseph Sterling

The Case of the Mukkinese Battle-Horn is a 1956 British short comedy second feature ('B') film directed by Joseph Sterling and starring Peter Sellers, Spike Milligan and Dick Emery. It was written by Harry Booth, Jon Penington and regular Goon show co-writer Larry Stephens, from a story by Stephens, with additional material by Sellers and Milligan.

<i>The Doctor Is Sick</i> 1960 novel by Anthony Burgess

The Doctor Is Sick is a 1960 novel by Anthony Burgess.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Andrew Sinclair</span> British novelist, historian, biographer, critic, and filmmaker (1935–2019)

Andrew Annandale Sinclair FRSL FRSA was a British novelist, historian, biographer, critic, filmmaker, and a publisher of classic and modern film scripts. He has been described as a "writer of extraordinary fluency and copiousness, whether in fiction or in American social history".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peter Sellers on stage, radio, screen and record</span> British actor, 1925-1980

The British actor and comedian Peter Sellers (1925–1980) performed in many genres of light entertainment, including film, radio and theatre. He appeared in the BBC Radio comedy series The Goon Show, recorded a number of hit comic songs and became known internationally through his many film characterisations, among them Chief Inspector Clouseau in The Pink Panther film series. English filmmakers the Boulting brothers described Sellers as "the greatest comic genius this country has produced since Charles Chaplin".

A bibliography of reference material associated with the James Bond films, novels and genre.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Trader Faulkner</span> Australian actor (1927–2021)

Ronald "Trader" Faulkner was an Australian actor, raconteur and flamenco dancer, best known for his work in the UK on the stage and television.

Hermione Harvey, was an English actress and dancer. She was known in the 1950s for starring on the West End stage in London.

References

  1. 1 2 3 "The Writers of Wales Database: Roger Lewis". Literature of Wales. Archived from the original on 13 November 2013. Retrieved 13 November 2013.
  2. ↑ "The Modern Word – "Anthony Burgess: A Life" Review". Archived from the original on 18 March 2011. Retrieved 5 June 2011.
  3. 1 2 3 Stephen Masty, "Roger Lewis – Modernist, Moralist and Wit", The Imaginative Conservative , 30 May 2012, accessed 28 October 2021
  4. 1 2 3 Stephen Moss. ''Roger Lewis: My father died and I thought, I'll try and make that funny', in The Guardian, 8 December 2009
  5. ↑ Lewis, Roger (1995). The Life and Death of Peter Sellers. London: Arrow Books. ISBN   0-09-974700-6. 1108 pages.
  6. ↑ Festival de Cannes: The Life and Death of Peter Sellers, Cannes Film Festival, accessed 28 October 2021
  7. ↑ Lewis, Roger (1995). The Life and Death of Peter Sellers. Arrow. ISBN   978-0-09-974700-0.
  8. ↑ "BBC Programme Index". genome.ch.bbc.co.uk. 26 May 1973. Retrieved 18 July 2024.
  9. ↑ "BBC Programme Index". genome.ch.bbc.co.uk. 26 May 1973. Retrieved 18 July 2024.
  10. ↑ Reviewed by Nicholas Lezard in The Evening Standard, 10 April 2012
  11. ↑ Anthony Quinn. 'An epic hymn to a joyously vulgar pair', in The Guardian, 22 October 2023
  12. ↑ "Roger Lewis, former TV critic, tells The Oldie "my career as a writer, I worked my way up from nothing, to a state of absolute poverty."". The Oldie. Retrieved 18 July 2024.
  13. ↑ Lewis, Roger (26 October 2023). Erotic Vagrancy: Everything about Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor. Quercus. ISBN   978-0-85738-277-1.
  14. ↑ "30th January 2024". BookBrunch.co.uk. Retrieved 18 July 2024.
  15. ↑ Lewis, Roger (March 2010). Seasonal Suicide Notes: My Life As It Is Lived. Short Publishing Company Limited. ISBN   978-1-907595-00-4.
  16. ↑ Lewis, Roger (2011). Growing Up With Comedians: A collection of portraits of some of the finest comedians of our time. Century. ISBN   978-0-0994-7865-2.
  17. ↑ Masty, Stephen (30 May 2012). "Roger Lewis - Modernist, Moralist and Wit". The Imaginative Conservative. Retrieved 7 July 2024.
  18. ↑ "A Life in Biography: I have reloaded the episode with Roger Lewis talking about his Taylor-Burton biography. on Apple Podcasts". Apple Podcasts. Retrieved 7 July 2024.
  19. ↑ Williams, Nigel (10 November 2002). "Not like clockwork". The Observer. ISSN   0029-7712 . Retrieved 7 July 2024.
  20. ↑ Blake Morrison. 'Kingdom of the Wicked', in The Guardian, 9 November 2002
  21. ↑ Foundation, Jewish Literary. "Book Week 24 | Roger Lewis discusses his new book 'Erotic Vagrancy' with Tanya Gold". jewishliteraryfoundation.co.uk/. Retrieved 7 July 2024.
  22. ↑ Addley, Esther (17 August 2011). "Esther Addley's diary". The Guardian. Archived from the original on 17 March 2018. Retrieved 17 March 2018.
  23. ↑ "Welsh 'monkey language' anger". BBC News. 16 August 2011. Archived from the original on 17 March 2018. Retrieved 17 March 2018.
  24. ↑ "Spectator columnist on Dusty Springfield: 'You can always spot a lesbian by her big thrusting chin' ·". PinkNews . 14 August 2014. Retrieved 13 January 2017.
  25. ↑ "The mad, bad and sad life of Dusty Springfield". The Spectator . Archived from the original on 17 December 2014. Retrieved 13 January 2017.
  26. ↑ Hemsley, Andy (27 February 2023). "Hastings man describes how he came back from the dead after collapsing in Morrisons car park". Sussex Express. Retrieved 6 July 2024.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.