Roger Law - Still Spitting at Sixty - From the 60s to My Sixties, A Sort of Autobiography

COPYRIGHT Copyright Dedication Epigraph Chapter One: The Lizard of Oz Chapter Two: Fen Boy Chapter Three: University Challenged Chapter Four: Portrait of the Artist as a Young Yob Chapter Five: The Sixties Chapter Six: Stars and Bars Chapter Seven: The Cosmic Couch Chapter Eight: Luck and Flaw Chapter Nine: Here’s One I Made Earlier Chapter Ten: Hit and Miss Chapter Eleven: Spitting Imperialism Chapter Twelve: Trash for Cash Chapter Thirteen: Not Quite Dead Yet Chapter Fourteen: The Blue Beyond Chapter Fifteen: Change of Life Chapter Sixteen: Chinese Takeaway Chapter Seventeen: Berk and Wimp Chapter Eighteen: Walkabout Chapter Nineteen: Home and Away Chapter Twenty: No Worries Acknowledgements Bibliography About the Author About the Publisher

HarperCollins Entertainment

An Imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street,

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

This paperback edition 2006

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Entertainment 2005

Copyright © Roger Law 2006

The Author asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins ebooks

HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication .

Source ISBN 9780007182503

Ebook Edition © AUGUST 2018 ISBN: 9780008325497

Version: 2018-08-14

Collaborative writer on this book was Lewis Chester.

‘Between [Roger Law and Lewis Chester], they have garnished Law’s jolly life story with diverting details … Law sounds like he’s having far too much fun in the sun to risk a return to gloomy British satire. But his superb illustrations suggest that, should he ever tire of Bondi Beach, another brilliant career awaits back home in the periodicals that spawned his grotesque yet loveable effigies.’

Independent, William Cook

‘Many glorious illustrations … litter this book … [it] is worth buying just for the twin studies of kangaroos. Not that it isn’t a marvellous read. Still Spitting at Sixty is that rare thing, a ghost-written book that somehow distils its “writer’s” essential flavour … Hazlitt said we applaud satirists not out of love but fear. Impossible, though, to read this book and not love its author. Partly this is because it is so pungently amusing, partly because it is so unsickeningly life-affirming.’

Sunday Times, Christopher Bray

‘This is really a sublime autobiography … [it contains] some of the finest pieces of writing about Australia. Much more evocative than Bill Bryson. And the illustrations are wonderful.’

Sydney Morning Herald

‘Highly engaging … a breeze, a pleasure to read, as it leaps from anecdote to anecdote with aplomb and much humour. Like all the best people, Law is a dedicated fan of P.G.Wodehouse, and there are some lovely jokes here, if not the awesomely polished prose of his hero. This is a much more distinctive piece of work than the usual run of showbiz memoirs. And yet there is clearly something going on underneath … great entertainment, and his paintings, which somehow manage to be both bold and delicate, are quite something.’

Daily Mail, Marcus Berkmann

‘Filled with all the lunacy and flair that one would expect from the co-producer and creator of Spitting Image.’

Guardian

‘This entertaining memoir takes the reader behind the scenes at Spitting Image and on to a series of hilarious adventures as a “teenage granddad” in the Outback of Australia.’

Sunday Express

DEDICATION Dedication Epigraph Chapter One: The Lizard of Oz Chapter Two: Fen Boy Chapter Three: University Challenged Chapter Four: Portrait of the Artist as a Young Yob Chapter Five: The Sixties Chapter Six: Stars and Bars Chapter Seven: The Cosmic Couch Chapter Eight: Luck and Flaw Chapter Nine: Here’s One I Made Earlier Chapter Ten: Hit and Miss Chapter Eleven: Spitting Imperialism Chapter Twelve: Trash for Cash Chapter Thirteen: Not Quite Dead Yet Chapter Fourteen: The Blue Beyond Chapter Fifteen: Change of Life Chapter Sixteen: Chinese Takeaway Chapter Seventeen: Berk and Wimp Chapter Eighteen: Walkabout Chapter Nineteen: Home and Away Chapter Twenty: No Worries Acknowledgements Bibliography About the Author About the Publisher

This book is dedicated to Richard Bennett, who is as essential to this sorry tale as Jiminy Cricket is to Pinocchio. Why didn’t I listen?

EPIGRAPH Epigraph Chapter One: The Lizard of Oz Chapter Two: Fen Boy Chapter Three: University Challenged Chapter Four: Portrait of the Artist as a Young Yob Chapter Five: The Sixties Chapter Six: Stars and Bars Chapter Seven: The Cosmic Couch Chapter Eight: Luck and Flaw Chapter Nine: Here’s One I Made Earlier Chapter Ten: Hit and Miss Chapter Eleven: Spitting Imperialism Chapter Twelve: Trash for Cash Chapter Thirteen: Not Quite Dead Yet Chapter Fourteen: The Blue Beyond Chapter Fifteen: Change of Life Chapter Sixteen: Chinese Takeaway Chapter Seventeen: Berk and Wimp Chapter Eighteen: Walkabout Chapter Nineteen: Home and Away Chapter Twenty: No Worries Acknowledgements Bibliography About the Author About the Publisher

‘I can only see it going one way, that’s my way. How it’s actually going I have no idea.’

With apologies to Nick Wilshire (boxer)

CONTENTS

Cover

Title Page

Copyright COPYRIGHT Copyright Dedication Epigraph Chapter One: The Lizard of Oz Chapter Two: Fen Boy Chapter Three: University Challenged Chapter Four: Portrait of the Artist as a Young Yob Chapter Five: The Sixties Chapter Six: Stars and Bars Chapter Seven: The Cosmic Couch Chapter Eight: Luck and Flaw Chapter Nine: Here’s One I Made Earlier Chapter Ten: Hit and Miss Chapter Eleven: Spitting Imperialism Chapter Twelve: Trash for Cash Chapter Thirteen: Not Quite Dead Yet Chapter Fourteen: The Blue Beyond Chapter Fifteen: Change of Life Chapter Sixteen: Chinese Takeaway Chapter Seventeen: Berk and Wimp Chapter Eighteen: Walkabout Chapter Nineteen: Home and Away Chapter Twenty: No Worries Acknowledgements Bibliography About the Author About the Publisher HarperCollins Entertainment An Imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 1 London Bridge Street, London SE1 9GF www.harpercollins.co.uk This paperback edition 2006 First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Entertainment 2005 Copyright © Roger Law 2006 The Author asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins ebooks HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication . Source ISBN 9780007182503 Ebook Edition © AUGUST 2018 ISBN: 9780008325497 Version: 2018-08-14