Kingsley Amis was born in south London in 1922 and was educated at the City of London School and St John's College, Oxford. After the publication of Lucky Jim in 1954, Kingsley Amis wrote over twenty novels, including The Alteration, winner of the John W. Campbell Memorial Award, The Old Devils, winner of the Booker Prize in 1986, and The Biographer's Moustache, which was to be his last book. He also wrote on politics, education, language, films, television, restaurants and drink. Kingsley Amis was awarded the CBE in 1981 and received a knighthood in 1990. He died in October 1995.

"A brilliant novel. It is sadly comic and comically sad" -- Anthony Burgess "He was a genuine comic writer, probably the best after P. G. Wodehouse ... He had a lasting influence and was a very good novelist" -- John Mortimer "A bloody funny lovely bloody book... A genius at full throttle" Financial Times "In these explicit days, Mr Amis is the laureate of the unsayable, the literary it man" Sunday Telegraph