The Missing Will - Michael Wharton

Michael Wharton was of course ''Peter Simple'' of the Daily Telegraph. He wrote two volumes of autobiography, this one, The Missing Will, and its sequel, The Dubious Codicil. Both are reissued in Faber Finds. The Missing Will describes his early life in Bradford, a lamentable career at Oxford, army service in India, years adrift in post-war Bohemia, and finishes on New Year''s Day, 1957 when ''I sat down for the first time at my desk in the Daily Telegraph with one of the most appalling hangovers I have ever had in my life, and without a single idea in my head.''

''The jokes are bizarre and side-splitting, the sense of place and character haunting, and I don''t expect to read a more honest piece of self-portraiture for some time to come.'' Rivers Scott, Financial Times

''Everyone should read this book who want to know how an intelligent and civilised man can survive in the modern world.'' Auberon Waugh

''Brilliant and hilarious'' - Arthur Marshall