Len Deighton
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Leonard Cyril Deighton (born February 18, 1929, Marylebone, London) is a British historian and author of spy fiction and historical novels.
Several of his novels have been adapted as films. His first four novels featured an anonymous anti-hero, named "Harry Palmer" in the films, and portrayed by Michael Caine. The first trilogy of his Bernard Samson novel series was made into a twelve-part television series by Granada Television in 1988. He wrote the screenplay for the 1969 film of the play Oh! What a Lovely War. His 1970 World War II historical novel Bomber about an RAF Bomber Command raid over Germany often is considered his masterpiece.
Deighton's interest in spy stories may have been partially inspired by his witnessing the arrest of Anna Wolkoff, a British citizen of Russian descent who was a Nazi spy, and charged with violating the Official Secrets Act on May 20, 1940.
In 1949 Deighton attended St Martin's School of Art in London, and in 1952 won a scholarship to the Royal College of Art, graduating in 1955. He then worked as an airline steward with BOAC. Before he began his writing career he worked as an illustrator in New York and, in 1960, as an art director in a London advertising agency. He has since used his drawing skills to illustrate a number of his own military history books.
Deighton also has published a series of cookery books and drew a weekly illustrated cooking guide in The Observer newspaper.
To exploit the success of Deighton's first four "Harry Palmer" novels, he wrote Len Deighton's London Dossier (1967), a guide book to Swinging Sixties London with a "secret agent" theme — contributions from other writers are described as "surveillance reports".
Deighton's 1977 masterpiece "The Battle of Britain" was said by Albert Speer (Hitler's former Minister of Armaments) to be "An excellent, most thorough examination. I read page after page with fascination". With a comment by A.J.P. Taylor simply stating "Brilliant analysis...".
[edit] Selected bibliography
The "Harry Palmer" Books:
- The IPCRESS File, 1962
- Horse Under Water, 1963
- Funeral in Berlin, 1964
- Billion Dollar Brain, 1966
The Bernard Samson Books:
- Berlin Game, 1983
- Mexico Set, 1984
- London Match, 1985
- Spy Hook, 1988
- Spy Line, 1989
- Spy Sinker, 1990
- Faith, 1994
- Hope, 1995
- Charity, 1996
A prequel to the series, Winter, was written in 1987.
Others:
- Len Deighton's London Dossier, 1967
- An Expensive Place to Die, 1967
- Only When I Larf, 1968
- Bomber, 1970
- Declarations of War - short story collection, 1971
- Close-Up, 1972
- Spy Story, 1974
- Yesterday's Spy, 1975
- Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Spy aka Catch A Falling Spy, 1976
- SS-GB, 1978
- XPD, 1981
- Goodbye, Mickey Mouse, 1982
- MAMista, 1991
- City of Gold, 1992
- Violent Ward, 1993
History:
- Fighter: The True Story of the Battle of Britain, 1977
- Airshipwreck, with Arnold Schwartzman, 1978
- Blitzkrieg: From the Rise of Hitler to the Fall of Dunkirk, 1979
- Battle of Britain, 1980
- Blood, Tears and Folly: An Objective Look at World War II, 1993
Cookery:
- Len Deighton's Action Cook Book, 1965
- Où Est le Garlic, 1965
