John Mortimor has died. Anyone who has followed Rumpole of the Old Bailey will mourn his Mortimer's passing. Mortimer was a legend in own lifetime, not only as an author and playwright, but also as a practicing barrister who took on high profile cases.
The Guardian starts its obituary this way:
"The barrister, playwright and author Sir John Mortimer, who has died aged 85, was a man for all the seasons that touched his Chilterns garden, where he lived as profusely as he wrote, in a spirit of unjudgmental generosity. His greatest achievement was to create, in Rumpole of the Bailey, a lawyer whom the world would love."
The Guardian also has an interesting pen-portrait of Mortimer by Melvyn Bragg a neighbour of Mortimers for many years:
"One of the best things about the last few years is that I ended up as a country neighbour to John Mortimer. His house was a short walk away in the woods and every time I went there I knew that there would be talk, drink, gossip, mockery of our great leaders, almost certainly a heavy argument and then rolling back home knowing that you'd been in company as good as it gets. John and Penny were irresistible - even their squabbles made you laugh.
I've known him for years. I made a film about him and never had a dud moment with him. It wasn't only the jokes and the stories and the roguish malice but the unshakeable core of the man. The pillars of his mind were in the liberties of England, which had to be defended at all costs and extended wherever possible. And in literature. He was soaked in Shakespeare, steeped in Dickens, an everyman library in the great writers and the great laws of this country."
The IHT, in its obituary article, provides a delightful background to Rumpole:
Mortimer created the character Rumpole of the Bailey, an endearing and enduring relic of the British legal system who became a television hero of the courtroom comedy.
To read Rumpole, or watch the episodes, is to enter not only Rumpole's stuffy flat or crowded legal chambers, but also to feel the itch of his yellowing court wig and the flapping of his disheveled, cigar-ash-dusted courtroom gown. Rumpole spends his days quoting Keats and his nights quaffing claret at Pommeroy's wine bar, putting off the time that he must return to his wife, Hilda, more commonly known as She Who Must Be Obeyed.
The Guardian starts its obituary this way:
"The barrister, playwright and author Sir John Mortimer, who has died aged 85, was a man for all the seasons that touched his Chilterns garden, where he lived as profusely as he wrote, in a spirit of unjudgmental generosity. His greatest achievement was to create, in Rumpole of the Bailey, a lawyer whom the world would love."
The Guardian also has an interesting pen-portrait of Mortimer by Melvyn Bragg a neighbour of Mortimers for many years:
"One of the best things about the last few years is that I ended up as a country neighbour to John Mortimer. His house was a short walk away in the woods and every time I went there I knew that there would be talk, drink, gossip, mockery of our great leaders, almost certainly a heavy argument and then rolling back home knowing that you'd been in company as good as it gets. John and Penny were irresistible - even their squabbles made you laugh.
I've known him for years. I made a film about him and never had a dud moment with him. It wasn't only the jokes and the stories and the roguish malice but the unshakeable core of the man. The pillars of his mind were in the liberties of England, which had to be defended at all costs and extended wherever possible. And in literature. He was soaked in Shakespeare, steeped in Dickens, an everyman library in the great writers and the great laws of this country."
The IHT, in its obituary article, provides a delightful background to Rumpole:
Mortimer created the character Rumpole of the Bailey, an endearing and enduring relic of the British legal system who became a television hero of the courtroom comedy.
To read Rumpole, or watch the episodes, is to enter not only Rumpole's stuffy flat or crowded legal chambers, but also to feel the itch of his yellowing court wig and the flapping of his disheveled, cigar-ash-dusted courtroom gown. Rumpole spends his days quoting Keats and his nights quaffing claret at Pommeroy's wine bar, putting off the time that he must return to his wife, Hilda, more commonly known as She Who Must Be Obeyed.
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