Thinker, Failure, Soldier, Jailer: An Anthology of Great Lives in 365 Days - The Telegraph

by Harry de Quetteville (Editor)

`I did what I always do in times of trouble - consult not the Good Book, but a good book. This wasÿ Thinker, Failure, Soldier, Jailer , a collection of obituaries from theÿ Daily Telegraph , the paper that first started printing warts and all descriptions of the dead.' Simon Hoggart,ÿ Guardian The Telegraph 's obituaries pages are renowned for their quality of writing and capacity to distil the essence of a life from its most extraordinary moments. A unique mix of heroism, ingenuity, infamy and the bizarre, Thinker, Failure, Soldier, Jailer collects the very best of those obituaries to present an endlessly absorbingÿcompendium of human endeavour.ÿÿ

Organised day by day around the calendar year, with each life presented on the date it ended, the bookÿfeatures hundreds of remarkable stories. World statesmen jostle with glamorous celluloid stars, pioneering boffins sit alongside chart-topping rock 'n' rollers, while artists and their muses mingle with record-breaking sportsmen, Victoria Cross winners, spies, showgirls and captains of industry - as well as the titans of rather more esoteric fields.

Here, for instance, can be found Britain's greatest goat breeder, a hangman who campaigned to abolish the death penalty, a priest to Soho's pimps, a cross-dressing mountaineer and a minister who preached a gospel of avarice - donations in notes only, please, as `change makes me nervous'.
ÿ
A treasure trove of human virtue, vice and trivia, Thinker, Failure, Soldier, Jailer is the perfect gift for the armchair psychologist in all of us.

Genres: History, Nonfiction

592 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2012

Reviews

[Davidg · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some entertaining obituaries. A whole variety of the great and good and the bad and truly awful.

However, this is the Daily Telegraph, so it loves minor aristocracy. It loves cads and bounders who were constantly drunk and obviously deeply unpleasant to live with but are held up as having the sort of wild life we would all love to have. Upper Middle class, ex-army who treat those beneath the, with disdain and worse, are described as “kind”. Being unpleasant to the lower orders is just to be expected and praised. Racists like Jan Smuts are “great statesmen”. The only people of colour to be included are monsters like Amin and Bokassa.

It has been a generally fun read over the year, but you have to hold your nose at times.

[Eleah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I do enjoy reading about different people and the lives they've lived, and obituaries are such a quick and easy way of doing so.
I learnt more about some people I knew of and many I didn't.
I will admit, though, I started to skip the cricket players when the obituaries spent several pages going over their cricket scores.... unnecessary and so droll.
Also, I found that a lot of the famous women had maybe a paragraph of their own obituary that talked about their life, and then the rest detailed their husbands' exploits. Which is disappointing.
It would be interesting to see another anthology like this for more recent deaths, though, just to see how obituaries have changed in the last decade.

[Alastair Hill · Rating 4 out of 5]

A superb cocktail of sportsmen, politicians, entertainers and eccentrics. Reading a few entries at a time you'll find yourself coming back for more every time.