Biografie

Turned down an honorary degree from the University of Oxford because of the institution's financial links with Rupert Murdoch.

In 1963, won a Special Tony Award, along with his "Beyond the Fringe" co-stars Peter Cook, Jonathan Miller, and Dudley Moore, "for their brilliance which has shattered all the old concepts of comedy," in a show that was recreated in a television version of the same title, Beyond the Fringe (1964).

Underwent surgery for colon cancer in 1997, and was initially given only two years to live.

He allegedly declined the C.B.E. (Commander of the Order of the British Empire) in 1988 and Knighthood in 1996.

He allegedly refused the honour of a Knighthood in 1996.

Definition of a classic: a book everyone is assumed to have read and often think they have.

One obstacle always stopped me directing films - namely, having to say, 'Action!' My instinct would be to say, 'Er, I think if everybody's agreeable we might as well sort of start now - that is if you're ready'.

At 18 I thought that to be 'sensitive' was a writer's first requirement - with discipline and persistence nowhere.

My claim to literary fame is that I used to deliver meat to a woman who became T.S. Eliot's mother-in-law.

When [Harold] Pinter turned 50 I was asked to say something and couldn't think of anything. Later I thought there should be a two-minute silence.