Horace Rumpole, RIP

I just came across the sad news that the great John Mortimer died on Friday at the age of 85. Mortimer created one of the great fictional characters of the late 20th century, Horace Rumpole, British barrister, defender of the Rule of Law, the rights of the common man, a bane to hypocrites, meddling prigs, and stuffed shirts, a damned funny and wise man, and husband to She Who Must Be Obeyed.





If you only know Rumpole from the old BBC TV series, then you really need to grab a copy of one the Rumpole books. Might as well start at the beginning: Rumpole of the Bailey (LinkCat) or The First Rumpole Omnibus (Amazon), a compilation of the first three Rumpole books.

Despite the title of this post, Mortimer wrote a number of non-Rumpole books, fiction and non-fiction, such as his memoir Clinging to the Wreckage, where he quotes his barrister lawyer while urging him on to a career in the law: "That's the great thing about the law, it gets you out of the house." .




The laudatory obits are rolling in:

NYT: John Mortimer, Creator of Rumpole, Dies at 85 - Obituary (Obit ...

WAPO: Own Legal Career Imbued Author's 'Rumpole' Series

BBC: BBC NEWS Entertainment Rumpole's creator Mortimer dies

BBC: Rumpole's creator Mortimer dies

Here's a wonderful tidbit from the BBC story:

"Displaying his offbeat view of life, Sir John revealed in the latter how he found murderers "really the most relaxed people" he had come across.

"Generally, they had disposed of the one person that was irritating them,"
he said.

So long, old darling.