History – 270 page – my copy (hardback; 1999) bought for 50p from Plymouth Library
- 1 nod
Who better to write a book upon the eccentrics of our British parliament than a disgraced former M.P.? Neil Hamilton – the aforementioned disgraced M.P. – put pen to paper in this fast-tracked book; cashing in on the boom and bust of his short lived fame in the celebrity spotlight. It is cheap; it has errors a-plenty; it was never worth the £16.95 this hard book edition originally cost the poor fool of readers who purchased it.
Yet, with such a topic at hand, what could possibly have gone wrong? After all, Westminster has spawned many noteworthy maniacs in the course of three hundred years, from Winston Churchill to George Brown; along with many minor politicians included this volume, such as the deluded Green David Icke and the literary raving looney Screaming Lord Sutch.
Easily the most interesting biography within these pages centres upon Trebitsch Lincoln. An Orthodox Jewish Hungarian who moved to Britain at the turn of the twentieth century to seek his fortune in any manner he could; even it meant converting to Catholicism, to Protestantism and Irish Presbyterianism! He left unpaid bills behind, always on the run from bad debt and loans, before somehow – magically – becoming Liberal M.P. for Darlington in 1910. He was promptly kicked out in a later election in the same year, yet that wasn’t the end of Mr Lincoln. This ‘former journalist, ex-missionary, unfrocked parson, failed politician and bankrupt businessmen’ then decided his next career move was to be an international spy, putting out offers for Britain in the First World War, before moving on to work for the Germans, before double-dealing with them. Lincoln even wrote about his experiences for a New York newspaper in an article entitled: ‘Revelations of Mr Lincoln, former Member of Parliament, who became a German spy.’ He eventually moved to Tibet to become a monk before ending up poisoned – as rumoured – by the Nazis during the Second World War. Wow, what a life!
Yet Hamilton’s book fails in a lack of directorial control. The repeating of facts and sloppy mistakes show it for what it exactly is: a hastily put together collection of words. It has the feel of many authors, or more precisely, undergraduate researchers, who chuck and chuck paint upon the canvass until something sticks. The Worm – as his close friends know – is no supporter of Wikipedia; but the reader would do much better to type in a search of Churchill, Icke or Sutch onto its search engine than pick up Hamilton’s book (if, indeed, the reader can find an edition in the year 2010).
The Worm’s copy will promptly be discharged from its care and book shelf, joining the list of 1 nodder losers he has had the misfortune of meeting this year. Perhaps, just perhaps, it may find a home just yet in the unforgiving world of the political reader. The Worm does not hold his breath.
