Peter Cook, comedy genius, writer, performer, star of stage, screen and LP, savior of Private Eye, partner of Dudley Moore, this is a collection of (not quite) all the collected writings on one of England's great comedians.

Whether you're a fan of Pete n' Dud, Derek and Clive, Sven the insomniac Norwegian fisherman or Sir Arthur Streeb-Greebling, there are some treasures in here for you.

Cook's humour was quintessentially English, often based on class differences and the perceptions of difference, he used humour to have a go at the rich, stupid, working class, middle class, the religious, the pious, but often done in an abstract and surreal style that would inspire those other giants of British comedy the Monty Python team.

My personal favourite would be that failure of a man, Sir Arthur Streeb-Greebling, the man who spent half a lifetime trying to teach ravens to fly underwater, undertook a financially disastrous musical crickets tour and once had a job as Betty Grable's leg tugger (she had very short legs you see, they required daily tugging to keep them at a reasonable length for dancing).

Cook's star has waned somewhat in comparison to Python and other comic luminaries like the Two Ronnies and Morecombe and Wise, but if one of the numerous endless repeats channels on satellite tv should see fit to broadcast some Pete ' Dud, or maybe air the Twelve Days of Christmas, they are well worth looking out for, and if you can't see them, pick up the book.

RELEASE NOTES:

Releasing at Leeds Bookcrossers.

Will take this on my next holiday in February.