The very best columns from a body of outstanding comic writing by the irreplaceable, irrepressible Miles Kington.

For decades the columns of Miles Kington were a refreshing spot of lunacy in the dull acres of the world's news. From the arguments between gods past and present (as recorded in the minutes of United Deities meetings), to unlikely agony aunts, all-purpose Shakespeare plays, and interviews with ‘sock psychologists’, nothing is too trivial or unlikely to attract Kington’s attention and wit.

Selected here are over a hundred pieces, each a powerful antidote to doom and destruction with their irreverent, absurd and sometimes surreal attitude to life. They are amongst the best journalism and humorous works of the past fifty years. Read on.

‘Every single day over more than two decades, his column [was] witty, topical, erudite, acutely observed…Quite simply, no-one in modern journalism is capable of such an output at such high quality.’ Simon Kelner

‘As with the very best in any sphere of endeavour, Miles’s trick was to make it look easy. His lightness of touch amounted to a kind of genius. But behind the conversational prose lay craftsmanship of the highest order. His standards never wavered.’ Simon O’Hagan