Kingsley Amis was born in London in 1922, educated at City of London School and St John's College, Oxford, and worked for a time as a university lecturer.

Following the publication of Lucky Jim in 1954 he wrote over twenty novels, including The Alteration (1976), The Old Devils (1986), winner of the Booker Prize, and The Biographer's Moustache (1995), which was to be his last book.

He published a variety of other work, writing about politics, education, language, films, restaurants and drink. Kingsley Amis received a knighthood in 1990, and died in October 1995.