[nilesfunnies] Hillier v Wilson

A literary spat:

In essence, the story is this. Bevis Hillier spent fifteen years
working on an exhaustive (and exhausting) three-volume biography of
John Betjeman.

A N Wilson rubbished the second volume when it came out a few years
ago.

Then Wilson announced his own biog, taking less than two years. It
came out earlier this year.

In it is a letter from a lady in Monaco, enclosing a letter from JB
to a wartime girl-friend. It had come into her possession through
her father, she said

Wilson pounced on it with glee and made much of it in his book. The
PR people made much play with the fact that Wilson had unearthed a
previously unknown relationship.

Then someone spotted the fact that the initial letters of sentences
in the letter spelled "A N Wilson is a shit.". And the sender's name
- Eve de Harben - is an anagram of "Ever been had."

At first Hillier denied all knowledge of the jape. Now he's
admitted it.