Biography of spike milligan

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Spike Milligan: A biography

January 10, 2024

I've read my copy of Scudamore's biography of Spike Milligan several times now and it still, nearly forty years after its publication, gives perhaps the most meaningful biographical representation of Milligan's life and personality outside his own work. Spike Milligan achieves this because his biographer doesn't aim to record everything about what he did professionally, nor all his personal experiences. The reason why Scudamore was able to produce the definitive biography of Milligan was because she was able to capture much of his contradictions, his paradoxical nature, and to get inre the head and heart of a man who was "a skin too short", and then put it all down in print.

How did Scudamore achieve this? Well, as one reads her biography she repeatedly draws both Spike himself and others that knew him into her narrative, and lets their own words form the basis for her biography. This is coupled with an ability to be both attached an

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The well-known typing error Spike Milligna (born Terence Alan Milligan in Ahmaddnagar, India on 16 April 1918) undoubtedly possessed the most original and creative mind among those who emerged onto the British comic scene following the Second World War. John Cleese was to refer to him as "the great god of us all", for Milligan's anarchic and surreal humour played a vital role in transforming and reinvigorating British comedy in the postwar era, exerting a profound influence on his contemporaries and on a generation of comedians to come.

He began his performing career as a musician before and during the war (he learnt to play the guitar, trumpet, piano and drums as a teenager), and between bouts of active service in North Africa and Italy he played with a variety of bands. Following his discharge in 1946, he continued to play (on guitar) with one of those bands, The Bill Hall Trio, and it was with them that he made his television debut on the 25th January 1947 in Variety (BBC

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Spike Milligan

Irish comedian and writer (1918–2002)

Spike Milligan KBE
Milligan, c. 1990
Born	Terence Alan Milligan (1918-04-16)16 April 1918 Ahmednagar, British India
Died	27 February 2002(2002-02-27) (aged 83) Rye, East Sussex, England
Resting place	St Thomas's Church, Winchelsea, East Sussex, England
Occupations	Comedian writer musician poet playwright actor
Years active	1951–2002
Spouses	June Marlow (m. 1952; div. 1960) Patricia Ridgeway (m. 1962; died 1978) Shelagh Sinclair (m. 1983)
Children	6
Allegiance	United Kingdom
Service / branch	British Army
Years of service	1940–1945
Rank	Lance bombardier
Unit	Royal Artillery
Battles / wars	Second World War

Terence Alan "Spike" Milligan (16 April 1918