Ballard Bio Slated…by Everyone it Seems

Just before JG Ballard died in 2009 he published his memoir, Miracles of Life: Shanghai to Shepperton. In that book he said rather more about Shanghai and his childhood than he had cared to previously for many years. Publishing his own autobiography so near the end Ballard niftily rather stalled a flood of quickie biographies; indeed that may well have been his intention. However now they are appearing. John Baxter’s The Inner Man has just been published and, though I haven’t read it yet, appears to have been roundly trashed by everyone so far.

Robert McCrum in The Guardian certainly doesn’t like it

David Evans in The Independent is unconvinced

John Gray in The New Statesman says “A Model for Missing the Point of Biography”

All in all it’s hard to think of a book that’s had worse reviews across the board for quite some time!!