Author(s): Sir John Mortimer

Short Stories

Horace Rumpole - witty, eloquent, dishevelled and cynical - is one of fiction's best-loved barristers-at-law. In these twenty classic tales, Rumpole battles through the Old Bailey, whether defending various members of an incompetent South London crime family, taking on haute-cuisine chefs and showfolk or mocking the pomposity of his own profession, all the while being held in check by his wife, Hilda: the wonderful, fearsome She Who Must Be Obeyed. These collected stories, in "Penguin Modern Classics" for the first time, are a definitive introduction to one of the wisest and wittiest characters in British comic writing and a reminder of what justice should really be about. This title comes with a new introduction by Sam Leith, former literary editor of the "Daily Telegraph" and contributor to the "Evening Standard", "Guardian" and "Spectator".