At My Mother's Knee - Softcover

O'Grady, Paul

4.22

3,442 ratings by Goodreads

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0593059883 ISBN 13: 9780593059883

Publisher: Transworld Publishers, 2008

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In his own uniquely acid tongue, Paul O'Grady traces the hilarious tales of life in Irish Catholic Birkenhead that took him from a virtuous altar-boy ("my first drag") to Britain's best loved entertainer. It's a life that includes, varyingly, stints in an abbatoir, as a social worker, in a high-class Mayfair brothel, and traipsing down to London to chase his dreams. By 23, Paul O'Grady had been a father, husband, drag queen, gay lover, divorcee, and degenerate. He did it all with a smile on his face, making a mental note to register the whip-smart one-liners that would later inform his star-studded path from the fringes of comedy to the heart of the British establishment, first as his own brilliant comic creation Lily Savage, then, triumphantly, as himself. Paul's remarkable childhood and early life is littered with a dizzying cast-list of rogues, rascals, lovers, fighters, saints, and sinners. Oh, and one iconic bus conductress. Told with pathos, love, empathy, and naturally, biting humor, the story of Paul O'Grady is that of everyman, everywoman, and inevitably, every drag act ever. He has been rich and poor, posh and common, straight and gay. He has mixed with stars and whores and all that's in between, slyly spotting the similarity between them all. His amazing and riveting life story reminds us that there is, when all is said and done, a bit of savage in all of us.

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About the Author:

Paul O'Grady first came to fame in the guise of Lily Savage, and was nominated for a Perrier Award at the Edinburgh Festival in 1991. He currently hosts The New Paul O'Grady Show.

Review:

"One of the most brilliantly observed testimonies to working-class life I've ever read" -- Sue Carroll * Mirror * "Funny, well observed and recognisably human. Soon you start to wonder why all celebrity autobiographies can't be like this" * Private Eye * "Among the three-for-two slew of sleb lit heaped on the tables of the nation's major bookshops... At My Mother's Knee distinguishes itself on every level" -- Carol Ann Duffy * Observer * "Paul speaks with warmth and hilarity about a childhood filled with poverty. Hugely interesting and entertaining" * Heat * "While most celeb memoirs are as memorable as an air kiss, O'Grady's is a proper snog" * Scotsman * "Warmly funny, dry and mischievous... Genuine - and brilliant" * Daily Mail *

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