A no-holds-barred biography about the greatest British comic since Charlie Chaplin from Sunday Times bestselling author Roger Lewis.

'A fascinating, tragic and instructive story, vividly told' Sunday Telegraph

Roger Lewis, in his no-holds-barred biography, exposes a Peter Sellers the world little knows. Recognized as the greatest British comic since Charlie Chaplin, Sellers was the grand master of fifty-five films - from Dr. Strangelove, to Being There and the Pink Panther hits.

But shadowing his phenomenal career was a history of increasingly bizarre behaviour involving psychotic violence, compulsive promiscuity, drug abuse and humiliating self-destructive obsessions with people including Princess Margaret, Sophia Loren, Liza Minnelli and each of his four wives (Ann Hayes, Britt Ekland, Miranda Quarry and Lynne Frederick). He alternately showered his wives and children with gifts and then threatened to kill them. Sellers' fluidity as an actor made for a terrifying madness that grew like a slow metastasizing cancer throughout his adult life.

The Life and Death of Peter Sellers concludes with his premature death at the age of 54, 'sick at heart and alone in those sunless hotel rooms', so recoiled from intimacy that no one really knew him anymore.

PRAISE FOR THE LIFE AND DEATH OF PETER SELLERS

'It is a mad book - but then the subject is a madman. I love Lewis's passion ... I recommend it' Sunday Times

'Reinventing the genre as well as reassessing its subject with formidable intelligence, this book is a remarkable achievement' Literary Review

Details

ISBN13: 9781529444025
Format: Paperback / softback
Number of Pages: 1024
Edition:
Publication Date: 06 Oct 2026
Publisher: Quercus Publishing
Publication City, Country: London, United Kingdom
Dimensions (cm): 19.6(H)x12.8(L)x4.8(W)705
Weight (gm): 705

Author Biography

Roger Lewis has achieved considerable word-of-mouth success with Seasonal Suicide Notes. He has also written a biography of Anthony Burgess, and Sunday Times best-selling books on Laurence Olivier and the Carry On actor Charles Hawtrey. His most recent book, Erotic Vagrancy: Everything about Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor was described by Stephen Fry as: 'One of the very best biographies I have ever read'.

Reviews

Everything one could possibly want to know about Sellers is contained in this book. * New York Times *
Sensational . . . consistently engrossing * Daily Mail (Book of the Week) *
Gloriously revealing, funny and tragic . . . Sellers is a gift to his new biographer's talents * Mirror *
The showbiz book of the year * Christopher Bray, The Tablet *
Lewis' portrait of this most complex of figures is as funny, maddening and enthralling as its subject * Daunt Books (Five Favourite Books of the Week) *