Great Britain: A Moral Post-Mortem

All his life Stephen Ward had been surrounded by people, a few of them, perhaps, his friends. In death last week he attracted only curiosity seekers, several hundred strong. Nine days after swallowing a massive overdose of Nembutal, Stephen Ward—liar, drug user, pornographer, libertine and convicted pimp—was cremated in the London suburb of Mortlake. Though his solicitor had asked that no flowers be sent, there was a wreath of two hundred roses from, among others, Playwrights John Osborne and Arnold Wesker, Critic Kenneth Tynan, Novelists Angus Wilson and Alan Sillitoe, Jazzman Acker...

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