Reading order
| # | Title | Published | Author | Buy on Amazon |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Humphrey Bogart: Take It & Like It | 1992 | Jonathan Coe | Buy |
| 2 | Jimmy Stewart: A Wonderful Life | 1994 | Jonathan Coe | Buy |
| 3 | Like A Fiery Elephant: The Story of B. S. Johnson | 2004 | Jonathan Coe | Buy |
Jonathan Coe’s non-fiction work includes two early biographies of Hollywood actors and a later, more substantial biography of the British experimental novelist B. S. Johnson. All three books reflect Coe’s interest in people who struggled against the constraints of their medium.
His first two books were compact biographies of Humphrey Bogart (1992) and Jimmy Stewart (1994). Like A Fiery Elephant: The Story of B. S. Johnson (2004) is a much larger project, tracing the life of a novelist who pushed the boundaries of what a book could be. Johnson’s novels used blank pages, holes cut through pages, and unbound sections meant to be shuffled. He took his own life in 1973 at age 40. Coe’s biography won the Samuel Johnson Prize and helped bring renewed attention to a largely forgotten writer.