You Cannot Live as I Have Lived and Not End Up Like This

The life of Willie Donaldson ended in June 2005 when he was found dead in the seedy rented flat in Chelsea where he had lived for 35 years. Born into privilege, he was an unlikely social anarchist. At the epicentre of Sixties hedonism, he had affairs with the most desired women of the time, notably Sarah Miles and Carly Simon. But deviance and self-destructiveness were never far away. Though he could switch company with enigmatic ease, he was always happiest in the company of tarts and criminals. The impresario became a serial bankrupt, and the man about town ended up living as a ponce in a Chelsea brothel. His best-known achievement would be the "Henry Root Letters", a bestselling practical joke that heralded the new age of celebrity. Yet financial success merely led him deeper into a dark underworld of crack addiction, fraud and sexual perversion. For some Willie Donaldson was a great unsung comic genius. For others, he was irresponsible and diabolical. But his most lasting work of art was undoubtedly his own life - a story that he was never fully capable of telling himself.