Hunter hits the mark with talk on his memoirs
25 March 2005
Andrew Brightwell
HUNTER Davies' career began as a Sunday Times journalist where he got to interview and then become friends with Paul McCartney.
Now 68, the Highgate resident managed to scoop the coveted role as the Beatles official biographer.
"I said to Paul, there ought to be a proper biography of the Beatles, telling people why you've got funny haircuts and why the Beatles is spelt the way it is," Mr Davies told an audience at Highgate Library last Thursday.
"Isn't that funny, that people don't ask about that now, but people used to get it wrong all the time. So I sat down with Paul and he helped me to write a letter to (Beatles manager) Brian Epstein."
Eventually Mr Davies signed a contract with Epstein and a publisher to write the book, allowing the writer into key moments in their lives.
He said: "I was walking with Paul on Primrose Hill. It was the first day of spring, much like today was. And one of us, probably Paul, but I can't remember who it was, said: "It's getting better."
"Paul started to laugh and I asked him why and he told me that when they had been in Australia on tour Ringo had been ill and they had another drummer play.
"Every night, after they had played, they would ask him "how are you getting on Jimmy" and he would say It's getting better.
"Paul just started to sing "It's getting better, It's getting better all the time... he went home then to St John's Wood and wrote the song."
As patron of the library in Chester Road, Mr Davies was selling off a job lot of his books at last week's AGM.
He told the Friends of Highgate Library, that he had found the books, which included several copies of his wife Maragaret Forster's latest novel, while clearing up.
He said: "I found her books in the dustbin, they are brand new, £7.99, just published. "Margaret said I don't want them, put them in the skip. She really was going to throw them out.
"Margaret does this all the time, she is mad and doesn't believe in signing books."
Mr Davies, who has lived in Boscastle Road for 43 years, signed the books, including a pile of his own The Good Guide to the Lakes.
During his long career, Mr Davies has also written the biographies of footballers including Dwight Yorke and Paul Gascoigne.
He told his audience that his fears that Gascoigne would be slow to open up to him proved unfounded.
"I met him at the airport, he was flying out to China. He was with Jimmy Five Bellies and his dad. They were all pissed, not because they just wanted a drink but because they were all scared of flying.
"Well, after an hour with Paul I was saying Paul don't give me any more and that is too disgusting, that can't go in the book.
"He was completely open, he told me everything I wanted to know."
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