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Date: 31/01/08

Miles Away

Photograph of Miles Kington

Miles Beresford Kington
Humourist, broadcaster, musician
b. 13 May 1941 d. 30 Jan 2008

It's been a bad few months for lovers of intelligent humour. First was the death of Alan Coren back in October. Now one of his contemporaries (and former employees) has left us too.

I have to admit that most of my contact with Miles Kington was from his years spent playing double bass with the cabaret group Instant Sunshine, but being an avid reader of Punch in the late seventies, I came across his written humour regularly.

My interest was augmented by the fact that he grew up near here. Indeed, my sixth-form friend William, whose father was a bank manager, told us of how Kington - long after he had moved to London - insisted on keeping his account at the Wrexham branch because they issued bilingual cheque books, which always caused interest and amusement amongst his metropolitan friends.

I feel considerable regret now at not having kept up with what he was writing (the same thing happened with Coren to a large degree as well). Typically, one of the last things he did before his sudden death was to file his column for yesterday. I shall have to trawl through the archives of the Independent now to see what I've missed.