"Rumpole" creator John Mortimer diesVeteran British writer and leftwing lawyer John Mortimer This article is about the writer. For the leader of the Kent rebellion, see Jack Cade. Sir John Clifford Mortimer CBE QC (born 21 April 1923) is an English barrister turned prolific writer and dramatist. whose most famous creation was curmudgeonly cur·mudg·eon n. An ill-tempered person full of resentment and stubborn notions. [Origin unknown.] cur·mudg old London barrister "Rumpole Of The Bailey Rumpole of the Bailey is a British television series created and written by British writer and barrister Sir John Mortimer, QC and starring Leo McKern as Horace Rumpole, an aging London barrister who defends any and all clients. " died Friday aged 85, his family said. Mortimer -- also known for defending "Lady Chatterley's Lover" and the underground magazine Oz against obscenity charges -- died peacefully at his home in the Chiltern Hills Chiltern Hills, range of chalk hills, c.45 mi (70 km) long and 15 to 20 mi (24–32 km) wide, S England, NW of London, extending NE from Goring Gap. Its highest elevation is Coombe Hill (852 ft/260 m), SE of Aylesbury. northwest of London, they said. "His wife and family were at his side," they said in a statement. Mortimer's prolific literary output often poked fun at the legal profession. Starting out in the 1940s, he was a prodigious author of plays, novels and television and movie scripts, including the 1999 "Tea with Mussolini" directed by Italian film and opera legend Franco Zeffirelli. A vociferous supporter of the Labour Party, he was a sharp-tongued critic of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher Noun 1. Margaret Thatcher - British stateswoman; first woman to serve as Prime Minister (born in 1925) Baroness Thatcher of Kesteven, Iron Lady, Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Thatcher before her ouster ouster n. 1) the wrongful dispossession (putting out) of a rightful owner or tenant of real property, forcing the party pushed out of the premises to bring a lawsuit to regain possession. and the election of a Labour government in 1997. As a lawyer he successfully defended Penguin in the 1960s over obscenity charges against D.H. Lawrence's steamy book "Lady Chatterley's Lover", doing the same for the publishers of the magazine Oz in 1971. "Rumpole Of The Bailey" was turned into a long-running television series and string of radio programmes. Tony Lacey, his editor at publishers Viking, said: "It's hard to think he's gone. At least we're lucky enough to have Rumpole to remind us just how remarkable he was." 
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