On paper Norman Lewis was a colourful character. His first of three marriages was to the daughter of a mafioso and he had stints as a wedding photographer, an umbrella wholesaler, a motorbike racer and even a spy before he turned to writing. His investigative journalism for The Sunday Times in the Sixties led to the founding of Survival International, an organisation that protects the rights of indigenous tribes worldwide, and Graham Greene considered him one of the 20th century’s greatest writers. And yet, as Lewis would happily admit in his Essex twang, a wry smile under his bank-teller’s toothbrush moustache, in person he was instantly forgettable.
It is precisely this ability to insinuate himself into a situation rather than impose upon it that makes
