This October Private Eye will be celebrating its 60th birthday. And I’ve had a great deal of fun editing The 60 Yearbook, a compilation of the biggest historical, political and cultural events of the past six decades as they were portrayed in the pages of the magazine. From Mrs Wilson and Dear Bill right through to St Theresa’s and the People’s Prime Minister, they’re all in there, along with many of the best covers and cartoons, some of which you’ll remember, and many of which are being reproduced for the first time in many years. The year-by-year chronicle also features many of the scoops Private Eye itself broke, from the Poulson scandal and Ronan Point right through to the Post Office trials and two we had to redact because they’re the subject of ongoing criminal investigations (one of them 36 years on from the original story!). It’s a companion piece to my history of the mag, Private Eye: the First 50 Years, which as you may be able to work out came out a decade ago now and ROCKETED to the VERY BOTTOM of the Sunday Times Top 10 Bestseller charts (for an entire week. Hey, it makes me officially a bestselling author, so there).
It’s coming out on 2nd September. You can order a copy here: https://uk.bookshop.org/books/private-eye-the-60-yearbook/9781901784695
And if you’d like to listen to me and Ian Hislop waffling about what’s in it, you can do so here: https://www.private-eye.co.uk/podcast/63
Adam Macqueen 