BRITAIN:Miles Kington, the jazz aficionado, wit and writer, has died at the age of 66 following a battle with pancreatic cancer, a family member said today.
Kington wrote for satirical magazine Punch,the Timesand, for more than 20 years, the Independent.
He penned a series of stage plays and books, including the "fictional autobiography" Someone Like Me: Tales From A Borrowed Childhood.
Born in Northern Ireland, where his father was posted in the army, Kington attended Glenalmond College in Perthshire, Scotland, before reading modern languages at Trinity College, Oxford.
He loved jazz and played the double bass and other instruments in the group Instant Sunshine from 1970 onwards. One of his first roles on a national newspaper was as a jazz reviewer for the Timesin 1965. He joined Punchin the same year - becoming famous for a series of comic sketches combining French and English - and was appointed the magazine's literary editor in 1973.
Kington's "Franglais" columns formed a series of books, including Let's Parler Franglais!, Let's Parler Franglais Again!, and Let's Parler Franglais One More Time, between 1979 and 1982.
Kington left Punchin 1980 and for five years from 1981 wrote the Times'shumorous "Moreover" column before leaving the paper during the Wapping print union dispute.
As a celebrated broadcaster, Kington's programmes included Three Miles High, Great Railway Journeys Of The World, Steam Days and The Burma Road.
Kington listed his hobbies as "mending punctures" and "falsifying personal records to mystify potential biographers".