Amusing musings

His latest book, collected occasional pieces from 1999-2010, Working the Room, reflects the eclectic nature of Dyer’s output, dividing the pieces under the headings Visuals (on painters and photographers), Verbals (writers), Variables (travel, sex, music) and Personals (autobiography).

Dyer likes to describe himself as “the son of a sheet metal worker and a dinner lady”. He went from grammar school to Oxford, but rather than continue climbing the ladder, he spent the next few years slacking: smoking dope, listening to music, and reading and writing for his own pleasure.