"Many Continentals think life is a game; the English think cricket is a game." -- George Mikes
George Mikes (15 February 1912 in Siklós — 30 August 1987 in London) (pronounced Mik-esh) was a Hungarian-born British author most famous for his humorous commentaries on various countries.
"An Englishman, even if he is alone, forms an orderly queue of one.""In England only uneducated people show off their knowledge; nobody quotes Latin or Greek authors in the course of conversation, unless he has never read them.""Jokes are better than war. Even the most aggressive jokes are better than the least aggressive wars. Even the longest jokes are better than the shortest wars.""On the Continent people have good food; in England people have good table manners.""The world still consists of two clearly divided groups: the English and the foreigners. One group consists of less than 50 million people; the other of 3,950 million. The latter group does not really count.""When people say England, they sometimes mean Great Britain, sometimes the United Kingdom, sometimes the British Isles, - but never England."
His father, Alfréd Mikes, was a successful lawyer, a profession in which he wanted George to follow. Mikes graduated in Budapest in 1933 and started work as a journalist on ("Morning"), a Budapest newspaper. For a short while he wrote a column called for ("Theatre Life").
In 1938 Mikes became the London correspondent for and ("8 Hours"). He worked for until 1940. Having been sent to London to cover the Munich Crisis and expecting to stay for only a couple of weeks, he remained for the rest of his life. In 1946 he became a British Citizen. It is reported that being a Jew from Hungary was a factor in his decision. Mikes wrote in both Hungarian and English: The Observer, The Times Literary Supplement, Encounter, , , the Viennese Hungarian-language , and .
From 1939 Mikes worked for the BBC Hungarian section making documentaries, at first as a freelance correspondent and, from 1950, as an employee. From 1975 until his death on 30 August 1987 he worked for the Hungarian section of Szabad Európa Rádió. He was president of the London branch of PEN, and a member of the Garrick Club.
His friends included Arthur Koestler, J. B. Priestley and André Deutsch, who was also his publisher.
He married twice, and had a son called Martin by his first marriage, and a daughter called Judith by his second. He died in London on 30 August 1987. On 15 September 1991 a memorial plaque was unveiled at his childhood home.
His first book (1945) was We Were There To Escape – the true story of a Jugoslav officer about life in prisoner-of-war camps. The Times Literary Supplement praised the book for the humour it showed in parts, which led him to write his most famous book How to be an Alien which in 1946 proved a great success in post-war Britain.
How to be an Alien (1946) poked gentle fun at the English, including a one-line chapter on sex: "Continental people have sex lives; the English have hot-water bottles."
Subsequent books dealt with (among others) Japan (The Land of the Rising Yen), Israel (Milk and Honey, The Prophet Motive), the U.S. (How to Scrape Skies), and the United Nations (How to Unite Nations), Australia (Boomerang), the British again (How to be Inimitable, How to be Decadent), and South America (How to Tango). Other subjects include God (How to be God), his cat (Tsi-Tsa), wealth (How to be Poor) or philosophy (How to be a Guru).
Apart from his commentaries, he wrote humorous fiction (Mortal Passion; The Spy Who Died of Boredom) and contributed to the satirical television series That Was The Week That Was.
His autobiography was called How to be Seventy.
Serious writing included a book about the Hungarian Secret Police and he narrated a BBC television report of the Hungarian Revolution of 1956.[1]
