Profile via TMDB · Courtesy of TMDB
OverviewAI-generated
Len Deighton, born Leonard Cyril Deighton in Marylebone, was a British journalist, historian, novelist, and screenwriter. Educated at Saint Martin's School of Art and the Royal College of Art, he began his work period in 1962. His notable works include the spy fiction novel The IPCRESS File, as well as Catch a Falling Spy, Battle of Britain, and SS-GB. He wrote in English and worked within the genres of detective and spy fiction.
Deighton received the German Crime Fiction Award and was nominated for the Locus Award for Best Science Fiction Novel. He had two children and died in Guernsey on March 15, 2026.
Synthesized by Vinony from 30 facts across 3 sources: Wikidata, Open Library, TMDb. Generated from structured data (not the Wikipedia text) and checked against those facts — may still contain errors.
Person · Open Library
- Born
- 1929
- Died
- 2026
- Works
- 334
Top works
- Catch a Falling Spy / More Tales of the Black Widowers / Never Pick Up Hitch-Hikers!
- The Verdict of Us All
- מלונדון באהבה
- Battle of Britain
- SS-GB
via Open Library + Wikidata
Film & TV
London, England, UK
Len Deighton was a thriller writer best known for his 1962 novel The Ipcress File.
Known for
- MCAINE: An Anagram of Cinema — Self - Writer (archive footage)2023
- The Case of Sherlock Holmes — Self1987
- Wogan — Self1982
via TMDB
Key facts
- Born
- Leonard Cyril Deighton , ( 1929-02-18 ) 18 February 1929, Marylebone , London, England
- Died
- 15 March 2026 (2026-03-15) (aged 97), Guernsey , Channel Islands
- Occupation
- Writer illustrator
- Alma mater
- Royal College of Art
- Spouse
- Shirley Thompson ( married</span>"}]]}'>m. 1960 ; divorced</span>"}]]}'>div. 1976 ) Ysabele de Ranitz ( married</span>"}]]}'>m. 1980 )
via Wikipedia infobox
Wikidata facts
- Instance of
- human
- Given name
- Cyril
- Gender
- male
- Citizenship
- United Kingdom
- Place of birth
- Marylebone
- Place of death
- Guernsey
- Occupation
- writer
- Languages spoken
- English language
- Notable work
- The IPCRESS File
- Genre
- spy fiction
- Number of children
- 2
Show 7 more facts
- date of birth
- 1929-02-18
- birth name
- Leonard Cyril Deighton
- start of work period
- 1962-00-00
- name in native language
- Len Deighton
- Commons category
- Len Deighton
- nominated for
- Locus Award for Best Science Fiction Novel
- date of death
- 2026-03-15
Sources (7)
via Wikidata · CC0
~29 min read
Encyclopedic overview
Leonard Cyril Deighton (/ˈdeɪtən/ DAY-tən; 18 February 1929 – 15 March 2026) was a British author. His publications included cookery books and works on history, but he was best known for his spy novels.
After completing his national service in the Royal Air Force, Deighton attended the Saint Martin's School of Art and the Royal College of Art in London; he graduated from the latter in 1955. He had several jobs before becoming a book and magazine illustrator and designed the cover for the first UK edition of Jack Kerouac's 1957 work On the Road. He also worked for a period in an advertising agency. During an extended holiday in France he wrote his first novel, The IPCRESS File, which was published in 1962 and was a critical and commercial success. He wrote several spy novels featuring the same central character, an unnamed, cynical and tough working-class intelligence officer. Between 1962 and 1966 Deighton was the food correspondent for The Observer and drew cookstrips—black-and-white graphic recipes with a limited number of words. A selection of these was collected and published in 1965 as Len Deighton's Action Cook Book, the first of five cookery books he wrote. Other topics of non-fiction include military history.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Len Deighton” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.