Giles Coren's lavatory 'humour'

4:22pm Wednesday 19th March 2008

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From time to time, without my ever having asked for the favour, I am sent a free copy of Richard Ingrams's excellent publication, The Oldie. One came last week, announcing that the Rev Ian Paisley had been named Oldie of the Year. A pity there was not an award for Odious Twerp of the Year. That title might have gone to Giles Coren.

On Page 53 of the magazine is printed a letter from Coren, which reinforces my dislike of him and will perhaps reveal to others why I feel this way about him. Here it is: "Sir, I note with great sorrow that you have once again sent me a large brown envelope containing a horrid little magazine. You seem to do this every month. I cannot begain to imagine why oh, come on Coren, with you being such a mightily important man!. I have never asked you to, nor ever paid you anything for it. I am constantly bombarded with free s**t for no reason I can properly understand see above, and have decided to clamp down on it. Send me your vile, bigoted, humourless, bag-of-crap publication again, and I shall be forced to call the police."

Graceless, or what? Ingrams might, perhaps, have been inclined to dismiss this as a spoof, except that he knows Coren has form in this area. He will recall, as I do, his four-letter outburst - leaked to Private Eye - after some lowly sub-editor at The Times had the temerity to make a slight alteration to his copy.

As for his obsession with things lavatorial, I cannot do better than refer readers to his article in The Times last Saturday, concerning Goodfellas restaurant in Belfast. This contained - apropos the taste of a certain dish - a confession so vile that, on reading it, I felt I really couldn't mention it here. When a friend later pointed it out to me again, I asked if he could come up with a suitable circumlocution. He suggested I should describe Coren as "someone who admits to the sort of personal habits that would make one hesitate to shake his hand".