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| WNP Barbellion. Illustration by John Nash. |
My hero: WNP Barbellion by William Atkins
Sickly from a young age, Barbellion was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis when he was 26. His Journal of a Disappointed Man records his spirited, furious fight with the disease
Friday 1 August 2014
I
came across WNP Barbellion's The Journal of a Disappointed Man in a charity shop 10 years ago. It was the title that attracted me first, then that euphonious surname (a pen-name, it turned out), and finally the opening entry, written when he was 15: "Am writing an essay on the life-history of insects and have abandoned for the time being the idea of writing on 'How Cats Spend their Time'."
