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[edit] Betjeman letter hoax

In August 2006 Wilson's biography of Sir John Betjeman was published. It was then discovered that he had been the victim of a hoax and had included a letter (to Anglo-Irish writer, Honor Tracy) which purported to be by Betjeman detailing a previously unknown love affair, but which he acknowledged to be a fiction, when it was pointed out that it contained an acrostic spelling out an insulting message to him.^[1] The letter was sent to Wilson by "Eve de Harben", who then wrote to a journalist to reveal the hoax. The acrostic spelt out "AN Wilson is a shit" and "Eve de Harben" is an anagram of "Ever been had". Bevis Hillier, Wilson's arch rival and Betjeman's authorised biographer, was an immediate suspect but initially denied all knowledge. A week after the hoax was publicised, however, Hillier admitted responsibility, stating that "When a newspaper started billing Wilson's book as 'the big one', it was just too much."^[2]