NAME: John Winston Lennon
DOB: Saturday, October 9, 1940
"My mother was a housewife, I suppose. She was a comedienne and a singer. Not professional, but she used to get up in pubs and things like that. She had a great voice."
"My mother and father split when I was four and I lived with an Auntie, Mimi."
"I soon forgot my father. It was like he was dead. But I did wee my mother now and again and my feeling never died off for her. I ofter thought about her, though I'd never realized for a long time that she was living no more than five or ten miles away."
"I was never really wanted. The only reason I am a star is because of my repression. Nothing would have driven me through all that if I was 'normal'."
"I spent a lot of time reading. Hanging around the home never bothered me. I enjoy it. I love it... Although I had half-sisters, I lived alone. I always tripped out on my own or in books."
*He fought his way through school*
"I was shot at for stealing apples."
"I was the kingpin of my age group. I learnt lots of dirty jokes very young; there was a girl who lived near who told them."
"I was obviously musical from very early, and I wonder why nobody ever did anything about it - maybe because they couldn't afford it."
"I was aggressive because I wanted to be popular. I wanted to be the leader... I wanted everybody to do what I told them to do, to laugh at me jokes and let me be boss."
"I only got on beating from Mimi - for taking money from her handbag. I was always taking a little, for soft things like Dinky's, but this day I must have taken too much."
"The sort of gang I led went in for things like shoplifting and pulling girls' knickers down. When the bomb fell and everyone got cuaght, I was always the one they missed. Most of the masters hated me like shit."
"I'm not a tough guy. I've always had to have a fascade of being tought to protect myself from other people's neuroses. But really, I'm a very sensitive, weak guy."
"I'd say I had a happy childhood. I came out aggressive, but I was never miserable. I was always having a laugh."
"We [Mimi's husband and I] got on fine. He was nice and kind. [When] he died, i didn't know how to be sad publicly - what you did said - so I went upstairs. Then my cousin arrived and she came upstairs as well. We both had hysterics. We just laughed and laughed. I felt very guilty afterwards."
"I'm not afraid of dying. I'm prepared for death because I don't believe in it. I think it's just getting out of one car and getting into another."
"I met Cynthia at Art School. Cynthia was a right Hoylake runt. Dead snobby. We used to poke fun at her and mock her, me and [my friend] Geoff Mohammed. 'Quiet please', we'd shout, 'No dirty jokes. It's Cynthia.'"
"We had a class dance. I was pissed and asked her to dance. As we danced, I asked her to come to a party the next day. She said she couldn't. She was engaged."
"I was triumphant having picked her up."
"I was hysterical. That was the trouble. I was jealous of anyone she had anything to do with... I couldn't stand being without her."
"I was in a blind rage for two years. I was either drunk or fighting. It had been the same with other girlfriends I'd had. There was something the matter with me."
