Russell Ash 1946 - 2010

We are very sad and sorry to announce the recent sudden death of our author and good friend, who died on the 28th June of a heart attack. Colin Webb's obituary for Bookbrunch follows:

In a career as publisher, packager and writer spanning 30 years Russell Ash achieved an astonishing output of best selling titles from collections of bizarre facts, bizarre book titles, howlers, epitaphs, silly names and double entendres, to distinguished art monographs. In each and everything he applied a perfectionist’s touch. His encyclopaedic knowledge of the arcane, obscure, and very often wicked informed his factual compilations that included the annuals Top 10 of Everything and Whitaker’s World of Facts. It also formed the basis of much repartee in his communications and conversations. He was always good company " nothing was too serious for too long.

His publishing career started soon after he graduated from Durham when following work on partworks he formed Ash and Grant with Ian Grant and published over a six year period many distinguished titles. In 1980 he took over my role at Weidenfeld & Nicolson as publisher of art and illustrated where he published Dame Edna Everage amongst others and then joined me in my start up of Pavilion Books where he contributed many successful titles. He went on to form the packaging company Ash & Higton with designer Bernard Higton to produce beautiful international co-editions before making the full commitment to being a freelance writer.

More recently, I acted as Russell’s agent and packager on his monumental annual the Top 10 of Everything now published by Hamlyn but which first appeared in 1989. The achievement of this annual consistently published over the last 22 years will, I feel, secure his legacy.

Starting every August the yearly quest for facts that would support his 700 remarkable lists each year was always intense in order to meet tight deadlines. Alongside the expected subjects such as the 10 Highest Mountains and 10 Longest Rivers there were always the completely unexpected - added to delight and enthuse his global audience.

Some that appealed to me were for example:

The Top 10 Celebrity Pet Names (Tyson, as in Mike, was number 1)

The Top 10 Countries Consuming Most Ice Cream (Australia, at 18 litres/

31.7 pints per capita in 2008)

(and perhaps linked to that one)

The Top 10 Heaviest People (Carol Yager, 1960"64, who weighed 726 kg)

The Top 10 Most Common Phobias (Agoraphobia - fear of open spaces)

And perhaps skating on rather thin ice the

The Top 10 Oldest Pillarboxes in Daily Use (Union Street, St Peter Port, Guernsey, 1853)

Russell had the unique gift of finding the extraordinary in the ordinary. He always managed to convey such astonishing information in entertaining terms; both wry and meticulously relevant. As one of his contributors said to me ‘he was a one off. There will never be another quite like him.’

Such was his workload that we always forgave him for being consistently a little behind schedule in delivering his books. I find it much harder to forgive him for being ahead of schedule in this, his far too early departure.

- by Colin Webb