© Cambridge Jones

Sheila Hancock is the author of The Two of Us, a moving and utterly compelling memoir of her marriage to John Thaw.

When John Thaw, star of The Sweeney and Inspector Morse, died from cancer in 2002, a nation lost one of its finest actors.  Sheila Hancock lost a beloved husband.  In this unique double biography she chronicles their lives - personal and professional, together and apart. 

John Thaw was born in Manchester, the son of a lorry driver.  When he arrived at RADA on a scholarship he felt an outsider.  In fact his timing was perfect: it was the sixties and television was beginning to make its mark.  With his roles in Z-Cars and The Sweeney, fame came quickly.  But it was John’s role as Morse that made him an icon.

In 1974 John married Sheila Hancock, with whom he shared a working-class background and a RADA education.  Sheila was already the star of the TV series The Rag Trade and went on to become the first woman artistic director at the RSC.  Theirs was a sometimes turbulent, always passionate relationship, and Sheila describes their love - weathering overwork and the pressures of celebrity, drink and cancer - with honesty and piercing intelligence.

The Two of Us is a remarkable book - a biography of a born actor and a tender, often heartbreaking memoir of a marriage.  Full of insight and vivid memories, it evokes two lives lived to the utmost.

Sheila Hancock was born in 1933 and attended RADA before embarking on a successful career in acting, both on stage and screen. She was awarded the OBE in 1974 and published her previous memoir Ramblings of an Actress in 1987. Sheila Hancock lives in London.