Ian Macpherson

Ian Macpherson is an Irish writer and performer. He is best known for his stand-up comedy (especially his work in alternative comedy of the 1980s) and for his comic novel, Deep Probings: The Autobiography of a Genius. In 2004, Deep Probings was featured as a BBC Radio 4 Book at Bedtime. He has also written a number of children's books including Late Again!, Bernard Brain, and Hortense and her Sensible Friend. 2011 saw the publication of The Autobiography of Ireland's Greatest Living Genius, an omnibus containing both Deep Probings and its previously unpublished sequel, Posterity Now. He was described by Arthur Smith as "Comedy's answer to James Joyce" and by Stewart Lee as "Pre-dating and pre-empting all contemporary Irish comics, and the originator of the most influential joke of all time, Ian Macpherson is the Newgrange Megalithic Passage Tomb of stand-up comedy."