The Guinness Book of Fakes, Frauds and Forgeries

by IanCrofton (Editor), RichardNewnham (Author)

• Used

  Paperback
  1991

  $3.28

  What makes someone devote hours of meticulous calligraphy to writing a passable lost Shakespeare play? Why does a superb painter like Van Meegeren turn from being the best student of his generation to the perpetrator of such masterly imitations that the leading authorities on Dutch painting were hoodwinked? The motives of forgers are not always simple and certainly not always financial. Here are accounts of the stories behind some of the surprising and diverse people who have slipped, sometimes almost inadvertently, into fraud and forgery, falsifying scientific evidence, finding Hitler's diaries, printing vast numbers of dollar bills, or producing works which, although fraudulent, have a considerable artistic value.