Peel and a £1.5m book deal

Crossing the divide from Radio One to Radio Four, John Peel has become something of a broadcasting legend.

Now his anecdotes from four decades on the airwaves could be about to earn him £1.5million.

Two publishers, Transworld and HarperCollins, are believed to have offered the 63-year-old disc jockey an advance of around that amount for his autobiography.

The deal would be one of the biggest ever for a celebrity memoir.

He will certainly have some intriguing tales to tell, including his one-night stand with Germaine Greer, who had just published The Female Eunuch, in the early 1970s.

Born John Ravenscroft, Peel's businessman father sent him to Shrewsbury School, which he left with four O-levels.

After completing military service, he headed to Texas in the early 1960s, and his father helped him secure an office job.

He managed to talk his way on to radio shows in Dallas, telling station bosses he knew the Beatles. He soon landed a full-time presenting job.

While in America he married Shirley, a Texan girl he thought was 16 but who turned out to be 15.

On his return to Britain, he became a disc jockey at the pirate station Radio London, before joining Radio One at its launch in 1967. In recent years he has appealed to a very different audience with his Saturday morning show Home Truths on Radio Four, where he discusses the eccentricities of family life.

Such is his iconic status that BBC2 aired a John Peel theme night when he turned 60 in 1999.

For the past 29 years he has been married to his second wife, Sheila, whom he nicknames 'the Pig' because of her snorting laugh. They have four grown-up children.

His book deal would top advances to Murray Walker (£1.4million), Sir Alex Ferguson (£1.2million), Geri Halliwell ( £ 500,000) and Billy Connolly (£250,000).

The only recent deal thought to be worth more was secured by David Beckham, who reportedly agreed a £2million advance with Harper-Collins last year.