Clifford Irving, Howard Hughes, and the Greatest Literary Hoax of the 20th Century

By Karen Harris | December 7, 2022

The Weirdest Guy Ever

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Fiction writer Clifford Irving talks to reporters after serving 16 months in prison for writing a fake autobiography of Howard Hughes. (Photo by Paul Demaria/NY Daily News Archive via Getty Images)

Eccentric billionaire Howard Hughes was an odd character, indeed. In the later years of his life, Hughes became so reclusive that he lived as a hermit in a hotel in the Bahamas and had virtually no contact with the outside world. His unorthodox lifestyle and his reclusively only added to his mystique and the public yearned to learn about his bizarre life. A middle-of-the-road novelist named Clifford Irving hatched an elaborate scheme to write Hughes’ ‘autobiography’ using faked interviews and forged letters that was so cleverly crafted that he fooled almost everyone. Let’s see why and how Clifford Irving pulled off this hoax … and how his scheme was unraveled.

Who Was Clifford Irving?

Clifford Irving graduated with honors from Cornell University. Beginning in the mid-1950s, he worked as a copy editor for The New York Times. His first novel, On a Darkling Plain, was published in 1956. He traveled through Europe, living at various places for short periods of time, and wrote two more books, The Losers in 1958 and The Valley in 1960. While living on the Spanish island of Ibiza in the Mediterranean Sea, Irving befriended Elmyr de Hory, a noted Hungarian art forger. De Hory was such a skilled forger that he amassed a fortune by selling hundreds of fake paintings to both art museums and private collectors. Irving was fascinated by his notorious friend. His next book, Fake!, which was published in 1969, was a biography of de Hory. Fake! was well-received and commercially successful. That gave Irving a crazy idea.

A Crazy Idea

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Howard Hughes (Getty Images)

After spending time with the notorious art forger Elmyr de Hory, and bolstered by the success of his latest book, Fake!, Clifford Irving got a crazy idea – one of those ideas that was so crazy it just might work. He met up with his longtime friend, children’s book author, Richard Suskind, in Palma de Mallorca, Spain, in 1970 and the two writers hashed out a plan for Irving to write a purported authorized ‘autobiography’ of the world’s most famous shut-in, Howard Hughes. The public was clamoring for information on Hughes, so they knew readers would be interested in their ’autobiography.’ Since Hughes has completely withdrawn from the world and hadn’t; talked to the press since 1958, chances were good that he would never even learn about the unauthorized ‘autobiography’ and if he did, he likely would never bother to file a libel lawsuit against them. Lastly, there was enough information about Hughes in news archives that Irving, with Suskind’s help, could fabricate a plausible ‘autobiography.’

Getting Down to Work

Richard Suskind took the role of researcher for the fake ‘autobiography’ project. He combed through news articles about the billionaire recluse Howard Hughes and watched old interviews that Hughes had granted in the past. Clifford Irving called on some of his contacts in the forgery world in Ibiza to write fake letters that made it look like Howard Hughes had written to Irving. Some of Hughes’ handwritten letters had been published years earlier in Newsweek magazine, so the forgers had examples from which they could forge Hughes’ handwriting. 

The Ruse

Clifford Irving met with his publisher, McGraw-Hill, to inform them that he had received a letter from Howard Hughes. In the fake letter, Hughes explained that he had read Fake! and admired Irving’s writing style. He added that he would like Irving to serve as the ghost writer for his autobiography. Irving showed the letter to the editors at McGraw-Hill who were over-the-moon about this incredible opportunity. Yes, they did have their lawyers look at the letter, which looked like a perfect match to Hughes’ handwriting, so they gave the project their thumbs up.

Clifford Irving and the top people at McGraw-Hill met to draw up a contract between the publishing company, Irving, and Hughes. Of course, Hughes was not present at the meeting, so Irving agreed to send him the contract for his approval. Instead, he sent it to his forging pals who faked Hughes’ signature.