For Billy Bunter, the lazy, gluttonous wimp of pre-war children's fiction, had none of the virtues that drove him to create in Singapore one of the richest societies in the world. This autobiography confirms Senior Minister Lee, former prime minister of Singapore, is of a different stamp: ruthless, single-minded, obsessed with detail and unsentimental in his approach to politics, but extraordinarily clear-sighted and prodigiously energetic. All these qualities are strikingly evident in his description of the events that led up to the expulsion of Singapore from the Malaysian federation in 1965.

Mr Lee says one of the reasons that led him to write the book is to explain to younger Singaporeans how their country came into being and how it developed. The appeal to a wider audience lies in more than the rare description from a Singaporean point of view of life under the Japanese Occupation.

The Singapore Story lifts the lid on the calculating way Mr Lee was able to control the political process, at least in Singapore.

In his grander objective, the inclusion of Singapore in a non-racial Malaysian federation, of course, he failed. From his early days, he believed the communists would seize control quickly of an independent Singapore.

Independence within the Malaysian federation was the only way, he believed, of keeping them out. But while in two years of federation he was able to neutralise the communists, he came up against an immovable obstacle in the form of Malay nationalism. The late Malaysian premier Tunku Abdul Rahman feared Mr Lee's political activity in Malaysia would lead to dominance of the Chinese over the Malay population. There simply was not room for two of them.

It was an emotional moment when the rift became final in 1965. Mr Lee broke down in front of the television cameras and had to break off a press conference while he composed himself. It was partly because his dream had collapsed, but also because of his awareness of how difficult it would be for Singapore to go it alone. Not only was it a tiny country, dependent on its hostile northern neighbour even for water. Its other neighbour, Indonesia, was in ferment, and violence showed signs of spreading.

The sense of having one's back against the wall has been a driving force behind Singapore ever since. In showing how Singapore had to go it alone, Mr Lee's book explains why -- from a Singaporean point of view.

One wonders whether some of his descriptions do his opponents justice. The Tunku, he complains, was so difficult to pin down it could take four days of eating, drinking and golfing before he would come to the point.

There is a condescension and abrasiveness in his approach that the Tunku evidently found insufferable at times. When Mr Lee made a speech in Malay to the Malaysian parliament, the Tunku suggested irritably that he "speaks Malay better than I do."

But if Mr Lee was unforgiving with his enemies, he was equally so with himself. While trying to suggest he was not a swot, he admits to being horrified after his first year at Raffles College to discover that he had not come first in every subject. Later, as a political campaigner making an almost continual series of radio broadcasts in three separate languages, he imposed on himself a schedule so demanding that he had to lie down for a rest on the studio floor between recording sessions.

Had he been kinder on himself, Mr Lee might also have got on better with those around him. No doubt he would see it differently. Had he been soft, Singapore would never have become the success it is today.