We hear that John Gotti Jr, son of the late Dapper Don, has been trying to earn good parole points in prison by writing a children's book.Who knows, his happy tale, The Children of Shaolin Forest, might earn the former hard man a spot at next year's New Yorker Festival.pandora independent.co.uk. Alexander's greatest love was for a male boyhood friend, Hephaestion. When Hephaestion died of typhus in 324BC, Alexander wept over his body for a day and night.Where did he die?13 June 323 BC, Babylon He suffered a recurrence of a fever in Babylon He died aged 32 and was buried in Alexandria, Egypt. He also had an illegitimate son, Heracles, by his Phrygian mistress, Barsine Both sons and Barsine were murdered in 309BC. Legend had it that whoever "untied" the knot would become the master of Asia.Any significant others?He married several Persian princesses: Roxane of Bactria; Statira, daughter of Darius III; and Parysatis, daughter of Ochus Roxane gave birth to Alexander IV, his son. Alexander had many old wounds, he travelled in marshes riddled with malaria, he drank all night. He simply might have had a seizure," he said.WHO WAS ALEXANDER AND WHY WAS HE SO GREAT?Where was he from? Born in 356BC, in Pella, Macedonia, Alexander ruled Macedonia from 336-323BC and was considered the greatest military leader of the ancient world.

He was taught by Aristotle and his empire extended from Thrace to Egypt and from Greece to the Indus valley.What did he do?United the warring city states of Greece and conquered two-thirds of the civilised world Conquests reached to the borders of India He also "cut" the Gordian Knot. I came to the conclusion that she could have killed him," he said.Professor Robin Lane-Fox of Oxford University, who acted as the history consultant for Oliver Stone, is sceptical of claims of Roxane's guilt."If you were going to kill Alexander you would want to make sure he was killed on the spot. You wouldn't want to risk a slow death by poisoning which would alert his suspicions," Professor Lane-Fox said."We don't know what really killed him. "The initial symptoms were agitation, tremors, aching or stiffness in the neck, followed by a sudden, sharp pain in the area of the stomach," Mr Phillips says in his new book Alexander the Great: Murder in Babylon, published this week."He then collapsed and suffered excruciating agony wherever he was touched. Alexander also suffered from an intense thirst, fever and delirium, and, throughout the night, he experienced convulsions and hallucinations."In the final stages he could not talk, although he could still move his head and arms. Roxane was one of the few people who could have known about the deadly derivative of the strychnine plant Strychnos nux vomica.What little is known about Alexander's sudden death starts in Babylon, the cultural capital of the ancient world, with a funeral feast held at the end of May in 323BC in honour of the late Hephaestion.Roman historians, drawing on original accounts of the banquet, suggest that Alexander was gripped by pain before collapsing. It may also prompt more interest in Alexander, who is making something of a comeback in the form of two new Hollywood films.

Oliver Stone's movie Alexander the Great, starring Colin Farrell and Sir Anthony Hopkins, is released next month. Another blockbuster - with the same title - by the Moulin Rouge director Baz Luhrmann and starring Leonardo DiCaprio, is expected out in 2006.The jealous wife theory is being propounded by Graham Phillips, an author of popular history, who believes Alexander was murdered by Roxane in revenge for taking another wife or perhaps flaunting his homosexual lover, Hephaestion, who also died in mysterious circumstances.He believes that both Hephaestion and Alexander suffered the classic symptoms of strychnine poisoning. She is said to have poisoned him with what was then a little-known toxin taken from the strychnine plant.The disclosure will intrigue followers of a historical whodunnit which has fascinated scholars down the ages. Some experts say he died of malaria, others suggest a bout of typhoid caused by tainted food, or chronic liver poisoning brought on by his bacchanalia. But the latest theory suggests he was the victim of a plot by his wife, Roxane. Yet Alexander the Great's sudden death at the age of 32 has been a mystery for centuries. He conquered most of the known world and created the biggest empire in ancient history.