Clive James, an expatriate Australian writer and broadcaster who wrote incisively and often hilariously about television, literature and current affairs, has died aged 80, his agents said on Wednesday.

James, a big name in British television and radio in the 1980s, was influential in media circles and won awards for journalism and broadcasting.

His often coarse, dead-pan style peaked in popularity in the 1980s with the show "Clive James on Television," in which he lampooned clips of absurd international television shows, in particular a Japanese contest called "Endurance.