Oxford update

Beatles guitarist George Harrison, actor Nigel Hawthorne and Harry Secombe, one of the stars of The Goon Show, have been added to the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Britain's definitive record of the great and the good, reports The Associated Press.

In total, 195 biographies were added to the dictionary in the update published Tuesday. The group included 44 women.

''The dictionary is a record of people who were once our contemporaries and who shaped the society in which we now live,'' said the dictionary's editor, Lawrence Goldman. The revised 60-volume dictionary was published in September.

American-born harmonica virtuoso Larry Adler is among the 31 new entrants from outside Britain.

Other new biographies include one of Douglas Adams, author of The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy.