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Damien Hirst's sale of 223 new works at Sotheby's in London this week may have been a lot of things – a repudiation of the market crash, a revolutionary new way to sell art by cutting out the gallery – but above all it was a brilliantly managed marketing stunt.

All the dramatic elements were in place: punky, quote-worthy Hirst in one corner; aging art pugilist Robert Hughes in the other, making disparaging remarks about the wealthy young star; the whole thing boldly lit by hundreds of camera lights. The result was coverage as thick as a winter duvet, and two nights of sales records, fetching a total of $211-million. History will judge his art, but we know already that Hirst is a genius in one area: He's a PR wizard.

At the other end of London in fag-end Finsbury Park, the opposite in every way to Sotheby's gleaming Bond Street showroom, traffic was snarled for hours and commuters liberally exercised their middle fingers after a gas station announced it was giving away $40,000 of free fuel. Actually, it wasn't gas-station charity but rather PR gimmickry at work. The promotional stunt was arranged by the creators of the video game Mercenaries 2, in which gasoline is currency. The stunt worked a treat, with coverage in the national papers and steam hissing out the ears of the local MP.

This is all familiar territory for Mark Borkowski, whose PR company in London has arranged some spectacular stunts, from cricketer Ian Botham's restaging of Hannibal's march (complete with elephants) to freeing a horde of scorpions in the corridors of the BBC. He's always on spin cycle.

Borkowski, who has represented Van Morrison and Michael Jackson, Ikea and Cirque du Soleil, says, “I'd say 75 to 80 per cent of what I read in the media these days has the hand of a publicist behind it somewhere.” He lobs this estimate not with pride, but dispassionately, as an observer and student of the business. But if you listen closely, you can hear him sounding a warning from within.

The Fame Formula is Borkowski's new book, a loving history of the Hollywood con men and hustlers who, like pomaded alchemists, created hype from absolutely nothing. They were the early PR men, trained in travelling carnivals, equally happy hiding lions in hotel rooms or hiding their stars' penchants for pills and rent boys.

The lion was the brainchild of Harry Reichenbach in order to promote The Return of Tarzan; earlier, Reichenbach had stuck a top hat on an orangutan and sent it loping into a high-society party.

Borkowski's greatest fondness is for the sly flack Jim Moran, who once flew to the Arctic in order to actually sell an icebox to an Eskimo – or as we would say these days, a fridge to an Inuit. The fridge, incidentally, fetched $100, two fox furs and a piece of ivory. It was Moran who promoted the anti-booze film The Lost Weekend by getting a hoot owl drunk, thus proving the phrase “drunk as a … .” Later, he attempted to combine a make-work project with a make-headlines project by employing midgets, tied to kites, as human advertising blimps. Local authorities did not take kindly to this plan, leading to Moran's undying observation: “It's a sad day for American capitalism if a man can't fly a midget over New York.”

In those days, the flacks owned the hacks, sometimes buying their silence but more often plying them with booze, a shivery brush with glamour, and a sense of exclusivity. (Very little has changed today, as anyone who's been on a studio-sponsored movie junket well knows.) While Borkowski regards the past with fondness – particularly the ingenuity of the PR pioneers – he's a little bit alarmed when he looks around today, at the emptiness of celebrity culture and the strange yearning it creates in its young audience. “There's a new generation that's thinking incredibly smart about not working hard.”

It's easy to see a bit of Victor Frankenstein in Borkowski; he's looking askance at the monster he's helped create. “I think we have to look very carefully at who we choose to deify,” he says. “Is it carers? Scientists?” Oddly for a PR guru, he directs readers to Nick Davies's recent book Flat Earth News, a condemnation of “churnalism” – the media's increasing inability, or financial disinclination, to grapple with complex subjects.

Isn't he worried that if he continues to question his profession, he's going to put himself out of work? Borkowski shrugs: “It all comes down to what you have to promote. If it's a worthy product, you don't have to worry.”

It doesn't look like the art of hype is in danger of fizzling. Sixty years ago, in an inspired stunt, Jim Moran led a bull through a china shop to promote the career of a now-forgotten band leader. This week in London, Damien Hirst sold The Golden Calf – a bull in formaldehyde, adorned with solid-gold hooves and horns – for $20-million.