Jeffrey Bernard

Speaker 30:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.

Speaker 30:08

The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen ninety one.

Speaker 30:12

And the presenter was Sue Lawley.

Presenter0:31

Mike Costaway this week is a journalist. Taking his own life as a model, he entertains his readers with witty and honest accounts of his experiences. He would be the first to admit that these are rarely heroic. For him, booze, horses, and women have made up the greater part of his life. A life which really began when, at the age of fourteen, he was introduced to the joys of Soho. Having been unhappy at school, he found himself very happy there, and it's been his base ever since. Always a freelance, he's written for The New Statesman, The Sunday Times, and Sporting Life, but it's in the weekly magazine The Spectator that he's found fame with his funny and sympathetic column Low Life. A great survivor, though often unwell, he is Geoffrey Bernard.

Presenter1:18

Jeff Boo's horses and women, is that the order of their importance in your life, or does it vary?

Jeffrey Bernard1:25

It varies from time to time, it started off women horses booze.

Jeffrey Bernard1:30

Then

Jeffrey Bernard1:31

Coming into the final furlong, Booze.

Jeffrey Bernard1:34

moved up at an alarming rate.

Jeffrey Bernard1:37

Women dropped back.

Jeffrey Bernard1:39

Then I suppose that racing and uh

Jeffrey Bernard1:43

Booz crossed the line together, as it were, a dead heat.

Presenter1:46

But of course any any one of them can be the the downfall of a man, but so far they haven't quite been your downfall.

Jeffrey Bernard1:53

No, but anyone who

Jeffrey Bernard1:56

Couldn't claim that women are their downfall. He's just a idiot, I think.

Presenter2:00

Well, whatever, as I said at the beginning, I mean, you've you've survived them all so far. You are a survivor. Is is that how you see yourself, if you had to define yourself? Yes, very much.

Jeffrey Bernard2:09

Yes, very much so, yeah.

Presenter2:11

And what do you put that survival down to? I mean, is it is it luck or is it friendship?

Jeffrey Bernard2:16

It's uh luck and friendship and uh great fear of falling through the very thin ice that I skate on every day.

Presenter2:27

But do you do you worry every day? Do you worry about money or deadlines or your image? Do those kinds of things?

Jeffrey Bernard2:34

Yes, very much. I worry about deadlines particularly because I find writing

Jeffrey Bernard2:41

Columns gets harder and harder as time goes by because

Jeffrey Bernard2:45

I feel as I've said it all, and that there's not really all that much more to say.

Jeffrey Bernard2:51

I don't uh it embarrasses me to to to think that I

Jeffrey Bernard2:56

Write the same column every week.

Jeffrey Bernard2:58

Which is I I I think that most columnists suffer from this.

Jeffrey Bernard3:03

I could name a few, but um I won't.

Presenter3:05

But they do occasionally print, as well as Geoffrey Bernard is unwell. They occasionally print, don't they?

Presenter3:10

Geoffrey Bernard's column does not appear this week because it bore a r a remarkable resemblance to last week's.

Jeffrey Bernard3:16

That only happened once. That's that's an exaggeration. Incidentally, the Geoffrey Bernard is unwell

Jeffrey Bernard3:24

Um

Jeffrey Bernard3:26

Readers and other people, particularly people that don't like me very much, will always assume it's that I've passed out somewhere. That's not true. My health is appalling.

Jeffrey Bernard3:37

And I do get ill frequently.

Jeffrey Bernard3:39

Because I don't uh

Jeffrey Bernard3:42

control my diabetes properly, which is my own fault.

Presenter3:47

Tell me how large a part music plays in the survival of Geoffrey Bernard.

Jeffrey Bernard3:52

Enormous part. Uh it's one of the most important things in the world.

Presenter3:57

How often do you listen to it?

Jeffrey Bernard3:59

Every day.

Jeffrey Bernard4:00

for a for a bit. It makes me reflect, which is quite nice after the

Jeffrey Bernard4:05

Holy burley of some of the disgusting places I go to. Um

Jeffrey Bernard4:11

It's uplifting tremendously.

Presenter4:14

So what's the first record you'd put on when you were dumped on this desert island?

Jeffrey Bernard4:18

I think I'd put on

Jeffrey Bernard4:20

Mozart's Requiem Mass.

Jeffrey Bernard4:24

It's a magnificent piece of music.

Jeffrey Bernard4:27

And

Jeffrey Bernard4:29

I haven't known it all that long because.

Jeffrey Bernard4:32

For nearly all my life I

Jeffrey Bernard4:34

Hated

Jeffrey Bernard4:36

Cool music.

Jeffrey Bernard4:38

I found it very depressing.

Jeffrey Bernard4:40

Because it reminds me of school.

Jeffrey Bernard4:44

I was I I had a would you believe it a a beautiful little treble voice.

Jeffrey Bernard4:50

And uh

Jeffrey Bernard4:52

I was the star of the choir.

Jeffrey Bernard4:54

The humiliation and embarrassment.

Jeffrey Bernard4:58

I had to go through being forced to stand up and sing solos. It made me feel absolutely awful.

Jeffrey Bernard5:04

And now that no one forces me to do anything.

Jeffrey Bernard5:08

Uh I d I d I think that Mozart is divine and Mozart is divinity as far as I'm concerned.

Presenter6:11

Iliana Kottreubach singing part of the introitus from Mozart's Requiem Mass with the Academy and Chorus of Saint Martin in the Fields, conducted by Sir Neville Mariner.

Presenter6:23

Do you find, Geoffrey Bernard, that people come to you to talk about their drinking problems or habits? They kind of want to assuage their guilt by talking to someone who drinks rather more than they do.

Jeffrey Bernard6:34

They do sometimes, yes. Uh

Jeffrey Bernard6:42

The only way you can w uh possibly give up drinking is to want to give it up.

Jeffrey Bernard6:48

And I don't want to.

Jeffrey Bernard6:50

And uh alcoholics are dreadful self-deceivers. Not many of them do really want to.

Presenter6:55

Have you ever wanted to?

Jeffrey Bernard6:57

I had two and a half.

Jeffrey Bernard6:59

Years on the wagon once because I did something awful and the remorse was.

Jeffrey Bernard7:04

Ghastly, but um

Presenter7:06

What did you do?

Jeffrey Bernard7:08

I hit a woman.

Jeffrey Bernard7:09

We're we're great friends now.

Jeffrey Bernard7:12

But even so I sometimes give her sidelong glances and think the mistake I made was not hitting her harder.

Presenter7:19

Perfect.

Jeffrey Bernard7:20

Yeah.

Presenter7:20

The two and a half years on the wagon did not do the trick patent.

Jeffrey Bernard7:23

It made me miserable, lonely, bad tempered.

Jeffrey Bernard7:28

Melancholy.

Jeffrey Bernard7:29

My then wife later um cited these things in in her

Jeffrey Bernard7:36

Divorce action against me.

Presenter7:39

These, of course, are the sorts of things you write about in your column. Do you think that's why people enjoy reading it, that they, again, like reading about somebody who's making more of a hash of life than they are?

Jeffrey Bernard7:53

Um their grass is greener.

Presenter7:56

But what did you intend to do with your life? I mean, when you were, let's say, twelve years old, what did you intend that you would be?

Jeffrey Bernard8:03

At twelve I wanted to be a marine engineer.

Jeffrey Bernard8:07

At sixteen.

Jeffrey Bernard8:10

I wanted to go to bed with every woman in the world, well with few exceptions. I wanted to open the batting for England. I had my ambitions were very uh banal.

Presenter8:22

Your mother all this time, they wanted you to be an officer and a gentleman.

Jeffrey Bernard8:25

Yes, yes, she's very keen on that.

Presenter8:27

How did she set about trying to perform that?

Jeffrey Bernard8:29

She sent me to a naval college, Pangbourne. I was almost asked to leave. The only thing that saved me from being expelled, I think, was the fact that uh

Jeffrey Bernard8:39

I was a good bowler at cricket.

Presenter8:42

Did you spend this time then begging your mother to take you away?

Jeffrey Bernard8:45

After two years.

Jeffrey Bernard8:47

I came home.

Jeffrey Bernard8:48

It was the start of a summer holiday, and she said, How did you get on this last term, did you?

Jeffrey Bernard8:56

Enjoy yourself and I I burst into tears. I I think I was near having a nervous breakdown, and to my amazement she was very hard.

Jeffrey Bernard9:05

woman in many ways, although affectionate. She said, you know, I didn't realize it upset you that much, uh.

Jeffrey Bernard9:13

You need never get to go to school again, which was one of the most marvellous moments in my life, I think.

Presenter9:20

Your father had died by this time, had he?

Jeffrey Bernard9:22

He died in nineteen thirty nine when I was only seven.

Presenter9:25

Did that have an enormous impact on you?

Jeffrey Bernard9:28

I I've always missed not having a father.

Jeffrey Bernard9:31

Tremendously, especially since he was an exceptional man, by all accounts.

Presenter9:36

But let's have the second record. What is it?

Jeffrey Bernard9:38

Granadas

Jeffrey Bernard9:40

from his sweet dances Espagno, It's Andalusia. When my mother was in a good mood, she made it a special treat for me in the evening, and I'd had my bath and I'd come downstairs to the drawing room, where she had a magnificent

Jeffrey Bernard9:59

Blutener Grand Piano.

Jeffrey Bernard10:01

I'd come down all scrubbed and

Jeffrey Bernard10:04

rosy cheeked with my hair slicked down, my little dressing gown, putting on my Crystal Robin act, and I'd five minutes previously having been upstairs in my nursery chain smoking woodbines. And she used to play me this tune and I it mi it touches me and because it reminds me of her and the nice times.

Presenter11:26

Alicia de la Rocha playing Andelutha, one of the Spanish dances by Granados.

Presenter11:32

I said that you were introduced to the joys of Soho at the age of fourteen. Who introduced you, Jeff?

Jeffrey Bernard11:39

My brother was a student at Saint Martin's School of Art, and he said why don't you come up to cafe?

Jeffrey Bernard11:48

Opposite foils that all us students go to for coffee in the morning.

Jeffrey Bernard11:54

And uh

Jeffrey Bernard11:56

It was awful as a whole new world opened up in front of my eyes, and immediately I opened the door of this place.

Presenter12:02

What was it? I mean, what bits did you fall for?

Jeffrey Bernard12:03

What did you fall for? Um well, just the people, I mean writers, painters, poets.

Jeffrey Bernard12:12

Amateur philosophers, strictly amateur.

Jeffrey Bernard12:15

And people sat around talking about things like sex, which I'd never heard of people discussing before.

Jeffrey Bernard12:22

And they were pretty girls.

Jeffrey Bernard12:25

actors, actresses, and I I just sat there enraptured listening to these people. And they didn't mind if you smoked cigarettes or had a half a pint of bitter.

Jeffrey Bernard12:40

There was no authority. That's the thing I always wanted to escape from all my life, is authority.

Presenter12:46

What did you actually look like when you were fifteen?

Jeffrey Bernard12:49

Not bad looking, although I say myself.

Presenter12:54

Record number three.

Jeffrey Bernard12:56

Record number three is the Sebaleus Symphony number one, which um.

Jeffrey Bernard13:04

This last one was a woman, wasn't it? My mother. Now this is.

Jeffrey Bernard13:08

Sibelia Symphony No. One.

Jeffrey Bernard13:11

is uh my uh most recent wife. I wouldn't think of it as being her dowry.

Jeffrey Bernard13:19

Apart from uh bringing herself, which was a lovely thing to do because she's a very lovely, nice woman indeed, um, she brought that and I I hadn't really listened to it much before.

Jeffrey Bernard13:35

The thing about Sebalis that fascinates me is that uh

Jeffrey Bernard13:40

It's all about

Jeffrey Bernard13:41

Finnish landscape

Jeffrey Bernard13:44

To some people who who are not familiar with it.

Jeffrey Bernard13:48

He may sound slightly gloomy, but I think he's absolutely marvellous. Also, in case she's listening, I would like to point out to Susan that um although Sir Belis can be very, very grim indeed, I never thought she was.

Jeffrey Bernard14:05

Just bad-tempered.

Presenter15:08

The opening of Sibelius Symphony No. One in E minor, played by the Philharmonia Orchestra conducted by Vladimir Ashkenazi.

Presenter15:16

So it was the early fifties in Soho, and Geoffrey Bernard, aged twenty, newly discharged from the army, was trying to make a life for himself. Who are you mixing with? Who who are your friends? You're allowed to name drop.

Jeffrey Bernard15:30

Well

Jeffrey Bernard15:31

Wha what's the opposite of name-dropping? Because I can do both.

Jeffrey Bernard15:35

There were people like

Jeffrey Bernard15:38

Ironfoot Jack Handbag Johnny, who made a living stealing new handbags and selling them in the market. Uh Sid the Swimmer, a bookmaker's runner, called himself Sid the Swimmer because he said he was always trying to keep his head above water.

Jeffrey Bernard15:55

And then five minutes later, one will be having a drink with.

Jeffrey Bernard15:59

Painters like Cajun McBride, Johnny Minton, Lucien Freud sometimes. I got to know Francis when I was Francis Bacon when I was pretty young.

Jeffrey Bernard16:10

Louis McNeese, for Dylan Thomas, George Barker, who is still a dear friend.

Jeffrey Bernard16:17

Um

Presenter16:18

Augustus, John, Brendan Jean.

Jeffrey Bernard16:19

Augustus John Brendan Byrne, marvellous man when sober.

Jeffrey Bernard16:24

Difficult otherwise.

Jeffrey Bernard16:26

Put it mildly.

Presenter16:28

So so there you were in Soho, mixing with with with all these people, all these names we've dropped or names you've picked up.

Presenter16:35

It it must be much less exciting than that today.

Jeffrey Bernard16:39

It's awful to day.

Jeffrey Bernard16:42

Terrible.

Presenter16:43

But there you still are.

Jeffrey Bernard16:46

Well

Jeffrey Bernard16:47

It's the only place where w where people accept you for

Jeffrey Bernard16:51

what you are without being judgmental, like my colleagues are so disgustingly judgmental about me.

Jeffrey Bernard17:00

People like Private Ah who I used to work for.

Jeffrey Bernard17:04

They make jokes about the fact that I drink quite a bit, which is not really very funny, nor very interesting.

Presenter17:11

But you make jokes about the fact that you drink quite a bit.

Jeffrey Bernard17:14

Yeah, exactly. That's why they shouldn't bother.

Presenter17:18

So you're allowed to, but other people aren't.

Jeffrey Bernard17:20

Hmm.

Jeffrey Bernard17:21

I don't mind readers' writing and

Jeffrey Bernard17:24

saying silly things like, Oh, you are awful, Mr. Bernard and etcetera, but when Jonas get on their high horses, I find it slightly irritating.

Presenter17:34

You don't think they're trying to save you from yourself?

Jeffrey Bernard17:37

No, they wouldn't save anyone, as long as there was a story there.

Presenter17:42

Record number four, let's get away from all of this with some Mozart.

Jeffrey Bernard17:45

Right. When I first left home, they used to call it running away from home in those days.

Jeffrey Bernard17:52

The very first

Jeffrey Bernard17:54

records I bought were the seventy eights of Mozart's Paniconcerto number twenty three. It it stuck in my mind so much that when Keith Warthouse

Jeffrey Bernard18:09

Ask me for some music for the play at the Apollo

Jeffrey Bernard18:13

I suggested that when

Jeffrey Bernard18:15

The curtain went up, which is always a

Jeffrey Bernard18:19

A nice moment in the theatre, particularly.

Jeffrey Bernard18:22

Opening night

Jeffrey Bernard18:23

The opening bars of

Jeffrey Bernard18:25

The Mozart twenty three.

Presenter19:23

The RCA Victor Symphony Orchestra playing the opening of Mozart's concerto number twenty three in A major.

Presenter19:30

That was music used at at the beginning of the West End hit, Geoffrey Bernard Is Unwell, which was based on ten low life columns written by my Castaway. It it must be a very strange experience having your own life translated onto the stage,

Jeffrey Bernard19:46

Very strange indeed. Um to hear your own words.

Jeffrey Bernard19:52

coming out of somebody else's mouth is is almost alarming, but it's it's f let's face it, it's f one has to admit it's fascinating, but uh

Jeffrey Bernard20:02

It's done me nothing but good, it's been marvellous for me.

Presenter20:04

How has it done you good? What's happened as a result?

Jeffrey Bernard20:08

I I don't have to

Jeffrey Bernard20:10

Look in a shaving mirror anymore to know I exist. I know that sounds darf, but do you know what I mean? I it's uh

Jeffrey Bernard20:20

Unidentifiable, which I like.

Presenter20:23

Is it important to you to be liked?

Jeffrey Bernard20:26

I'm afraid, sir, I despise myself for that.

Presenter20:29

Why, you see it is a weakness.

Jeffrey Bernard20:30

I think it's a weakness, yes.

Presenter20:33

Do do you like yourself?

Jeffrey Bernard20:35

I disliked myself until.

Jeffrey Bernard20:38

Ten years ago.

Jeffrey Bernard20:40

But I I don't know, I'm an absolute monster anymore, no.

Presenter20:44

You also um care quite a lot about what you look like, don't you?

Jeffrey Bernard20:49

Well, I've given up that.

Jeffrey Bernard20:52

That's a lost course.

Presenter20:54

You're always known for your immaculate shirts and your gleaming shoes.

Jeffrey Bernard20:58

Yes, that was true.

Presenter21:01

Is are we talking about a bit of vanity there, or was that?

Jeffrey Bernard21:04

Oh yeah, I'm tremendously vain.

Presenter21:06

Are you still?

Jeffrey Bernard21:08

Yes.

Jeffrey Bernard21:09

You you can't get rid of that.

Jeffrey Bernard21:12

I mean, I'd like to if I was standing in front of a firing squad, I'd say, Hang on, let me brush my hair first, in case there was a photographer standing by the rifles.

Presenter21:22

Let's have record number five.

Jeffrey Bernard21:25

This will be

Jeffrey Bernard21:26

The Enigma variations.

Jeffrey Bernard21:30

I love the Englishness of Elgar.

Jeffrey Bernard21:33

I can listen to I I can listen to our gun sometimes

Jeffrey Bernard21:37

The mind could wander.

Jeffrey Bernard21:39

And I'd find myself wondering if I was listening to.

Jeffrey Bernard21:43

Test cricket commentary from Lords or

Jeffrey Bernard21:48

racing commentary from Worcester which was his

Jeffrey Bernard21:53

Favourite occupation. When uh Menouin auditioned for him.

Jeffrey Bernard21:59

for the first time in the Grosvenor, I think it was.

Jeffrey Bernard22:03

Violin concerta.

Jeffrey Bernard22:05

Apparently he only played about seven, eight bars.

Jeffrey Bernard22:09

And Elgar impatiently said, Yes, you'll do you'll do fine. Very good very good indeed. Now I must dash. I've got to get to the first race at Worcester.

Jeffrey Bernard22:19

Good chap, Olga, great man.

Presenter23:22

The London Philharmonic conducted by Bryden Thompson playing the finale of Elgar's Enigma variations.

Presenter23:29

Let's talk a bit more about the writing, Jeff. You've always been a freelance, haven't you?

Jeffrey Bernard23:34

Yes, Daily Mirror magazine

Jeffrey Bernard23:37

Then the spectator.

Jeffrey Bernard23:39

First of all I was T V critic until Alexander Chancellor n noticed through my bad behaviour that I only reviewed television that was shown on Saturdays and Sundays.

Presenter23:53

Why, because you were out the rest of the time.

Jeffrey Bernard23:56

Then he made me write a racing column.

Jeffrey Bernard24:00

And after that, he and Simon Cortell suggested I write Low Life.

Jeffrey Bernard24:07

And uh I suppose that caught on in a way and

Jeffrey Bernard24:12

I've been doing that for

Jeffrey Bernard24:14

Must be fourteen years, I think.

Presenter24:16

If not fifteen, I

Jeffrey Bernard24:17

Yeah, maybe fifteen.

Presenter24:19

Is it a living?

Jeffrey Bernard24:20

No, no.

Presenter24:22

And is it work that you enjoy? I mean, do you look forward to writing?

Jeffrey Bernard24:25

I loathe working more than anything else in the world, writing.

Jeffrey Bernard24:30

It makes me physically sick.

Jeffrey Bernard24:33

With anxiety. I hate it.

Jeffrey Bernard24:36

If I was a masochist, an electric typewriter would be an iron luxury, but it won't be.

Presenter24:42

We'll find out about that in a minute. Let's have the sixth record.

Jeffrey Bernard24:47

The sixth record is

Jeffrey Bernard24:49

An excerpt from De Rosen Cavalier

Jeffrey Bernard24:52

which transcends a lot of other opera and I think it's sensational.

Jeffrey Bernard24:57

So I'd really like to have that.

Presenter26:00

Elizabeth Schwartzkopf, Krista Ludwig, and Theresa Stitch Randall singing part of the final act of Richard Strasse's De Rosen Cavalier, with the Philemonia Orchestra conducted by Herbert von Karrion.

Presenter26:12

You smoke several packs of cigarettes a day, Jeff. You drink, it's always said, two thirds of a bottle of vodka. It's a very precise figure.

Jeffrey Bernard26:20

I say that because I I measure it from time to time, yeah.

Presenter26:24

Never goes up to one bottle.

Jeffrey Bernard26:25

Yeah.

Jeffrey Bernard26:27

I don't drink as much as as as

Jeffrey Bernard26:30

My colleagues on the press make out.

Presenter26:32

But you're considerably underweight and and

Jeffrey Bernard26:35

That's because of the a muscle-wasting thing connected with diabetes.

Presenter26:40

And you're very bad, you've said about taking your insulin.

Jeffrey Bernard26:43

Oh, I forget. Forget. Yeah, it's ridiculous.

Presenter26:44

Okay.

Presenter26:47

And your pancreas packs up from time to time.

Jeffrey Bernard26:49

It's finished, yeah.

Presenter26:52

All of which means that you're no stranger to hospitals and doctors.

Jeffrey Bernard26:56

Yeah.

Speaker 226:57

Uh

Presenter26:58

How do you feel when

Presenter27:00

And we know they say these things to you because you write about them in your column, when they say to you, you know, go on drinking and you've only got X months or one year to live.

Jeffrey Bernard27:10

Hmm.

Jeffrey Bernard27:12

I think to myself

Jeffrey Bernard27:15

Go on talking, I've probably only got ten more minutes to live to this so boring and awful.

Presenter27:23

Realistically, how long do you think you've got?

Jeffrey Bernard27:25

About two years?

Presenter27:28

Does that frighten you?

Jeffrey Bernard27:31

No, I mean I mean it

Jeffrey Bernard27:33

In some ways

Jeffrey Bernard27:34

Life is so.

Jeffrey Bernard27:37

awful at times. And I mean I I've gotta f

Jeffrey Bernard27:40

Suddenly develops a new feeling that dying might be like going on holiday. Might be like

Jeffrey Bernard27:47

Check in at Heathrow to go to um Barbados or

Jeffrey Bernard27:52

Some are really nice.

Presenter27:55

It's obviously therefore really quite a painful process, isn't it?

Jeffrey Bernard27:58

The hells.

Jeffrey Bernard28:01

Nasty.

Jeffrey Bernard28:03

But it's my own fault, it's all self inflicted.

Presenter28:08

Let's have the next record.

Jeffrey Bernard28:10

Well

Jeffrey Bernard28:12

You can't go to a desert island without Beethoven.

Jeffrey Bernard28:15

Although he's a miserable, sad, cantankerous companion. But I love him and late string quartets.

Jeffrey Bernard28:25

Offer a fairly wide choice.

Jeffrey Bernard28:28

Mine

Jeffrey Bernard28:30

would be to take the beginning of the second movement.

Jeffrey Bernard28:35

Of uh my favourite quartet, which is opus one two seven. And and this second movement I think is

Jeffrey Bernard28:43

terribly sad and it it's sort of

Jeffrey Bernard28:46

heart rending in a way and uh

Jeffrey Bernard28:50

I've got a funny feeling that I know how

Jeffrey Bernard28:52

Beethoven felt about all sorts of personal things. I'm not talking about music, but um general depression, unhappiness.

Jeffrey Bernard29:01

On the usual subjects that we'll get.

Jeffrey Bernard29:05

Depressed about but my God, he does encapsulate it in this movement.

Presenter30:02

The beginning of Beethoven's string quartet in E flat major, opus one two seven, played by the Melos quartet. It's very sentimental music.

Speaker 230:11

Very

Presenter30:13

Have you a vision of yourself and what life would be like for you on the desert island, Geoffrey?

Jeffrey Bernard30:20

Sedentary, not adventurous. I am no Robinson Crusoe or James Bond. Um

Jeffrey Bernard30:31

Barbados is one of my favorite places to go on holiday. Well, I I've only been there three times, but I love it. I like uh lying on beaches and wandering around and smelling the bougainvalia and

Jeffrey Bernard30:46

Of course there's not going to be a bamboo beach bar on this as there that as there is in Barbados.

Presenter30:52

And no people.

Jeffrey Bernard30:53

Does this

Presenter30:53

Does the solitariness have any appeal at all, or is it terrifying?

Jeffrey Bernard30:57

Doesn't terrify me. No.

Presenter31:00

And as you sit there,'cause I presume escape would be all too much effort.

Jeffrey Bernard31:04

How are you?

Presenter31:06

As you sit there looking back across your life, what

Jeffrey Bernard31:10

That's all I do, memories.

Presenter31:13

But what would you feel when you were just left to do that and not even be able to write about it? Would you feel a

Presenter31:18

A sense of disappointment or would you feel that you hadn't done too badly in terms of the

Jeffrey Bernard31:20

Maybe you

Jeffrey Bernard31:21

I do that now, I do that now in the morning when I wake up, bed, drink endless cups of tea.

Jeffrey Bernard31:27

I think about the past.

Presenter31:29

Um um what do you think of it, as you look back on it?

Jeffrey Bernard31:33

But there's a little bit too much remorse.

Jeffrey Bernard31:36

I don't like that emotion at all.

Presenter31:40

And what's the remorse about?

Jeffrey Bernard31:44

I wish I had been a better person, that's all.

Jeffrey Bernard31:49

Simple as that.

Presenter31:51

Last record.

Jeffrey Bernard31:53

Having gone to sleep, hopefully.

Jeffrey Bernard31:56

after listening to a sort of melancholy

Jeffrey Bernard31:59

Very sad.

Jeffrey Bernard32:01

But it was Beethoven.

Jeffrey Bernard32:02

I'd very much like to wake up in the morning.

Jeffrey Bernard32:06

To my

Jeffrey Bernard32:08

Cocoanut juice made, if there's such an an equivalent of a teas made.

Jeffrey Bernard32:13

A wakey wakey to uh

Jeffrey Bernard32:16

The Haydn string quartet.

Jeffrey Bernard32:19

Opus twenty number one and I only discovered.

Jeffrey Bernard32:23

The Sun Quartets, which this is the first one of recently.

Jeffrey Bernard32:28

I love it.

Presenter33:26

The opening of Haydn's string quartet number one in E flat major, opus twenty, played by the Tartroy Quartet.

Presenter33:33

So which one of those eight records would be the most necessary to you on the island?

Jeffrey Bernard33:39

I don't think it's a question of necessary, I think it's a question of which one would last the longer. And in which case I think I have to say the Mozart Requiem.

Presenter33:52

And a book. You've got uh the Bible.

Jeffrey Bernard33:54

Yes, now here here all my intellectual snob friends are going to be deeply shocked.

Jeffrey Bernard34:01

I'd like the

Jeffrey Bernard34:02

Complete Sherlock Holmes short stories.

Presenter34:07

Why did you want those?

Jeffrey Bernard34:08

They are

Jeffrey Bernard34:10

Full of

Jeffrey Bernard34:12

absurdities that that make me chuckle. It wasn't intended by Conan Doyle, but um

Jeffrey Bernard34:19

He did have a

Jeffrey Bernard34:21

highly defined sense of the absurdity even if he wasn't quite aware of it.

Presenter34:27

And a luxury.

Jeffrey Bernard34:29

A luxury. I'd like a high powered hunting rifle.

Jeffrey Bernard34:36

With a lot of ammunition.

Jeffrey Bernard34:38

A

Jeffrey Bernard34:40

to shoot game with.

Jeffrey Bernard34:43

For food.

Jeffrey Bernard34:44

B

Jeffrey Bernard34:46

To shoot Man Friday with after he'd started telling too many boring jokes and anecdotes.

Jeffrey Bernard34:53

And finally C.

Jeffrey Bernard34:54

Should blow my own brains out if I got ill.

Presenter34:58

How can I say no? Geoffrey Bernard, thank you very much indeed for letting us hear your desert island discs.

Speaker 335:12

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Islandists archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk slash radio four.