Dame Stephanie Shirley

Presenter0:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young. Thank you for downloading this podcast of Desert Island Discs from BBC Radio 4. For rights reasons the music choices are shorter than in the radio broadcast.

Presenter0:10

For more information about the programme, please visit bbc.co.uk/slash radio four.

Presenter0:34

My castaway this week is the I.T. entrepreneur Dame Stephanie Shirley. Although, having given away fifty million pounds to date, she may more accurately be described as an ambassador for philanthropy. Extraordinary, yes, that she's done it, but extraordinary too, that she had the fortune to give. She arrived in Britain in 1939 on the eve of war, packed off from Vienna without her parents on the Kinder Transport. In the years since, her motivation has always been the need to prove that her life was worth saving. Her experience has, she says, given her a need to feel that I've helped somebody, achieved something, that I haven't frittered the day away. Now, I introduced you as Dame Stephanie, but in fact, for decades you've been known as Steve. Why have you been known as Steve?

Dame Stephanie Shirley1:20

Uh

Dame Stephanie Shirley1:21

Fuck.

Presenter1:21

My eye cheek

Dame Stephanie Shirley1:21

company was more of a crusade for women, Kirsty. And we had a very slow start and no real capital to put in, literally only six pounds. And

Dame Stephanie Shirley1:35

I wasn't really getting any responses to my business development letters and my dear husband of over fifty years sort of suggested that um I sign my letters just as Steve rather than Stephanie. And it seemed to me as if we began to get some responses and the business began to take off.

Presenter1:57

But, Stephanie, stroked Steve, would have to turn up to meetings. What happened when you walked through the door?

Dame Stephanie Shirley2:02

Well, there was a little fruissance of surprise, but um people were sufficiently civilized, I think, to to get over that.

Presenter2:11

And this was 1962, 63. Right. Um, what does your husband call you then?

Dame Stephanie Shirley2:12

Six to two has started.

Dame Stephanie Shirley2:16

He calls me Steve or Darling or Shmu.

Presenter2:17

Now, you've had a very distinguished business career. What makes it all the more remarkable is that at the same time you were being mother for much of it to a severely autistic son, Giles. I I'm wondering.

Presenter2:31

If the input that you had whilst you mothered him at home almost meant that you needed something else.

Dame Stephanie Shirley2:36

Well, certainly people asked me how did I manage two things, each of which were considered to be all consuming but I feel that I mean the only time I forgot Giles was when I was working.

Dame Stephanie Shirley2:50

And I am a workaholic, so really the only time that I forget work is when I was with Giles. And so the two two seem to work together.

Presenter2:59

Right, we'll hear more about that, I'm sure, as we go through. Let's begin then, Steve, with your music. Tell me about your first disc for the island.

Dame Stephanie Shirley3:07

One of the many things that an entrepreneur does is selling, and without selling you never get anywhere. And for a long period in my thirty years of business, I was writing detailed sales proposals. And they took me about five hours. And the working day was very fragmented, so many interruptions. And I got in the habit of doing those proposals at night.

Dame Stephanie Shirley3:34

And

Dame Stephanie Shirley3:35

I would horror of horrors play Bach.

Dame Stephanie Shirley3:38

as background music. And so I d I hardly noticed it at all. It just became part of and of course I am a mathematician, so it makes a lot of sense.

Presenter4:44

The opening of Bach's Brennenberg and Schutter No. 5 in D. You have said, Steve, Shirley, that the experiences of your childhood created the person that uh we see today, this highly motivated person with a lot of energy and and determination. I'd like to go back then to those very early days. Do you remember anything of life before you tumbled out onto the platform at Liverpool Street Station?

Dame Stephanie Shirley5:08

Well, like most children, one remembers the uh

Dame Stephanie Shirley5:11

Childish things, the lost doll rather than the lost home, the boy stopping, being sick every time the train stopped and things like that. But I was very lucky. I was with my older sister Renata. I was five, she was nine. And our parents really did a very brave thing. They organized for us to come to England on a kind of transport.

Dame Stephanie Shirley5:38

Basically, into the arms of strangers, although we knew their name, we didn't know them at all.

Dame Stephanie Shirley5:43

Each train there weren't all that many trains each train had about a thousand children and two adults. So you can imagine a two and a half day journey like that was fairly traumatic. Um my sister, I think, was more traumatized by uh the family losses and she found it much more difficult to settle in England. But I was terribly lucky. I had wonderful foster parents and basically brought me up as I went.

Presenter6:05

Amen.

Dame Stephanie Shirley6:07

They put their end.

Presenter6:08

You were five when you left Austria. What memories do you have of your parents, of the very early years?

Dame Stephanie Shirley6:16

Not very many really, because uh we were moving round Europe trying to find a a safe place. I was told we lived in seven countries, I can't think what they were. I remember the gypsies who stole some washing or were accused of stealing some washing. Um I remember things like the stalks in the chimneys of Vienna.

Presenter6:37

Your father had been a judge prior to the men.

Dame Stephanie Shirley6:40

Yes, he was a judge in Dortmund near Berlin, and in nineteen thirty three, shortly after I was born, he was fired by edict of the so-called Reich, and the dismissal was two lines, I think.

Dame Stephanie Shirley6:55

What do you remember, if anything, of your mother, then?

Dame Stephanie Shirley6:59

She was bossy boots, not very loving to me, efficient, very admirable. Um I respected her more than I loved her because we never really bonded.

Presenter7:10

Mm-hmm.

Presenter7:11

Five is just about old enough to as you say, you remember your doll being lost on the train and so on.

Dame Stephanie Shirley7:16

Train

Presenter7:18

Uh do you remember the moment your parents explained to you what was happening? Did they explain that you were leaving and they were no

Dame Stephanie Shirley7:23

Yeah. Um my mother, as I say, she's very thoughtful and um

Dame Stephanie Shirley7:27

Insightful. She had given us tiny little presents to unwrap as soon as the train left, but we were not allowed to open them until the train had started. And to my shame, really, both of us were more interested in finding out what was in this exciting parcel than realising quite what was happening. I think my sister understood much, much more.

Presenter7:53

Did you have a sense of where you were going? Did you know anything about that?

Dame Stephanie Shirley7:55

Yeah.

Presenter7:57

Yeah.

Dame Stephanie Shirley7:57

They're complete strangers.

Dame Stephanie Shirley8:00

At Liverpool Street Station, and we had numbers and names, and they were called out and

Dame Stephanie Shirley8:06

It was Auntie who saw in the local paper two little pictures of Renata and I with homes sought for two little girls, well brought up, etcetera. etcetera., and ages and names. Why they, you know, fostered two Jewish children, I do not know.

Dame Stephanie Shirley8:26

There it was.

Dame Stephanie Shirley8:27

Let's have some music, what's next?

Dame Stephanie Shirley8:30

Well, my sister comforted me on the journey, and Renata had a very sweet voice, as I remember. She's dead now. And this is one of the songs that she used to sing to me.

Speaker 18:53

Yeah.

Speaker 18:55

Yeah.

Speaker 29:08

Christmas

Presenter9:15

Theresa Stitch Randall, singing Schubert's Heiden Roeselein, Little Wild Rose. So it was Auntie Ruby and Uncle Guy, and they were in Sutton Coalfield. You say it was remarkable that they took on these two little Jewish girls. What what makes you say that?

Dame Stephanie Shirley9:24

Yeah.

Dame Stephanie Shirley9:31

Well, they were very conventional. Uncle had started as an apprentice in a small engineering firm and finished up as managing director. Auntie had not worked after marriage and was really quite a flibbity gibbert. She had a wonderful sense of humour. We used to giggle away quite happily. But I mean Uncle was just gold dust, really. And I mean, you wouldn't have spoken English, do you no, no. We arrived stateless,'cause Hitler took the nationality away from Jewish families. Penniless, but um we arrived in the beginning of July. By September I was speaking enough to start at school.

Presenter10:06

Right. And you and your sister then, did did you talk to each other about what you made of all of this, or were you just busy

Presenter10:12

Kind of coping on your own with it.

Dame Stephanie Shirley10:15

Well, we shared a double bed, but I can't really remember talking about it at all. Uh that's how life is.

Presenter10:23

Uh

Presenter10:24

And your sister when was it that your sister left?

Dame Stephanie Shirley10:28

two years, something like that, that my mother then had somewhere where she could provide um a home for her and she left. But I stayed there much longer.

Presenter10:39

So your mother had fled and gone in she'd gone into domestic service.

Dame Stephanie Shirley10:42

Yes.

Presenter10:42

And did you have any contact with your parents whilst you were living in Southern COVID?

Dame Stephanie Shirley10:45

Yes, we knew that they were alive. Basically, we knew that they were there.

Dame Stephanie Shirley10:51

Auntie and Uncle knew that we were not available for adoption because our parents were not only there but wanted us.

Presenter10:56

But not

Dame Stephanie Shirley10:59

Long time ago.

Presenter11:00

Yes. And how are you doing in school? I think I might know the answer to this.

Dame Stephanie Shirley11:07

Ha ha.

Presenter11:07

Yeah.

Dame Stephanie Shirley11:08

I'm a swatty little st

Presenter11:09

You've said that so much of what happened to you in those early years has indelibly shaped the things that you were motivated to go on to do.

Dame Stephanie Shirley11:20

Yes, it's not all positive, Kirsty.

Dame Stephanie Shirley11:24

There's a sort of irrational survivor's guilt at having survived. And so for many, many years I suffered from uh depression um quite seriously at times. My depression really only lifted at about sixty and don't ask me why it went away. It wasn't anything to do with anything as far as Angsel see, but it eventually went.

Presenter11:46

And how does this survivor's guilt manifest itself?

Dame Stephanie Shirley11:52

Fear sadness at

Dame Stephanie Shirley11:54

of living.

Dame Stephanie Shirley11:56

Well, Churchill called it a black dog, but there's sort of heavy weight on your shoulders. To be depressed is a mental illness that really is very hard.

Presenter12:04

Does it visit you now, still or?

Dame Stephanie Shirley12:06

Yeah.

Presenter12:06

No.

Dame Stephanie Shirley12:07

Absolutely. Pray.

Presenter12:09

Yeah.

Dame Stephanie Shirley12:09

Let's have some Music. Tell me what's next.

Dame Stephanie Shirley12:12

Well, Uncle was in a sense the musical one, but Auntie was passionate about greed.

Dame Stephanie Shirley12:20

She introduced me to Greek and taught me in a sense sort of, you know, listen to the bells, listen what's happening here, and then sort of finding out the story. So she really has given me a love of Greek as well, and that remains.

Presenter13:30

Geza Arenda playing the opening of Grieg's piano concerto in A minor with the Berlin Philharmonic conducted by Raphael Kubalik. And you were saying, Steve Shirley, that you described your father. Well, you weren't officially adopted. They were foster parents, really. But they were very much parents to you as gold dust. You said he was gold dust, Uncle Guy. What was it about him?

Speaker 113:44

Uh

Dame Stephanie Shirley13:52

Loving

Dame Stephanie Shirley13:54

Unconditional acceptance, firm, good values. But yes, they brought me up well.

Presenter14:01

And you weren't adopted because, as you say, your parents survived the war.

Presenter14:06

Was it your understanding, as you got a bit older and you you did know more about life that you would be reunited with your parents?

Dame Stephanie Shirley14:12

It was always the expectation. There was one instance when the question of my returning to my mother came up and I upset her, I fear, and endeared myself to Auntie by sort of rushing, clinging to her around the waist and sort of saying, I want to stay with Auntie, I want to stay with Auntie, which is the sort of

Dame Stephanie Shirley14:37

tension that you have when you've got these split families, but basically both sides really tried to make it work. Was your mother there when that happened? She was around. Right. I mean, we didn't have phones in those days, but letters would be coming and she visited once or twice.

Presenter14:46

There's a

Presenter14:51

And you did go, I understand it, back to your father, as we say, had been a judge, and after the war ended, he took part in the Nuremberg trials.

Presenter15:00

Uh

Dame Stephanie Shirley15:00

Yes, he was with the American army serving as a very junior jurist and um I attended some of the Nuremberg trials. I was much too young to really r realize how historic it was. And um

Presenter15:00

Yes.

Dame Stephanie Shirley15:13

You look at those men whose behaviour you are hearing about in gruesome detail.

Dame Stephanie Shirley15:22

And cursed do they look like.

Dame Stephanie Shirley15:25

The local butcher, the man on the bus, absolutely fine, pleasant faces, even warm eyes. And you just cannot judge people by their opinion.

Speaker 215:26

Yeah.

Presenter15:35

Yeah.

Dame Stephanie Shirley15:36

Yeah. Yeah.

Presenter15:37

Do you think I mean, at the time, of course, your parents were only ever trying to do entirely the right thing by their daughters. It must looking back it it must have been terrifically difficult for them to say one of our girls has has built her own life and is starting out in England and is happy there and we must allow her to get on with that life.

Dame Stephanie Shirley15:58

There's a a book, Sophie's Choice, where mother has to choose between two children. And I think this is what happened with our family at one time.

Dame Stephanie Shirley16:08

And what do you think about that?

Dame Stephanie Shirley16:10

Yeah.

Presenter16:10

Life is

Dame Stephanie Shirley16:11

Tough.

Presenter16:11

Uh

Dame Stephanie Shirley16:11

Uh

Dame Stephanie Shirley16:12

We were very lucky.

Presenter16:14

Let's have some more music then. Tell us what we're going to hear next. We're on disc number four.

Presenter16:18

I met my husband

Dame Stephanie Shirley16:20

and at work. Uh we had an epic courtship because really I was still very disturbed of six years before we finally uh married. I was twenty six at that time. And he is

Speaker 116:29

Matt.

Dame Stephanie Shirley16:36

more musical, and he plays the piano.

Dame Stephanie Shirley16:38

And in fact, the first bit of furniture we had was a grand piano, two deck chairs and a bed. So, you know, that you can see where the balance is. I see where the priorities were. He's very shy, and he really plays for his own enjoyment. And when we were first married, he has stopped this now. I knew he would stop playing as I came into the house.

Presenter16:47

Uh

Speaker 216:47

I see where the priorities were.

Dame Stephanie Shirley16:59

And so I used to walk round the garden, even in the snow and rain. As soon as I opened the front door, he'd stop.

Dame Stephanie Shirley17:06

And this is one of the pieces that he plays.

Presenter18:05

The opening of Mozart's sonata in C, the Easy Sonata, played by Sviatoslav Richter, to remind you of your husband of

Dame Stephanie Shirley18:11

It doesn't play so quite as well.

Presenter18:12

But that was for Derek, and the memory of you traipsing round the garden and listening to him play. Let's talk then, Steve Shirley, about business. You set up your business

Dame Stephanie Shirley18:17

And that

Presenter18:23

In nineteen sixty two

Presenter18:25

What was the idea behind it?

Dame Stephanie Shirley18:28

As a mathematician I had moved into computer software, and software for me was like was like falling in love again, because suddenly overnight I realized that that's what I wanted to do, and it was the right thing for me. I did have some flair for it.

Dame Stephanie Shirley18:43

It hit the glass ceiling and I realized that there were a lot of women like me who had good mathematical training, were in the industry and were leaving never to return. And so it was a crusade for women, a company of women, a company for women.

Dame Stephanie Shirley19:05

an organization that allowed women to go on working in the software industry.

Presenter19:11

Well, let's not forget, of course, this was still a time when women, if they wanted to open up the a bank account, had to get the permission of their their husbands. I mean, did you have investors? Where did you get the capital to set up the banks?

Dame Stephanie Shirley19:19

Which has no capital at all. Indeed, my my letter heading Freelance Programmers was done in lower case because we have no capital. A nice little sort of

Presenter19:29

Yeah.

Dame Stephanie Shirley19:29

Uh Pop.

Presenter19:29

Uh

Dame Stephanie Shirley19:29

Mm-hmm.

Presenter19:30

I like your style. Of course, plenty people set up their own business, but there are very few people who are genuine entrepreneurs. You're one of the entrepreneurs. You're one of these people who has the foresight. You were going into an area, of course, that would change all of our not just our working lives, but our home lives, information, technology.

Dame Stephanie Shirley19:39

Mm.

Dame Stephanie Shirley19:46

But

Presenter19:46

Uh

Dame Stephanie Shirley19:46

tells you that that's what they saw. It's just a great big fib. We did not look ahead. It was just such a wonderful thing to do. It was great fun. It was very exciting.

Presenter19:57

And it was the next year, the year after setting up your business, that your son, uh, Giles, w was born? And was there easy pregnancy, easy births, everything was fine, was it?

Dame Stephanie Shirley20:08

No, it wasn't really very easy, but he arrived an absolutely beautiful baby.

Dame Stephanie Shirley20:14

I know every mother says that, but he he was lovely.

Dame Stephanie Shirley20:17

And then round about two and a half years, almost like the changeling in the fairy story, he turned from this being a very placid child with l you know, little speech, lovely little treble voice,

Dame Stephanie Shirley20:29

to a wild, unmanageable toddler.

Dame Stephanie Shirley20:33

who lost the little speech he had he never spoke again.

Dame Stephanie Shirley20:37

and was eventually diagnosed as autistic, which in those days was considered to be a very rare disorder. We were advised to put into an institution and start our family anew. But my husband and I are very different, but we we we're absolutely firm on on the the really important things in life and we're firm together on them. And we really didn't want to

Dame Stephanie Shirley21:03

Eh we di we decided not to have any more children, but also we were not able to put him aside and start anew, so we decided to concentrate on the child we'd got.

Dame Stephanie Shirley21:14

Of course I mourn the child that might have been, I mourn the grandchildren I haven't got. But, um no, it was right for us.

Presenter21:23

Let's take a break for some music. We are at disc number five. Tell us about this piece of music.

Presenter21:29

Yeah.

Dame Stephanie Shirley21:29

The music of the trout has always been a favourite one, and I do associate it very much with Giles. He required constant attention, and I mean constant. One of the few things where he was quiet and happy was playing with water. So he was a very clean child. He had three baths a day. But yes, he's a watery little child.

Dame Stephanie Shirley21:53

And Derek and I have always loved the Thames, and um it seemed to combine both those streams of my life.

Presenter23:03

That was the opening of the trout by Schubert, performed by Daniel Barrenboyn, Iksark Perlman, Pincha Suckermann, Jacqueline Dupre and Zubinmehta.

Presenter23:12

I have read, Steve Shirley, that at at one point the strain of caring for Giles was so great for you and Derek that you you considered a family suicide pact. Is that true?

Dame Stephanie Shirley23:22

Yeah.

Dame Stephanie Shirley23:23

That is certainly true. Um the fact that I'm here is because Derek really wouldn't or couldn't consider it, but it was serious for me and um

Presenter23:26

Really?

Dame Stephanie Shirley23:33

Anyway, you know, we didn't. Very glad we didn't. We did come through.

Presenter23:38

You did come through. You you've spoken about the difficulty that the six year courtship that you had with Derek and and the legacy of this um extraordinary childhood that although it had its secure parts, had been fundamentally disrupted. You had a breakdown and you were in hospital for months.

Dame Stephanie Shirley23:54

There was a breakdown. Both Giles and I finished up in hospital. I just was couldn't function at all. And basically as the main carer for Giles, he went into hospital. I came out of mine after a month and was back at work within the year, which for a workaholic is a very long break. But basically, Giles really finished up in hospital. By the age of thirteen, it was clear that he really could not live at home any more.

Dame Stephanie Shirley24:24

So he went into what's called a subnormality hospital.

Dame Stephanie Shirley24:28

If you've ever been in prison, Kirsty, they're a bit like that. Very, very plain, you know, concrete floors, plastic chairs, because there's always somebody who's destructive with paper or plastic or eats paint or whittles behind the the radiators. So it it's it's pretty basic. And Giles remained in his hospital for eleven years.

Speaker 124:40

Whittles behind this.

Presenter24:48

Giles died of an epileptic seizure, he was thirty-five.

Dame Stephanie Shirley24:52

Mm-hmm.

Presenter24:52

Yeah.

Presenter24:54

Many people who've been in your situation of having a profoundly disabled child talk about the conflict that they sometimes feel in those moments, that that when the child passes away, of course there is a a deep and sometimes never-ending sadness, but there's also a sense of being released from the enormous responsibility that you have as a carer.

Dame Stephanie Shirley25:15

Well, how insightful of you, Kirsty. I mean, I always refer to his death, and I don't think McDerek would really agree with me, but I refer to it as bittersweet. We were aging. In some ways, it was an enormous relief not to have the worry of what would happen to him after our death. He was by that time living within the Kingwood Trust, which is a charity we set up for Giles and now fifty other people like him. But we did actually get him living in the community again, going swimming, going shopping. And we visited him every weekend and in between sometimes, so that the the week before he died, for example, I I saw him four times so that he was very much part of our lives. And we miss him quite terribly. And we both grieve and grieved in a different way. And it's ten or so years now, and I don't dream about him all the time, but a couple of times a week still.

Presenter26:23

Let's have some music then. Uh tell me about your next piece of music, Steve.

Dame Stephanie Shirley26:29

I now work a great deal in my philanthropy with autism charities and it started with Kingwood which was an organisation for Giles and others like him and developed in a whole range of things including today's medical research into the causes of autism. One of the charities that I supported was the Wirral Autistic Society and there's a group of eight of them there including a music t tutor who formed a little band and I've heard them over the years performing in public and they get better every time I hear them. So I would like to hear the Beethovens as they call themselves from the Wirral Autistic Society. It really makes shows autism as what it can be and how you can value it.

Speaker 127:24

Good bad, sober's child.

Speaker 127:30

Goodbye.

Speaker 127:32

So by

Speaker 127:35

Goodbye.

Speaker 127:38

Clear the sky.

Speaker 127:41

Goodbye, goodbye.

Presenter27:46

Summer's Child, written and performed by The Beethovens from Whittle Autistic Society. Um You have said, Steve Shirley, pain allows you to grow, and it has sensitized me in ways that many people who have always been wealthy cannot imagine. Tell me about that.

Dame Stephanie Shirley28:04

I think wealthy people who have inherited or married money have a different approach to money. It's no use just wishing for a better world, but money.

Presenter28:15

Money.

Dame Stephanie Shirley28:16

Does allow you to

Presenter28:17

Let's talk about giving money away, shall we? I said in the introduction it was fifty million that you'd given away to date. Is that about right? Bit more. Bit more. Go on. Uh Uh

Dame Stephanie Shirley28:28

How much more?

Presenter28:28

I don't know what

Speaker 228:28

Yeah.

Presenter28:29

Uh

Dame Stephanie Shirley28:29

I think

Dame Stephanie Shirley28:31

Philanthropy is more about strategy and adding energy and drive and contacts to not just writing a check.

Dame Stephanie Shirley28:41

And

Dame Stephanie Shirley28:43

I don't want to live in penny myself ring fenced a little bit for make sure I don't uh have too tough uh an old age, um but basically it's all being given away.

Presenter28:52

Because you sold your company and you realized money from selling your company to a a much bigger uh concern a few years back. Th that's what gave you the cash to do this, wasn't it?

Dame Stephanie Shirley29:01

Well, I started giving away the company to the staff, and then they bought shares, and then the company floated, and it's really the only the company shares that have funded my philanthropy. That's where it all comes from.

Presenter29:17

You say you gave the company part of the company away to the staff. How much did did the staff make then?

Dame Stephanie Shirley29:24

Well, when the company floated, which was in'ninety three', there were seventy millionaires, many of them women millionaires, so a lot of them started to think in terms of giving back.

Presenter29:36

Where were you on the rich list? How high up did you get?

Dame Stephanie Shirley29:38

Well, I got into oh, I don't know.

Dame Stephanie Shirley29:42

I think we'll skip that.

Presenter29:44

Well, suffice to say you were three down from the Queen, which I think gives most people an idea of where you were sitting up.

Dame Stephanie Shirley29:47

Yeah.

Presenter29:50

I won't get too personal. I won't ask you how much money you've saved for yourself and and Derek. But what what sort of lifestyle do you have? Do you have a house abroad? Do you own a boat? Do you fly a private jet?

Dame Stephanie Shirley30:02

Well, I do have a driver who drives me around, which is a the height of luxury, and I do have a weekly massage without which I think I would just crumble completely. But apart from that, I am working. I haven't really moved into that retirement lifestyle, and I don't think I ever really want to. So we live very comfortably in a duplex flat with a bit of a shared garden, and if I stand tippy-toe in my study, I can just see the river.

Presenter30:34

Does Derek mind you giving all the money away?

Dame Stephanie Shirley30:37

Well, obviously, this is something that we discuss because we've always run everything jointly, and he supported me when we started because it was years before I earned any money.

Presenter30:44

Yeah.

Dame Stephanie Shirley30:47

He's very happy with it. Let's

Presenter30:49

Have some music then. Tell me about where disc number seven.

Dame Stephanie Shirley30:53

When Giles died, we had a lot of consideration about what music to play at his humanist funeral, and we did play some sad type music, but also decided to play the most beautiful thing that both of us agreed on.

Dame Stephanie Shirley31:14

And this is it.

Presenter32:16

Mark Andre Hemelin, playing the second movement of Haydn's piano sonata in E-flat major, played Steve Shelley because you you said it was the most beautiful piece of music that you and your husband could imagine. Can I hear it now, yes. Yes, it was played at uh Chelsea's funeral. Um so you're going to be on a desert island. You are an enormously self-reliant person. Will you be all right on the island on your own? Or is there a a threat that the black dog may come to visit?

Dame Stephanie Shirley32:25

But from use

Speaker 132:25

Uh

Dame Stephanie Shirley32:26

But I hear it now, yes.

Dame Stephanie Shirley32:42

Well, I have lived by myself, but after fifty years of marriage it it's going to be difficult to be by myself. I'm a survivor.

Dame Stephanie Shirley32:52

Uh

Presenter32:52

And I don't know if you ever do relax. Do do you and Derek have time to relax, time to do almost nothing together?

Dame Stephanie Shirley33:00

I like to work. I like to be actively engaged on worth while projects. I don't really look forward to holidays. I don't think on Monday mornings, Oh dear, it's Monday. I have a wonderful lifestyle. I behave like a working woman and tend to go on doing so.

Dame Stephanie Shirley33:17

What would you like the legacy of this working woman to be, then?

Dame Stephanie Shirley33:21

made a difference. I think that's what most philanthropists want to make a difference.

Dame Stephanie Shirley33:27

Worth saving?

Presenter33:28

Yeah.

Presenter33:30

Let's have your final disc then, tell me what it is.

Dame Stephanie Shirley33:33

Well my biggest philanthropic project in terms of both value I put thirty million into it and time it took me five years of my life was Prowers Court School, which is near Newbury, and it is a very special school, day and residential, for pupils with both autism and challenging behaviour. And as you might guess, it's sort of also modelled on my jars.

Dame Stephanie Shirley34:00

And it is sheer pleasure for me.

Dame Stephanie Shirley34:04

From the music point of view, I've discovered fairly recently that the 20th century composer Finzi.

Dame Stephanie Shirley34:12

had worked at Prise Court school when it had been a a preparatory school called King's Wood. And I like his music. The piece I've chosen I think is one of the most exciting and it will link me to Pricecourt.

Presenter35:30

That was the third of Finze's five bagatelles, performed by Robert Blaine with the Northern Symphonia conducted by Howard Griffiths. So, Steve, I'm going to give you the Bible and the complete works of Shakespeare, and you're allowed to choose a book. What's your book going to be?

Dame Stephanie Shirley35:45

Endless thinking about this and

Dame Stephanie Shirley35:49

I'm going to ask you for AA Milne's Winnie the Pooh.

Dame Stephanie Shirley35:55

And this has all of life in it, and I think will entertain, and I shall enjoy it. It's yours. And what about a luxury?

Dame Stephanie Shirley36:06

I'm going to luxuriate in a bee.

Dame Stephanie Shirley36:11

Contemporary

Dame Stephanie Shirley36:13

Stone statue by Henry Moore, one of his mother and child, please.

Presenter36:19

You don't mind which one?

Dame Stephanie Shirley36:19

The

Presenter36:20

Got it.

Dame Stephanie Shirley36:20

Yeah.

Presenter36:20

Yeah. Beautiful. Right. Okay, we'll find you one of those. And if you had to choose just one of the eight discs that you've played today, impossible, I know, but I'm going to make you do it. Which one would it be? It has to be the Celestial Mozart. Right, it's yours. Steve Shirley, Dame Stephanie Shirley, thank you very much for letting us hear your Desert Island discs.

Dame Stephanie Shirley36:32

Uh Right.

Dame Stephanie Shirley36:39

Great fun. Thank you very much.

Presenter37:26

You've been listening to a download from the BBC.

Presenter37:29

You'll find more information on the Radio 4 website bbc.co.uk/slash radio four