Anthony Grey

Speaker 10:01

BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, Podcasts. For rights' reasons, the music is shorter than on the original broadcast. The presenter is Roy Plumley. I hope you enjoy listening.

Anthony Grey0:20

Yes.

Anthony Grey0:30

Livien faith in the chances.

Anthony Grey0:39

Le Cur chandon despoiles.

Presenter0:49

Edith Pia

Presenter0:51

What your second is

Presenter0:53

My second one is uh Tchaikovsky's first piano concerta.

Presenter0:58

Why do you choose that?

Presenter1:00

Well, I like uh piano music of all kinds.

Presenter1:03

And this is a particularly

Presenter1:06

Beautiful.

Presenter1:07

Peace.

Presenter1:08

Who's the Sailorist?

Presenter1:09

Uh Richter.

Presenter1:11

And

Presenter1:12

With the Leningrad

Presenter1:14

Philharmonic.

Presenter2:03

The opening of Tchaikovsky's first piano concerto with Richter as soloist. Mr. Gray, what part of the country do you come from?

Presenter2:11

I was born in North.

Presenter2:12

Did you guys go there? Yes.

Presenter2:14

Was journalism your first job?

Presenter2:17

No, I I first worked with a well-known Norwich insurance company. How did that go? Well, I wasted two years of my teens there before going into the Air Force.

Presenter2:32

When did you start writing?

Presenter2:35

While I was in the Air Force, I um

Presenter2:37

It occurred to me that perhaps I was a short story writer, and I tried my hand at this.

Presenter2:44

And wrote one or two stories and sent them to various magazines, and they sent them back again with rejection slips, and eventually.

Presenter2:51

The one I thought was rather good got lost in the post, so I gave that idea up.

Presenter2:55

I thought well perhaps the

Presenter2:58

The safest and surest way of getting into print was to um

Presenter3:01

Become a newspaper man. Mm. So?

Presenter3:04

So I managed to get a

Presenter3:06

part-time job when I was still in the Air Force on a

Presenter3:09

The Glasgow weekly paper, the Bears Den and Mulgai Chronicle.

Presenter3:14

Had you at that time any particular

Presenter3:16

Speciality in view. Did you want to be a drama critic or leader writer or political correspondent or?

Presenter3:23

No, I was just happy to become a reporter and and and be mixed up in the

Presenter3:28

And the important things that are going on at a local level.

Speaker 23:31

Yeah.

Presenter3:31

So when you left the RAF?

Presenter3:33

I joined the Eastern Daily Press and I stayed with them for about four years in various parts of Norfolk and covered all kinds of stories from lifeboat rescues to industrial strikes and even show business in Great Yarmouth. I had a good experience of all kinds of reporting before.

Presenter3:53

Joining Reuters. In Fleet Street. In Fleet Street.

Presenter3:56

What was your first posting for Reuters?

Presenter3:59

I took up my first assignment in East Berlin in

Presenter4:04

1965. Yes. And from there I traveled to

Presenter4:09

various parts of Eastern Europe to Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria.

Presenter4:15

Poland, and also I was the accredited correspondent for Reuters in Czechoslovakia at that time. How long did this go on?

Presenter4:22

Uh almost two years.

Presenter4:25

And then you were posted to peek in.

Presenter4:27

Yes, I was assigned to Peking in March 1967 when the Cultural Revolution was hitting the world headlines. Yes. Did you speak any Chinese? No.

Presenter4:38

No, it's uh it's quite rare for uh an agency, a correspondent of any nationality to to speak a rare language like Chinese.

Speaker 14:43

Uh

Presenter4:44

You work through an interpreter always? Yes, all all foreign correspondents, all Western correspondents, worked through their interpreters in Peking at that time.

Speaker 14:46

Yeah.

Presenter4:52

Well, let's have your third record. What next?

Presenter4:55

Uh I'm very fond of the Beatles and uh

Presenter4:58

One of their numbers, which I'm particularly fond of from the LP Sergeant Pepper, is she's leaving home.

Anthony Grey5:10

We gave her most of our lives Ms. Levy sacrificed most of our lives

Anthony Grey5:21

We gave her everything the money could buy She's leaving home after living alive Her so many years

Presenter5:37

The Beatles

Presenter5:38

You were posted to begin in March 67. How many British journalists were there at that time?

Presenter5:44

Just myself. You were the only one.

Presenter5:47

Well two or three months later you were sent for and told you were going to be kept under house arrest.

Presenter5:52

This was in retaliation for the imprisonment of some Red China newspapermen in Hong Kong after some riots. Were you given this as a reason at the time?

Presenter6:00

Yes, it was put to me that because of the fascist atrocities committed by the British authorities in Hong Kong, that action was being taken against me. Yes, there was no charge made against you personally. No, I was simply told that my freedom of movement was being restricted.

Presenter6:15

For the first few weeks, things were worrying, but not too bad. You were given the run of your house, your own house. That's right. Then there was a sudden invasion by a couple of hundred Red Guards who beat you up and.

Presenter6:26

made a mess of the house and hanged your cat.

Presenter6:29

Do you think this?

Presenter6:31

Was officially inspired, or was it a bit of mob hysteria on the part of the guards?

Presenter6:36

No, I think it had uh official approval. There were interpreters and photographers present and the public security bureau men or policemen as we would call them were also present during the

Presenter6:47

Action against me.

Presenter6:49

After that there was no more violence, just varying degrees of

Presenter6:53

Discomfort and humiliation. That's right.

Presenter6:57

Was there any rapport at all, any conversation between you and the gods?

Presenter7:02

None at all. They uh treated me with contempt and hostility and their eyes always showed their

Presenter7:07

What I suppose they imagined was their class hatred for me as a member of the bourgeois society of the West. What happened to your household stir?

Presenter7:17

Well, they continued to work in the house, but under the instructions of the public security people. Yes, they prepared your food. Yeah.

Presenter7:25

Did you continue to pair them?

Presenter7:27

Yes, I was allowed to have money from the bank to pay their wages. So you were paying for your imprisonment? Yes, it was in fact I was a

Presenter7:37

Uh a prisoner in a one man prison and paying expenses.

Presenter7:41

When you had twenty-six months of this, still with no charges brought against you, you must have felt very abandoned and rejected.

Presenter7:50

Yes, I think probably one would have to be a saint, uh, not in these conditions to feel abandoned.

Presenter7:57

And the forgotten man.

Presenter7:59

I felt resentful against everybody in the world being so alone.

Presenter8:03

William certainly had a great welcome home.

Presenter8:06

I've been quite overwhelmed by the welcome I've had. I've had many, many letters from people in many countries welcoming me home, expressing sympathy and concern.

Presenter8:16

And um many of them I I am unable to thank because they haven't given me their names and addresses in

Presenter8:22

But they should know that I am really very grateful to one and all of them for their help and sympathy which they've given to me.

Presenter8:29

Let's have your four three accordance degree.

Presenter8:32

The fourth record is um

Presenter8:34

Perhaps a surprising choice. The East is red. This is

Presenter8:39

I

Presenter8:41

The anthem really of the Cultural Revolution. And this woke me every morning, booming out across the rooftops of Peking over loudspeakers. But nevertheless, despite this rather unpleasant aspect of it, I like the melody. It's rather like a land of hope and glory type of melody. And it's an old Shancy folk song which has been developed by the communists.

Presenter9:04

And um I quite like to hear it now in circumstances which I can appreciate the music rather than the ideological.

Presenter9:10

Thing behind it. And the whole city is woken by this music. Indeed, the whole country.

Presenter10:08

The East is red.

Presenter10:11

Now

Presenter10:12

Solitude.

Presenter10:14

Probably the worst thing was that you couldn't put a term to it, you couldn't cross the dazor.

Presenter10:20

Yes, well each day the only job I had to do really was to add one to yesterday's date, to bring myself up to date.

Speaker 110:26

Yeah.

Presenter10:28

And there was, of course, always the nagging anxiety there might be a repeat of the Red Guards incident or some even worse violence.

Presenter10:35

Yes, I had no experience or precedent to

Presenter10:39

On which to base my thoughts or my actions in enduring this, that's true.

Presenter10:45

During the periods when you weren't allowed books, how did you occupy your mind?

Presenter10:50

I managed to write one or two short stories.

Presenter10:53

And amused myself.

Presenter10:56

devising the plots and so on while while walking in the courtyard, this kind of thing. I talk to myself quite a lot in various accents. I like mimicry and

Presenter11:04

I did this. In the last four months of your imprisonment, you were allowed a radio. What stations could you hear?

Presenter11:10

When I listened almost every evening to the BBC World Service.

Presenter11:15

And you could hear news about the negotiations to free you. Yes, I heard my name frequently. I also heard Desert Island Discs. Did you? You heard this program? Yes, I heard this program.

Presenter11:25

And in fact

Presenter11:27

If I may say, my rather wry sense of humour was put to work on it one evening when I was listening to it, and I didn't like the selection of records very much.

Speaker 111:36

Yeah.

Presenter11:37

I thought they were really um

Presenter11:40

Not very good at all. Well, don't blame us. We don't choose the discs. And I renamed the program Donatitis Discs because I felt that here was a selection of discs I wouldn't touch with a bar detrol. Yeah.

Presenter11:55

But I do like the programme. Thank you very much.

Presenter11:58

Well, what's your next Dermatitis disc? My next record is by Peter Cook and Dudley Moore, The Art Gallery.

Speaker 212:07

Oh Lord, there you are. What do you mean? Well, I'm looking at the passing out of the moneylenders.

Speaker 212:14

I don't care about it. I've been looking for you for the last half hour. We said we'd meet in front of the Flemish Masters. No, we didn't, Dad. We never said anything of the sort. When I last saw you, you were in the Pissarro, weren't you? Well, I said I'd meet outside the abstracts. We'd go through the Albraco, up the Manheight, and I'd see you in front of the Vladimir Rubins.

Speaker 112:20

Yeah.

Presenter12:36

Pete and Dodd.

Presenter12:38

What are the principal problems of readjustment to ordinary life?

Presenter12:44

It's difficult to pick out any one aspect.

Presenter12:48

The real problem is adjustment to everything. After being alone for two years doing nothing every day, the problem is adjusting to.

Presenter12:55

A full, busy, varied, and happy life again. Yes. Do you look back with much bitterness on your experiences?

Presenter13:03

It was a wretched experience, but uh

Presenter13:06

I'm an optimistic person and I feel there's no point in containing and nursing a bitterness.

Presenter13:14

recrimination about about my experiences.

Presenter13:17

Do you still have your early?

Presenter13:19

Ambitions of Fiction, you you wrote these short stories.

Presenter13:22

While you were in Peking

Presenter13:24

Yes, I've I've written some and and brought them home and uh

Presenter13:28

I will perhaps uh go back to trying the magazines again and see if I can get some more rejections.

Presenter13:34

That's how I got six.

Presenter13:36

Um

Presenter13:38

Number six, um Elgar's Enigma Variations.

Presenter13:42

The Nimrod variation. Why?

Presenter13:45

It's just very beautiful.

Presenter14:48

Nimrod from Elgar's Enigma Variations, Sir John Barbirolli conducting the Philharmonia Orchestra.

Presenter14:54

Mr. Gray, we know that you could triumph over the mental problems of being

Presenter14:58

A desert island coast where you've already fought that battle.

Presenter15:01

How well could you resolve the practical problems? Could you look after yourself?

Presenter15:06

I suppose if I had to, I would, yes.

Presenter15:09

Would you try to escape?

Presenter15:11

That's hard to say until I was actually there. Do you know anything about navigation? Do you like...

Presenter15:16

Small boat? No. No.

Presenter15:18

I'm a landlubber. You better stay where you are. Yes, I remember thinking in Peking after several months of my house arrest of a

Presenter15:27

A rather uh perhaps a sick little joke against myself, really.

Presenter15:31

I thought to myself, I didn't like this house very much when I came here, but

Presenter15:36

Since then I have become rather attached to it.

Presenter15:39

And I felt this was the kind of thing that the castaway might find himself saying to himself.

Presenter15:45

Let's have record number seven.

Presenter15:48

Number seven is uh handles uh

Presenter15:51

Concerto Grosso in C.

Presenter16:46

The closing passage of Handel's concerto glosso in C major Alexander's Feast.

Presenter16:51

Granville Jones directing Fellow Musica of London.

Presenter16:54

And what's your last disc?

Presenter16:56

My last uh choice is

Presenter16:59

one record which is new to me and which I heard

Presenter17:02

in the last four months of having my radio set.

Presenter17:05

Frank Sinatra's My Way.

Presenter17:08

I've always liked Frank Sinatra very much.

Presenter17:11

And this song I found very moving, particularly in my

Presenter17:14

Isolated condition.

Anthony Grey17:17

My bit of

Anthony Grey17:19

More than I could choose.

Anthony Grey17:23

But through it all

Anthony Grey17:26

When there was doubt

Anthony Grey17:29

I ate it up and spit it out.

Anthony Grey17:36

I raised it all.

Anthony Grey17:39

And I stood tall.

Anthony Grey17:42

And did it more?

Presenter17:47

Frank Sinatra My Way

Presenter17:50

If you would take just one disc out of the eight you've chosen, which would it be?

Presenter17:54

I think this question is one of the most unfair that you put to your castaways, having restricted them to eight, to restrict them then to one. But I think probably if I had to choose, I would choose the handle because it was very soothing.

Presenter18:06

And one luxury to take with you.

Presenter18:10

Well, I don't know whether you're going to allow me this, but I want to take with me the

Presenter18:14

bookstall on Victoria Station with all its newspapers and magazines.

Presenter18:20

Well

Presenter18:21

I don't think I can refuse you. You'll have to promise not to live in it. I promise not to live in it. All right.

Presenter18:26

And one book, apart from the Bible and Shakespeare, one book that isn't on the bookstore at Victoria Station.

Presenter18:33

I think I'd take a good dictionary.

Presenter18:35

I found that my dictionary in Peking was of great use to me, both when I was reading and also for compiling crosswords. It gave me a lot of fun in punning, which is one of my faults.

Presenter18:47

And thank you, Anthony Gray, for letting us hear your Desert Island Disc.

Presenter18:52

Godby everyone.