Nemone Lethbridge

Speaker 30:01

BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, Podcasts.

Presenter0:05

Hello, I'm Lauren Laverne and this is the Desert Island Discs podcast. Every week I ask my guests to choose the eight tracks, book and luxury they'd want to take with them if they were castaway to a desert island. And, for rights reasons, the music is shorter than the original broadcast. I hope you enjoy listening.

Presenter0:43

My castaway this week is the barrister and writer Nemonie Lethbridge. She was called to the bar in the mid-1950s when she was one of very few female barristers in London. At her chambers, she was locked out, literally and metaphorically, by her colleagues. She was banned from using the toilets and told that she'd better find her own cases, since they wouldn't be passing any briefs her way. Undeterred, she found herself in London's East End, representing two brothers who, as she puts it, got nicked every Friday night. They were the Cray twins, and defending them helped make her name.

Presenter1:17

Her legal career was just taking off when her marriage derailed it. Her husband was a talented playwright, but he had a criminal history. They married in secret, but when news of their union hit the press she was sacked. It was nearly two decades before she would practise law again.

Presenter1:33

She used her creativity to make ends meet, writing, living abroad, and raising two sons. Then in 1981, she found her way back. She joined a new chambers and later set up a law centre near her London home, giving free advice to those in need every weekend. They still have more people coming in than they can help. At 92, she's still working and says, I've had a very interesting life. If I had just gone along the conventional path, it would have been quite dull. Nemony Lethbridge, welcome to Desert Island Discs. Hello. We're so thrilled to have you on the programme today and an interesting life. You're a mistress of understatement. Nemony, lots to talk about today. Now, I know that you're currently at home due to a fall, but you are still working for your pro bono law centre. What sorts of cases do you take on? We do everything. When we started, we thought we'd just do.

Presenter2:27

things like housing for local people. But we ended up with all sorts of difficult cases. We dealing with quite a lot of human trafficking, that sort of thing.

Nemone Lethbridge2:39

That's

Presenter2:40

It's really whatever doesn't qualify for legal aid. And that now is most criminal cases and things like arranged marriages that don't work. I can see why you want to keep working then. I mean, the human cost of all that and the people that you meet, they really need you.

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It's so interesting and certain things make you so angry. You've just got to keep on bashing away.

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So you've still got that fire in your belly. That's good to hear. When you started out, Nemine, you were one of just a handful of women practising law. What actually inspired you to take it up as a career? I thought when I was at school

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that I'd like to go into politics. And I thought this was a good route in. And I've always been very, very political. Back then I think you wanted to be the first Communist Prime Minister of Britain, didn't you? That's right. That's right.

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Your work is honoured by something called the Lethbridge White Gloves tradition. It was started by a KC called Katie Gollop. Tell me about it.

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Oh, that's quite funny, Katie Gull.

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is a wonderful girl. She's a king's counsel now.

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And she was very amused when I told her a story. When I was a pupil barrister, which is the equivalent of an apprentice, my pupil master was a very alarming man.

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who'd been one of the prosecuting counsel at Nuremberg.

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and knew my father, who was at that time head of intelligence in

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For the British Army of the Rhine.

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Mm.

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And he took me out reluctantly. He was.

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Very strict.

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about how I dressed, how I behaved.

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and I could see him cringe with embarrassment.

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when he took me to the old bailey.

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which he had to do all the time.

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That

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Conservative was

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The least of words.

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to use when one speaks about the dress code.

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I'm in evil.

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Always.

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Striped trousers, black coat, waistcoat, bowler hat, rolled umbrella.

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and one day I turned up at the old bailey.

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wearing a pair of beautiful kid gloves, which my mother had given me for Christmas, and they were pink, and he just looked at my hands and he said, Pink glove at the old bailiff.

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So I reluctantly I took them off and got a pair of plain black ones.

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Vokati was very amused by this.

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At least are all

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She got

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A pair of

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Beautiful white lead gloves.

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Which

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are presented every year.

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to one of the women who's just taken silk. That's become a king's or queen's counsel.

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And they're called after this silly story.

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They're known as the Lethbridge Gloves.

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and I present them to the lucky recipient.

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I love that they've become a symbol of your endorsement and this this wonderful trailblazing career that you started. Nemony, I can't wait to hear your discs today. I mean, what a life you've got to put into eight records. It was terribly difficult and to get them down to eight.

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was agonizing.

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And the first one I chose

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Is Paul Robeson the famous American bass baritone singing When Israel Was in Egypt land?

Nemone Lethbridge6:47

Yeah.

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Because to me it represents rebellion and history. And Paul Robeson, of course, has such a superb voice. And this is a a brilliant song.

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Uh

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Moses wait dawn in Egypt's land, tell

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The fail.

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Yeah.

Nemone Lethbridge7:21

Uh

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Yeah.

Nemone Lethbridge7:22

Bet ma

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I

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Great.

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People

Nemone Lethbridge7:26

Uh

Speaker 37:26

Uh

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Paul Robeson, Go Down Moses.

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Nemony Lethbridge, you've described your mother Katherine, who went by the name Nikki, as having quite a streak of wildness, and apparently your parents' honeymoon was a bit of an adventure. What happened exactly?

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Oh, they got managed, Shimla.

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as it's called now, in northern India, where the family had a house called Armadale Cottage, and after they got married in Holy Trinity Church, Shimla, they walked into bitter

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How long did that take? Six weeks there and back. So they sound very intrepid, adventurous. Yes, they love the Himalayas, loved mountaineering. And you were born over there in 1932. You were born in Quetta, modern-day Pakistan, then pre-partition India. I know that you have a remarkable memory. Do you remember your early life there?

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Oh yes. I can remember back to ten months when we were stationed in Chakrata in the Himalayas. So you must have been under a year old. What do you remember about it? I remember

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the Himalayas in the monsoon, the rain, the mountains, the purple rhododendrons.

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It's that colour, and I can remember being in my pram.

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And the feeling when it went

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Over bump.

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and I'm bumped to the bottom of the bag.

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A pram may be not that practical for that kind of landscape. No, it is really made for Kensington gardens.

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Your father was in the British Army. He had a very distinguished career. As a younger man, he served in both World Wars. I think he spent three years in the trenches, which must have been a formative experience. Did he talk to you about that? He found it difficult, but I think it was pretty appalling. He went to war straight from school, and his mother gave him a box of a thousand cigarettes to see him off.

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I'm having survived two world wars and the Third Afghan War and civilian life in Germany preparing me

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Nuremberg trials. It was cigarettes that killed him.

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He was on at Mons.

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Eep.

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In some

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And then he went back to

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Join his regiment.

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He was in the Bengal Zappas in India.

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And he was shipwrecked on the way back and

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Landed up on Walter. Your father spent his life in the army, and his career meant that your family moved around quite a lot. Where was home for you as a young girl? Where did you consider home?

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Well, first of all, in India, then spent a short time in London. Then he sent us to Kent at the beginning of the war. This is the Second World War. And we spent a year there, we were there, through the Battle of Britain. And because we were in a village on the North Downs called Harritam, we were directly under the route of the Battle of Britain. And Peter, my little brother, and I used to go out and watch the fighters.

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Fighting overhead.

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And my mother never tried to stop us. She just said off you go. Be back in time for tea.

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And if the fight gets a bit close, find a nice dry ditch and lie down in it until the all clear goes.

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That's that adventurous streak of hers coming out again. She was a bit partially.

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And then my father thought this gets a bit rough we'll go further from London. So he sent us down to a village in Somerset, near Bristol, called Norton Maraward, and we rented a house there.

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The winter of nineteen forty to forty one, we spent every night in the cellar.

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So we slept in the cellar. Were you frightened? No, Peter and I were we were very young. I mean, I was seven when the war broke out. We thought this was splendid.

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Because we are allowed to break all the rules we stayed up all night. We had bread and cheese in the cellar at two o'clock in the morning, and my mother spent the whole night reading us Peter Rabbit.

Nemone Lethbridge12:12

Mm.

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Then in the morning Peter and I would go out into the garden with our little string bags and pick up the pieces of shrapnel and things that had fallen down in the blitz.

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I haven't

Nemone Lethbridge12:34

Uh

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Take them home, and one night we picked up one morning, we picked up an unexploded incendiary bomb.

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And we took it and put it in our toy box. How long was it there? It was there for three or four days. And then my mother found it to her horror. What did she do with it? She put it in a bucket of sand. It's time for some more music. Your second choice today. What are we going to hear, and why are you taking this disc to the island with you? It's O Camera Come Emanuel, which is usually sung as a Christmas carol.

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And it is sublimely beautiful, I think.

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And it reminds me.

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of those Christmases during the war. It's played on the radio, or the wireless we called it in those days, every Christmas.

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It was very austere.

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existence that I

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There was no heat at all above stairs, and downstairs

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The only day on which we had a fire before lunch, and that was Christmas Day. And I just remember the magic of those Christmases, with a burning wood fire in the drawing room. Well, it was a mixture of wood and peat, no coal.

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And this wonderful music.

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O coming man, O earth, redeem thy curtain.

Nemone Lethbridge14:13

I can't believe Israel pagins all exactly.

Speaker 214:24

Far from the face of God's desire.

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Rejoice, rejoice in matter.

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Heaven glory shall come to thee.

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Uh

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Lord Lee is made.

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O Como Com Emmanuel, sung by the choir of King's College, Cambridge. Nemelie Lethbridge, you were sent away to boarding school when you were just nine years old, which seems very young. How did you cope with leaving your family behind?

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Hated it.

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Absolutely hated it, and I was miserable at that school. Now I can see it I never said at the time.

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Headmaster was paedophile. But I never told anybody.

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I had a great friend there, and she used to say, What's he trying to do? So she was being abused as well, the room. Yes. We used to be called in once a week.

Nemone Lethbridge15:22

Yeah.

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for something that he called the private interview.

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made to sit on his knee. And I and my friend Gillion talked about this and Gillian said, I tell you what he's trying to do. He's trying to find out how quickly you can close

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Your ribs.

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so that he can get at your heart.

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That must have been terrifying, especially when separated from your family. Could you talk to anyone else about it? No. No.

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And what did it do to you to carry that with you? Did it ignite a sense of injustice? Were you questioning authority? I mean, it must have been awful. Anger.

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Anger, but also shame.

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You know, that's the odd thing. You feel it's your fault.

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When you became a barrister, obviously you must have faced many paedophiles in court. You must have seen many cases of child abuse. Did you ever connect that with what you'd been through? Oh yes. I didn't much like them.

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But when you're at the bar, when you're a defence barrister, the rule is that you're like a black taxi. If your flag is up and you're available, you have to take the case. You don't have to like your clients.

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Nemini, you said you had that sense of anger and actually you described anger at the beginning, you know, as still being a driving force within you. Yes. Do you think that in a way that was part of your choice of career, part of what led you to work in the law, to gravitate towards the justice system?

Nemone Lethbridge17:03

Have you said

Presenter17:06

Very much.

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Nemini, your father was posted to Germany just after the end of the Second World War, and he was Chief of Intelligence for the British Army of the Rhine, so leading the denatification efforts there. In 1946, prior to its destruction, he actually took you and your brother down to the Führerbunker to see where Hitler and Goebbels spent their final days. What do you remember about them?

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He took us up to Berlin.

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He said I was spending too much time sitting in our house in Western Germany reading the Bronces.

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He said, I didn't bring you to Germany to read the Brontes. I wanted to teach you a bit of history. And at that time my mother was with us and my little sister, who is two, I about to. And she said, This isn't a suitable place for children. And my father just said, I'm sorry, I think Nemone and Peter should get educated. So she said, Well, I'm sorry, I'm going to wait outside.

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He managed to get the keys.

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And for your hand, child.

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steps. It is something like a cellar.

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It was down m many steps we went, and there were different rooms on each of them, and he got the keys and opened them. And most of them were of no interest. They were empty or had been ransacked. The further down we went, the more significant they became.

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And then we came to one room.

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which had nothing in it except a sofa.

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which was covered in some satin material. I think it was orange or yellow. It had a terrible big brown stain.

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I felt just a little Okay, I think we've seen enough.

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It must have stayed with you, that experience. Have you thought about it a lot over the years? Never lost it. Even if you wanted to, you couldn't forget things like that. And when I got back to school, by this time I was at Tudor Hall, which is the equivalent of a secondary school. And the first day back...

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Uh

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We used to eat our meals with the staff.

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We were supposed to learn Diliparte manners by sitting next to a nice civilised teacher, and I was put down to sit next to the headmistress, who is a very larbing lady.

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And she said to me, Now, Nemony, I want you to tell me all about Germany. And I found that very difficult.

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Nemony, let's take a moment for some music, your third track today. What are we going to hear next and why?

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Oh, we get a bit cheerful now.

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I mentioned the alarming headmistress.

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Well, she was actually a very, very accomplished musician. She had a

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tremendous fondness for English folk music. We learnt a lot of s the sort of songs that were being discovered at that time in rural communities.

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by people like Ford Williams and Cecil Sharp.

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And they're all beautiful.

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But the song I chose, just because I think it's so beautiful, is Simon and Garfunkel.

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Singing Scarborough Fair

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Tell her to make me a camel rick shirt of deep forest green Parsley, sage, rosemary and lost me and snow crystal

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Without no sleep nor my soul goes the child.

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When she are true love of Smith

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Simon and Garfunkel, and Scarborough Fair.

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So Nemonie, you moved to a new school, which I'm very happy to say you loved, and then after that you went on to Oxford and studied law. Now you were one of only two women on that course, so you must have stuck out. How were you treated? I went to Somerville College and there was no law tutor at that college because Audrey, my friend and I, was sent out to a man's college.

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And the man's college was Keble.

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And our tutor was a man called mister Davidge.

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He thought that Audrey, my friend and I,

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We're just trying to joke.

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He said the idea of you reading Lord going to the bar is absolutely ludicrous.

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Neither view is clever to start with, and anyway it's totally unsuitable for girls.

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And you commit matrimony anyway.

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How did you respond to that? How did you react? We didn't know whether to laugh or cry. You had a lot of ambition and a certain amount of fearlessness at this point, not just taking on the course, but also co-founding a magazine during your time at Oxford. It was called Kuth. What was the idea behind it? We wanted to.

Nemone Lethbridge22:37

What was the idea behind?

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found a glossy magazine, and we got Cecil Beaton to do the cover. I wrote to Evelyn Moore.

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Who was a great hero of mine at that time? It was the top of the pops when it came to novels, was Brideshead, and everybody at Oxford had read Brideshead at that time. Even more wrote back to me, obviously turning me down, but saying,

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When you reach my great age, you realize the enormity of your suggestion.

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That's quite a thought to leave you with, isn't it? To cogitate upon. Yes.

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Couth lasted exactly three issues, and then we went broke.

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Nemony, it's time for your fourth disc today. Tell us about the next piece that we're going to hear.

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relates to a time when I'd come down from Oxford.

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And I was sharing a a house in London with other s girls from Somerville. There were four basic tenants, and then other girls came and went. One of the girls

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who'd been at summer phone. She's one of my

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Best friends

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There was a girl called Xanthi Wakefield. She was achingly clever. She had read classics and had got a double first. And Xanthe was a wild spirit. But she was so clever that after she'd come down, she took the Farad Office exam, which has always been a very, very difficult exam to pass. And she came top, of course.

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And she was given a a place in the Foreign Office, but on a probationary basis, which is the way it's done.

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But she wasn't very popular there because she used to do cheeky things like correct ambassador syntax and

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That sort of thing.

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Now add to chime.

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There was a

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Japan America is still alive.

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Amazingly, Cook Tom Leara, who was an American professor.

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But he also used to write and sing very satirical political songs. But they were a bit subversive and they were actually banned in this country. And we ha wanted to have them. And we couldn't buy them.

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So Xanthi managed to get a load of them sent across in the diplomatic bag. But her employers found out about this, and she was sacked from the the Foreign Office.

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Tom the Era's songs were very anti-Republican.

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are very critical of the governance of the southern states, and this is one of them.

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Would you mind introducing it for us? Give us the title, Nemone.

Nemone Lethbridge26:00

That's the title number.

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Yes, I Wanna Go Back to Dixie, sung by Professor Tom Leara.

Presenter26:08

And I should say, as Nemini mentioned, this satirical song was written by Tom Lehrer in the nineteen fifties, sending up racist attitudes, but listeners might find some of the lyrics racially insensitive.

Nemone Lethbridge26:21

Back to Dixie. Take me back to dear old Dixie, that's

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It's the only little old place for little old me.

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Old times they are not forgotten, Whopping slaves and selling cotton, And waiting for the Robert E. Lee, It was never there on time.

Nemone Lethbridge26:38

I'll go back to the Suane where Polygra makes you scrawny and the honeysuckle clutters up the vine.

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Uh

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I really am.

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Tom Lara, I want to go back to Dixie.

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You were called to the bar in nineteen fifty six. Now, ironically, there was scant equality for women within the justice system back then. What kind of discrimination did you face?

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Tenancy in Chambers.

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The first thing they did was to put a Yay lock on the lavatory.

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So that I couldn't use the lavatory. So all the men had a key, but you didn't? Yes. They had one cut for every member, and I was told to go up the road to

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Fleet Street and used the Cardoma. What was the Cardoma? A cafe. And what was the idea of that? Was that just that it was an abomination to Sheraloo? Yes. But I was also told that I couldn't have access to the chambers work. Work is sent to chambers by solicitors. And our chief source of work in my chambers was Scotland Yard. This was before the CPS was set up.

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And the Scotland Yard solicitor who had

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All the work in his gift.

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Just didn't like women.

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And he wouldn't send any work.

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To wait in the

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Greatest source of work in Three Hare Court, which is my chambers, was prosecution work for Scotland Yard.

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And so there was no work for me.

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and I was told I'd have to look.

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For my own.

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I never

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Two sources. One was a private solicitor who would

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Dane to send some work to women, and the other was the dock brief.

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And the dog brief, it's a very strange archaic system.

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That

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Defendants who were unrepresented in criminal cases.

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were brought up into court on the first day of the session.

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And they were told to look at the row of unemployed barristers at the bottom of the court.

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And choose one. They would do that. They'd say, a la vime, a la ve.

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So sometimes who got chosen?

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Were there many other female barristers, and if so, did you stick together?

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Now they're plenty. I mean it it became

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More and more.

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But it took

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the hell of a long time. And you think that uh

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misses Pankhurst, Sylvia Pankhurst, they were barristers, but they could never

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Yet

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Interchambers.

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No, you know, there are lots of girls. Nemony, let's hear your next piece of music. What have you gone for? Oh, I went f yes, for the final.

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Duet from the Marriage of Figaro.

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I chose this.

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Because it's the duet between Susannah.

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and the Countess, when they have outwitted the lecturer's Count. And so this is a triumphant feminist aria. That's why I love it.

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Set what the peace of the world.

Speaker 230:37

Mayfold Fast Los Angeles.

Speaker 330:47

God will speak and go.

Speaker 230:52

Christos Peter.

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The Solaria duet from Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro, sung by Edith Mathis and Gunda Le Janowitz, with the Deutsche Opera Berlin Orchestra conducted by Karl Bohm.

Presenter31:27

So, Nemonie, as I mentioned in your introduction, you represented the Cray twins. What do you remember about your first meeting with them? I was sent to defend them.

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Because they

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Represented

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you know, on a permanent basis, on a retainer by a Jewish firm of solicitors called Lincoln and Lincoln. And of course, being Jewish Orthodox, they couldn't go to court on Saturday, because normally the senior partner, Ellis Lincoln,

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Would do his own advocacy. But he couldn't go to court on Saturday.

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Now they were kept on getting nicked on Friday evening, so they would appear at Thames Magistrates' Court on Saturday morning.

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I went down and they were already in a cell at Arbor Square, which was the magistrates' court for Whitechapel in that area. And the court when I arrived, it was absolutely packed.

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And there was a little lady with a basket.

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of dirty laundry, a basket on wheels, and

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Various

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rather frightening looking men, and the little lady came up to me and said,

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I'm a mum.

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They're innocent. They're definitely innocent.

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and the man walking at her side.

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Save

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I'm Brother Charlie.

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They're innocent, they're definitely innocent.

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Anyway, I was taken into a cell.

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And there were the the twins. They were absolutely immaculate and freshly shaved.

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Well brilli creamed, nice clean shirts, well pressed suits. Anyway, we went into court after a large or two.

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And um magistrates at morning, boys.

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It was quite obvious he knew them. They said morning, sir. They were remarded to another day to retra and Mr. Lincoln would represent them. People were so scared, I mean, justifiably terrified of the craze. I wonder about your interactions with them. Were you ever intimidated by them? Not in the least.

Presenter33:59

They were always as a good as gold, as far as I was concerned, and very polite, very correct. They were later convicted of murder, sentenced to life imprisonment. I mean, how do you square that circle with the the interactions that that you had personally with them?

Presenter34:16

It's difficult, isn't it? They were undoubtedly guilty.

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of that crimes.

Presenter34:23

Yes, I mean I

Presenter34:25

defended them a number of times.

Presenter34:28

and they recommended me to their mates.

Presenter34:32

and to their associates.

Presenter34:35

And

Presenter34:37

They sent me a lot of very good work.

Presenter34:40

It was a very strange relation to Ronny.

Presenter34:45

kept in touch with me right up to the time of his death.

Presenter34:49

Now he went to Broadmoor.

Presenter34:52

Because he he was a paranoid schizophrenic.

Presenter34:57

And

Presenter34:58

But he was always so sweet.

Presenter35:01

Nemini, I want to ask you about your husband, Jimmy O'Connor. You married him secretly in 1959. Jimmy was a writer, but he also had a criminal past. He'd grown up very poor and been a thief, and he'd also served time in prison for a murder which he always maintained, and you maintain that he didn't commit. Given your legal career, did you have any qualms about getting together? Oh, gosh, yes. I knew that it would probably be the end of my career at the bar. I was a bit wild, a bit incautious.

Presenter35:36

But one of my great crusades.

Presenter35:40

was against the death penalty.

Presenter35:43

And I thought that it would really help. Jimmy had been sentenced to death, hadn't he? But the sentence was commuted. Yes.

Nemone Lethbridge35:47

Yes.

Presenter35:51

But they still let him do eleven years. How did your parents react when you told them that you were married?

Presenter35:58

I didn't dare tell him for three years.

Presenter36:01

And always said they were upset.

Presenter36:04

But in the end

Presenter36:06

I took him down to Somerset to meet them.

Presenter36:11

and they got on very well.

Presenter36:13

One of the things a

Presenter36:15

I couldn't

Presenter36:16

talk to them about when we very fast we

Presenter36:20

is being torpedoed.

Presenter36:22

Which both of them were. The circumstances were not dissimilar. And I thought, isn't this odd?

Speaker 236:27

Hmm.

Nemone Lethbridge36:28

Yeah.

Presenter36:31

They both should have been.

Presenter36:33

Torpedoed

Presenter36:35

During the war.

Presenter36:37

Did they talk about it together?

Presenter36:41

They understood each other.

Presenter36:44

Immediately.

Presenter36:46

Nemony, your marriage became public when you and Jimmy were pictured together in a newspaper at your sister's wedding, and this meant that you were asked to leave your chambers. Yes. How did you react to that news?

Nemone Lethbridge36:53

Yeah.

Presenter37:00

I was very s upset.

Presenter37:04

'Cause I loved the bar.

Presenter37:07

Nemini, I want to find out what happened next, but first I'd love to hear your next disc if you wouldn't mind. Tell me about it. Number six.

Presenter37:14

It's strosetostroma.

Presenter37:18

Which is a song in Greek written by Micky Theodoraki.

Presenter37:24

I think it's a lovely song.

Presenter37:27

But anyway, after

Presenter37:29

I was.

Presenter37:31

virtually frozen out of the bar. They couldn't find anything to prosecute me with,'cause I hadn't done anything wrong.

Presenter37:41

So in the end we got fed up and we decided to go to Greece. Jimmy by this time had a commission from the B B C from the Wednesday play and

Presenter37:54

Kenya agreed to direct it.

Presenter38:28

Mikas Theodorakis, Strossa To Stromasu.

Presenter38:33

Nemini, you and Jimmy moved to Mykinos. He had a writing commission and while you were there you turned your hand to writing too. One of your scripts, Baby Blues, was a play with themes that are considered progressive today, fertility issues and postnatal depression, both of which you'd been through. This was the early 70s. How did it feel writing about what was then so taboo?

Presenter38:56

Add a commission.

Presenter38:58

From the B B C to write a play

Presenter39:02

About the craze.

Presenter39:05

And I just couldn't even think about them. I was in such a mess.

Presenter39:10

Mentally.

Presenter39:12

You were still suffering from postnatal depression? Yes. But I'd sort of got my foot in the door with the BBC.

Presenter39:22

Partly because of Jimmy.

Presenter39:24

But also because I've made friends with Ken Loach and all the um

Presenter39:30

Wednesday play, people.

Presenter39:33

And they all came one by one came and stayed with us in Greece. And Tony Garlitt, who was the script editor at the time.

Presenter39:42

Came out and I

Presenter39:45

He said, You've had an interesting life. Why don't you write about it? So I did.

Presenter39:51

But, Nemini, I'm wondering about getting a a play with these themes commissioned in those days. I mean, they just weren't talked about. And when they were, people wouldn't have been sympathetic necessarily. Certainly, there was plenty of kickback against the play when it went out as a play for today. Oh, and it took two years to get it on.

Nemone Lethbridge40:07

Out.

Presenter40:10

When it went out, I mean Mary Whitehouse, the critic and campaigner, was railing against it. I wonder about the response that you got from viewers? How did they react? As a result of it, I got a lot of letters and I answered them and I got more. And in the end, we started off a sort of um

Presenter40:33

Sympathy grew.

Presenter40:34

Cold oppressives.

Presenter40:36

Anonymous.

Presenter40:38

How many letters did you get out of interest? You said you got lots.

Presenter40:42

Oh, hundreds

Presenter40:44

It must have been the first time many of those women saw that kind of thing discussed, saw that experience represented. I think so.

Presenter40:53

It was absolutely horrible. Luckily we had a a very good GP.

Presenter40:59

And he gave me some medication.

Presenter41:03

But I didn't like the medication.

Presenter41:06

thought I I'd do this myself.

Presenter41:09

And I I learnt how to cope with it.

Presenter41:13

But

Presenter41:14

I have to be very careful.

Presenter41:17

about what I read.

Presenter41:19

I don't dare read Thomas Hardy. I wouldn't even now dare open tears.

Presenter41:25

Or Jude the Hip Skill.

Presenter41:28

And the song that I've chosen for the next track.

Presenter41:33

I don't dare listen to but obviously I'm going to now. You're taking it with you. Wh tell me about that. Why why don't you dare listen to it and and why are you choosing it?

Presenter41:44

I'm choosing it because it's so very important.

Presenter41:48

Episode in my life

Presenter41:51

I was actually still in hospital.

Presenter41:54

I'd had a Caesarean section.

Presenter41:56

when it came on the radio.

Presenter41:59

It hit me like a sledgehammer.

Presenter42:02

And I

Presenter42:04

Haven't until

Presenter42:07

As originally approached about making this programme, ever dared to listen to it. So this was, you think, a trigger for you, Nemone?

Presenter42:16

It just pushed me into a really deep depression.

Presenter42:21

But you're taking this to the island because of the experience was so successful.

Nemone Lethbridge42:25

What's he called?

Presenter42:26

Mm-hmm.

Presenter42:27

I've conquered it.

Presenter42:30

Okay, let's see it.

Presenter42:32

Do you want us to play this in, Nemony, or would you like us to? Yes, I'd like to hear it. Okay, we can do that.

Presenter42:39

But it's a long, long while.

Presenter42:45

From May to December.

Presenter42:51

And the days grow smart.

Presenter42:57

When you reach September.

Presenter43:03

And

Speaker 343:04

The otter

Presenter43:08

Grazy Fields and September song. Nemony Lethbridge, how does it feel to hear that again? It's such a beautiful song, but with such a difficult memory for you. I'm okay.

Presenter43:19

Okay. But it it's very good, isn't it? It's gorgeous. A really beautiful piece of music. Nemani, you went through a lot during the time in your life that we've been talking about. You and Jimmy divorced, but you were still unable to work at the bar, bringing up two boys. How did you manage to keep yourself afloat?

Nemone Lethbridge43:19

Yeah.

Presenter43:38

With difficulty, we had a bit of a nightmare.

Presenter43:42

Getting through the seventies.

Presenter43:45

I didn't get back until eighty one.

Presenter43:49

And even then it was very difficult. So when you did find new chambers, it was almost twenty years since you'd practised. What had changed to allow that to happen? It was a more liberal world.

Presenter44:02

I went back to court for the first time, into the magistrates' court, and I was astonished.

Presenter44:10

to see women and people of colour.

Presenter44:13

And I thought this is terrific.

Presenter44:16

But the chap who took me into his chambers was a very old fashioned liberal chap called Louis de Piner.

Presenter44:27

And he he had no prejudice.

Presenter44:31

So this was the early 80s. What was it like going back into court? How much had changed?

Presenter44:37

Well, it was so odd to see black faces and

Presenter44:42

Wouldn't it?

Presenter44:44

Some of the judges were very

Presenter44:47

patronizing.

Presenter44:49

and some were very rude.

Presenter44:52

But gradually I mean nowadays

Presenter44:56

They just take it as normal.

Presenter44:58

Thank God.

Presenter45:01

Nemony, you and Jimmy reconciled later in life and he died in two thousand one, but the family are still fighting to clear his name. What would it mean to you if you were to succeed and to be able to do that?

Nemone Lethbridge45:09

What would it mean to you?

Presenter45:13

It would mean everything.

Presenter45:16

Because um it was a miscarriage of justice, and I hate injustice.

Presenter45:23

There's a podcast series in the works about your story, you and Jimmy. How do you feel about that?

Nemone Lethbridge45:26

If

Presenter45:29

Brilliant.

Presenter45:31

And we've found out some

Presenter45:33

New evidence.

Presenter45:35

Idney, Public Records Office.

Presenter45:38

Which is

Presenter45:40

The itemized.

Presenter45:42

Can't wait to hear that. I am, of course, about to cast you away to the desert island. Yes. Have you thought much about what it'll be like there? The landscape, the isolation? I think it'll be beautiful.

Presenter45:55

And we know you're resourceful, but are you practical? Do you think you'd be able to start a fire if you needed to? Oh, yes.

Presenter46:02

We've got one more disc before we cast you away, Nemone. One final track to hear. What's it going to be?

Presenter46:08

It's going to be bark.

Presenter46:10

who is one of my favorite composers.

Presenter46:13

And it's Jesus Joy of Man's Desiring.

Presenter46:18

And it's played by Lang Lang.

Presenter47:19

Jizu Joy of Man's Desiring by Bach. Played by Lang Lang. So Nemini Lethbridge, it's time for me to send you away to the island. I'm giving you the books, the Bible, and the complete works of Shakespeare, and you can take one more choice. What would you like?

Presenter47:33

I'd like an ancient Persian poem which was a favourite of my father, the Rubaiet of Omo Khayyam. So your dad loved that. Has it stayed with you throughout your own life? Yes.

Presenter47:46

He had a very good memory, and he knew the whole thing by heart.

Presenter47:51

Wonderful. You can definitely have that. Then there's your luxury item. What will you be taking with you to make life a little bit more enjoyable?

Presenter47:59

My doll.

Presenter48:01

So, this is Sarah Jane, am I right? Yes. So, tell me about her. You've had her since you were how old?

Nemone Lethbridge48:04

Yeah.

Presenter48:07

Less than one.

Presenter48:09

So she goes all the way back to the beginning to Quetta? Yes. She's very dilapidated now, but uh I'm going to send her to the repair shop.

Presenter48:20

We'll have to see if they can sort her out first and then we will uh give her to you to take to the desert island.

Presenter48:26

And finally, Nemone, which track of the eight that you've shared today would you save from the waves first? Oh, the Mozart.

Presenter48:33

Why? Because I think it's one of the most beautiful pieces of music ever written.

Presenter48:40

Nemony Lethbridge, thank you so much for letting us hear your Desert Island discs. Thank you. Thank you for having me.

Presenter48:59

Hello, it was lovely to chat to Nemonie and I hope she's very happy on her island. There are more than 2,000 programmes in our archive that you can listen to. We've cast other lawyers away over the years including former judge and cross-bench peer Heather Hallett, Nazir Afsal and Baroness Hale. You can hear their programmes if you search through BBC Sounds or on our own Desert Island Disc's website. The studio manager for today's programme was Giles Aspen, the assistant producer was Christine Pavlovsky, the production coordinator was Susie Roylance and the producer was Sarah Taylor. Join me next time when my guest will be the actor Stephen Mangen.

Speaker 250:06

I'm Alex Kratoski. And I'm Kevin Fong. How do you f

Speaker 350:09

feel about AI.

Nemone Lethbridge50:11

Does it scare you?

Speaker 350:12

Very quickly that question comes up. You know, is it going to think for us?

Nemone Lethbridge50:16

Does it excite you?

Speaker 350:17

I say, how is the AI going to help

Speaker 250:20

Help us to think better. Do you worry about how it'll change your life, your job, your kids?

Nemone Lethbridge50:25

AI is built into many of the software applications that we now use in schools every day.

Speaker 250:29

In every episode of The Artificial Human from BBC Radio 4, Kevin and I are here to help. We will chart a course through the world of AI and we will answer your questions.

Nemone Lethbridge50:40

It doesn't just lie, but it lies in an incredibly enthusiastic, convincing way. That ability to be able to kind of think critically is just going to be so important as we move forwards.

Speaker 250:48

The Artificial Human with me, Alex Kratofsky.

Nemone Lethbridge50:52

And me, Kevin Fong.

Speaker 250:53

Listen on Babysy Sounds.