Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
A diplomat who survived eight months of solitary confinement after being kidnapped by Uruguayan terrorists.
On the island
Eight records
In conversation
Presenter asks
0:26How big a part does music play in your life?
It's always played an enormous part from being a very small child and even more so now. I listened to a great deal of music and there was always a good deal of music in my home as a small boy. A musical family? I think it's true to say that. Yes, my mother was an extremely lively and competent pianist. And nothing gave her greater joy than to accompany my father at the piano in, I suppose in retrospect, a rather Victorian style. I remember we children used to get the giggles whenever we saw it and heard my dear father singing, you know, the storm fiend and Hydrius the Cretan and Songs of the Fair. But in retrospect, he did it very well and they both loved it.
Presenter asks
5:10What part of the country do you come from, and how did you start in the diplomatic service?
I'm a North Countryman, a Lancashireman by birth. … No, no, not at all. My family were always farmers. In fact, if my grandfather had gone in for trying to found prematurely a national opera company, I would have probably been a farmer today. … Well, when I was 14, I read a book by Bruce Lockhart about the British diplomacy and the life of a consular official, as a matter of fact. And I never wanted to do anything else after that and I've never had any reason to change my mind.
Presenter asks
6:57The keepsakes
The book
The Lord of the Rings (trilogy)
J.R.R. Tolkien
a splendid, oh, science fiction, great literature combination of the pursuit of good and the conquest of evil. Wonderful book to read seven days a week.
The luxury
I've always intended if I had the time and the leisure to learn to play the classical Spanish guitar properly.
Did the Uruguayan guerrillas have any particular grievance, or was it just a revolutionary left wing movement?
I would uh say that probably uh an element of both. There is, after all, a tendency throughout the world amongst people of usually university age, for example, to find a cause for frustration in their society, as I think young people have always found. And of course, again, I suspect with the influence of the media and expanded education, young people aren't so ready to wait as they used to be. They want instant social justice, instant this, instant everything.
Presenter asks
10:18In what sort of conditions were you held? Was it a dungeon, a cellar, a hut?
Technically, I suppose you'd call it a dungeon. It was underground and it was composed largely of rock and cement and fingernail breaking materials of that nature. Dry? Very damp, to the contrary. Very damp. Yes.
Presenter asks
15:43Could you do any writing during your captivity?
At the beginning, no. Then after a while I started to write. Uh I was allowed to write. But certain things I still went on writing more in my head, because I suppose they were of a a personal and emotional nature, and uh I suspect although I have been accused of being uh A Lebanese Latin American from Lancashire. I suspect that beneath it all I am still a very conventional Englishman and I don't like to demonstrate my feelings on my cuffs too freely. … Stories, verse, a bit of everything. Translations, translations in my own mind, translations even from the Latin, for example. All kinds of things, anything to keep my mind busy.
Presenter asks
17:39Are you convinced that you were given strength through prayer?
I haven't the slightest doubt about it, but not so much my own prayer. I've said this before, and I shall always go on maintaining it. I think uh other people's prayer was the most important factor there.
“Music covers virtually everything from intellectual activity to physical exercise, practically, I find. I mean, you know, the old phrase about opening up the pipes and so on. And when one's in captivity, oh, there were times, for example, when there was very loud background noise where I was. Well, frankly, when that was going on, I opened up my pipes and let it blast, and it did me a great deal of good.”
“Well, I could never have described them, in fact, because I never saw their faces. They wore kind of, I was going to say, masks or hoods. They were more or less like a pillowcase pulled down over their head with holes for their eyes to look out of. And all one could see was their eyes. Eyes, of course, are the window of the soul. And one, I think, can learn to understand quite a lot of people's personality through their eyes, but not to recognize them.”
“I haven't the slightest doubt about it, but not so much my own prayer. I've said this before, and I shall always go on maintaining it. I think uh other people's prayer was the most important factor there.”
“I've always intended if I had the time and the leisure to learn to play the classical Spanish guitar properly. So, if you don't mind, if you can cough up a really fine specimen, that's what I'll strap onto my back as I go overboard.”