I played my last serious game of football at the age of 33, playing centre forward for Magdalen College. Ironically, I was in the best shooting form of my career, scoring no less than five golas. But it was in the year that I started to work in London, where my schedule made regular sport impractical.  In any case, my ankles were unwilling to take more punishment.  I reluctantly admitted that I had spent far too much time kicking a ball instead of cultivating my other interests. (Twenty years later I took my younger son to the scene of my five-goals spree. It was utterly changed. The lush, green grass of Magdalen’s old sportsground had gone. In its place rose the minarets and golden dome of Oxford’s New Islamic Centre.)

I first bought a ticket for a musical concert at the age of 15, when I travelled on my own on the bus to Manchester to hear the Halle Orchestra in a matinee performance at the Free Trade Hall.  I had entered myself for Music O-level, and the History of the Modern Classical repertoire formed one of the obligatory sections of the exam. My cousin Deidre was playing the oboe, and the programme included the Intermezzo rom Mascagni’s "Cavaleria Rusticana" and Tchaikovsky’s "Nutcracker Suite". I have been an avid aficionado of classical music ever since. 

In my schooldays I made several unsuccessful attempts to master a musical instrument.  Unfortunately, my nerves could not stand the screeches which emanated from the violin, and my clumsy fingers could not follow the instructions of my pitiless piano teacher, Miss Staton. For some reason, no-one advised me to try the trumpet or the guitar, with which I might have made a tolerable noise. Honour was saved, however, when I found that I could imitate my Uncle Don and play tunes on the piano by ear. Much later I saw an accordion in a pawn shop window, and taught myself to play it quite successfully. I play it when I need a rest from writing and when my wife has gone out.

Collecting stamps was no more fruitful than learning the violin. I was deeply interested for several years, struggling to bring order to my father’s collection. But I was unable to decide on which countries to concentrate, and was slowly paralysed by the impossible task of trying to collect everything. Yet eventually I resolved the dilemma by moving into postal history, especially of Eastern Europe. In 2008 I published a two-volume album of Poland’s modern history illustrated by old letters, postmarks, covers and postcards.

Which leaves the life long habit of rambling. As a teenager, I learned to navigate the Wild moors above Bolton in the rain and the fog, and the joy of solitude amidst the beauties and storms of nature have never left me. For a decade or so, deteriorating hips made walking as much a duty as a pleasure. But the miracles of modern surgery have restored full movement, and there’s nothing I love more than strolling with my wife along the promenade at Aberystwyth or Criccieth, or paddling through the surf along the beach at Tyrhenia with the sea breeze in my hair and the Isle of Elba in full view.