Singapore 1950
With my parents, Singapore 1951
I am the eldest of three children, and had the good fortune to be born in Changi, Singapore. At this time, 1950, the hospital had replaced the prisoner of war camp, and my father, an engineer in the RAF, was on his first tour of duty as a married man. This was the first of 29 homes he and my mother would have between now and my father’s retirement from the RAF in 1973.
This peripatetic life impacted on me in contradictory ways: I loved the thrill of travelling to new places, and like to think my multiculturalism derives from an early childhood in the Far then Middle East. Conversely, I grew up in a hierarchical society where rank and stiff-upper-lip were the rule. Unconsciously afraid to make friends who would inevitably be torn from me, I was introverted, painfully shy and lacking in self-confidence.
This peripatetic life impacted on me in contradictory ways: I loved the thrill of travelling to new places, and like to think my multiculturalism derives from an early childhood in the Far then Middle East. Conversely, I grew up in a hierarchical society where rank and stiff-upper-lip were the rule. Unconsciously afraid to make friends who would inevitably be torn from me, I was introverted, painfully shy and lacking in self-confidence.
Constantly on the move
With my brother. Amman, Jordan, 1954
I began school in Iraq, and have glorious, Proustian memories of the sensation and smell of wet tar and disinfectant, as we set off on our jeep journey across the desert, home by lunchtime. Being naturally gifted, I was successful at school, despite the many moves (4 grammar schools in 7 years!). Partly in Electral imitation of my father, who spoke Malay and Arabic, I gathered languages: a bit of Arabic as a young child was followed by French, German, Latin, Greek, Russian ‘O’ then ‘A’ levels. But ironically, rather than open me to the world, languages defined and, in time, confined me: the blue stocking who spent every evening and all weekends studying alone, not using these magical keys to enter into the rich realities they represented.
So emerge some of the key themes of my journey towards lifewide leaning: insecurity, introspection and an unhealthy passion for education.
So emerge some of the key themes of my journey towards lifewide leaning: insecurity, introspection and an unhealthy passion for education.
Body and mind
Ironically, whilst despising the corporeal 'me', it came to dominate my life. As a child, I felt stigmatised by the old-fashioned plaits I was obliged to wear until my early teens. Here are the locks of which my parents were so proud, when I was just 4 years old.
Where I was nourishing my intellect and creativity, I neglected the body I disliked, with its freckles and lack of waist. I hated all forms of sport and by the 6th form would be skipping Games lessons in favour of more study in the library. In some perverted notion of the Platonic world, I imposed my own forms of abstension on the external person I disassociated from the 'real' me.
Spiral into depression
Graduation 1972
Early in my fourth year (year 10) of secondary schooling, I moved to my third grammar school, and let down my guard: for the first time, I had a close friend, from whom I was duly wrench as we moved to another posting in time for me to begin sixth form in my fourth grammar school. The next two years were mired in depression, but a glimmer of hope shone in the distance: my friend and I might be reunited if we applied to the same university. I gave up my opportunity to study at Oxford, opting for Manchester University, her chosen institution. But even before we arrived as Freshers, she no longer wished to continue our relationship.
University should be a time of experiment and enquiry; I look at today’s students and envy their fearlessness and hunger for experience. For me, my undergraduate years saw me decline into illness (again in imitation of my father, who has had a psychiatric condition for most of my life?): by the time I graduated, I weighed less than 5 stone and was like a zombie, drugged constantly by anti-depressants and tranquillisers. Intellectually, I fought against the stultifying drugs, but my body eventually won: I dropped out of a PhD programme, unable to cope with being in a new university, and feeling that my Proustian studies were a self-indulgence which had nothing to offer society. Before long, I was forcibly hospitalised.
My academic aspirations came to an abrupt end. Although I would recover sufficiently to pursue another career, I remain dogged to this day by the corrosive, crippling illness which would impact on my professional and personal life, alike, defying rationality and the best efforts of many.
University should be a time of experiment and enquiry; I look at today’s students and envy their fearlessness and hunger for experience. For me, my undergraduate years saw me decline into illness (again in imitation of my father, who has had a psychiatric condition for most of my life?): by the time I graduated, I weighed less than 5 stone and was like a zombie, drugged constantly by anti-depressants and tranquillisers. Intellectually, I fought against the stultifying drugs, but my body eventually won: I dropped out of a PhD programme, unable to cope with being in a new university, and feeling that my Proustian studies were a self-indulgence which had nothing to offer society. Before long, I was forcibly hospitalised.
My academic aspirations came to an abrupt end. Although I would recover sufficiently to pursue another career, I remain dogged to this day by the corrosive, crippling illness which would impact on my professional and personal life, alike, defying rationality and the best efforts of many.