Gyles's diary, episode 30

0:20Hello, before we begin More Rosebud, most of you I think will know that we record more Rosebud and indeed Rosebud at Grosvenor House on London's Park Lane. And before this week's episode, Harriet and I want to tell you about a very exciting competition we're running for listeners in association with Grosvenor House, Hachette Children's Group and Enid Blyton Entertainment. Grosvenor House is serving a magic faraway tree tea in the parkroom from now until the 30th of April. This celebrates the enchanted world of Enid Blyton's classic book, The Magic Faraway Tree, truly one of my childhood favourites.

1:01How about you? Were you into Enid Blyton Harriet? I love The Magic Faraway Tree. I loved it. I think maybe it's her best. You know I knew both her daughters. Yes. If they were alive, I'd be bringing them for tea here. Though they didn't get on necessarily that well with each other, and they had very different views about their mother. But I'm sure they would get on if they were having this tea. They certainly would because this tea is inviting guests into a world of wonder, of nostalgia with cakes and treats that capture the stories in the book. You can try Moonface's Bauble or Silky's Sparkling Granita.

1:38Rosebud and Grosvenor House are offering one lucky listener the chance to enjoy one of these teas with a guest in the park room. You simply need to email hello at rosebudpodcast.com with the email heading Magic Faraway Tree Competition and your name and telephone number. The closing date is midnight on Sunday, December the 14th, 2025. So we're giving away tea now, are we? Yeah. Oh, it's unbelievable. Two teas. Two teas. Tea for two. The Magic Faraway Tree tea for two. So don't miss this chance to have an unforgettable afternoon at Grosvenor House. Who knows, depending on the day you come, you might find me and Harriet there.

2:21Cue the music. Bring on the scones.

2:37Twas in a restaurant they met, Romeo and Juliet. Have I done that too often? Have I done it too often? oh fine no no okay the second time oh well i'll do another one then this is by the way oh you just oh you turned on the microphone didn't realize you've done that we started already hello this is some this is more rosebud yes you caught us but i was doing a poem but of course harriet now knows me so well she realized i'd already done that poem for you and um and and and the limerick as well the reason i'm thinking about poetry is is i love poetry and we're doing diaries again today and the name cyril fletcher will come up and cyril fletcher when i was a boy was so famous because he did these funny poems on radio and television people do remember him still because i introduced him to esther ranson and he ended up on that's life with esther of course sitting in the corner reading amusing tidbits that were sent in by he wrote these poems did he the original poems the odd odes he wrote some of them himself he had other people write them and And in the period when they were doing the diaries now, the early 1970s, my first Radio 4 panel show was something I devised called A Rhyme in Time, which was about poetry and rhyming.

3:53So I've always loved poetry and rhyming. Do you ever read serious poetry? Do you have a poetry anthology on your bedside? Yes. In fact, I've got Philip Larkin's poems next to my bed at the moment. But I don't read it as much. I have a feeling you should probably read a poem every day. Would do you good. And in fact, my daughter had a book called A Poem for Every Day of the Year, which did really well. And I used to read her a poem every night. Have I not? It was such a good thing to do. Have I not given you my anthology of poetry called Dancing by the Light of the Moon? I'd love to have it. I will bring it next time.

4:28And I'll read a poem every day. I think it's a good thing to do before you go to bed. It's a great thing. It's a great calming. It's all part of mindfulness, et cetera. But also thought-provoking, moving. Absolutely. All of those things. All good things. Yeah. The reason I'm talking about poetry is we've, a listener sent us a poem. I know. Aren't we lucky? This actually, it came, it was sent on our Facebook page. Oh. Yes. So that is actually not operated by us. No. I mean, it's just operated by the people that go on it. Exactly. But it was started by Peter, who's a listener, who just likes the podcast and wrote to me and said, why didn't we start a Facebook group?

5:06so he is in charge of it and i i think i'm one of the admins you're called an admin we're like the the prefects if anyone does anything naughty on there we come on with our prefect badge and say don't do that please but we've never had to do that because obviously everyone who listens to rosebud is it's nice lovely yeah so there's only nice things on there and um it's called rosebud reflections we've talked about it before anyway if you if you are on Facebook and you want to join this really friendly group where people talk about the podcast, share memories, share photos, share poems, then you can.

5:42And this was written by someone called Matt Jarvis. And I thought I'd read it out because it's so nice. And I know I'm sure Matt would be thrilled to hear it being read out as well. So should we read it? Please, you file away. Should I just read the whole thing? I think read the whole thing. Do you want to take alternate of verses oh yeah let's do that okay okay you do verse one the poem's called to the voices that bloom and it's dated october the 25th 2025 in quiet hours your voices rise not loud but like the hush of spring where memory unfurls its petals and stories find their wings giles with laughter laced in care invites the past to gently speak a rosebud held in open palm the first remembered streak harriet steady as morning light guides the rhythm threads the seam while michelle's grace a soft refrain joins the tapestry of dream each guest arrives with trembling truth a cradle of their earliest flame and leaves us richer hearts aglow but never quite the same you ask not for applause or praise but offer something far more rare a space where lives are honored whole with tenderness laid bare so thank you for the bloom you bring for letting silence have its say for showing us that time can sing in the most joyous, life-affirming way.

7:23Well, that's completely delightful, isn't it? Eat your heart out, poet laureate. We've had Simon Armitage on, haven't we? We have, actually. Ben Oakry, we've had some distinguished poets. Pam Ayers, we've had them all. Yes, we have, we have. But Matt Jarvis joins the ranks of our laureates, the Rosebud laureates. and we had Roger McGough the other day who is, oh I've seen him and he's very very sad his friend Brian Patton has died another of the Liverpool poets and he went and he spoke at the funeral and he was in a bad way because of that, anyway pretty awful losing friends isn't it? yes of course friends and particularly a friend like that who is not just a friend but your working life is, they they appeared in a book together.

8:15So their work is sort of intertwined. I know. Yeah. Anyway. Are you friends of yours starting to die? Oh, good grief. I mean, sorry, that's an awful question. Of course they are. Awful question. I mean, there's not a week goes by. I know. Michelle is saying, now we can either go to the funeral or we can go to the memorial service. We don't have time for both. It's like that. I mean, I could go to a funeral every week. Can I ask you an impertinent question? Sorry, I totally interrupted. What do you prefer? a funeral or a memorial service i like both oh and i i'm actually ready to go to funerals and memorial services because i see both of them as celebrations and thank yous i think to be honest when you get to my age and most of the people whose funerals i'm going to now are happily in a sense people in their 90s who've lived full achieved lives so though it is a sadness you're losing someone nonetheless you know it was going to happen it's inevitable you can then feel good yeah i like a funeral where whoever is speaking at the funeral does it properly don't assume that everybody in the congregation knew the person well actually if you're getting up to say a few words remind people when they were born as well as when they died who their parents were where they grew up, where they went to school, at the university, what their career was.

9:39Give a flavour of that person before you get into the human stuff about them. I like to know that. Also, nowadays, there are always photographs and inevitably they make me cry. They often have a photograph you turn to the back, oh, and the person when they were a child. I know, isn't it lovely? Do you go to a lot of funerals? Have you been to some recently? I don't go to a lot because I think I'm probably a little bit too young for the kind of... They are. because if you go to a funeral it's tragic because if it's a contemporary well i mean the last one i went to was with it was of an old person so that i was really sad actually it was my next door neighbor and i cried um and i did a little speech and cry during the speech probably isn't a great thing to do but i just couldn't help myself um but no i don't go to lots of funerals of people my age and that really would be awful um it's very sad when someone young younger dies isn't it But no, I'm not great at a funeral because I'm a real weeper, as discussed.

10:36And I can't stop. And I feel bad because, you know, I think it's fine to be really sobbing if you're the nearest and dearest. But if you're just someone in row five, you shouldn't really be kind of, but I really struggle. Even at funerals of people I don't know, I cry. Well, I understand that totally. It is emotionally engaging, isn't it? I mean, I do cry. I like a magnificently arranged memorial service. The one that Sam West and his brother Joseph organized for Tim West a few weeks ago. Oh, you said that was lovely. Was wonderful. It was a full-scale production because they're a theatrical family.

11:15And it was a year after Tim West had died. So there was a bit of distance. That was marvelous. But a funeral is more intimate. And also there's the coffin there. I speak at a lot of funerals. And I spoke at the funeral about a year ago of a friend of mine called Jane McCulloch. She was a very attractive and amusing woman. She was a theatre director. She was in her 80s. And huge fun. She was a writer. She was a poet. Oh, I'm going to bring some of her poems in there. Hilarious. Anyway, I knew her and I loved her. And I was asked to speak. And the coffin in the church was right there, right by my side.

11:54Gosh. And I've spoken quite a few times when the coffin is there. and that does change how you feel because the person is absolutely there. And I found myself saying, because I wanted to say it, how brilliant, how beautiful, and then I threw in, and how sexy she was. Oh, gosh. And I suddenly thought, well, I'm not sure that the children and the grandchildren are quite going to like this, but I thought it doesn't matter because I know her, I knew her well. Right. And she would have liked that. Okay. And I think it was a legitimate thing to say. The reason I'm mentioning it is I met somebody the other day who was at that funeral and said, oh, you said she was sexy.

12:32Can you say someone's sexy at their funeral? Gosh, that is an interesting question. It's an interesting, it's a philosophical question. Can you call somebody sexy at their funeral? Yeah, I mean. Letters on a postcard, I mean. Answers on a postcard. Email, answers to, what is that address? Hello at rosebudpodcast.com. I've talked at so many other people's funerals that I'm now working on my own. Gosh. And are you hoping someone says you're sexy? I should be saying it myself. I should be doing it myself. I'm going to pre-record it, but I've got to work out when to do it. I may have to re-record it every year, so I don't want to look absurdly young.

13:11Okay, well, I can record it, Giles, because I've got the equipment. You can record it. As you know, you will be at it. Oh, do you like to be beside the seat? Yes, you will be at it. I mean, I've booked, and I've sensibly only booked people who are a few years younger than me. That is sensible, yeah. which means that's why I'm going to have to give the address myself because the people I thought might give the address keep falling off the perch. So I'm reduced to doing it myself. You'll be left with people like me who haven't got a clue who anyone is. Yes, or who I was. So what Fletcher is now?

13:41Chuck that bit out then. No one knows who they are. Okay, so we should start the diary, shouldn't we? Oh no, we're doing the diary, yes. Just before we do, just to say, yes, if you want to write any, if anyone wants to write a poem about Rosebud or about being sexy at a funeral or anything, you can and put it on the Facebook page. And if there's a doctor out there who knows where tears come from, how the lacrimal... You keep asking. Well, I want to know how the lacrimal glands work. No one's been in touch, Giles. Do you not know any doctors listening? It's falling on deaf ears. I don't think we've got any doctors listening.

14:13Okay. This is in the middle of the year, 1971. I'm recently on the jobs market. I'm working as a freelance journalist, beginning to write for the Manchester Evening News, doing some radio, doing some television, and I've been invited to be part of a pornography commission set up by Lord Longford, the Earl of Longford, who'd become a Knight of the Garter, had been a Labour Cabinet Minister, and was now wanting to deal with the problem of pornography in our society and wanted to find the best way to do it. Wednesday, 23rd June 1971. took a cab from Muswell Hill to the BBC Playhouse at Sharing Cross to join Siddle Fletcher, who was doing a guest spot on a rather drab new radio quiz.

15:01We went round the corner to the Sherlock Holmes pub afterwards for a snack. Siddle told me the tale of his first West End cabaret engagement at the Ritz in the 1930s and how Godfrey Wynn, who died on Sunday. Oh. Gosh, maybe that's why he was sweating. Oh. He wasn't very well. Do you remember how much in the last episode I remarked on how his hands were shaking and how he was sweating profusely? And the glue from his toupee was dribbling down his forehead. Oh my, and I'd seen him only a few weeks before. And you were saying how brilliant he was. I was saying what a remarkable, successful person he was.

15:36And how Godfrey Wynn, who died on Sunday, talked loudly to Dorothy Dixon throughout it. We were joined by Alastair Scott Johnson, radio producer, whose name I feel I've known all my life, and Richard Murdoch. A lot of reminiscing ensued. Murdoch's doing a summer season at Bournemouth. Siddle said later that he thought it was sad that Murdoch felt he had to do a summer season still. He doesn't need the attention. He must need the money. Or perhaps he just likes to work. William Rushton was there too. Fat and funny. Oh, I love him. Yeah, he was. I remember him. Siddle then drove me to Old Heathfield.

16:16He wants to do a one-man show in the tradition of Emlyn Williams' show about Dickens. I've suggested Lewis Carroll, and we're working on it. Betty was there to greet us, with Jilly, their daughter, now recovered from the Depression following her divorce. Jilly is a magician. Her act, equipment and secrets cost£400. I'm hoping she will saw me in half. I've always wanted to be sawn in half. I would be a magician myself if I had the patience to do the homework. We walked around the garden, worked and then had dinner. A well-risen cheese souffle, chicken with banana, strawberries. Chicken with banana?

16:59She was quite a cook, Betty Estelle. Oh, like a curry. Yes, it probably was like a curry. Oh, gosh, yeah, we used to have bananas with curry. The three Fletchers jabbered away as we ate. All theatre stories. Several of the stories were exactly the ones I'd heard when I was last here. Word for word, the same. Tuesday the 24th of June, 1971, to the BBC Portland Place for the press conference to launch the summer season. Peter Titheridge has had to pull out of producing my series because he has cancer. Clearly, I overdid my sympathy note. He wrote back saying, give me a chance, I'm not dead yet. Simon Brett has taken over and seems very pleasant.

17:41Smiles a good deal while not giving a lot away. Why can't I manage that? He met me in reception and took me up. It was all rather grand. I moved straight over to Siddle for security. He was wearing his wig and kept reminding everybody of the fact. He introduced me to Kenneth Moore and Lisa Goddard and we chatted. Kenneth Moore told us about his technique for finding out the names of people whose names he should know but has forgotten. He says, oh, it's on the tip of my tongue now. Come on, come on, what's your name? The other party replies, Michael. And Moore comes back, no, no, no, not your Christian name, I know that.

18:17What's your surname? He gave up the technique when he met up with an old RAF chum whose surname was John. Clearly these theatrical types repeat the same stories shamelessly. We trooped up to the roof garden to have our photographs taken. and I was much chuffed to be included in the star line-up. Kenneth Moore, Lisa Goddard, Kenneth Williams, who was genuinely funny in his outrageous way, Liz Gebhardt, whose dark glasses I accidentally walked off with, and Nicholas Parsons, who began a gag that died, but he carried on with it laboriously nonetheless. Tonight, we gave a dinner party. Michelle did a lovely meal.

19:01Fishy soise, chicken casserole, strawberries. plenty of wine and simon caddell brought some champagne darling michelle was anxious about her soup quite unnecessarily the guests were the right mix simon caddell simon d and his wife bunny she was feeling queasy and burped incredibly kirsty mcleod michelle's friend from oxford derek and pam willoughby our new medical friends encountered at the next table at the side saddle at the local restaurant. The two Simons were excellent and kept the table on a roar. We played charades and other games and were off to bed with a bit of a glow of satisfaction.

19:42Oh, well done. Well done, Michelle, because cooking a dinner party is a bit of a nightmare. Well, also, we were 23. It's very impressive. And this was a grown-up dinner party with grown-up people, you know. Simon D was a bit of a star. Yeah. So it was a bit nerve-wracking. And we had a very small flat in Muzzle Hill. Well done. Sunday the 27th of June 1971 Last night we did some Porn Commission field work in Soho There are around 30 specialist shops Within the square mile Of depravity as Lord Longford Likes to call it We looked in on three Our fellow customers really were wearing Shabby fawn coloured raincoats At the last shop, the largest We spoke to the manager We told him that we were doing research for Lord Longford he chuckled that's what they all say nowadays he was very friendly and open about his business and it's a good business he sells around 500 magazines books and pictures a week and takes in about 2 000 pounds his rent and rates cost 100 pounds and his wages bill comes to nearly 200 pounds we asked to see the most unusual sample of his wares and he produced a magazine called Amigo, a glossy publication designed for foot fetishists.

21:02It contains 30 close-up photographs with accompanying toe-by-toe, step-by-in-step descriptions of naked feet. We were not aroused. So that's all that was in it, just feet? No, not people doing things to feet or anything? Nope. There's no accounting for taste. Gosh. I've never been a fetishist. Actually, that's a sort of joke that one can actually run. My principal fetish is tongue twisters. Well, I'm amusing myself. I know. But do you remember when we had the great Grayson Perry with us? He said, explained that he was into fetishism. Yeah. And that explains his outfits and things. Yeah. And I don't think you and I really, I mean, we accepted what he said.

21:51It was very interesting. It was very interesting. And when we had his wife on, she talked a little bit about it too. But I don't think I do have fetishistic enthusiasms. No, but it... Do you? No, so I sometimes do these big generalisations. I'm going to do a few generalisations now. Yeah, by the way. They're much more common among men than women. Ah. And I think they're formed in late childhood slash early adolescence between the ages of nine and 12 or perhaps seven and 12. I didn't know this was your mastermind specialist subject. Leon, my husband, he knows a little bit about it. He did some research on it.

22:30And so that it's something that happens at that time in someone's life that fixates them on. you know it may be that their nanny wore particularly interesting gloves or that they were in love with a teacher at school who did xyz and i think that's why it's not particularly surprising that grayson perry has a fetish because he had a very unsettled childhood and i think it's possibly more likely to happen to people that had unsettled things happening in their childhood he teased me in fact he said you and your jumpers it's all to do with your nappies Do you remember you said that? And maybe it is, Giles, and you just don't know.

23:11Because I had nappies in the era when you could wash them. Yeah, the Terry nappies. Yes. Yeah, the fluffy nappies. So maybe that's what it's all about. So maybe you're a fetishist and you don't know it. Yes. It's not much fun in being a fetishist and not knowing it. Because how can you satisfy the fetish? You do like chocolate. Well, you're satisfying it right now, Giles. You're wearing a jumper. I am wearing a jumper. You do like chocolate mousse. I love a chocolate mousse. But I've never been a chocolate mousse. I want the chocolate mousse in a nice bowl. Yeah. then in a spoon, and then in my mouth.

23:39Oh, Lord. Oh, Lord. Moving quickly on. A more innocent day today. Earlier this year, I dreamed up the idea of the National Scrabble Championships. And this morning, early before eight, I set off for the grand finals in the ballroom at Grosvenor House Park Lane. Oh. That's where we are now, recording this. It is. How funny. Plenty of press, some excitement, not too many squabbles. I hosted the event and presented the prizes with old Mr. Spear, chairman of J.W. Spear & Sons, manufacturers of Scrabble, who is funding the event. I think we'll do it again next year. Scrabble done, we went to Watford to dine with the Craddocks.

24:21Feeling in need of post-Scrabble fortification, we stopped off for tea and toast at a local hostelry. A mistake. As we arrived at the Dowerhouse, huge dishes of strawberries and thick yellow cream were served, and Johnny emerged from the cellar bearing a magnum of 1949 champagne. Then we moved to the dining room to eat caviar in sour cream, quail's eggs, lamb sweetbreads in cream with raw broad beans, followed by the richest chocolate cake in the history of the world, all washed down with a 1952 red burgundy and a white wine whose origin I didn't catch. Johnny explained that with a good wine, however much you drink you don't get a hangover that sounds like a terribly rich meal the other guests were admiral ross and lady callie fanny announced that we were her four closest friends oh i don't think any of us has met her more than half a dozen times it was a very cozy happy evening johnny beamed benevolently as fanny prattled on tales of her three husbands husbands mark you i marry my men her first child i was just 15 my dear that's all i knew nothing of the world her second husband a disciple of the marquis de sard and we all know what that involves don't we admiral she is outrageous a woman had a child at 72 it is fact medical history says so but completely endearing tomorrow i'm lunching with simon d outrageous but less endearing He wants to discuss the publication of his poetry, its drivel, with a Christian twist.

26:04Can you imagine anything worse? Yeah.

26:17Wednesday 30th June 1971, 11.30am at the Royal Court Theatre Sloane Square, I meet Athol Fugard, South African playwright, gentle, warm, generous. I tell him I want his play for the Davis Poynter playlist that I'm editing. 1pm. Lunch with Stephen Milligan at The Economist, 25 St James' Street. We discuss Britain's negotiations to enter the European economic community. Stephen says that Geoffrey Rippon, our chief negotiator, says we're almost there. Our subscription will be about£100 million a year. well worth it says Stephen who loves being in the know he expects to be prime minister one day perhaps he will be wanting is the first step to getting as we know 3 30 meeting with Reg Davis pointer I feel with him as I often do that I don't do myself justice irritating 5 p.m.

27:18tea at the chanel cross hotel with a girl who interviews me for the radio times 6 p.m drinks at eve arnold's flat in mount street with francis her son one of my friends from bdell's still a rather ludicrous hip figure now plans to be a doctor 7 p.m a rendezvous with lord longford in the ladies annex at the athenaeum club we're having supper with a couple of girls before going on to a dirty movie. I've brought the tickets, says Lord Longford, positively trembling with nervous excitement. I say, and I brought the raincoats. He doesn't get the joke. What are we going to see, I ask? Catch-22, he says.

27:58Catch-22? Ye gods. I try to explain to him that whatever it is, Catch-22 isn't pornography. It's a serious film based on a tremendous novel. Frank won't be deflected. I've been told it's quite disgusting. So he takes his young lady, a trainee publisher, I think, to Catch 22. And I take mine, a student nurse, to a double bill at a tiny cinema at the top end of Piccadilly. Anybody's body and collective marriage. Naturally, my nurse has seen it all before but let's face it i hadn't and frank forgive me i rather enjoyed it oh dear charles this is a diary after all yeah just saying what it was like at the time thursday 1st july 1971 i'm on my way to the broadway hotel letchworth to address the letchworth women's luncheon club in place of godfrey win when paddy davis from the associated speaker's office telephoned them to offer them me instead of Godfrey Wynne, the Cub secretary responded, I'm sure Mr.

29:09Brandreth is very good, but really we do want Mr. Wynne. I'm afraid you can't have Mr. Wynne. Sadly, Mr. Wynne is dead. But we've booked Mr. Wynne. He's died, I'm afraid, of a heart attack on his tennis court. But we have a contract with Mr. Wynne. Nevertheless, persisted Paddy. He's dead. You don't seem to understand. We must have Mr. Wynn. There's no alternative. We've had the menus printed. Saturday the 17th of July 1971. Philip Hodson who had been a friend of mine at Oxford. Later I think became a psychotherapist. Sent me a letter from an elderly friend of his. The letter is addressed to me and Philip wants me to take it seriously because he believes that the Pornography Commission is no joke but potentially very damaging.

30:04This is what the man says. I'm one of those who have suffered from the suppression of pornographic information. What the prude calls pornography is an essential element in the mental and emotional diet of the growing young. Recently I saw my first blue film. I found myself wishing I'd seen it some 50 years earlier. You people on Lord Longford's team are so arrogant. To say that because you yourself don't feel you want it, somebody else must be denied it is a curiously perverse form of argument. I don't at the moment wish to visit America. Therefore, I demand that all transatlantic transport facilities must be removed.

30:47The argument is obviously absurd. Where is the harm in pornography. I can vouch for its value. It relieves tension and anxiety and takes away a lifelong sense of shame. Can you show me the damage it does? Well, can we? So it's interesting. So I was having to think about this because I'd just gone on to it really unthinkingly. And now I was thinking, well, I've got to be a bit skeptical. I've not got to just accept what I'm being told, but to see the argument in the round. Anyway, let's go on. Thursday, the 22nd of July, 1971. Frank Longford tells me that today is the feast of St Mary Magdalene.

31:32He also tells me that one of his daughters, Antonio, I think, has invented a new dinner party game. The idea is that for the length of the soup course, all the guests must converse in words of one syllable. With the next course, they are allowed two, and so it goes on through the meal until you get to the brandy liqueurs by which time anti-disestablishmentarianism is the one topic on everyone's lips that sounds like a total conversation killer could you do that it sounds like a fun game i'm sure we tried to do it this of course is antonia fraser yeah who was then i think married to a conservative member of parliament and later became married to the famous playwright and poet, Harold Pinter.

32:16And she's still alive, I'm happy to say. Yeah. The meeting itself was useless. No Cliff, which was a bore, because I'd splashed out on a special silver-buckled belt for the occasion. I love the fact you're trying to impress Cliff Richard with your clothes. Well, also I'm trying to be a bit like him. Bear in mind I'm only 23. Yeah. You know? Instead I sat next to a charming, rather pretty peeress called Lady Massam. She's confined to a wheelchair and told me to watch what the men did the moment the meeting came to an end. I did. And every man jack of them, except for Lord Longford, darted for the door without offering to help get her up the stairs.

33:00She told me that coming to London by train, she has to travel in the goods van, even on a first-class ticket. We should be campaigning about that, shouldn't we? Instead, the meeting deliberated for 90 minutes and concluded that Catch-22, if not pornographic, is certainly obscene. Oh. Interesting job. I got to know this lady, Lady Masham, who was in the House of Lords and spoke brilliantly for disabilities. And it's the result of this sort of experience that people like her, supported by people like me, had legislation and rules introduced that, you know, that are now, you have to make trains and public vehicles accessible to people with disabilities yes but you still hear terrible stories i mean you were talking about tanny gray thompson oh yeah she regularly talks on social media about how she has to crawl off you know because people don't come or there are people who are left on planes for hours waiting for someone to come with a ramp and the it's not good.

34:04Friday the 30th of July 1971. Last night we went to the Mermaid Theatre for the first night of The Old Boys by William Trevor. As we arrived, we greeted the diminutive Carol Brahms, small in stature, though broad of beam, and bought her a brandy. She was reviewing the play for The Guardian and was worrying about how she was going to get it written in time and then about how she was going to telephone it into the paper. She's an odd creature. Michelle said, where on earth does she come from? She doesn't. That's the point. She's an ancient goblin who has turned up from nowhere, but she has her own peculiar genius.

34:45Michelle says, I must read A Bullet in the Ballet and No Bed for Bacon, the books she wrote with S.J. Simon. Have you heard of this lady, Carol Brahms? No. Oh, she was so famous. she wrote these very entertaining books I think in the 1930s or maybe in the war that are very very humorous that Michelle recommended and later she collaborated with Ned Sherin and they wrote TV shows TV series together she was brilliant and she was one of the guests on this A Rhyme in Time radio show that I was doing which is how I knew her The Old Boys is a fine play we're going to publish it in our play script series but the evening was a sad one Sir Michael Redgrave dear great man stumbled through his part forgetting so many of his lines that the whole audience was on edge from start to finish it was agony to watch he was prompted through a hearing aid ingenious as he was supposed to be playing an old boy but disastrous because we heard the prompts before Sir Michael did in the interval William Trevor told us the hearing aid was vital he couldn't have gone on at all without it.

35:56In the second act, he had one strong moment, but at the curtain call, you knew that he knew what we knew, that we'd been witnessing the end of a wonderful career. It was heartbreaking. His nerve has gone, and the bottle has taken hold. Reg Davis Pointer was there, with his assistant, or is she his mistress? We never see his wife. She stays down in Chichester. He was being paternal, as usual, reproving me, as I reproved myself, for having got involved in the Longford porn probe. It's interesting, I protest. It's wrong, says Reg. You are a writer and a publisher. You should stand up for freedom of expression.

36:45What's interesting for me, Harriet, reading this, bear in mind I am just 23, is I'm meeting people who are teaching me things. And I'm seeing great people like this wonderful actor, Michael Redgrave, in this desperate state here. I later discovered more. I wouldn't have written that had I known the truth about his health, which I discover later on. But somebody like Reg Davis Pointer, who was old enough to be my father, these were people who were incidentally giving me advice. So I can see here that as I go along, I'm learning things. Did you learn things in your 20s? Did you have experiences like this of meeting older people who almost incidentally taught you stuff?

37:28Yeah, I think so. But I think the thing with advice is you've got to be receptive to it, haven't you? And it's quite easy in your 20s to be a little conceited. And I think it's good that you are listening. Because I think probably people do give you advice and quite often you think, oh, shush, you old fuddy-duddy or whatever. I'm not sure that I'm learning it then. I'm listening and noting and I think now I'm seeing things here I'm interested I mean I talked about Simon Brett doing a lot of smiling and not saying very much and obviously I read registered that was a good thing to do but I don't sure that I followed the advice then or that I'm even following it now.

38:09Sunday the 8th of August 1971. We are in Bristol at the end of our long weekend. The culinary highlight was dinner at Floyd's. The social highlight today's curious encounter at the Grand Spa Hotel. We came for lunch. We had the set meal. All went well. And then, as the coffee was being served, the waiter pressed his hand on my shoulder. I looked up, and I recognized him at once, a boy I'd been at Bedsanger with. You don't remember me, do you? He said. Of course I do, George. How are you? What are you doing here? I didn't notice you. Of course you didn't. I'm your waiter. Sit down, I said. I can't sit down.

38:54I'm your waiter. Half an hour later, we met him at the side of the hotel by the staff entrance. He took us to his flat and told us his story. He'd wanted to be an airline pilot. He'd come to Bristol to train, but his eyesight wasn't good enough. Then his life changed. He went to the ballet and fell in love with one of the dancers. He wrote to her. He met her. Nothing happened because she was already married. He became obsessed. He followed her everywhere. He stood outside her house waiting to see her. He traveled around the country watching her every performance. When she went to South Africa, he went too.

39:37Eventually, because of her complaints, he withdrew. He came back to Bristol alone. He found work as a waiter. He has no idea what the future holds. We got to his tiny flat, and as we came through the door, our drawers dropped. From floor to ceiling, every inch of wall space in the hall, in the bed-sitting room, in the bathroom, is covered in photographs of his ballerina. Hundreds of photographs. Everywhere you look, you see this beautiful girl. he of course looks like a scarecrow in a hand-me-down suit horn-rimmed specks beaky nose round shoulders we ended the day at the purr down mental hospital open day when michelle was living in bristol she used to come and visit the sun was shining in the gardens full of patients wandering about old men and women shuffling simpletons who have lived here all their lives children with Down syndrome, young men and women muttering to themselves and twitching uncontrollably.

40:41We did our best to mix and mingle. Tuesday, the 24th of August, 1971. I've come to Copenhagen with the Earl of Longford, KGPC, to reap the alien porn. This is Sin City, advertised as the most permissive place on earth. And we're here till Thursday. There are six of us from the commission and an accompanying posse of at least two dozen newshounds. I've not known a shadowbank outing like it. On the plane, the 4.50pm from Heathrow, I sat next to Lord Longford. From take-off to landing, he read the Bible, Book of Proverbs, and didn't lift his eyes from the page once. I am preparing myself for the ordeal we are going to have to face.

41:31we arrived early evening and over dinner at the hotel were briefed by a british embassy official on where to find denmark's hottest sex clubs you seem remarkably well informed said frank brow furrowed we try to be of service said the diplomat with a smile after we'd eaten frank gave us each 10 pounds spending money that should be more than enough said our man from the embassy you can usually get live sex for around a fiver. We decided to hunt in pairs and agreed to meet back at the hotel at midnight to compare notes. I teamed up with Sue Pegden, 21-year-old social psychologist and one of the commission's official researchers.

42:14And Lord Longford went off with Dr Christine Saville, wise old bird and prison psychiatrist. Chaperoned by the Daily Mirror and the News of the World, Sue and I wandered somewhat sheepishly in and out of assorted sex shops and eventually ended up at the private club where, for£7, we had ringside seats. Stark naked hostesses offered us plastic beakers of beer and frankly, anything else we wanted. The man from the news of the world couldn't resist a quick fumble and as a consequence, one naked girl removed his spectacles and made them disappear about her person. When eventually they were returned, he was too self-conscious to wear them and so missed the rest of the performance.

43:05Sue and I missed quite a bit of it too. The press presence was inhibiting. During the most lurid moments, we simply grinned inanely at each other or gazed steadfastly at our knees. When we got back to the hotel, Frank was looking positively wild-eyed. I feel exhausted, disgusted and degraded. He'd had a night to remember. The first club he'd been to was small, crowded, no more than 50 in the audience. When Frank arrived, he found a fat, middle-aged man on stage with his trousers round his ankles, being attended to by a naked dancer equipped with a battery-operated vibrator. To put it delicately, the girl was not getting much change from the fat man.

43:50Frank gazed on the scene aghast, and then the penny dropped. The fat man was not part of the act. He was a visiting tourist. This was a club where audience participation was the order of the day. Hastily, Lord Longford got to his feet, and dragging Dr Savile with him, made for the exit as discreetly as he could. Unfortunately, the manager caught sight of him, and taking him for a disappointed customer, chased after him. but sir don't go you haven't seen any intercourse yet the intercourse here is excellent i assure you it's next on the program frank fled into the street i wanted to come straight home but in fairness to christine i felt we should give another club a chance it was even worse than the first we were placed in the front row and almost as soon as we arrived a naked girl approached me with a whip.

44:43She used the whip to caress the top of my head and then looped it round my neck. She vibrated me for seconds that seemed like minutes. The next thing I knew, she was sitting on my neighbor's lap, caressing him indescribably. I realized what was about to happen. I could sense whose lap she was going to be landing on next. I had to get out and I did. Don't think me faint-hearted, Giles, I'd seen enough for science and more than enough for enjoyment.

45:20Wednesday, 23th August, 1971. Copenhagen. A day of meetings. At the Ministry of Justice, officials explain to us that Danish society now takes sex in its stride. And the essence of the law here is that anything goes so long as you keep it out of the reach of children and don't impose it on the general public by littering the streets with it. They maintain that decriminalizing porn has drastically reduced domestic consumption and coincided with a substantial drop in sex crimes. This afternoon we met Jens Theander, 27, the man they call the Pornographer Royal. For a moment, I think Lord Longford thought he might have been by appointment to the king and queen here.

46:07He isn't. He is simply the biggest noise in the Danish pawn trade. A big teddy bear of a man, twinkly and fun, difficult to resist. Lord Longford took him in his arms and embraced him warmly. Frank is marvellous the way he lives his philosophy of loving the sinner while hating the sin. Gens told us his business would collapse if countries like Germany, Japan and Britain didn't maintain strict censorship. The bulk of his business is exporting. Thursday the 26th of August 1971 Last night we took in a blue movie. It could not have been more explicit. In the front row, Lord Longford and Peregrine Westhorn perched on tubular chairs, eyes popping as they studied, outsized genitalia thrusting to and fro on a scratchy screen.

46:56Quite soon and quite loudly, they began to tell one another how desperately boring it was. Let's go, said Perry. I can't, said Frank. I walked out of the live show last night. I've got to sit this one out. You go first. No, you're the leader, hissed Perry. You must leave first. in the end a compromise was reached we endured five minutes more thrusting and then all left together today lord longford and i had lunch in the tivoli gardens with one of the press retinue frank pretends to be wary of the press but in truth he can't get enough of them this trip to denmark has turned us all into ludicrous figures of fun but he doesn't seem to mind he loves the publicity.

47:40He told me a taxi driver had dropped him off the other day and said, I can never remember your name. I know you're Lord Pawn, of course, but your other name escapes me. He's even ready to admit that my favourite Longford story may be true. In it, he's walking up Piccadilly and passes Hatchard's bookshop. He looks into the window for a moment and then suddenly storms inside, demanding to see the manager. Where's my new book? It's only just out. Why isn't it on display? I'm so sorry, Lord Longford, mumbles the manager. I didn't know about it. What's it called? Humility. And you should have it in the window.

48:21He may be a vain old goat, but he's good company, patently sincere, and his eccentricity is genuine. When we got up from lunch, he inadvertently put on my jacket. So I put on his. He really didn't notice. He walked back to the hotel wearing a jacket whose sleeves only reached his elbows. Friday the 27th of August 1971. Our BEA Trident brought us safely back to Heathrow at 6.50pm last night. As soon as we reached the Customs Hall, Lord Longford accosted a young man in uniform and thrust a thick blue folder into his hands. I want you to examine these magazines. carefully. You may have heard of me.

49:06I am the Earl of Longford. I was a member of the last government. I have just returned from a fact-finding mission to Copenhagen. The young man leafed through the sordid material, nodding appreciatively. At this point, Lord Longford realised he was not addressing a customs officer, but a courier for American Express. Eventually, Heathrow's chief customs officer appeared, and having secured Frank's assurance that the magazines would remain in his personal control allowed us back into the country. It's been a funny few days. Frank is disappointed that the rest of us haven't been as horrified by what we have seen as he has been.

49:47He believes sex outside marriage is sinful and pornography is the devil's work. It's as simple as that. Sex should be something beautiful. what we've seen isn't beautiful it's revolting it is total degradation every instinct in me tells me that it ought not to be allowed on the flight back i asked him are you sorry we came no it has been necessary dreadful but essential of course i would rather have gone to rome with mary whitehouse you know she flew to rome yesterday she's gone to see the pope she wants to show him the little red school book. I said to her, Mary, you are off to heaven when I am going to hell.

50:36That's where we've been, Giles. You do realise that, don't you? I've taken you on an excursion to hell. Will you ever forgive me? Later, will Lord Longford ever forgive me? the press coverage of our trip is completely out of hand longford porn team split is the front page lead in the daily mirror britain's biggest daily sale according to the mirror and most of the other papers too a furious row has blown up between lord longford and the younger members of his team i.e sue peggdon and me sue is quoted as saying some of us feel that we no longer accept lord long for its rigid attitude to pornography an unfortunate kind of praise but there you go

51:28i'm quoted as saying that some of what we saw was an aphrodisiac sue is quoted as saying that some of it was beautiful what the press men really wanted of course was to catch me and pretty sue who pegged in 21 in each other's arms. At the hotel in Copenhagen, our bedrooms were on the same floor. The newspaper photographers took it in turn to hide in the corridor through the night in the hope of catching one or other of us indulging in a bit of corridor creeping. They would have been disappointed. But Fleet Street doesn't give up that easily, and lo, this Friday morning, who do we find adorning the front page of The Sun?

52:13my darling Michelle there's a huge picture of her along the ludicrous headline my life was the porno rebel Michelle Brown girl in the life of Giles Brandreth rebel of Britain's porn squad talked last night of their life together the interview is a complete farce and the quotes are all inaccurate they've even got our ages wrong but what can you do I had breakfast with Nick Tomalin Sunday Times at his house in Gloucester Crescent. He commiserated. He says the only thing to do when approached for an interview in such circumstances is to say, yes, I'll talk to you if you quote my statement in full.

52:54This is my statement. Bugger off. Wow. I know. This is all coming back to me. Split in the porn commission. But also, wait for it. We're 23-year-olds. Somehow, because of me, Michelle is on the front page of the Sun newspaper I'm on the front page of the Daily Mirror newspaper I mean the whole thing is quite alarming it's quite stomach churning have you ever been in a story that's been on the front page of a paper you personally uh no but you've been associated with people who have and it's pretty unnerving for them isn't it it really is you do you you tremble your stomach churns etc so oh my goodness and I was thinking what have we done why are we on this thing you know i really wasn't anyway it's cliffhanger stuff you got a free trip to denmark though i did and not only that 10 pounds to go to around the the pawn shops you know 10 pounds have you kept any of the things you bought well this will interest you i did keep them in a file in my desk marked pornography oh all the material and michelle about a year later maybe two years later looking for something fun because i'm very methodical so finding between premium bonds uh well filed yes exactly found this file yeah and so what is this and i said well it's from the longfoot she said this material is revolting oh dear you will shred this and then throw it out which i did well done giles so i did have it but it's not there now so there's no point in coming round looking for it.

54:30That's fascinating. It was shredded. You shredded it. 50 and more years ago. Wow. So that's more rosebud for this week. Was it too much? Do you think it was too much? Well, if it was, Giles, people can just put it in the shredder. Oh, yes. Yeah. Or delete. Yeah. Just put this episode in the shredder. Please don't do that. No. Please be with us on Friday because we've got a very special guest. And please be with us for our next Tuesday. Who knows what's happening then? Who knows? And the Tuesday after, more diaries. Woo-hoo! Yay! woohoo it's pretty fruity stuff at times i apologize about that i know i know we should we should have done a warning trigger do a trigger trigger trigger can we do one at the end no it's too late do one a retrospective trigger yeah we apologize to any listeners that were offended by this week's episode look okay it won't happen again or maybe it will who knows anyway this is giles and harriet saying goodbye you can say cue the music they'll try they trust you they don't trust me any longer no no and they're right not to uh cue the music

56:16That's this week's More Rosebud with me, Giles Brandreth, and my friend and producer, Harriet Jane. It's produced by Harriet, and I turn up too.