my parents had lived through a period of mass unemployment and great poverty.

i think my parents saw education as a way that would ensure i and my sister would never face such deprivations.

And so i was educated. hours of homework every night so i got in the A class , where all the richer kids were in, and i passed the 11 plus.

but i wasn't the ideal subject for education - never could learn lists of words - latin declensions, french irregular verbs, the periodic table - hydrogen, helium, berilium, boron .carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, fluorine, neon, sodium, magnesium, aluminium, silicon, phosphorus.... i'm sure i would have preferred learning to flip burgers.