Born in Walton-on-Thames, my formative years were spent in an environment where we were actively encouraged to get out in the fresh air to run, play, climb trees and just have fun. To this day, I find being outside preferable to being in, and to my family’s consternation, occasionally enjoy scaling a tree to lop off a few branches. When going out was not an option I liked nothing more than getting my nose stuck into a good book or my weekly comic.

School was actually quite enjoyable, although the social and sporting aspects held far more appeal than the academic. My secondary education took place at Woking County Grammar School For Boys when the state grammar system was already in the process of being run down. 

I wasn’t aware of it at the time, but the school must quite have nurtured creative talents. In the year above me, Peter Lord and David Sproxton developed their artistic skills before going on to found Aardman Animations, home of Wallace and Gromit, and I studied my English Literature ‘A’ level with good friend Kasuo Ishiguro.

As was common in those pre-Internet days, we soon lost touch, and I only really became aware of Kasuo’s meteoric literary rise after the success of The Remains of the Day. While he had let his creative spirit drive him on, trying first for a musical career stateside, I took the more boringly conservative option, reading Economics at the University College of Wales, Aberystwyth before spending most of my working life in financial institutions in the City of London.

I have a wonderful wife and two great kids, and still enjoy the occasional pint. For outside entertainment, I love being on in or near the sea, or walking out over the Surrey Hills. When indoors, I read quite a lot, write, play guitar not very well and enjoy listening to a variety of music, though rarely anything you would call cultural.