I can remember being aged 15, walking on Romans Road in the autumn. There was that smell of the chestnut leaves that were mulching down and the mist was rising. I can really remember just thinking to myself, I must never forget how lucky I am to have been here because this isn ' t just beautiful, this is amazing. I ' ve got to do something worthwhile with it and I ' ve got to do something with this opportunity.
... it was these pivotal, inspiring, educated intellectuals that could really take a class and open my eyes.
Q. Looking back, was there anything about Winchester that surprised you?
G: What surprised me was the breadth of things that were there to be interested in. At 12 and 13, the longevity of the institution and the sense of place and pride were all very different for me.
What was surprising about the school? Mainly a sense of an unbroken tradition extending for many hundreds of years. Not unchanging, but continuing and being kept alive, being important in its own right. I hadn ' t previously been exposed to that and the power for good that sense of tradition can be. I wouldn ' t have phrased it like that when I was 15 or even 13 when I went to school, however I was very aware of that by the time I left and that stayed with me.
( Above) Standing in front of a wing of Moorfields Eye Hospital, London
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