»  The Virtual Attic — Letters, 1979

 

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The letters linked to from this page were written in 1979.

I started the year at home in Northampton. From January 25 to April 18 I was in Hong Kong, with the vague idea (not much realised) of writing a novel. The months of June, July, and August I spent as a construction worker doing general laboring duties for Austin's of Northampton, who were building a factory for Avon Cosmetics on South Bridge Road. In September I enrolled as a student at Ealing College of Higher Education, pursuing a Postgraduate Diploma in Modern Chinese. I lived at lodgings in Ealing from September on.

If not for that spell of pick-and-shovel work at Austin's, this would have been the only year of my life when I had no paid employment.

• Birthdays:  My father was 80 in July, my mother 67 in March, my brother Noel was 49 in January, my sister Judith 36 in September. Judith's daughter Tessa was 12 in September; Judith's son Marcus was two in January. I was 34 in June.