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There have been times, in places such as Iraq and Afghanistan and Lebanon, when I’d have been happy to know I’d still be alive and working in an hour’s time, let alone decades later. I’m now celebrating the 60th anniversary of when I first pushed through the doors of Broadcasting House and confided to the commissionaire I’d come to work in the radio newsroom. I was 22 and newly graduated. It would have been inconceivable to that callow, self-doubting, ignorant chap that in 2026 – unthinkably far into the future – he’d still be pushing those doors open. The BBC has often been a difficult employer, and I’ve been a difficult employee; but it’s kept me on. In 2020, it even gave me my own programme on foreign affairs: Unspun World on BBC Two. I labour on it like an 82-year-old grandad on his allotment. Though much is taken, a certain amount abides…

I’m halfway through a theatre tour of the country.…