Also my most triumphant: 2017 at the Royal Court. Julie Hesmondhalgh reads my psychologist’s report over two hours. Every excruciating intimate word of it. Extreme verbatim theatre. One night only.

When I was doing a masterclass at a theatre and I had to leave the stage because I was about to shit my pants.

Years ago in a safari park in South Africa, and getting all dressed up for dinner. Walking across the lawn, I didn’t realise there was a swimming pool that hadn’t been lit and walked straight into the shallow end fully clothed. It still haunts me. I remember trying to get out as if no one would notice.

I remember being a teenager and writing this romantic short story in the style of the Brontës on a computer and I didn’t realise that the person whose computer it was could just print it out. A group of boys had a couple of pages and they were all reading it.

To two ex-girlfriends, for my cowardice.

To make www.theschooloflife.com a global brand (to open a branch in Australia). To make www.living-architecture.co.uk flourish. To write good books.

The architect Peter Zumthor, for the baths at Vals in Switzerland.

I'd grow more hair and try to be less mortal.

failure. I dream of chapters I haven't written and things that I forgot to say in books I wrote three or seven years ago.

I want to persuade people that Culture, broadly defined (literature, philosophy, art, theatre, photography etc.) can be used as a guide to how to live. I believe in the practical application of Culture, Culture as self-help.