A People’s Historian: John Julius Norwich, 1929-2018

Too many obituaries of people who had some kind of influence on my life lately.

All those I remember from my youth are getting old, yet I can only remember them as just a little older than me and even though I'm now 62 I don't feel that old inside; so every time one of my near contemporaries dies I feel a sudden shock and think, could he or she really have been that old? And then it hits me, yes they are and I'm heading that way too.

This for me, is one of the worst aspects of ageing; that the subjects of my memories are disappearing.

I discovered his books on the Byzantine Empire when I was about 15 years old, and I loved reading them. He made history so interesting and it was about a subject I previously had no information about, in those days before the Internet.

I've been meaning to read his book about Venice, but I keep forgetting to go get it. This is reminding me to do so.

It was an interesting read and John sounds like an interesting guy however, Norwich is my home city and I found the whole article a weird reading as couldn't help but think of every reference to Norwich being the place and not the person.