On the rare occasions when I spend a night in Oxford, the keeping of the hours by the clock towers in New College, and Merton, and the great booming of Tom tolling 101 times at 9 pm at Christ Church are inextricably interwoven with memories and regrets and lost joys. The sound almost sends me mad, so intense are the feelings it evokes.

In a private settlement Wilson was forced to publish an apology and retraction acknowledging that there had been no basis for his claims. He claimed that the chances of filming natural behaviour like this were far too low and that the crew must have thrown baby penguins to the seal until they got the shot they wanted. S.

Andrew Norman Wilson (born 27 October 1950) is an English writer and newspaper columnist known for his critical biographies novels works of popular history and religious views. He is an occasional columnist for the Daily Mail and former columnist for the London Evening Standard and has been an occasional contributor to the Times Literary Supplement New Statesman The Spectator and The Observer.