Hello, I'm Kristi Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive.

For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.

The program was originally broadcast in 1982, and the presenter was Roy Plumley.

Our castaway this week is a playwright, a novelist, and a lawyer.

I hope I've got that order right.

It's John Mortimer QC.

John, how do you feel about this Desert Island project?

Could you endure it?

Well, I'm quite good at being alone in the day.

I wouldn't mind the days.

I do get a bit restive in the evenings, I think.

And I haven't really spent many evenings alone in the course of my life.

But I don't mind being alone.

I think I should miss an audience.

I mean, I'd have to write plays for the Seagulls, presumably.

How much does music mean in your life?

It means a great deal, increasingly.

I play a great deal of music, and I've become late in life,

addicted to opera.

You don't play any instrument?

No, I'm really totally turned deaf.

If I were to sing, it would be a very painful experience.

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