One of the joys of a recent career change is taking a slightly longer run in the mornings. I get up in the dark and hammer my way round the park with the Protforce detectives strolling behind (and breaking into a theatrical jog when I turn round). There is nothing more beautiful than watching the sun come up over a frosty London, and seeing the light begin to gleam on the tops of those high-rises – tastefully located – that I helped to greenlight, with Eddie Lister and Simon Milton, when we were running City Hall. As I trundle along, I brood on my next moves. I think I have cracked it.
One way to take your mind off the rigours of athletic exertion is to recite poetry. I now have a pretty stonking repertoire. In 35 mins I can do the first 100 lines of the Iliad, the first 100 lines of the Aeneid, the first canto of the Divine Comedy and the whole of Lycidas. I am pretty much word-perfect, though I might hesitate over the names of all those flowers towards the end of Lycidas and I am not sure a real Italian speaker would enjoy my version of Dante. But I have at least been able to meditate on these amazing works of art.
The openings of the first two, the Iliad and its majestic Roman successor, are really what you call suppliant dramas. One character turns to another and implores them to do something. I like to act them out in different voices – much to the puzzlement of people overtaking me. I love Juno begging Aeolus to destroy the Trojan ships, and offering him sex with her most beautiful nymph. But my favourite is the old priest Chryses, begging Apollo to punish the Greeks for dishonouring him and for refusing to accept the ransom he has offered for his daughter – otherwise doomed to occupy the bed of Agamemnon.
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