Alan and I first met when I did a talk at Hoylake Library on Wirral around 12 years ago. Alan sat at the back and during the Q&A session fired a series of really complex questions at me. I remember thinking at the time that “this is one person who is clearly underwhelmed by me and my writings”.
However this was not the case, Dr Roberts just has a razor-sharp intellect and is a profoundly deep thinker. We subsequently became (and remain) really good friends and, over the years we have had a number of incredible conversations about matters esoteric …… but the greatest thing about him is his amazing sense of humour. He is one of a very few people who can make me laugh out loud. As a Liverpool-born scouser it would surprising if Alan was any other way! In this incredibly wide-ranging exchange of ideas Sarah, Alan and I discuss, among other subjects, William Shakespeare’s plays “The Tempest” and “A Midsummer’s Night Dream”, the J B Priestley plays “Johnson Over Jordan” and “Time and the Conways”, the novels “The Tin Drum by Gunter Grasse, “The Magus” by John Fowles and “Replay” by Ken Grimwood. the Philip K. Dick short story “The Electric Ant”, the writings of Jorge Borges, Esther Salaman’s “A Collection of Moments” , the movies “Jacob’s Ladder” and “A Matter of Life and Death”, the on-line game “Second Life” and the Liverpool pub “Flanagan’s Apple” ………