THE DAZZLING PETER USTINOV

Multi-lingual genius: actor, writer, humorist, theatre director, TV presenter, columnist, and raconteur

W E D N E S D A Y,  5  J U L Y

Had a pretty lazy day. It was hardly worth coming into school at all. First we did typing: seven of us with three typewriters - it was quite good. Then Madame Cornet gave us a little talk on French cooking, then we bought tickets for ‘Tobias’ and gave the staff sixpences for our exam papers. But it was so feeble, we weren’t allowed to go home till afternoon register, so we had to stay from 1pm to 2.20 doing nothing.

Tidied up the whole of the downstairs because I couldn’t bear the mess any more, and looked through my Diary. I suddenly miss Dutronc again - it’s been three months since I met him. 

I so badly want a boy to love. I can hardly bear to think I’ve let such a nice boy slip through my fingers.

Later Mummy told me that Richard Olssen wants his friend Tim to be there when we go round because Tim is so fond of me. It made me cry.

“It’s so nice to know somebody loves you - even if he’s only ten.”

Saw Wimbledon when we got home. Roger Taylor was beaten by Bungert - such a shame. Then the TV broke down so we missed Spinach and Newcombe. I was pretty mad about that.

Later we listened to Peter Ustinov on the radio – he’s a marvellous speaker! He’s so intelligent and so humorous and not in the least affected.

“July 1967: Homosexuality between males is decriminalised”

David Hockney, Portrait of an Artist ( Pool with Two Figures) (1972).

For most people, the Sixties was a time of sexual awakening, and in 1967, gay and bisexual men (in England & Wales, not Scotland) began to share that freedom. However, all was not as it first seemed. Gay activist Peter Tachell writes: “Not only was homosexuality only partly decriminalised by the 1967 act, but the remaining anti-gay laws were policed more aggressively than before by a state that opposed gay acceptance and equality. My new research reveals that an estimated 15,000-plus gay men were convicted in the decades that followed."

Tate Britain’s exhibition Queer British Art, 1861-1967 goes some way towards recording what E M Forster called the “great unrecorded history”.