Remembered Heroes
Two things have come up recently that I’d like to mention here. They’re both, in their different ways, about heroes, but the remembrance that’s called for is different to that normally observed on this day.
First, I couldn’t resist passing on a link to a short but intensely moving piece by Alan Garner in yesterday’s Guardian about Alan Turing, in the My Hero series.
I suppose most readers of this blog will know of Turing’s pioneering work on computer science and his crucial contribution to the war effort in cracking the German Enigma codes. I also suppose most know about the circumstances of his death; he took is own life in 1954 after being forced to endure a form of chemical castration after being found guilty of homosexuality, in case you didn’t already know. Many of you will also have read some (or in my case many) of the various books about his life and work. (If not I recommend Andrew Hodges’ excellent The Enigma of Intelligence, which I read when I was an undergraduate, over 25 years ago.)
But what those of us who never met Alan Turing will never know is what he was really like as a man, and that is why pieces like the one by Alan Garner are so moving. Turing comes across as eccentric (I think we all know what was the case), but also as a very amusing character who was excellent company and a bit of a chatterbox, despite suffering from a stammer. The circumstances of his arrest and subsequent conviction for the “crime” of being gay also confirm the impression that he had an almost childlike innocence about the world outside academe. In other words, he was a very easy target. We like to think we live in more enlightened times nowadays – and I suppose in many ways we do – but I think Alan Turing would be as much, or even more of, a misfit in today’s world than he was in the 1950s. Although he was undoubtedly a genius, he rarely bothered to publish academic papers so I dread to think how he would fare in the present university system!
Anyway, I’d just like to say thank you to Alan Garner (who knew Turing well as a friend) for sharing his thoughts and experiences. I may have never met Alan Turing, but he’s my hero too…
And that brings me to another sad story. I only learned this morning that former cricketer Peter Roebuck died yesterday, at the age of 55, having taken his own life in a hotel room in Cape Town. Peter Roebuck always seemed to me an unlikely figure for a sportsman, with his spectacles, cerebral air, and rather stooped gait he looked more like an academic than an athlete, but he was a fine cricketer. I remember him very well from the time I was a schoolboy mad keen about cricket, and I liked him particularly because he wasn’t – or didn’t seem to be – someone blessed with prodigious natural skill. He made it in the professional game because he worked hard. People like that are always heroes to those, like me, who love sport but don’t have any innate talent for it.
After retiring from cricket Roebuck went to live in Australia and took up a career as writer and commentator on the sport, a role at which he excelled, as much for his lucid prose as for his deep technical knowledge. Although he mainly covered Australian cricket, I often read his articles and admired his writing enormously. I have no idea what caused him to commit suicide, and I wouldn’t wish to speculate about that, let alone presume to judge. All I can say is that it’s the saddest thing when someone takes their own life, whatever the circumstances.
UPDTATE: 14/11/2011 There’s a lot of traffic coming to this post via Google searches of “Was Peter Roebuck gay” or suchlike. I have no idea whether he was or wasn’t and I’m not going to indulge in gossip, so I’m afraid that if that’s the reason you’re here you’re going to be disappointed.
Rest in peace, Peter Roebuck.
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In the Dark 
November 13, 2011 at 1:52 pm
The Garner piece was indeed wonderful. I just love the picture of Turing (who despite the photos I can’t but help but think of as Derek Jacobi, and therefore Claudius) out in 1950s running regalia, talking about Snow White and (not so much) artificial intelligence.
I like your sentence that begins “As someone who was undoubtedly a genius but who rarely bothered to publish academic papers, I …” It’s important to have a modest and clearheaded view of one’s own career! Or perhaps an unclear antecedent?…
November 13, 2011 at 2:43 pm
Oh I hate flawed syntax, especially when I’m guilty of it. I’m most definitely not a genius and have published many more papers than Turing did!
I’ve changed the construction of that sentence.
November 13, 2011 at 2:33 pm
I remember Peter Roebuck’s cap being knocked off by West Indian quick Andy Roberts at Fenners, the Cambridge University ground, in summer 1976 when the tourists played a combined universities team at the end of my first year at Cambridge. An inch lower and Roebuck would have been in hospital.
There is a perplexing and distressing correlation between cricket and suicide. A significantly greater proportion of retired professional cricketers have taken their own lives than other sportsmen. Cricket writer David Frith has written a book about it, called Silence of the Heart. He doesn’t know why, though. And the problem is as great among bowlers as batsmen, which disproved a private theory of mine. Of course there is the correlation-causation debate, ie does the game attract people likely to do this, rather than cause people to? Cricketers spend a far higher proportion of their time actually playing their game than other sportsmen, but whether this is a factor is unknown.
November 13, 2011 at 2:50 pm
What was your theory, if you don’t mind me asking?
November 13, 2011 at 2:57 pm
My theory was to do with the fact that a batsman can lose his life (ie, be out) at any instant of his innings with no second chance, whereas a bowler who is hit for six can dust himself off and continue bowling.
I should add that the suicide rate for retired cricketers is also well above the average for non-sportsmen. Whether that is the case for those who played other sports, I can’t remember.
November 14, 2011 at 12:07 pm
As I understand it there actually hasn’t been a decent statistical study for cricket, nor a proper scientific investigation into the causes/correlations, but in baseball (the nearest equivalent to cricket) the suicide rate is apparantly over 2.5 times that of the general population. David Frith’s book ironically has a forward by Peter Roebuck…. in which Roebuck refuted a colleague’s suggestion that he himself would one day take his own life. I agree with Anton on the difference between batting and bowing and the finality of dismissal. It took me until my late 20s to fulfil my potential with the bat in club cricket because of the “fear of failure”. But I could always fall back on my bowling, where psychologically I knew I always had a chance to immediately make amends for being hit for 4 or 6. Indeed, as a batsman I’m always well aware that the next delivery after hitting a boundary may well be the bowler’s best…. (these days I’m too old and fat to bowl my military medium. I stick to batting).
My twopenny theory is that cricket as a sport attracts a greater proportion of personalities that are perhaps more introverted or self absorbed. The statistics and strategies may also attract a greater proportion of intellectuals, and those somewhere on the aspergic and autistic spectrums. I’ve seen plenty of examples among players, scorers, umpires….. and crowds at county cricket…. These kinds of personalities may be more prone to depressive tendencies especially rumination. Which is not helped by the finality of dismissal. Some of the best modern diaries by cricketers still in the game contain an element of that (eg Ed Smith, Ed Cowan).
This is completely anecdotal and probably rubbish, but consider the personalities of some of cricket’s greatest stonewalling batsmen, eg Boycott and Roebuck, and contrast with some of its greatest entertainers eg Botham, Warne…
November 14, 2011 at 2:00 pm
All hypotheses are welcome, although it’s not easy to know how to test some of them. It is well known that professional sportsmen face a meaning-of-life crisis upon retirement, and perhaps that is greater for cricketers since they spend much of their life away from their families and staying with fellow pros, while playing away matches. A game of cricket lasts for days unlike other sports.
November 14, 2011 at 6:03 pm
A lovely man to follow on twitter who talks openly about his depression is New Zealand fast bowler Iain O’Brien (@iainobrien). Iain is currently trying to regain his place in their Test side and I hope he makes it.
November 14, 2011 at 6:53 pm
Marcus Trescothick and Michael Slater are both depressives too. May they avoid anything worse than they have already been through.
November 15, 2011 at 7:32 am
“Call no man happy until he knows the manner of his death.”
November 14, 2011 at 11:07 pm
Re cricket, I think that the outstanding Australian batting performance in the recent Test against South Africa deserves commemoration here. 47 all out is a great recovery from 21-9.
November 13, 2011 at 2:52 pm
Would that be the same Alan Garner who wrote the children’s books Weirdstone of Brisingamen and The Owl Service?
I too have read Hodges’ biography of Turing; a triple meaning in the book title is quite an achievement. I agree with Hodges that Turing would have been better off remaining in the Oxbridge milieu than moving to Manchester, both for social and professional reasons. And I have looked at the house where Turing died – a plaque is just visible from the road. (The house is in private hands and has quite a long drive.) I have spoken about Turing to only one person who knew him personally, the late maverick engineer Eric Laithwaite. Laithwaite emphasised Turing’s stammer.
I was at Bletchley Park (again) last week. Turing’s achievement there was very great and saved tens of thousands of lives, perhaps most notably on the Atlantic convoys.
I would like to ask a question about his work in fundamental computing. This probably reflects my own lack of understanding, but had this work never been done, would the design and implementation of computers be any different, or any slower? I confess to not understanding the importance of Turing machines (other than bombes…)
November 13, 2011 at 6:36 pm
It’s the same Garner, I think. Alan, not Joel.
November 13, 2011 at 6:34 pm
A fine tribute to Peter Roebuck can be found here:
http://www.espncricinfo.com/magazine/content/current/story/540315.html
November 13, 2011 at 11:30 pm
And another, by Vic Marks, here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2011/nov/13/peter-roebuck-gifted-complex-brilliant
November 15, 2011 at 1:59 pm
[…] who is quite new to me called Lora Zombie. It also kind of fits with a theme established by a recent post. The Observer piece about her series of Depressed Superheroes was in the print edition, but […]
November 19, 2011 at 11:34 pm
Well, there’s no point in disguising thelatest revelations about the Peter Roebuck story
http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2011/nov/14/peter-roebuck-sexual-assault-claims
November 21, 2011 at 4:57 pm
I too believe that DSK was set up.