The author and illustrator Raymond Briggs has two lifesize papier-mâché statues in his house made by his friend, Alan Baker. “One shows me sitting on the lavatory, the other, downstairs, has me bent over a Zimmer frame.” He’s busy writing and illustrating a book Time for Lights Out, inspired by some verses of a favourite poet, Edward Thomas. “It’s about death and dying. Do you know I’ve just worked out the average age of death of 50 cartoonists of the 1980s and it was 68, so I’m on a winning streak!” It’s almost 30 years since he wrote The Snowman; the animated TV film made in 1982 is shown every Christmas, and new generations adore it. His strip cartoon book on how an elderly, ordinary couple try to cope after a nuclear bomb, When the Wind Blows, was made into a play and a film and had impact around the world. He’ll be celebrating his birthday with his partner and three step-grandchildren. Raymond Briggs is 72 today.
RGT
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Chief Emeka Anyaoku, Commonwealth Secretary-General, 1990-2000, 73; Air Marshal Sir Alfred Ball, Deputy C-in-C, RAF Strike Command, 1977-79, 85; Peter Beardsley, footballer, 45; David Bellamy, botanist, writer and broadcaster, 73; Sir Michael Bett, chairman of the Pensions Protection and Investment Accreditation Board, 71; Vice-Admiral Sir Tom Blackburn, Master of Her Majesty’s Household, 2000-05, 61; John Boorman, film director, 73; Professor M. J. Brown, clinical pharmacologist, 55; J. R. Carr, chairman of the Countryside Commission of Scotland, 1986-92, 79; Kevin Costner, actor, 51; Sir Rocco Forte, hotelier, 61; Lord Goodhart, lawyer and Liberal Democrat peer, 73; Sir William Harding, Ambassador to Peru, 1977-79, and Ambassador to Brazil, 1981-84, 79; Sir Robert Hicks, Conservative MP for Bodmin, 1970-83, and Cornwall South East, 1983-97, 68; Lord Higgins, Conservative MP for Worthing, 1964-97, 78; Jane Horrocks, actress, 42; John Hougham, chairman of Acas, 1993-2000, 69; Lord Howell of Guildford, Conservative MP for Guildford, 1966-97, 70; John Hume, Social Democratic and Labour MP for Foyle and SDLP MEP for Northern Ireland, 69; Dame Jennifer Jenkins, chairman of the National Trust, 1986-90, 85; Paul Keating, Prime Minister of Australia, 1991-96, 62; Sir Martin Laing, chairman of John Laing, 1985-2001, 64; Sir Godfray Le Quesne, chairman of the Monopolies and Mergers Commission, 1975-87, 82; Mark Rylance, artistic director of the Globe Theatre, 1995-Jan 2006, 46; Sir Clive Whitmore, civil servant, principal private secretary to the Prime Minister, 1979-82, 71.