Such outbursts were notable, though rare. John has been criticised for his treatment of his third wife, Catherine Dove, who was one of the author’s chief informants, and John comes out of the account here as insensitive, with a low threshold of boredom. That is not quite right. Catherine was a hugely forceful personality, which expanded exponentially in the Washington climate. John’s transfer of his affections to her social secretary was his bid for freedom and also the reason why he resigned from the ambassadorial job after two very successful years. He needed the stimulation of problems but he also required calm in his private life. His last wife, Judith, gave him that. Thus the axiom “Freeman changes his job and his wife every few years” was a smart-aleck simplification of a very complex trajectory.

The largest slice of John’s life was spent in broadcasting, either as interviewer or as a mogul. Of his Face To Face interviews three-quarters were superlative successes. He brought Edith Sitwell (“a mobile high altar”) into brilliant and sacramental life. He transformed Gilbert Harding from a snarling bully into a pathetic and tragic hero. He fought a rapier duel with Evelyn Waugh, both at the top of their sardonic form. The meeting with Carl Gustav Jung, the only one to take place outside the studio and preceded by a meal at which Catherine Dove was present, became a piece of history. Jung, then aged 83, was confiding because, during the meal, his right hand was anchored firmly on Mrs Freeman’s thigh. These famous interviews are among the very few from that epoch which have been preserved and are available to the public. They are part of TV legend and enable everyone to judge for himself a central episode of John’s life. His spell as a mogul lasted much longer and was largely uncovered until Hugh Purcell reconstructed it. His account presents Freeman at his superb best: the cerebral man of action. I recommend all to read it attentively.

In John’s retirement I used to paint him an elaborate birthday card every year, and in return he sent me a handwritten letter. His handwriting did not vary over more than half a century: firm, clear, upright and instantly recognisable. I went to his funeral service which was in character, almost ritualistic, but fundamentally secular, and with a eulogium conspicuously absent. I was a friend of John’s for exactly 60 years, and I think he was the greatest man I have been privileged to know. Purcell has produced, on the whole, a fair and full account, and I am grateful to him.