My mentors
An acknowledgement of some of the people who made me who I am
My good buddy Phil South recently posted something about his mentors, and was gracious enough to mention me. So I figured I should do something similar, and write about some of the people who shaped me. I've chosen not to write about family, and I've also omitted some of my closest friends, including Phil - not because I haven't learned from them or because I'm not grateful to them, but because I want to focus on those who took me under their wing at a specific point in my life.
Let me start right at the beginning, with Geoffrey Wass, universally known as WingCo (since he was literally a Wing Commander in the Battle of Britain, piloting both Spitfires and Hurricanes). He was the husband of the headmistress in my first school: right from the start, he could tell that I was struggling to fit in among much the children of much wealthier families, and he helped instil me with the resilience to cope in that unfamiliar environment. It sounds like a cliché, but it's something born of his wartime leadership experience: the measure of a person isn't how rich they are or who their parents are, but whether they have the integrity, the resolve, and the kindness to be a good person.
Once I moved to boarding school at the age of eight, along came Simon Ransome & Don Clarke. I always think of them as a pair, even though they were very different in so many ways. Mr Ransome was my English teacher, well-to-do, and drove a Lotus: Mr Clarke was my science teacher, from a working class family, and drove a souped-up red Mini. They were great friends, and they organized all sorts of events for us kids at the weekend. They not only made boarding school life bearable, but encouraged us to be curious, creative, and take risks. Not dangerous risks, more in the sense of getting out of our comfort zones. You want to do something? Go ahead, try it. Be smart about it, but try it.
One more teacher I will never forget is Stephan Hopkinson, one of the chaplains at Winchester College. He had a more profound effect on my spiritual views than anyone else, largely because he didn't push me towards Christianity. He encouraged me to look into a wide range of religions and philosophies, and figure out what made sense to me. I used to love sitting in his garden with a glass of sherry on a Sunday afternoon, chatting about Buddhism, Taoism, Wicca, Nietzsche, or Jung. He had a fantastic way of teaching by asking questions, without making you feel stupid if you didn't know the answer. I also learned something else very important from him: it's okay to accept that other people may have valid opinions that are quite different to your own or to admit that you might be wrong. Father Stefan, the kindly priest in The Yellow Flowers, is my tribute to him. When I decided to rename all the characters, he was one of only two whose name stayed the same.
Another person I met at Winchester was Andy Christy. He was two years above me, but we fast became great friends. Like me, he was a scholarship kid from a similar background. Andy introduced me to so many things, but most importantly Michael Moorcock, Pink Floyd, and Aleister Crowley. When he went up to Cambridge, he invited me to visit him in Trinity College, which I did - and ended up staying on his floor or spare room for about a year. He's the only person from my school days I'm still in touch with: he moved to Oz in the 90s, but we still chat regularly about everything under the sun. He’s a true Renaissance man: geologist, teacher, saxophonist, writer, and therapist, among other things. He’s also the only person I know who has a mineral named after him, which is a seriously cool achievement.
After college, my first job was working as a journalist under the phenomenal Kojo Boakye Djan on a short-lived magazine called African Preview. He was the former Prime Minister of Ghana - after seizing power in a military coup in 1979. He taught me pretty much everything I know about professional writing - and a lot of other things besides. Turns out, African Preview was pretty much a cover for all sorts of nefarious activities in Africa, and I got to meet a lot of, shall we say, interesting people. We had many interesting discussions about the rights and wrongs of armed revolution, and I learned a lot about realpolitik from him.
My next professional mentor was much more conventional. Jack Lang was a real tech visionary, and one of the co-founders of Raspberry Pi. He was one of the investors in the first tech company I worked with, and he introduced me to all sorts of people. When Dave Lloyd and I started our first company, Short Fuze (which later became Moviestorm), Jack was our first investor, chairman, and greatest supporter. He and I had dinner regularly for about twenty years until I left England - Jack was an excellent cook, and also owned a restaurant - and he was always ready to provide advice.
I met Dave Morris while working in a games company. He's a writer, games designer, storyteller, film buff, and all-around good guy. We didn't end up working together at that time (he got a much better offer from Demis Hassabis, the Deep Mind guy), but we've collaborated on several projects since. He's been one of my greatest supporters with every creative endeavor I've attempted, and to this day, if I have a creative problem, Dave is my go-to guy. I don't always agree with him, but he always gives me new perspectives and makes me think.
It was Dave Morris who introduced me to David Bailey. I forget why, I think it was just one of those "you guys should meet" things. A few years later, when the investors demanded that Dave Lloyd and I hire an experienced CEO for Short Fuze, we hired David. He's one of the smartest people I've ever met when it comes to running businesses: whenever I'm having doubts about a business proposition, I call David. He's saved my ass on more than one occasion.
And then there's Jeff Zie, who took over as CEO after David left. I don't have the words to say how important Jeff was in my life, so I'll just tell a story.
In 2009, I was going through a rough divorce, and was falling apart. Jeff took me aside, and asked me, quite simply, "What do you want?" I babbled on about how I didn't want this and I didn't want that, and Jeff just cut me off, in that brusque, no-bullshit manner he had. As best I remember, what he said was something like this. "I don't give a shit what you don't want, and neither should you. Go home and don't come back to work until you've figured out what you do want, even if that takes a month, then we’ll figure out how to make that happen. Now fuck off." So I did, and that's how I ended up in America.
Whenever I needed a straight talking to, Jeff was there for me. Sadly, he died a few years ago. Damn, I miss that man.
Obviously, there were many others who guided me along the way, but these were the ones who had the most profound impact. Many of them probably never realized it, and sadly, most of them are now dead. It may be too late to thank them in person, but at least I can put the record straight by acknowledging them here.
Gentlemen, thank you.
I'd love to hear who your mentors were. Put something in the comments, or, better still, write your own post.
It's a little sobering to realize that of these ten people, just three are still alive.
Lovely tribute to important people in your life. Makes me reflect on those who shaped my life (far fewer than yours, Matt, sad to say)