Antony Mason is the author of some 40 books on travel, exploration, history, geography, spying, volleyball, house plants, the Belgians... In other words, he is a consummate bluffer, though he would not put it like that, publicly at least.
Like most males, as a boy he was constantly urged to be a man. Now that he is one, he realises that this is one of the world's greatest bluffs. Although well into his forties, if separated from a mirror he imagines he is about 18, and certainly wishes he was - were it possible to do without all those sticky agonies of adolescence.
'In your dreams,' interjects his wife. 'Forty-something going on fourteen,' she would say. But then women think they know all about men - a prejudice that the author would like to shoot down with all guns blazing. Neeeeorrrrrr! Dat...dat...dat...dat...dat...dat!
