In the 1940s he was a war hero, and then an MP who reduced Winston Churchill to tears in the Commons. In the 1950s he was tipped to become Labour leader but resigned from politics and became a TV interviewer. In 1961 he resigned from the BBC and became the editor of the New Statesman. Four years later he resigned and became a diplomat, working first as Britain’s high commissioner to India and then as the ambassador to Washington. In 1971 he resigned and became the chairman of London Weekend Television and then Independent Television News. In 1984 he moved to California to teach, until his return and re- tirement in 1990. In old age, he still did not look back. In 2005 he wrote: “When I retired from even the outer reaches of public responsibility, I resolved to put that life completely out of mind – to forget it all, in fact.”

The paradox of Freeman the private celebrity was symbolised by the TV series that made him famous from 1959 onward, Face to Face. (link to original NS article)