Book review: Portland Place: Secret Diary Of A BBC Secretary
Sarah Shaw, the securely middle-class diarist, was 19 at the time.
The object of her reciprocated affections was 62-year-old Frank, a married, working-class, Irish lift attendant.
Shaw, now a retired librarian, says she based the book on a diary she kept from those days.
Anyone who wonders whether it could possibly be entirely factual will find it hard to fault the period detail, which is a constant delight.
We are right back in a badly-heated world of typewriters and carbon paper and perennial cigarette smoke.
The still-prissy BBC is a place where a woman staff member can get into trouble for wearing trousers to work.
There would undoubtedly have been a minor explosion if the hierarchy had discovered what Sarah and Frank were getting up to on the premises.
