His most recent book 'The Heart of Things'(2021) is a personal reflection on his life, with extracts from favourite poems. In the final chapter, on forgiving, he stresses an important fact that we can read our lives through the prism of heroism or defeat or resignation or shame. But only admitting our own weakness will make us kind, help us identify with others and act kin to kin. In his closing verses he concludes that, in the absence of certainty about God or an afterlife, 'I, who walked the hills, I, who saw white hares dancing in the snow on Lammermuir, should be grateful for life, even as it passes'.
