Memorial Service: John Julius Norwich

St James’s Piccadilly is halfway between the London Library in St James’s Square, where John Julius Cooper, 2nd Viscount Norwich, spent much of his working life, and Hatchards bookshop in Piccadilly, where his Christmas Cracker selection has gone on sale since 1970. This was convenient for friends attending his memorial service in the church and the wake in the library – and buying his 49th and last Cracker.

Julian Fellowes, writer of Downton Abbey, said John Julius had been an inspiration to him: ‘He was always a tremendous influence from the moment we met more than 35 years ago. He wore his wisdom so lightly. He was never patronising, self-important or pompous.’

John Julius once asked Lord Fellowes what he knew about Carlo Goldoni, the 18th-century playwright. ‘Absolutely nothing,’ said Fellowes. John Julius then explained he had been asked to give a lecture on Goldoni for Save Venice, an American charity, but he couldn’t do it and he wanted Fellowes to do it for him. ‘You can read, can’t you?’ said J J.

‘A few weeks later,’ said Fellowes, ‘I am in Venice, giving two lectures on Goldoni, while Emma and I had a blissful ten days at the Monaco.’

‘After the shock of his death had passed, I thought what is wrong with me?’ said J J’s daughter Artemis Cooper. ‘Why aren’t I crushed with grief? He still shines so bright in my heart that every memory of him brings more gladness than gloom, more gratitude than regret.’

Artemis said she recalled his only once being angry when she was a child – when she refused to admire the view while driving over the Grossglockner Pass in Austria. She said that, when colour TV came in, he wore brightly coloured suits. ‘Do not adjust your set,’ he said.

Jason Cooper, the new Lord Norwich, recalled the letters he received from his father by singing I’m Going to Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter.

Simon Schama said John Julius was ‘the kind of historian who didn’t think wisdom should be confused with solemnity’.

J J’s daughter Allegra Huston read from Alternative Endings to an Unwritten Ballad by Paul Dehn, given to John Julius by historian Linda Kelly for the 1994 and 2005 Christmas Crackers.

‘Representing John Julius has been a constant in my life,’ said his agent, Felicity Bryant. ‘He wore his erudition so lightly – and he was such a pro.’