On Friday nights at 8.45pm, Radio Four has a slot called ‘Point of View’ which by turns can be enlightening or infuriating, but last Friday it replayed Alistair Cooke’s Letter from America on the death of Bobby Kennedy.

The 5th of June marks 50 years since he was slot. I wasn’t even a twinkle in my parents eyes in 1968 but I know that it was a hell of a year…we already commemorated Martin Luther King’s murder earlier this year, and I’m not very well read about the time but on Friday night, I listened to the broadcast and I knew that it was Alistair Cooke because I grew up with Letter from America and I knew that it was about Bobby Kennedy. I have probably heard this broadcast before, it is powerful. But as I was listening to it, in the back of my head I heard this song and I heard Sam Cooke

I wasn’t alive in 1968, but this song, I grew up hearing. I knew what it was about, I knew it was a sad song, but listening to Alistair Cooke (of all people) I felt that I finally understood it and maybe it felt more relevant to me now because of the times we are living in.