"The other day I picked up a book from the local library and was just returning home in my car, carefully negotiating the narrow streets adjoining Chalcott Square, when a very wobbly bicyclist came down the road opposite at some pace, his coat flapping in the wind. I was about to call out something rude when I recognised Alan Bennett's face under the helmet. It was a good thing I was going so slowly or I might have run over one of Britain's best loved authors!"

A narrow escape (although, knowing Aunty Ann, "something rude" would not have amounted to more than a "look here, Bennett!") but the History Boys scribe fared worse in an earlier incident involving Aunty Ann's friend, Howard. In a diary entry in May of last year, Bennett recounts how a tangling of his coat in his rear wheel sent him tumbling to the Tarmac, where he landed "painfully on his bum".

He writes: "Another passing pensioner [Howard], seeing my plight, goes to a friend's house for a pair of scissors to cut me free, except that the friend is out." Bennett eventually limped home and managed to free the wheel without having to cut his coat. "I imagine in the future," he concludes, "there is going to be more of this."

Let's hope not. Have you had a brush with a biking Bennett, or heard about other mishaps involving the writer? Could his "flapping" coat be to blame? Should we send him a rescue parcel of Lycra cycle wear to prevent future tangles?

Cartoon credit: Camden New Journal