Gordon Thomas Frederick Snell was born in
Singapore on 1 October 1932. He was an only child, and lived with parents in Singapore during the British colonization period. He attended the
Geelong College in Victoria, leaving in 1946. He was separated from his father for three years, who was taken prisoner during the
Japanese occupation of Singapore of World War II. After the war, the family moved to the UK. He finished
secondary school in Wiltshire. Snell attended the University of Oxford, where he was a friend and classmate of
Bernard Donoughue. ==Relationship with Maeve Binchy==