'Sign of the times'

Born in West Stockwith, Nottinghamshire, on Sept 2, 1960, Moody was highly academic and had a large book collection from a young age, his sister Jayne Graham said. His interest in journalism began at age 15, when he became the press officer for a pigeon club.

After having studied economics and gaining an honors degree at Coventry University, he swiftly committed to a career in journalism that spanned nearly four decades.

Before joining China Daily, he made a name for himself in the UK with his work as a political reporter, business editor and columnist with national and regional newspapers, including titles such as the Manchester Evening News, the Daily Express and The Observer, after doing a stint in the United Arab Emirates.

As to how he came to China, Ravi Shankar, a senior editor at China Daily who knew Moody for 35 years, said he invited his friend to spend "a paid holiday" in Beijing in 2008, which involved bringing out the paper's bumper editions during the Olympic Games.

"He was intrigued enough to take up the offer and was impressed enough about China Daily, and China, to take up a full-time job the next year," Shankar said. Moody noted in his diary that he received the China Daily offer on Jan 5, 2009.

Moody's fascination with Asia, particularly China, had begun much earlier when he covered the return of Hong Kong to the motherland in 1997 for a British newspaper. On that visit, he also ventured across the border to Shenzhen, Guangdong province, for a brief visit and became interested in the seismic changes he sensed taking place.

His diary entry recorded a scene one evening in early 1976. When he was 15, he "burst downstairs while News at Ten announced that (premier) Zhou Enlai had died".

"I actually don't know why I was so excited. I had no real interest in China at 15, but I suppose it was somewhat prescient," he wrote.

Nick Jaspan, director of Prolific North, a UK publisher of consumer and business journals and periodicals, who was a friend of Moody's for 35 years, said that by working in China, Moody believed he had been "given an extraordinary opportunity, and he took the opportunity with both hands".

Martin Jacques, a former senior fellow at Cambridge University's Department of Politics and International Studies and author of When China Rules the World: The End of the Western World and the Birth of a New Global Order, said when he first met with Moody in Beijing in 2009, he was struck that "here was someone from the UK with a lot of journalistic experience who had chosen to work in China", and viewed it as "a sign of the times".