The Oxford Book of SchooldaysPatricia Craig Oxford University Press, 1994 - 430 pages `School', wrote Henry Green, `is no odder than the world outside, only more concentrated.' It is also an experience that everyone has to undergo, and many people have left accounts of their schooldays inspired either by repugnance or regret. The old school, whether you compare it to a Fascist state (as W.H. Auden famously did), a hothouse, a prison, or a place of lost content, remains with you for the rest of your life. Drawing on fiction, memoirs, autobiography, poetry, and letters Patricia Craig presents an enthralling selection of attitudes to schools and schooling. All manner of institutions are described, from village schools to state comprehensives, charity schools, public schools, private schools and grammar schools, with some (usually) fond reminiscences of primary schools for good measure. But the emphasis is on individual experience - on the playing field, in the classroom, making friends and enemies, encountering inspiring or eccentric schoolmasters. Pupils and teachers have their say, Miss Jean Brodie alongside Dr Arnold, Winston Churchill rubbing shoulders with Nicholas Nickleby. Through it all run the anarchic exploits of the heroes and heroines of the school story - Billy Bunter and the Greyfriars mob, Stalky and Co., William Brown, Tom Brown, and the creations of T.B. Reed and Angela Brazil. Ranging from the sixteenth century to the present day, and focusing on Great Britain and Northern Ireland, this anthology sheds incidental light on attitudes to children, educational systems, and the divisions of British society. It will strike a chord with every pupil, past or present, in revealing the glories and defects of British education. |
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Page 120
... lives of smaller boys a perfect hell to them . I came too late into public school life to experience the full rigour of the bullying which used to go on , the sort of thing described in Tom Brown , which certainly persisted long after ...
... lives of smaller boys a perfect hell to them . I came too late into public school life to experience the full rigour of the bullying which used to go on , the sort of thing described in Tom Brown , which certainly persisted long after ...
Page 133
... lives . If they had not happened , I suppose we might all still have been in our nice comfortable little rut , as we were then . I met Miss Harford in the cloakroom , where she was making sure that all the windows were open . She was ...
... lives . If they had not happened , I suppose we might all still have been in our nice comfortable little rut , as we were then . I met Miss Harford in the cloakroom , where she was making sure that all the windows were open . She was ...
Page 244
... live in a dream Of squirrel's game , in tree room , other than this . On sour cream walls , donations ; Shakespeare's ... lives that wryly turn , under the structural Lie , Toward smiles or hate ? Amongst their heap , these children Wear ...
... live in a dream Of squirrel's game , in tree room , other than this . On sour cream walls , donations ; Shakespeare's ... lives that wryly turn , under the structural Lie , Toward smiles or hate ? Amongst their heap , these children Wear ...
Contents
Concerning Education I | 9 |
The World of School | 42 |
Customs Anecdotes Incidents | 88 |
Copyright | |
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