Lessons in hard knocks from chronicler of class divisions

Such, Such, Were the Joys An Essay

Penguin is publishing a 56-page essay written by George Orwell that even he considered to be so libellous it wasn’t seen anywhere until after 1952, when the wife of the headmaster of St Cyprian’s prep school finally died. She was referred to as Flip, and her husband was called Sambo — by the boys that is — in what may sound like an affectionate term, but Orwell clearly loathed them.

St Cyprian’s “…was an expensive and snobbish school which was in the process of becoming more snobbish, and, I imagine, more expensive.” It was one of a number of private, feepaying schools that was a kind of primary school for toffs that went on to Eton when they were 13. If the titled or rich were not intellectually up to it, they went to lesser establishments such as Uppingham. The first thing Orwell did on arrival was to serially wet his bed, a symptom of fright and being taken from your family at about seven years old, but considered a crime at St Cyprian’s, punishable by a thrashing.