Spencer reads his memoir on the Audiobook, and at first I was a little distracted by his super posh accent. I couldn't help but imagine what a snob he was. And later in the book when he mentions being the Queen's godson and having his dinner delivered to him every night at home, I really felt the vast differences between our lives.
However, no matter how privileged he was and is, at some point in his life, Charles was only an eight-year-old boy who desperately missed his recently divorced mother. He was a young boy who had never slept away from his home, and felt like he was being abandoned when his father dropped him off at Maidwell Boarding School in Northamptonshire. Charles Spencer attended Maidwell from 8-13 years of age, 1972-1977.
Spencer has a way with words, and his descriptions of the dread he felt at Maidwell was visceral. I can see now why so many books and movies take place in boarding schools. They were not exaggerating the meanness of the teachers. During Spencer's time, Maidwell was rotting from the top with a sadistic, pervy headmaster who got sexual pleasure from beating young boys until they bled. There were a couple of other teachers who were shockingly violent and/or sexually inappropriate as well.
You might ask why parents would subject their children to such a thing. Or why the kids never told their parents about all the abuse they suffered. The fact is that there was a strong tradition in the upper classes of sending children to boarding school. It was believed it would make good citizens of them that could continue governing the empire of Great Britain. Even if parents personally balked at sending such young kids away from home, there was considerable peer pressure to conform.
In addition, the parent/child relationship in the upper classes was practically nonexistent. Physical affection was often rare and emotional intimacies probably even more so. Finally, because the parents picked these schools and paid considerable amounts of money to send their children to them, the children felt obligated to put up a good front. Complaining about the school would be like complaining about their parents.
In addition to extreme homesickness, bullying from teachers and students, and disturbing physical abuse, Charles Spencer was also sexually abused by a young woman that worked there. He was only eleven at the time. I was impressed by how Spencer was able to describe how much those interactions messed with his head at the time, as well as his normal sexual development later.
So, this book can be a very challenging read. The content is dark, and it's no fun delving into all that pain and hurt. It's hard to understand how an adult could be so callous and cruel to children. But this is a very interesting, well-written book. Spencer has a way with words. I was impressed with both the writing and the insight Spencer brought to the topic. Recommended if you can stand it.
*One random, extra tidbit that I thought was insane, was that all of the women that worked at the school--from teacher to housekeeper--were addressed as, "Please." Their identities were basically stripped from them inside the school, and often the boys would end up saying, "Please, Please," to get their attention.
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