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A Very Private School
- Narrated by: Charles Spencer
- Length: 7 hrs and 57 mins
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A Very Private School
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Summary
THE #1 SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER
'Shocking and moving' Guardian
'A tour-de-force' Washington Post
At eight years of age, Charles Spencer was sent away to one of England’s most exclusive boarding schools.
In this courageous and beautifully written memoir, Spencer offers a clear-eyed, first-hand account of the strange secrets of the school, and the culture of cruelty and abuse he witnessed and experienced in his five years there as a pupil.
Drawing on the memories of many of his schoolboy contemporaries, as well as his own letters and diaries from the time, the book is his attempt to come to terms with the deep emotional scars inflicted upon him. Spencer reflects on the misery, hopelessness and abandonment he felt aged eight, viscerally describing the intense pain of homesickness, the vicious brutality of a boys’ school in the 1970s and the appalling inescapability of it all.
The book cracks the code of the unpoliced regime that ran the place and provides important insights into an antiquated boarding school system. He gives vivid portraits of the teachers and other staff placed in loco parentis, their casual cruelties and toxic obsessions. All these years later, Spencer’s bafflement at their motivations to inflict such cruelty on young children is palpable. As is his fury that, even if somehow he had spoken up, he’d never have been believed.
Charles Spencer's book 'A Very Private School' was a Sunday Times bestseller w/c 11-03-2024.
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Critic reviews
'Top marks for its searing frankness, framed in wistfully beautiful prose’
The Times
‘Spencer is acutely observant of the myriad power imbalances at play within this imperial throwback. There has been a steady stream of books about boarding schools in recent years… but two things mark Spencer out from the crowd. First, he is by title and birth the ultimate establishment man, but he’s still prepared to take on the shibboleths of his class and upbringing. Second, his turn of phrase is often delightful. A painstaking and traumatic process, but one for which any reader must surely give a cheer'
Daily Telegraph
‘Moving… A heartbreaking memoir of a childhood endured at a boarding school ‘without love’, where abuse was shockingly commonplace’
Financial Times
‘This is a story with a clear remit: to confront the British school system with the abuses it has long enabled. There are many graphic details in this book but the allegations have the most impact when read here as a grander narrative about power and how it is abused. As an individual testimony to the abuse that scarred a lifetime and hobbled his marriages, it is a tour de force'
Washington Post
‘Moving and beautifully written, what Spencer’s courageous book reveals will be horribly familiar to the thousands of us who endured the same vile abuse in dozens of schools that were clones of each other. Most of us will go to our graves with the wounds unhealed'
Louis de Bernieres
'This is a powerful, unforgettable story of childhood trauma, and the dark secrets and savagery of the past, told with a searing honesty and clarity that is ultimately redemptive'
Justine Picardie
What listeners say about A Very Private School
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Campesque
- 04-05-24
Harrowing.
I've enjoyed Charles Spencer's history books and bought this one because I know several boarding school survivors from the period this book is about.
Coming from a close loving working class family, Charles' childhood is anathema to me personally, however the story is remarkably similar to what went on in children's homes during those years to friends of mine. Being a mother and grandmother I can't conceive how anyone could send an eight year old child away to be brought up by strangers.
This is a difficult book to listen to but I did so in two sittings. It's a story that needs to be heard and heeded. It explains why we have some of the people in power that we do - stuck in childish emotional illiteracy, brought up by parents who'd gone through exactly the same thing, but still chose to put their own children through this hellish nightmare.
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- sarah hawes
- 25-03-24
Outstanding
What a honour to listen to this story of honesty and integrity and strength and spoken in his own voice thank you
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- Patrick Lubbock
- 20-03-24
Honest, grisly, vulnerable and brave
A wonderfully brave and honest account of the harsh grisly truth delivered with precious vulnerability thank you
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- Pam
- 03-04-24
brilliant brilliant
needed to be written , brought bk memories of my time in private school , luckily I wasn't a boarder
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- Lisa S
- 16-04-24
Interesting and intriguing in equal measure.
I bought this title after seeing the authors interview on tv. This is not a book I would normally be interested in but it complete delivered in every way and I found I could not stop listening once I started. A thoroughly enjoyable listen and the author reading it himself made it even more authentic and heartfelt. I would highly recommend it.
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- Helen Walden
- 01-06-24
Thank you for writing
This was a hard challenging book to listen to. My heart aches for those boys, for Charles, for the damage done. A very well written memoir, and brave too.
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- CrazyMaisy
- 31-05-24
Dicken’s “Dotheboys Hall”!
Very well written, beautifully narrated, very informative and interesting from a modern history perspective, and absolutely heart wrenching memoir.
Charles Spencer has very bravely opened the way for others to tell of their experiences.
Thank you for that.
The police should really investigate the crimes raised in this book as some of the perpetrators are still alive.
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- rhonamcm
- 28-03-24
A broken childhood - explains a lot about current establishment figures
I was weeping before he even got to this monstrous school. But beautifully written and to hear it in Charles Spencer’s own voice even more moving
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- Amazon Customer
- 17-06-24
The honesty
I loved it was read by Charles Spencer himself, a most interesting listen and will listen to this again, have added it to my favourites
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- Shopper
- 27-07-24
compelling read
enjoyed isn't the correct word, but I found myself having to keep listening. never experiencing anything like this in my own childhood I was shocked at how much pain suffering and humiliation a teacher/headmaste nanny, could inflict on boys who we're placed in their charge. I myself am now in my sixties and know to well the evil act adults do to others, but to perform such acts as these kinds on boys is profoundly evil. no wonder these boys adult years were affected.
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