Читать книгу The Man Within - Alison Carlson - Страница 16

C

hurchill’s youth was a typical upper-class Victorian

one, and he attended boarding school from an early

age. A willful and often rebellious child, with parents

who were too busy to pay him the attention he craved,

he found succour in his beloved nurse, Mrs Everest,

whom he nicknamed ‘Womany’ or ‘Woomie’. Some

of his father’s letters suggest he believed his son would never amount to

much, and a short inspection of Churchill’s school reports might make one

wonder how anything could have come of this seemingly underperforming

boy. The punishment book from Harrow and letters from the headmaster

to Churchill’s mother, trying to recruit her help in getting her somewhat-

irregular son to attend classes, would seem to confirm this view, one

which – helped by Churchill himself – has since taken on the status of myth.

In fact, Churchill excelled at the subjects he enjoyed – English literature and

history – even if maths and classics puzzled and bored him. His astonishing

memory, his indefatigable energy and, above all, his unflagging belief in

the dictum that he gave in his speech to Harrow schoolboys in the Second

World War – “Never, never, never, never give in”– ensured that sooner or

later he would realise his full potential.