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THE SCHOOL GATE
PRAISE be, primary school children in England go back today. But not their parents — for the foreseeable future, they are being discouraged from hanging around after drop-off and pick-up.
In normal times, primary school playgrounds are the modern equivalent of village wells; Cranford-like community hubs where people gather to meet, gossip and make plans. They have their own social codes, hierarchies and even uniforms: athleisure for the WFH juggler; smart shoes and coat for the non-stopping office-bound; relaxed fashions for the Friday ladies-who-lunch and play-daters.
No surprise, then, that contemporary writers have identified schoolgate communities as closed societies worth putting under a microscope and prodding.
Gill Hornby’s fun The Hive is centred on St Ambrose, a much-sought-after state Church of England primary in the Shires. There, Bea is the unchallenged queen of the playground and PTA, dividing and ruling friendship groups and spearheading all fundraising efforts. But why has she dropped lovely Rachel? And will the elegant Melissa steal her crown?
White Women LOL is a sharply observed short story in Curtis Sittenfeld’s latest collection Help Yourself. Jill has become a pariah, after an incident at her former school-gate best friend Amy’s 40th went viral. When Amy texts Jill for the first time in three weeks, Jill refrains from asking: ‘Does everyone at school hate me? Is it too soon for me to come back to drop off?’
When a celebrity parent’s dog goes missing, she scents a chance to redeem herself.
The Rumour, by Lesley Kara, also explores the dangers of something going viral. Keen to ingratiate herself with the coolest school-gate clique, single mother Joanna shares gossip she has heard about a child killer living under an assumed identity in their seaside town. But, as she’ll learn, loose talk can cost lives.
Will we have anything to gossip about when we can finally break free? If you are missing the school gate, or anywhere else you enjoy a chinwag, try one of these.