A prince among the pretenders
A VERY cute, but apprehensive-looking Prince George started school on Thursday, with his new headmaster hoping he’ll have “the confidence to be himself”.
Thomas’s, Battersea, where George will spend most of his day from now on, is not too far from where I live. We often walk past it at the weekend on our way to grab a large breakfast (yes, we’re a sad couple, my husband and me – we’ve got routines).
Battersea is a pretty well-off, in parts, London borough which was once steeped in radical socialism. Terraced, two-storey Victorian properties, once the home of poor industrial workers, now sell for upwards of £1million.
George’s new school, ironically, was originally set up for the 20 poorest boys of Battersea. It’s a lovely building with the rather ominous tenet “Rather Deathe Than False of Faythe” – crikey! – carved in stone over the entrance. Apparently it was the family motto of the Lord of the Manor who once owned the school.
As private schools go, it’s pretty egalitarian in that every family is minted, posh, drives a gigantic 4x4 and works in a moneyspinning trade such as stockbroking, marketing or investment banking.
The immaculately dressed, perfectly manicured and coiffed mums talk mainly about other mums or school events, school teachers, their over-achieving children or dinner parties.
It’s status-based chat, lots of where they’re going on holiday (February, skiing; summer, South of France; Christmas, upmarket Caribbean; weekends, house in Norfolk, Suffolk, anywhere, so long as it’s nowhere near Ordinaryfolk).
They case each others’ ring fingers to assess diamond quotient and employ nannies whether they’re in full-time work or not – and a relatively high percentage aren’t. The lots at the school fundraising auction are luxury holidays, behind-thescenes visits to TV studios, Formula 1 tickets etc, etc.
School fetes sell goods you’d actually like to buy rather than stuff you feel you should purchase to boost school funds. They name-drop to impress.
But George’s parents have no need to namedrop – they are the name-dropped. They have no need to curry favours – they are the favoured. They have no need to pretend they’re something they’re not, because they’re something.
Plus, William is one of the nicest, most emotionally intelligent blokes you could meet.
If George is indeed “himself ”, as his headteacher hopes, he’ll be one of the most down-to-earth pupils in the school.
George’s parents have no need to name-drop