Eton’s recipe for success

One of the first things you realise on arriving at Eton is that while you may be at arguably the best school in the world, you’re also possibly among Britain’s most hated. It’s great being surrounded by 15th-century quadrangles and Georgian boarding houses, and your uniform is as dapper as it gets (so long as you don’t mind dressing like a penguin). But you can’t walk into Windsor wearing a college crest, for fear of being mugged, and the papers are filled with stories claiming you’re overprivileged or not actually that clever. It’s a double-edged sword. You have the advantage of a brilliant education, but bear a stigma that can’t be removed no matter how many times you pretend to your friends that you vote Labour.

This makes you wonder — if the outside world hates us so much, how come Old Etonians do so well? The Prime Minister, the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Mayor of London are all OEs.