I still get a hot flush of embarrassment when I recall my first interview. It was for a summer job at Selfridges in London when I was 17. The lady from personnel asked me how my friends would describe me. Maybe it was the heat or nerves but all I could think of was the funeral oration by John Hannah’s character in Four Weddings and a Funeral where he describes his deceased partner, played by Simon Callow, as ‘so very fat and very rude’. So I did something you should never ever do in an interview: I tried to be funny. ‘Rude — my friends would describe me as rude,’ I replied. I didn’t get the job.
People from my background are meant to sail through such interviews. Supposedly, public school pupils are not only given an excellent academic education but also career guidance, and are drilled in interview technique so that they float through life on a cushion of money and privilege. In an article in the Guardian the philosopher Julian Baggini writes of how people with a public school education ‘approach the world with a sense of entitlement and possibility which means they simply expect to be taken seriously and given opportunities’. We all know the types: confident entrepreneurs barely out of their teens; blithe young journalists pronouncing on foreign affairs; smooth Etonian politicians.
Most popular
Mary Wakefield
‘Jordan Peterson is a sad and angry man’: an interview with Rowan Williams
Despite my public school education, I too regard people such as these with bafflement. How do they do it? Where do they get this confidence from? My school wasn’t exactly Eton or Winchester but it did give me a good education. I can still quote huge chunks of Antony and Cleopatra thanks to my inspiring English teacher.
Comments
Join the debate for just £1 a month
Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first three months for £3.
UNLOCK ACCESS Just £1 a monthAlready a subscriber? Log in