There is something culturally eminent about Alan Bennett’s play The History Boys and its subsequent 2006 film adaptation. For me, it represents a time capsule of bittersweet nostalgia for my own school days: a time marked by the juxtaposed feelings of ambition with irreverence, disillusionment with gratification, and a somewhat reserved sense of belonging. My formative years of education were perfectly imperfect. It is Bennett’s invocation of this sentiment that allows me to derive such comfort from his work, which provides an alternate perspective on the issue of grammar schools. The History Boys is a depiction of a certain type of grammar school that is rugged, quixotic, and plebeian - an environment not too dissimilar from my own.

"The History Boys is a depiction of a certain type of grammar school that is rugged, quixotic, and plebeian - an environment not too dissimilar from my own"

Set at the fictional Cutlers’ Grammar School in Sheffield during the 1980s, the play follows the trials and tribulations of a group of students applying to read History at Oxford and Cambridge, having achieved the school’s highest A-level results on record. Bennett places the audience into a world that is defined by contradictions. Whilst the journalist Anthony Sampson may have argued in his Anatomy of Britain that grammar schools carve up society by "segregating an elite" and monopolising entry to Oxbridge, this can only be true of some schools. Bennett, having attended a grammar school in Leeds, drew inspiration for the play from "the pains and the excitement" of applying to Oxbridge as someone unfamiliar with such institutions. In the play, this informs the contradictory styles of teaching between the characters of Hector and Irwin. Both are morally suspect and embrace the unconventional, but Hector claims that examinations represent the "enemy of education", whilst Irwin seeks to strip away the boys’ individuality by "grooming them like thoroughbreds" for their entrance examinations and interviews.

The antithetical methods adopted by the teachers in the play are something I experienced. Critics of selective education like to point out the number of successful Oxbridge applicants from grammar schools, but I fear this approach can provide a harmful generalisation. I attended a grammar school that had not sent a single student to Oxford or Cambridge for a number of years; this lack of success made it difficult for my teachers to offer adequate help, and I distinctly remember my singular mock interview being nothing like the real thing. This is an issue present in The History Boys. The headmaster resorts to hiring Irwin in order to give the boys the ‘polish’ needed for success, simply because the educational and cultural environment of Cutlers’ is so different from the elite grammar schools that have historically sent hordes of students to Oxford and Cambridge.

“Both in the play and in my own experiences, the very idea of Oxbridge was trivialised to some extent”

Both in the play and in my own experiences, the very idea of Oxbridge was trivialised to some extent. We see the boys initially treat their applications with irreverence as a consequence of a lack of genuine motivation. This is illustrated plainly after the boys receive their offers in the film adaptation: Rudge, having incredibly won a place at Christ Church, Oxford, states he "only wanted it because the others did". My first interaction with Cambridge was at an outreach talk from Queens’ College, which seemed a perfectly valid excuse to skip Geography that morning. A very small number of people in my year group ended up applying to Oxbridge, and despite only two of us receiving offers, this was nonetheless a remarkable achievement.

I find one of the most evocative moments in The History Boys to be when the boys travel to Oxford and Cambridge for their interviews. I am sure we can all reminisce about the different flurries of emotion we felt upon visiting Cambridge for the first time, but for Bennett, it was an experience that was as "intimidating" as it was "enchanting", as he arrived at Sidney Sussex for his interview in 1951. The film adaptation conveys this conflict of emotion superbly. Compared with their brazen demeanour at the beginning, by the point of the interviews (representing the plot’s climax), the boys become noticeably more reserved and are perhaps overwhelmed by their surroundings. Posner is commended by his interviewers for his "sense of detachment"; there is something telling here, suggesting that emotional isolation and the neglect of one’s identity are things to be rewarded. Though this is not something I have encountered personally, both at interview and during my time at Cambridge so far, it is certainly food for thought.

The play ends with Hector poignantly instructing the boys to "pass it on". Learning is something that transgresses beyond the rigid, utilitarian boundaries of the modern education system: it is something that is fundamentally human. Perhaps this is where things go wrong in the discourse surrounding grammar schools, as we tend to perceive such issues through a completely ideological lens. Whilst it is perfectly valid to argue that such institutions are regressive and inequitable, I don’t believe this to be wholly the case, as this depiction of an unconventional grammar school in South Yorkshire can prove.

Want to share your thoughts on this article? Send us a letter to letters@varsity.co.uk or by using this form.