. I became a disturbed child at the age of six

This is the first of an occasional series by prominent Catholics looking back to their schooldays
WHEN 1 was four or five went to a non-Catholic "dame school" or what is now called a kindergarten. I was very happy there; in fact. my only sorrow was that I was never allowed to play the drum in the school band. only the triangle! This annoyed me very much. What religious instruction there was consisted of being read stories, mostly out of the Old Testament, and then being told to illustrate them with crayons. I did not learn to read or write at this school.
We had a playground, and the most popular games we played there were jumping up and down on a pogo-stick and collecting lizards. My pet lizard was put in a cigarette tin but. very soon. mysteriously vanished from there. This made me very sad.
Perhaps my first introduction to sex occurred at this happy kindergarten. though I did not recognise it at the time. What I do remember is having furtive conversations with other little girls and boys in the lavatory. I had no sense of guilt, however. That came later.
When I was six years old, my parents. my sister, and myself moved to another town. There we were sent to a Catholic lay day-school. This school was enterprising. novel, and in many ways. exciting. Great stress was laid on a kind of careful experimentalism. I think that perhaps the very best activity we took part in was the art lessons. We were all given large sheets of paper, powder paints (which we ourselves mixed with water), and then we were permitted to paint. very freely, anything we liked in any manner we liked. This sort of art teaching is common practice now, but it certainly wasn't when I was six years old.
Another excellent idea was the formation of "house mothers." These were senior girls who were appointed to take care of the younger ones. Mine was called Louise and she had long. thick blonde plaits; she was very kind to me.
I was a slow developer and did not learn to read until I was seven years old. When I did finally learn. however, there was no stopping me. I read everything I could lay my hands on—in particular, boys' magazines. I was very much a tomboy. I was also an introvert.
My sister, who was two years older than me, was very happy at this school. She was a complete extrovert -excellent at all sports and at work, too. She. quite literally. carried off all the prizes I do not think I was jealous of her; I think I just took it for granted that she was altogether abler at everything than myself. But I was rapidly developing not only a serious inferiority complex. but was also becoming neurotic. (I indulged in what I now see was compulsive stealing.) I stole things I did not even want and shoved them up my navy-blue knickers.
I also lied and. one day, when asked about it. told my arithmetic teacher that I had had no help, when, in fact, my sister had helped me. Rather understandably, my teacher was surprised that I had got all my sums right for once! She went to my sister. and my sister revealed the truth. The next thing that happened was that 1 was taken to a small. white-walled room. where the teacher in question said she forgave me and then kissed me (this last truly revolted me and I shall never forget the smell of the powder on her face).
I was then told that I must go down to the nearest church and tell God I was sorry (I was too young to have made my first Confession because this experience happened when I was still only six years old). I think it was this event that really confirmed me as a "disturbed child."
However, many happy, sweet and gentle things took place at this school. One. I remember, was that on our birthdays, we were always given special sugar biscuits. And. as I have already said. my sister was happy and successful at this school. The only prize I ever got was one for Catechism. Even then, I did have a very good memory.
I spent four years at this school and I am grateful to it for being responsible for my learning French so young. When I was ten, I was moved, with my sister, to a large nonCatholic school. Something I shall never cease to be thankful for happened at this school. I had a marvellous form mistress who taught me English. History and Geography. I was her favourite, though I was too innocent to realise it at the time.
By the time I was ten, I had not only had concussion and most of the common childish complaints, but I had also become very neurotic about my religion. My first Confession, made at the age of seven, was partly responsible for this. I could not get straight with the priest the problem of my stealing. He was kind and gentle, but he said I must put the stolen objects back. I could never manage to do this, so, every time I was taken to Confession (about once a fortnight), I became almost hysterical with a guilt which I could not explain.
But, at this new, nonCatholic school. I began to acquire the love of learning and also to discover that I was really quite clever! I began to be top in examinations and to win form prizes. I was often away sick but, when I was, my kind form mistress sent me letters and easy lessons to do, when I was well enough to manage them.
Of course, at this time, my sister and I were not allowed to attend Scripture lessons. Instead (to our annoyance!), we had to spend an hour every Saturday being "instructed" by nuns. I do not remember learning much because my nun was old, though also very kind. Perhaps almost the happiest year of my childhood was when I was thirteen. I was still a child. not yet at all adolescent, and, thanks to another new and excellent English mistress, I discovered not only the love of poetry, but also began to write poems myself. My early poems were very bad. but at least they showed a sense of form. But the shadows were near at hand, and f was soon to suffer from the disadvantages of being a Catholic at a nonCatholic school. I remember longing for a crucifix or a picture of Our Lady to be in our classrooms; I needed some tangible. artistic vision of my faith. Also, I was beginning to have religious doubts.
When I was fifteen the trouble and unhappiness really started. I began to have "doubts" or what, in fact, I have learnt since were really simply religious difficulties. I remember lying on my bed one day and suddenly thinking "What can the Holy Ghost be?" I had a visual image of a large white bird. Doubt about the Blessed Trinity was my first difficulty. and that was after all, fairly basic. But quickly. I began to question all the tenets of my faith. My parents tried to help me and sent me to priests. But. as everyone seemed to think my old nun teacher was upsetting me, my religious instruction stopped.
Suffering from such doubts while at a non-Catholic school was very difficult and it aroused many conflicts. My non-Catholic friends were constantly saying to me the very things which I was thinking. I stood up for my faith always. even though often had the feeling of being a hypocrite. I think that if, at this age, when I was on the brink of adolescence, I would have been happier at a really good Catholic school. There are convents now, for example, where the nuns give the older girls excellent instruction in modern philosophy, even in linguistic analysis.
I think I took refuge in poetry and looking at paintings. though I never ceased, even until I became an undergraduate, asking questions and reading books of theology. When I did become an undergraduate, I was helped by such wonderful people as Fr. Martin D'Arcy. At school, however, sex, also, was beginning to become a problem, and, as 1 was not allowed to attend a lecture on the subject given by a woman doctor, it was years before I got the whole subject straightened out. For me, sex became synonymous with sin. and this was not a good thing at all.
But, to return to the question of general education—I think that there is absolutely no doubt that 1 was brought out, encouraged and taught sufficiently well at a nonCatholic school to go to St. Anne's, Oxford. This might very well have happened at a Catholic school. What must be admitted is that I was a difficult, and even neurotic, child and adolescent.
Yet, I am supremely grateful for all the learning I have acquired, from whatever source. I am not prepared to say that one particular school was better than another. I owe much to all of them, even to my dear old nun.
Elizabeth Jennings, 43. won the Richard Hillary Prize for her hook of poems "The Mind has Mountains" in 1966.