Richard Rieser: Mr Cousteau and Mr Bantam

Transcript

The French teacher was a man called Mr Cousteau, and he had a big scar up his head, he must have had some brain damage in the war I think. And it was quite easy to get him to lose his temper, so that was my main game in this. So, let it go, let it go, finally, we’re on to lesson twenty, we never got as far as that, so I would make a joke, and they all laughed. And he’d pull me out of my seat, he’d kick me all the way down three flights of stairs to the Head Teacher’s office, literally kicking me along the floor, so much for progressive really. And I think that was probably what got me to the child guidance actually.

There was a teacher called Bantam, who was our English teacher, and I think he quite liked my composition, but he always criticising my handwriting, which of course they never made allowance to the fact that I had Polio in this hand.

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