to Washington to watch national politics in action. The highlight of the trip was the delegates’ visit to the White House, where a gangly, crew-cut Clinton briefly shook hands with President Kennedy. The moment was recorded for posterity (and future Clinton campaigns) in a photo and on film. When Clinton returned home to Arkansas, he was set on a political career. His mother, Virginia Kelley, remembered, ‘I’d never seen him so excited about something. When he came back from Washington, holding this picture of himself with Jack Kennedy, and the expression on his face – I just knew that politics was the answer for him.’10 CHELTENHAM, ENGLAND, LITERARY FESTIVAL, 1963. JOHN FOWLES MEETS IRIS MURDOCH When bestselling author John Fowles was on the verge of success, but not yet famous, he was a panellist at the Cheltenham Festival. He was prepared to attack the famous authoress Iris Murdoch, but instead found her ‘a gentle creature with a good mind’. Mrs Fowles felt Murdoch ignored them. Years later, when Fowles’ fame was enormous, Murdoch invited the Fowleses to lunch. He recorded the following exchange in his diary: I.M.: Are you religious? J.F.: Not at all … I.M.: Nor am I. J.F.: in the normal sense of the word. I.M.: Ah. (long Pinter-like silence, contemplation of the lawn outside.) I expect you have a nice intellectual circle at Lyme Regis? [The extremely remote country area where Fowles lived.] J.F.: Are you mad?
– W.A.D. & C.F.
17 Famous People Who Were Expelled from School
1 TORI AMOS (1963–), SINGER AND SONGWRITER At the age of five, Amos was the youngest person accepted to the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, Maryland. Six years later, she was expelled for refusing to read sheet music. The experience inspired the title of her first album, Y Kant Tori Read?
2 JOHN BARRYMORE (1882–1942), ACTOR American actor John Barrymore was 16 when he was expelled from Georgetown Academy in Washington, DC. A faculty member recognised him, in the company of several other young men, entering a bordello where they had gone to celebrate Washington’s Birthday. The next day, when asked to name the other men, Barrymore refused and was expelled.
3 HUMPHREY BOGART (1899–1957), ACTOR The son of a successful physician with inherited wealth, young Bogart was sent to Phillips Academy of Andover, Massachusetts, and after a year was thrown out for ‘irreverence’ and ‘uncontrollable high spirits’. Since attending Yale was suddenly out of the question, Bogie joined the US Navy.
4 TINA BROWN (1953– ), MAGAZINE EDITOR Former editor-in-chief of Vanity Fair and currently editor-in-chief of the New Yorker, Brown was expelled from three boarding schools by the time she was 16. ‘I got other girls to run away,’ she recalled, ‘and I organised protests because we weren’t allowed to change our underpants.’ At one school the headmistress found her diary, ‘and opened it where I had described her bosom as an unidentified flying object’.
5 JACKIE COLLINS (1941– ), NOVELIST At 16, Collins was expelled from Francis Holland School in England for (among other crimes) truancy, smoking behind a tree during lacrosse, selling readings from her diary of naughty limericks and waving at the neighbourhood flasher. Says Collins, ‘I was a bad girl.’ She later sent her own daughters to the same school.
6 SALVADOR DALI (1904–89), ARTIST In 1926 Spanish ultra-modernist painter Salvador Dali was expelled from the Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes de San Fernando in Madrid when he refused to allow his professors to critique his paintings.
7 ROGER DALTREY (1944– ), MUSICIAN Daltrey was expelled from Acton County Grammar School in England. ‘I was an evil little so-and-so,’ he remembers, ‘I didn’t fit in.’ The headmaster who expelled him commented, ‘When you have 500 boys in uniform, and one in a teddy boy outfit, no wonder he didn’t fit in.’
8 GUSTAVE FLAUBERT (1821–80), AUTHOR The 18-year-old Flaubert was first in his philosophy class at the College Royal. Nevertheless, he led a revolt against a substitute teacher, and when the noisy students were ordered to copy 1,000 lines of poetry as punishment, Flaubert organised a petition in protest. The headmaster was unmoved, and Flaubert and two other boys were expelled.
9 WILLIAM RANDOLPH HEARST (1863–1951), PLUTOCRAT In 1885, American newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst was expelled from Harvard, halfway through his junior year. He had given each of his professors a chamber pot adorned with the professor’s name and picture.
10 JEAN-CLAUDE KILLY (1943– ), SKI CHAMPION Killy began skiing at the age of three, and by the time he was a teenager he often cut school to attend ski competitions. ‘Once you start racing in France,’ he said, ‘your schooling is finished.’ He was expelled at 15 because of chronic truancy.
11 BENITO MUSSOLINI (1883–1945), DICTATOR At the age of nine, Mussolini was sent 20 miles from home to a boarding school in Faenza, Italy, run by Salesian priests. The recalcitrant youth was nearly expelled for throwing an inkpot at a teacher who had struck him with a ruler. Finally he went too far – he stabbed a fellow student in the buttocks with a knife. The future dictator was permanently dismissed.
12 EDGAR ALLAN POE (1809–49), AUTHOR In 1831 American author and poet Edgar Allan Poe was expelled from West Point when he refused to attend drills and classes for several weeks.
13 RICHARD PRYOR (1940– ), COMEDIAN Pryor was expelled from a Catholic grammar school in Peoria, Illinois, when the nuns discovered that his grandmother ran a string of brothels. At 16, he was expelled from Central High School for punching a science teacher named Mr Think.
14 PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY (1792–1822), POET In 1811, while a student at Oxford, the poet Shelley and his close friend Thomas Jefferson Hogg sent a pamphlet entitled ‘The Necessity of Atheism’, a summary of the arguments of John Locke and David Hume, to the heads of the colleges. When both students refused to answer questions about the pamphlet, they were summarily expelled.
15 LEON TROTSKY (1879–1940), POLITICAL LEADER At approximately the age of 10, Russian Communist leader Leon Trotsky was expelled from secondary school in Odessa, Russia, after he incited his classmates to howl at their teacher. Trotsky, however, was the school’s best pupil and was readmitted the following year.
16 OWEN WILSON (1968– ), ACTOR AND SCREENWRITER Wilson was expelled from prep school after he and two friends stole the answers to a maths exam. ‘I got called into the headmaster’s office and he handed me a geometry problem and told me to do it. When I couldn’t, he pointed out I had just completed a similar one on the exam.’ The next year, Wilson was enrolled in the New Mexico Military Institute, where, he noted, ‘I learned to follow rules, even the ones I thought were stupid.’
17 ORVILLE WRIGHT (1871–1948), INVENTOR In 1883, during the sixth grade, American inventor and aviator Orville Wright was expelled from his elementary school in Richmond, Indiana, for mischievous behaviour.
– R.J.F. & The Eds
9 Tattooed Celebrities
1 DAVID BECKHAM Beckham has a large crucified figure in the centre of his back. Above and below are the names of his sons, Romeo and Brooklyn. Among his other tattoos are his wife’s name misspelled in Hindi and the Roman numeral VII, representing his number when he played for Manchester United.
2 NICOLAS CAGE On his back is a monitor lizard wearing a top hat.
3 WINSTON CHURCHILL Had an anchor on his arm. His mother, Jenny, had a snake on her right wrist.
4 EMINEM The singer has several tattoos including one on his wrist that says ‘Slit Here’, three in honour of his daughter and an open grave with the words ‘Rot in Pieces’ dedicated to his ex-wife.
5 JANET
