PROLOGUE

For Henrietta, Oliver, Michael and Christopher.

            I was born in Bethnal Green, London on the 29^th of July 1931 in the middle of a severe thunderstorm.  My parents, my brother and sister lived at 350 Hackney Road.  This was ‘Turner’s Dining Rooms’ a coffee shop in London’s East End.  My mother had been brought up in small villages near Chelmsford and was anxious to bring up her own children in the countryside.  An opportunity arose in the summer of 1934 when we moved to the ‘Blue Bird Café’ at Nevendon on the Southend arterial road, the A127.  Nevendon was a small village about 3 miles south of Wickford.  My father travelled up to London on Monday mornings and came back on Saturday afternoon.  I encountered my father chiefly at weekends. 

Most of my early memories relate to my life with my mother at the ‘Blue Bird Café’ and my primary school at Nevendon.  The title “A Little Learning” relates my life to the academic year.

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