Sunday, July 10, 2011

Another Look At Meredith’s Fine School And What It Says About Her And Her Family

Posted by Peter Quennell


Click above for our post of April last year on Meredith’s happy schooldays as described in Paul Russell and Grahame Johnson’s Darkness Descending.

This school explains a lot about Meredith. The United Kingdom has on the whole pretty good government-run schools. But its various public schools (its name for private schools) offer real renaissance educations where almost every hour is given to yet another area of formation.

Read Plato’s extraordinary Republic on education for the principles on which all of these schools are based. Not only was Meredith exceptionally focussed, ambitious, and hard-working. She also had the great confidence and poise that comes only from excelling in a lot of pursuits.

For the fourth child in a family it was remarkable that her family saw early what she needed and put forward all they could for her to get it.

Posted by Peter Quennell on 07/10/11 at 02:14 PM in Concerning Meredith

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7/10/11
The children dancing at this happy girls’ school evokes the tenderest nostalgia. Old Palace School is my idea of paradise for a young girl. Freedom plus security, and every day a holiday.

Meredith was so fortunate to have parents like Arline and John who had the foresight to invest in the best to give Meredith every advantage.

Somehow divine justice for Meredith’s demise will return that gift back to her parents and siblings. As her school’s motto says: The End Crowns the Work…it’s not over yet, Meredith’s impact.

Posted by Hopeful on 07/10/11 at 08:45 PM | #

Very interesting, the British tradition of boarding schools is very different from the Continental European method of education.
Yet reading this post I am puzzled when I think of Meredith and Amanda. As far as I know the latter received an expensive education as well and attended a Jesuit-run prep school. So far the two young women were actually more interestingly alike than described in later accounts.Both children of divorce, both graduates of renowned schools and both enlisted at prestigious universities. It always makes me wonder then how one could turn out so well and the other slip into such deep moral degeneracy as to end in murder .

Posted by aethelred23 on 07/10/11 at 11:31 PM | #

the simple answer is rebellion against a repressive childhood or in this case a Jesuit school and a desire to compete with her mother for the affections and acceptance of all things male hence the soccer/climbing tomboyish existence.
The desire to please perhaps.
it has been promoted elsewhere, “How could a girl with no criminal record commit such a crime?”
Easy answer is ‘Grass ” sold as a street drug can be “cut” many different ways. Just smoking a joint means nothing if it was pure. it’s a good a bet though that it wasn’t

Posted by Grahame Rhodes on 07/10/11 at 11:41 PM | #

It is so wonderful to think of Meredith happy and growing at that fantastic school. You can tell from the pictures here that she was happy, and seemed very self-confident for her age, which is quite an achievement in and of itself. Just from seeing her pictures and the video, it is clear to me, at least, that there was a depth to her character that can only be explained by her wonderful family and upbringing. That is how her family deserve to think of her. God bless the Kerchers.

Posted by Earthling on 07/11/11 at 11:19 PM | #

’Be England what she will, With all her faults she is my country still. ‘

God bless you, Meredith.

Posted by Janus on 07/12/11 at 12:45 PM | #

It is unfortunate that the names Meredith Kercher and Amanda Knox will hereafter be inextricably entwined. They don’t belong in the same breath, as Meredith utterly outclassed the other one. A private education is where the resemblance ends. The Jesuit Order have been in considerable hot water here, in the Pacific Northwest, with a recent class action suit awarding substantial payments to pupils victimised by paedophile priests. That, in itself, doesn’t damn the Seattle Prep,(it, along with Gonzaga and Seattle U were held outside of blame and immune to monetary damages, as far as i know.) As in any institution, one would be certain to fine excellent and mediocre faculty, talented, honest, moral students and the less so. My impression of Knox is that she could have attended the same school as Meredith, and still turned out as narcicissistic and depraved, because her leanings are innate.  A nasty piece of work is a nasty piece of work.

Posted by mimi on 07/13/11 at 07:02 AM | #

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