Editing John Gielgud (section)

===Background and early years===
Gielgud was born on 14 April 1904, in [[South Kensington]], London, the third of the four children of Frank Henry Gielgud and his second wife, Kate Terry-Gielgud, ''née'' Terry-Lewis. Gielgud's elder brothers were [[Lewis Gielgud|Lewis]], who became a senior official of the [[International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies|Red Cross]] and [[UNESCO]], and [[Val Gielgud|Val]], later head of [[BBC]] radio drama; his younger sister Eleanor became John's secretary for many years.<ref name=dnb>Morley, Sheridan and Robert Sharp. [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/74146 "Gielgud, Sir (Arthur) John (1904–2000)"] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130521083150/http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/74146 |date=21 May 2013}}, ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', Oxford University Press, online edition, January 2011, retrieved 2 February 2014 {{ODNBsub}}</ref> On his father's side, Gielgud was of Lithuanian and Polish descent. The surname derives from [[Gelgaudiškis]], a village in Lithuania.<ref name=dnb/> The [[Count]]s Gielgud had owned the [[Gelgaudiškis Manor]] on the [[Nemunas]] river, but their estates were confiscated after they took part in a [[November Uprising|failed uprising against Russian rule]] in 1830–31.{{refn|The date is given by Gielgud as 1830,<ref name=g22/> and by his biographer [[Jonathan Croall]] as 1831.<ref name=c8/> The historian Saulius Sužiedėlis dates the uprising as November 1830 to November 1831.<ref>Sužiedėlis, p. 134</ref>|group=n}} Jan Gielgud took refuge in England with his family;<ref name=c8>Croall (2011), pp. 8–9</ref> one of his grandchildren was Frank Gielgud, whose maternal grandmother was the Polish actress, [[Aniela Aszpergerowa]].<ref name=g22>Gielgud (1979), p. 22</ref>

[[File:Ellen-Terry-jubilee.jpg|thumb|upright=1.9|Centre: [[Marion Terry|Marion]], [[Kate Terry|Kate]] and [[Ellen Terry]] and, far right, [[Fred Terry]] at Ellen's [[Silver Jubilee]] matinée, [[Theatre Royal, Drury Lane|Drury Lane]], 12 June 1906. Everyone shown was a member of the [[Terry family]].]]

Frank married into [[Terry family|a family with wide theatrical connections]]. His wife, who was on the stage until she married, was the daughter of the actress [[Kate Terry]], and a member of the stage dynasty that included [[Ellen Terry|Ellen]], [[Fred Terry|Fred]] and [[Marion Terry]], [[Mabel Terry-Lewis]] and [[Edith Craig|Edith]] and [[Edward Gordon Craig]].<ref name=g222>Gielgud (1979), pp. 222–223</ref> Frank had no theatrical ambitions and worked all his life as a stockbroker in the [[City of London]].<ref>Croall (2011), p. 10</ref>

In 1912, aged eight, Gielgud went to Hillside [[preparatory school (United Kingdom)|preparatory school]] in Surrey as his elder brothers had done. For a child with no interest in sport he acquitted himself reasonably well in [[cricket]] and [[rugby football|rugby]] for the school.<ref>Gielgud (2004), pp. 5–6</ref> In class, he hated mathematics, was fair at [[classics]], and excelled at English and [[divinity (academic discipline)|divinity]].<ref>Croall (2011), p. 16</ref> Hillside encouraged his interest in drama, and he played several leading roles in school productions, including [[Mark Antony]] in ''[[Julius Caesar (play)|Julius Caesar]]'' and [[Shylock]] in ''[[The Merchant of Venice]]''.<ref>Croall (2011), pp. 17–18</ref>

After Hillside, Lewis and Val had won scholarships to [[Eton College|Eton]] and [[Rugby School|Rugby]], respectively; lacking their academic achievement, John failed to secure such a scholarship.<ref>Gielgud (2000), p. 34</ref> He was sent as a [[day pupil|day boy]] to [[Westminster School]]{{refn|He was briefly a [[boarding school|boarder]], but he persuaded his parents to let him live at home, which was only three miles (4.8 kilometres) from the school.<ref>Croall (2000), pp. 19–20</ref>|group=n}} where, as he later said, he had access to the [[West End theatre|West End]] "in time to touch the fringe of the great century of the theatre".<ref name=g36/> He saw [[Sarah Bernhardt]] act, [[Adeline Genée]] dance and [[Albert Chevalier]], [[Vesta Tilley]] and [[Marie Lloyd]] perform in the [[music hall]]s.<ref name=g36>Gielgud (2000), p. 36</ref> The school choir sang in services at [[Westminster Abbey]], which appealed to his fondness for ritual.<ref>Gielgud (2000), p. 37</ref> He showed talent at sketching, and for a while thought of [[scenic design]] as a possible career.<ref>Hayman, p. 13</ref>

The young Gielgud's father took him to concerts, which he liked, and galleries and museums, "which bored me rigid".<ref>Morley, p. 34</ref> Both parents were keen theatregoers, but did not encourage their children to follow an acting career. Val Gielgud recalled, "Our parents looked distinctly sideways at the Stage as a means of livelihood, and when John showed some talent for drawing his father spoke crisply of the advantages of an architect's office."<ref>Gielgud (1965), p. 31</ref> On leaving Westminster in 1921, Gielgud persuaded his reluctant parents to let him take drama lessons on the understanding that if he was not self-supporting by the age of twenty-five he would seek an office post.<ref name=g48>Gielgud (1979), p. 48</ref>