Editing Evelyn Waugh (section)

=== Golders Green and Heath Mount ===
[[File:Evelyn Waugh 1903 - 1966 writer lived here.jpg|thumb|upright|[[English Heritage]] [[blue plaque]] at 145 [[North End Road, Golders Green|North End Road]], Golders Green, London]]
In 1907, the Waugh family left Hillfield Road for Underhill, a house which Arthur had built in [[North End Road, Golders Green|North End Road]], [[Hampstead]], close to [[Golders Green]],<ref>Hastings, pp. 19–20</ref> then a semi-rural area of dairy farms, market gardens and bluebell woods.<ref>Waugh, ''A Little Learning'', pp. 34–35</ref> Evelyn received his first school lessons at home, from his mother, with whom he formed a particularly close relationship; his father, Arthur Waugh, was a more distant figure, whose close bond with his elder son, Alec, was such that Evelyn often felt excluded.<ref>Stannard, Vol I pp. 34–35</ref><ref>Hastings, pp. 27–28</ref> In September 1910, Evelyn began as a day pupil at [[Heath Mount School|Heath Mount]] preparatory school. By then, he was a lively boy of many interests, who already had written and completed "The Curse of the Horse Race", his first story.<ref name= S40>Stannard, Vol. I p. 40</ref> A positive influence on his writing was a schoolmaster, Aubrey Ensor. Waugh spent six relatively contented years at Heath Mount; on his own assertion he was "quite a clever little boy" who was seldom distressed or overawed by his lessons.<ref>Waugh, ''A Little Learning'', p. 86</ref> Physically pugnacious, Evelyn was inclined to bully weaker boys; among his victims was the future society photographer [[Cecil Beaton]], who never forgot the experience.<ref name= S40/><ref>Hastings, p. 44</ref>

Outside school, he and other neighbourhood children performed plays, usually written by Waugh.<ref name= H30>Hastings, pp. 30–32</ref> On the basis of the [[xenophobia]] fostered by the genre books of [[invasion literature]], that the Germans were about to invade Britain, Waugh organised his friends into the "Pistol Troop", who built a fort, went on manoeuvres and paraded in makeshift uniforms.<ref>Hastings, p. 33</ref> In 1914, after the [[First World War]] began, Waugh and other boys from the Boy Scout Troop of Heath Mount School were sometimes employed as messengers at the [[War Office]]; Evelyn loitered about the War Office in hope of glimpsing [[Horatio Kitchener, 1st Earl Kitchener|Lord Kitchener]], but never did.<ref name= Stannard42>Stannard, Vol I pp. 42–47</ref>

Family holidays usually were spent with the Waugh aunts at [[Midsomer Norton]] in [[Somerset]], in a house lit with oil lamps, a time that Waugh recalled with delight, many years later.<ref>Waugh, ''A Little Learning'', pp. 44–46</ref> At Midsomer Norton, Evelyn became deeply interested in [[High church|high Anglican]] church rituals, the initial stirrings of the spiritual dimension that later dominated his perspective of life, and he served as an [[altar boy]] at the local Anglican church.<ref>Hastings, pp. 39–40</ref> During his last year at Heath Mount, Waugh established and edited ''The Cynic'' school magazine.<ref name= S40/>{{refn|In 1993 a [[blue plaque]] commemorating Waugh's residence was installed at Underhill, which by then had become 145 North End Road, Golders Green.<ref name='EngHet'>{{cite web|url=http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/discover/blue-plaques/search/waugh-evelyn-1903-1966 |title=Waugh, Evelyn (1903–1966) |publisher=English Heritage |access-date=4 August 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140820151307/http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/discover/blue-plaques/search/waugh-evelyn-1903-1966 |archive-date=20 August 2014 }}</ref>|group= n}}