Today on the podcast I am excited to be speaking to Dillibe Onyeama. Dillibe was the first black boy to graduate from Eton and wrote about his account of boarding school in the 1972 book which was originally called, Nigger At Eton.

Dillibe suffered a lot of racial abuse while at Eton. On the podcast he shares some of his experiences at the school and talks in more detail what happened around the time of the publication of the book. He talks about how the powers that be tried to stop the book being published.

The Nigerian author goes on to talk about fagging, some of the good things about the school and some of his opinions about slavery and how there needs to be some form of restitution.

A truly fascinating conversation...

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Dillibe Onyeama is a Nigerian author, and publisher. Dillibe was the first Black boy to ever graduate from Eton College, and only the second to join when he started in 1965. In 1972, aged just 21 he wrote about his experiences of Eton. The book is a deeply personal account of the racism he endured during his times as a student at the world-famous institution. He has written 28 books published in 4 countries.

Here are some of the questions that he answers.

1. I would be really interested to hear you share some of your journey at Eton? How was it for you?
2. What was the difference for you between your experience of your prep school, Grove Park, and Eton? Were they the same or vastly different?
3. How did you manage to cope with the racism that was meted out to you at Eton?
4. I was fascinated to read about your experiences with the South Africans. “I wondered also why I had had more common decency shown to me by these two South Africans than by almost any other white boy at Eton.”(P.144) Would you be able to share some of what happened?
5. You mention that, “When I encountered racist abuse in some division... I was thus unable to fully concentrate on the teaching.”(P.119) Do you feel that the bullying impacted your ability to study at the school?
6. What happened after you published your book in 1972? How did you respond to the school?
7. What were some of the good things about Eton?
8. I felt really sad reading your story of the hallucinations and violence. I could relate to it having had similar attacks myself later in life. How did you learn to deal with these hallucinations? When you asked for support – was it helpful?
9. Blackett- Ord (P.225). What impact did this house captain have on the rest of the school in abolishing fagging, beating and fining students by the prefects?
10. How has time changed your impressions of what happened at Eton? How do you feel about your experiences now? Do you feel, looking from afar that Eton appears to have changed?
11. Anything else that you would like to share with people?

To purchase a copy of Dillibe's excellent book A Black Boy At Eton please visit: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Black-Boy-Eton-Britain-Writing/dp/0241993814/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1649347143&sr=1-1

To purchase Dillibe's other books: https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=Dillibe+Onyeama&ref=sr_gnr_aps

PLEASE NOTE: The recording does cut out in places due to our connection. I have left it in so that no part of the interview is missed.

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An Evolving Man (AEM) Podcast is for men (and women) who want to grow, evolve and want support in learning how to do this.

On a regular basis there will be an interview around men's (and women's) topics ranging from self-development, relationships, spirituality, archetypes, trauma, boarding school and men's work featuring authors and leaders in this field.

The sense with these interviews is to support people during these times of change. What are the teachings, tools and practices that you can use to help you through these turbulent times?