Author Richard Beard recounts his time as a boy at boarding school, delving into the troubling culture of the UK's private education system, which is responsible for the formative years of the majority of Britain's prime ministers.

The UK's private education system is exclusive, inaccessible, and outdated. In Britain, government-funded schools are referred to as 'state schools,' while private schools are often called 'public schools.'

Richard Beard is a writer who was educated in the private boarding school system at the same time as former UK prime ministers Boris Johnson and David Cameron.

Beard is scathing about how the private boarding school system is built for students to rise to the top of British politics.

In his 2021 book, Sad Little Men, Beard lifts the lid on his experience of the private boarding education he received as a child.

Outlining the culture of mistreatment, arrogance, and misplaced superiority, Beard explains how pupils are encouraged into lying and deceit from an early age.

Beard defies the idea that UK private schools are 'superior,' instead sharing dark truths about the education – both academic and social – that many leaders of the UK were given as children.