I remember during my first year at grammar school we had an art teacher who looked like a chubby version of Quentin Crisp, and acted just like him. We had to produce a portrait which would be scored and archived for our 'O' level course work. I painted an entirely black canvas and, when asked to explain it, I said that it depicted "Midnight in the Black Forest with a blackberry eating a stick of liquorice".
I was sent to the headmaster's study where I was caned and then suspended for a week for "wasting educational resources, attempted subversion and conduct liable to cause the good name of the school to be questioned by the local education authority". Fortunately for me, on my return after the suspension, I was banned from all further art lessons for the remainder of the term.
That was the first of a good number of canings and 4 suspensions and I've never, ever, regretted leaving school on my 16th birthday.
