To Sir, With Love

"A book that the reader devours quickly, ponders slowly, and forgets not at all." The New York Times He shamed them, wrestled with them, enlightened them, and, ultimately, learned to love them. Mr. Barithwaite, the new teacher, had first to fight the class bully. Then he taught defiant, hardbitten delinquents to call him "sir", and to address the girls who had grown up beside them in the gutter as "Miss". He taught them to wash their faces and to read Shakespeare. When he took all forty-six to museums and to the opera, riots were predicted. But instead of catastrophe, a miracle happened. A dedicated teacher had turned hate into love, teenage rebelliousness into self-respect, contempt into consideration of others. A man's own integrity, and concern and love for others, had won through.