At school (not identified but generally recognised as Eton)[29] (description of wartime bomb damage tallies), Widmerpool is undistinguished academically and athletically, a "gauche striver" in the words of one literary commentator.[2] He is the object of some ridicule, chiefly remembered for wearing the "wrong kind of overcoat" on his arrival at the school.[30] Driven by ambition, instead of going on to university ("much better get down to work right away") he is articled to a firm of solicitors, declaring this to be a springboard to wider horizons in business and politics.[31] When Jenkins encounters him a few years after school, Widmerpool has achieved some social success and is a regular invitee at dinner-dances.