This article is an autobiographical account of a remarkable childhood. In this essay, David Steiner, the Klara & Larry Silverstein Dean of the School of Education at Hunter College in New York, chronicles his early years and his road to Oxford. David is the son of George Steiner, the polymath who has scathingly denounced Western societies for the shallowness of their liberal education. Growing to intellectual maturity under his father's tutelage, David provides a vivid description of a time and place, and a subtle examination of the intersection of childhood and liberal arts.