Apparently, Enid Blyton is a bit Problematic

[Gulftastic]

His crotch fairy is also somewhat puzzling.

[Jittlebags]

His crotch fairy is also somewhat puzzling.

It appears whenever you rub his magic bell end.

[daf]

Also, I hated the Famous Five who I found dull as fuck, but I was a big fan of the Secret Seven. I couldn't name a single member of the Secret Seven now while I could name all the Famous Five.

Odd how none of her "Six" books caught on - quick google brings up . . .

Six Cousins at Mistletoe Farm (1948) :
After a fire at their home, Cyril, Melisande and Roderick are hastily sent to stay with their aunt, uncle and cousins on their farm. The three arrivals are somewhat spoiled and affected, and find it very tough to live on a working farm with their cousins Jane, Jack and Susan who have their own faults. Sensible Aunt Linnie helps the cousins to fit in a little and even the home cousins learn a thing or two.

Six Cousins Again (1950) :
After living on their uncle's farm Cyril, Melisande and Roderick are finally to move out from under their relatives' feet, but instead of returning to the city they are to have a farm of their own quite nearby. The children are quite accepting of this – they have come to love living in the countryside and their father is keen to do a good job. It is Rose, their mother, that is the difficulty this time – and everyone has to pull together to help her adjust to life as a farmer's wife.

The Six Bad Boys (1951):
The Six Bad Boys is the closest Blyton ever gets to kitchen sink drama. Refreshingly, the families in the story are not the middle-class families found in so many Enid Blyton books. There isn't a cook, a maid or a gardener in sight, and all the children attend the local day-school. The setting is no rural idyll, but a canal-side town (Lappington) with shops, a cinema, a fun-fair and streets of "half-tumbled-down" terraces.



The Six Bad Boys has sparked controversy because of the apparent condemnation of working mothers but, primarily, the book is about the need for a home and family. Homes are important in so many Blyton books. Characters often set about creating a "home from home" in times of difficulty or danger. Jack and the others build a house of willow in The Secret Island, the Trents and Mannerings make their home in a fern-cave in The Valley of Adventure and Peter and Susan live in a hollow tree in Hollow Tree House. These "homes" are places of security, companionship and comparative comfort. There, children arrange their belongings, develop a routine and take on roles which make them feel that they "belong" to the group and are contributing to it. What they have created is a functional "family," however unconventional that family may be.

I would argue that, far from being "retrogressive," The Six Bad Boys is ahead of its time in some ways. It examines social issues which are still very relevant today, such as family breakdown, children being left alone, the need for childcare, antisocial behaviour, alienation, the effects of violent films on developing minds, etc. And it acknowledges, as Basil Henriques points out in his foreword, that "bad" children are often "unhappy" children, and that there are many types of "broken home" — not only homes in which parents have separated or divorced, but homes in which parents quarrel, or children are neglected or abused.

Had to throw this in, as I just love the title -

"Those Dreadful Children" (1949) :

The three Carlton children - John, Margery and Annette - are excited when a new family move into the house at the bottom of the garden. However, the older Taggertys - Pat, Maureen and Biddy are loud, rough, dirty and not at all the sort of children the prim, tidy Carltons want to associate with. Due to an old friendship of their fathers they are forced together - two sets of Dreadful Children - who have to take a hard look at their own behaviours as they learn to get along.



The Taggertys move into the house at the bottom of the Carltons' garden and the new children on the block consist of Pat, Maureen, Biddy and Michael the baby. P, M & B are uncouth, bad-mannered, untidy, selfish, and out of control. On the other hand the Carlton children consisting of ten year old John, eight year old Margery and Annette who's five, are well brought up — immaculately behaved, clean and tidy, and they also go to church and Sunday school.

Despite their positive upbringing they aren't perfect. John harbours grudges far too long and he's a bit namby-pamby. His father would like him to be a real boy as in "Boy" — he'd like him to swarm up trees, tear his clothes a little, crawl through bushes, splash through puddles and generally do what boys generally do. Margery is rather timid and flighty — she's scared of mice, bats, moths, beetles, worms, earwigs and everything else. Annette is a spoilt little Mummy's girl who's not averse to telling tales and bursting into tears if things don't go the way she'd like them to. So, once again — Who are the Dreadful Children? In chapter #2 it's John and Margery labelling the Taggertys thus and in Chapter #5 it's revealed that the Taggertys consider the Carltons as T. D. C.

[Johnny Yesno]

Blimey! She could certainly churn them out. I really liked the Secret Seven but hated the Famous Five, the fucking show-offs. I'd forgotten she'd also done the of Adventure series. I know I liked those books as a child but I have no memory of them.

I think I must have been older when I read the Adventure books by Willard Price because I can still remember Hal and Roger getting delirious from lack of water while stranded at sea holding on to a piece of wreckage and one of them suggesting 'Let's go down to the beach'.

[daf]

Blimey! She could certainly churn them out.

It's something like 600 books - cranked out two or three a month in her peak years!

[that list gives 762 - as it's counting various repackages & Omnibus editions - but the number of her original books is thought to be roughly 600]

[Johnny Yesno]

It's something like 600 books - cranked out two or three a month in her peak years!

[that list gives 762 - as it's counting various repackages & Omnibus editions - but the number of her original books is thought to be roughly 600]

Quantity over quality. No wonder it seems like Mr Pink-Whistle was tossed off.

[Janie Jones]

As noted on this 2015 thread (CW - posters who are no longer with us) EB's canon includes The Chocolate Cock.

https://www.cookdandbombd.co.uk/forums/index.php?topic=48312.0

[Kankurette]

And it's a real thing too!

Christmas brings foil covered chocolate Santa Claus figures to brighten up the shops but they aren't the only novelties that attract children because at Easter time the outlets are full of chocolate bunny rabbits, roosters, and chooks. The final tale concerns a cockerel who is so extremely vain that he keeps proclaiming himself as the handsomest bird in the world. That's all very well but the children aren't interested in him. Why? Because he's marked "One Shilling" and they simply can't afford that kind of money. Next to him on the shelf is a chocolate chicken with whom he's become quite friendly but one day the cockerel gets a terrible shock! A little boy, who must be a richer than his chums, buys the chocolate chicken and bites his head off! This is dreadful ... especially when the boy tells the cockerel it'll be his turn next because tomorrow, when his uncle gives him a shilling, he'll be coming back to buy him! The bird shivers and shakes at this statement and determines not to be consumed by a horrid little boy with dirty hands. "I am the handsomest bird in the world! I will not be eaten!" When the boy returns next day the cockerel jumps down to the floor and is out of the door in a twinkling because he has no intention of allowing himself to be stuffed into someone's mouth. He struts down the road and comes to a market where there are turkeys, geese, and ducks all waiting to be bought or sold. A fat little hen asks him what he is and a duck asks him if he can lay eggs. A goose asks if he supplies feathers for pillows and the answers they receive are all in the negative so it appears he's not making much of an impression on these live creatures. The cockerel flies to a horse-trough and declares once again how wonderful he is - not to mention that he's made of chocolate. A little girl passing by makes a grab at him but the bird manages to dodge away and run for his life once again. Soon he reaches a farmyard and starts mingling with the stock - a donkey, goats, horses, cows, turkeys, hens, geese and ducks. The star of this story has to be the most vain character that Enid Blyton ever invented because once again he flies up to a wall and tells them who he is and that he's the handsomest bird in the world - now where have we heard that before? Oh yes, he's also "wise" and "clever!" He then goes even further and practically orders them to make him their king! There's an old saying: "Pride Comes Before a Fall," and "No," he doesn't fall from the wall!

The same book has a story called Mr Tweeky's Pockets. Incidentally, I also own A Book of Naughty Children and it's hilarious.

Jack Off Jill had a song called Chocolate Chicken. No idea if they're Enid Blyton fans though.

[Wonderful Butternut]

all of the toys make sense except the drumming cat

But I want one.

[Phoenix Lazarus]

Odd how none of her "Six" books caught on - quick google brings up . . .

The Six Bad Boys book's cover must have been a bit confusing to many who picked it up, looked at the front cover and thought 'there's only four of the bastards,' till they saw the part of the cover that wraps round the spine, where there's a more distant image of the other two cunts peering over a fence.

[Kankurette]

I have a feeling the Dreadful Children are Irish, from those names. Which means they're Wild Scamps and they say 'toora-loora-loo' and 'begorrah' and 'at all, at all'.

ETA: I liked the Secrets series, with Ruritanian Prince Paul and his faithful manservant Ranni. And the Adventure series with badass Bill and Kiki the parrot. My auntie had a load of Blyton adventure stories and I wish I'd taken them home with me before they all got given away to a charity shop.

[Poirots BigGarlickyCorpse]

I definitely read the second Six Cousins book. It features at least one farmhand who talks in a Farmer Palmer "Get orf moi laaaaaand!" accent (which is written out phonetically, of course). The youngest city-cousin gets a dog that his mother doesn't want and names it Tinker. After the dog gets robbed by "gypsies" and later returned he exclaims "Tinker, you really are a tinker now!"

I have a vague memory of "Those Dreadful Children!" but can't for the life of me remember how it ends. Sounds like "Six Cousins" and "Those Dreadful Children!" were reskins of each other, frankly.

[studpuppet]

all of the toys make sense except that they're fucking alive

FTFY

[willbo]

my Nan went mad at me for reading one of EB's girl boarding school books while I was staying at hers, and said I could only read boy's books like my uncle's old kid's western/007 novels. I was enjoying them too. I wish I'd read them now.

[Icehaven]

my Nan went mad at me for reading one of EB's girl boarding school books while I was staying at hers, and said I could only read boy's books like my uncle's old kid's western/007 novels. I was enjoying them too. I wish I'd read them now.

I remember my mum and my aunt having a massive row after my mum took my (male) cousin and I to the school book fair and he came back with a Paula Danziger novel. It wasn't expressly said in front of us of course but my aunt was concerned the book could turn him gay, and my mum was explaining that he chose it, what was she supposed to do, say he couldn't have it? He didn't turn out to be gay as it happens, obviously as a result of being kept away from girl's books as a child.

[Kankurette]

I had pretty girly taste in books and I ended up bisexual, but that might be because my favourite toy as a kid was a train set.

[Jittlebags]

As noted on this 2015 thread (CW - posters who are no longer with us) EB's canon includes The Chocolate Cock.

https://www.cookdandbombd.co.uk/forums/index.php?topic=48312.0

Started off as The Chocolate Starfish.

[Evil Knevil]

Blyton did at least three boarding-school series, three "crime-solving children" series, two "children are transported to magical lands" series, and two "man fucks things up" series (although Mr. Twiddle is more absent-minded while Mr. Meddle is more malicious). When she hit on a formula she stuck with it.

They've mostly been bowderised now in the new editions. In the Magic Faraway Tree the Tree gets invaded by Goblins(?) but instead of getting the shit kicked out of them they just get scolded and locked away. The evil teacher is called Dame Snap rather than Dame Slap and the corporal punishment stuff is gone. There's clearly still a market for all this stuff as it keeps being revisited and revised every decade or so.

[Johnny Yesno]

The boarding school series are to be merged with Mr Liddle.

[peanutbutter]

Does anyone under the age of 50 give a shite about Enid Blyton? Her 500 identical books on the childrens bookshelf in libraries and that fixation on just bleeding dry the most enthusiastic readers was the exact kind of thing that had killed reading amongst kids until Harry Potter arrived. Shelves and shelves of absolute wank, both you and your parents assuming you must hate reading if there's nothing you can find interest in across all the shelves.

[Kankurette]

Does anyone under the age of 50 give a shite about Enid Blyton? Her 500 identical books on the childrens bookshelf in libraries and that fixation on just bleeding dry the most enthusiastic readers was the exact kind of thing that had killed reading amongst kids until Harry Potter arrived. Shelves and shelves of absolute wank, both you and your parents assuming you must hate reading if there's nothing you can find interest in across all the shelves.

Surprisingly, yes. She's massive in Germany and Japan, there's even a St Clare's anime. And even here, Malory Towers and St Clare's and The Naughtiest Girl keep getting republished with new covers, so there must be a market somewhere.

[Custard]

She was also played by Helena Bonham Carter in a lightweight 2009 biopic, which probably makes people think she was more likeable and charismatic than she actually was, and not-a-big-racist

I honestly can't remember reading any of her books as a kid. It was all Roald Dahl round our way. Though it seems like he was a bit of a problematic person too, so kids should probably stick to Potter or David Walliams' shite

[buttgammon]

A few years ago, I was at a talk with the Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie where someone asked her what she read as a child and to my great surprise, she said she loved Enid Blyton. It's a bit odd to think these books were (perhaps still are) being read in post-independence Nigeria.

[Pinball]

Apparently the working class read them too.

[dothestrand]

She was also played by Helena Bonham Carter in a lightweight 2009 biopic, which probably makes people think she was more likeable and charismatic than she actually was, and not-a-big-racist

I honestly can't remember reading any of her books as a kid. It was all Roald Dahl round our way. Though it seems like he was a bit of a problematic person too, so kids should probably stick to Potter or David Walliams' shite

Dennis Potter is probably more wholesome than Blyton or Dahl tbf.