Enid Blyton.

[Charles Bannerman]

Between the ages of about 7 and 11 I just couldn't get enough of Enid Blyton. Any chance I got I would get stuck into the secret Seven, the Famous Five, the Adventure series, the Mystery series etc etc. I thought they were wonderful rip roaring yarns and it was only some years later that I became aware of the undercurrents... some of them quite "dark".  :009:

It was only later in life that it began to dawn on me that the Secret Seven Fuhrer Peter was, in fact, a self important little Fascist and that the "SS" on the door of their hut probably had implications of something a good deal more sinister. And in some respects the Secret Seven were the most normal group of children. They attended day school and seemed to have both parents around, albeit still somewhat "posh".

The other series of books all seemed to involve a bunch of patronising, supercilious prats who, used to spend their "hols" from boarding school swanning around either, like the Secret Seven, making the local cops totally redundant or like the Adventure kids intercepting arms shipments trafficked by sinister sounding neo Nazis with squints and dodgy central European accents.

Parents seemed to play a peripheral part in their lives if they were there at all and in some cases the poor sods were offloaded on to other relatives during the hols... perhaps because Mummy and Daddy (if he was still around) were away ruling the Raj.

One set of parents who did appear were the mad and somewhat sinister scientist Uncle Quentin and the stereotypically subservient Aunt Fanny  :015: in the Famous Five. With a background like that, is it any surprise that George was a Gender Bender? Uncle Quentin was probably the high water mark of the negative father figure image which comes through in so many of Blyton's books and which I gather may have been a throwback to her own childhood. (In the Adventure Series that tame and genial MI5 officer Bill Smugs seems to become some kind of surrogate father to the four crimebusters and thatbloody parrot.)

It must have been a great life, though, swanning about the countryside on bikes from farmhouse to farmhouse, freeloading massive meals and "lashings of ginger beer" off half witted locals with rustic accents before nipping in there in front of the moronic local cops to solve the mystery and arrest criminals who most of the time were black, gypsies, Cockneys or some kind of Johnny Foreigner.

At least senior police officers had the wit to afford these public school balloons (**** was so well named! :015:) the deference they were clearly used to and to understand that they were the greatest crime fighters since Holmes and Watson. Junior cops, such as the overweight and incompetent PC Goon were clearly a lot less perceptive as to the genius of the aforementioned Hooray Henrys.

It's actually quite scray to think that I was brought up on this psychologically twisted stuff. All I can say is... thank God I never read Noddy!!!!

Any more Blyton views or memories?

[The Mantis]

I'm sure writing that was a cathartic experience for you Charles  :023:

[Charles Bannerman]

Yup... loved the woman's books as a kid then discovered what a twisted old crone she really was.  :015:

[canuck]

I Think I read them all, Greaaat excitement! used to read them under the bed  covers under torch light on School nights pretending to be asleep. My all time favourite was ''Five go off to Smugglers Top"  I just finished the last one Last week! however I had a bit of explaining to do when I was under the covers with the torch!!

[Charles Bannerman]

I I had a bit of explaining to do when I was under the covers with the torch!!

Did you also, like me, have your transistor with you, tuned to Radio Luxembourg?

[DJS]

I did enjoy the books all those years ago and the Comic Strip TV rip off must be one of the most under rated comedy moments ever with Uncle Quentin a "screaming homosexual". It was hilarious. See it if you can.

Edited August 14, 2008 by DJS

[alimci]

I always preferred the FF and the Mystery novels to the SS ones. Funny how in those days abandoned children cycled around the country foiling international master criminals, and now they spend their time throwing bricks at fire engines.

[Charles Bannerman]

And didn't The Comic Strip in the mid 80s take the rip out of them wonderfully?! (But you have of course to remember that these were superior Upper Middle Class abandoned children... not Chavs! )