Review: Enid Blyton A Literary Life by Andrew Maunder

Andrew Maunder takes a look of one of the highest selling and, most surprisingly, controversial authors of the twentieth century Enid Blyton, in this latest instalment of the Literary Lives series. Enid Blyton rose to fame in the 1920s and by the advent of the Second World War was one of the highest selling authors in the United Kingdom and in many other Commonwealth countries such as Australia and New Zealand. Acclaim for the author soon turned to criticism with many pointing to the lack of depth in her stories and the peddling of values that as early as the 1960s were considered to elitist, sexist and racist. Following her death two biographies would draw an unflattering portrait of the author, portraying her as selfish and childish, first Barbara Stoney's biography and later, the more shocking A Childhood at Green Hedges written by Blyton's youngest daughter Imogen, in which she portrayed her mother as selfish and distant. Enid Blyton A Literary Life acknowledges these claims and does not seek to disprove them. Instead the author takes a different path, giving a very academic look at her work and places it within the context of its original time and place, and compares it to the other popular children's authors of the day. The result is a very interesting study.

While this one did not change my mind about the author, it did a wonderful job of discussing the books within their historical context whilst asking questions about their literary merit and the problems of racism, sexism and elitism that can be found in her work. (Many of the Blyton books that are in print today have been edited to address this.) Obviously, this is an academic book so the discussion is in-depth and extremely well researched, but it may feel a little long and overwhelming for the casual reader looking for a Blyton biography. 

Recommended.  

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Peppermint Patty: I Cried and Cried and Cried

Image
Unrequited love is a common theme in the Peanuts Comics and is one that I have previously explored on this blog. We know that Lucy loves Schroeder, Sally loves Linus and Charlie Brown has a crush on the unseen, unnamed and utterly unattainable Little Redhaired Girl. But perhaps the saddest unrequited love stories from the comic is that which ran in late June 1972. It was the series of strips where the usually self-confident Peppermint Patty came face-to-face with the Little Redhaired Girl with the intention of thumping her and then something surprising happened: Here we have a usually self-confident girl, who is funny, unashamedly herself and talented at sports reduced to tears by the realisation of who she is not and never can be. I really feel for her in this series of comic strips. She knows that Charlie Brown can never love her, when he is so hung up over a girl who represents a supposedly ideal feminine beauty. Fortunately Linus, the most spiritual member of the Pean
Read more

Phrases and Idioms: Tickets on Himself

To have tickets on himself: (Australian slang.) To be conceited or vain. To have an overinflated opinion of oneself.  He's got tickets on himself if he thinks that any woman would fall for that. I was thinking about this particular bit of Australian slang the other day, after my boss said, "He's got tickets on himself," to describe the actions of a particular individual. At the time, I smiled, knowing exactly what the boss meant. Later on, I started to ponder on this unusual phrase and wondered where it might have come from. A search on google helped me find the definition, but that was about all. There are no references to it being used in pop culture or literature (if you find one, let me know,) and at the time of writing this post, Tickets on Himself was not listed on Urban Dictionary. (I tried to add it, but the fuckers rejected my definition. They probably think I have tickets on myself or something for trying to add a relatively common piece of A
Read more

Who Else Writes Like V.C. Andrews?

Image
Are there any other authors out there who write similar novels to V.C. Andrews? This is a question I see asked frequently in excellent fan run V.C. Andrews Facebook groups like Attic Secrets and The Dolls Club. In times gone by, The Complete V.C. Andrews webpage (which is no more, but the best bits are archived by Lorraine at the Attic Secrets blog,) had a comprehensive list. Today, I thought I would put forward a few of my own thoughts and recommendations. (Note: This will focus mainly on the series and novels written by the actual V.C. Andrews and not ghostwriter Andrew Neiderman, who has a distinctive writing style of his own.) The Classics This is probably the best place to start, as it is likely that some of these novels influenced V.C. Andrews herself. Andrews was a fan of Charles Dickens, mentioning the author in the prologue of her most famous novel Flowers in the Attic. I have yet to read all of Dickens novels (I've read about half,) but I can feel a slight V.C. Andrews vi
Read more