Talk:Enid Blyton

Enid Blyton the writer?

The article could say something about what made Blyton start to write, how she created her famous characters, how she kept up the volume of writing, etc. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 59.92.175.174 (talk • contribs) .

Yanks

You Americans smell to relax with your PC. A book can be good and yet have a girl playing with a doll. Why do you have to spoil everything with pathetics polemics?

Fully agree - Tom

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We need some mention of educationalists disapproving of her books because they are so simple to read (though they have stories and are devoured by children).

And then there's the matter of recent reissues of Noddy, with an ethnically cleansed Toytown...

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I used to love these books as a kid, particularly the Mystery ones. Although upon re-reading them as an adult they are terribly sexist and racist. Mark Jeays

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For good or bad such were the times Mark though they remain great children's books - the ones i didn't wear to pieces reading so much are safely stored away for my own future kids to read one day.

Paul Melville Austin

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Should the attitude of Enid Blyton Ltd toward fan sites ("Shut down or we'll sue you, claiming copyright infringement and libel" even if the information is reasonably accurate, and works are used fairly) be documented? --Damian Yerrick

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Didn't EB play tennis in the nude? -- Tarquin

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EB's real name is Darryl Waters. I think someone should put that on the page. Also, I remember reading somewhere that she used to mistreat her own children.

Waters was her second married name: see [1] for more biography. Charles Matthews 09:10, 29 Dec 2004 (UTC)

EB's writing quality

The main reason for the withdrawal of Blyton books from school libraries was actually very little to do with racism or sexism, it was far more connected with the fact that Blyton simply didn't write very well, and her use of English is rather poor. The tabloids seized upon this as another example of "Loony Lefty Political Correctness", but the racism and sexism aspect was certainly more of an afterthought than anything else.

laugh on both issues. IMO her critics, on both grounds, have mainly shown that they didn't understand what she wrote. Andrewa 16:24, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

It was certainly the librarians. Her books grew out of her teaching background and 'reading schemes', so she was very self-conscious about vocabulary levels in different age groups. The article should add material on her early life, to expand on that. Charles Matthews 12:53, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

That sounds good. I'm not able to write much, my information comes mainly from the books I was given as a child, some of which I still have, see user:andrewa/Enid Blyton. Most of them were Famous Five and similar which I did not like at all but people kept giving them to me, possibly in the hope of educating me in what children ought to enjoy! I was reading chemistry books, Arthur Ransome and Carl Barks comics mainly at that age. I have also used my mother's memories of using Blyton's teaching material in a primary school in England in the late 1940s, but I have to be a bit wary of wandering into original research there.

My suspicion is that the reason that Blyton's books sold so well (and still do) is that she was 'way ahead of her time in her approach. The Teletubbies was based on a scholarly analysis of the way very young children speak. That's great, but in other ways, big deal. Blyton (and many billions of grandmothers) did it instinctively. Andrewa 00:58, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

birthyear?

on top it says it's 1897, the category is 1896 births though - can someone clarify?

NZ library ban

'This gave rise to the first rumour of a New Zealand 'library ban' on Blyton’s books, a recurrent press canard'

I grew up in NZ and as a child I do remember there being no Enid Blyton books in the school or public library. When I asked about this, I was told they were banned. This was back in about 1990. They were finally unbanned towards the end of the 90's. Any other Kiwi's back me up on this one? I would change the artical myself, but it could be the fact that the public libraries I went to just happened to have a ban on the books and it might not have been NZ wide.

= 'artical'?

You would have to give a reliable reference. Some librarians simply objected to buying Blyton books, it seems, because they wanted children to read something more literary. Budget decisions are not 'bans', as such. Charles Matthews 21:55, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Gollywogs

The article claims that only one Gollywog appears as a villain in one Noddy book. However I remember as a child reading a Noddy story in which there was a gang of Golllywogs patrolling the woods and harrassing people. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 83.71.19.187 (talk • contribs) 15:30, 11 September 2006.

I had a nearly complete Noddy book set when I was a child - so we're talking over 35 years ago. As I recall the golliwog was frquently a villain of the piece. I also recall that some time during my teens the books were PC'd up and republished, largely without the golliwogs, and with other characters substituted. Cain Mosni 15:03, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Controversies

The "controversies" section needs a major rewrite - it reads like an editorial opinion piece. 217.155.20.163 21:00, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Completely agree (SW)

step-parents

isn't it odd that EB re-named her children to their step-father's name, but in almost all the Famous Five books, she slags off step parents and step parenting. (nankai, a step-dad) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 125.239.42.209 (talk) 20:33, 13 March 2007 (UTC).

"critically acclaimed"?

I was a little surprised to see this in the opening, and I say that as someone who still owns and reads some of Blyton's books. Since this is likely to be a controversial claim, perhaps we could name some of the critics who have done the acclaiming? Vashti 18:47, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

After rereading the entire article, I think a POV flag is in order...the language in several places is anything but neutral.Alan 03:34, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Merge bibliography subpages

I propose to merge the various pages listed in the navbox {{Blyton bibliography}}, in the next few days, unless there are any specific objections. Thanks. --Quiddity 01:38, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Please don't. Huge pages aren't helpful. Charles Matthews 10:43, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree that the bibliography is better if kept on a separate page. OrenBochman 15:00, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

I agree that pages that get too long should be split into separate pages. However I would extend this thought to suggest, that for consistency, all similar pages, i.e. biographies be split in a similar way regardless of length, which would include bibliographies for authors, discographies for those in the music industry, filmographies for those involves with the film industry, etc. ForteTwo 03:33, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Please see List of books by Enid Blyton, and add anything useful to the merge discussion. Thanks. --Quiddity 18:44, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Update

I completed the merge, and made the source pages incoming redirects.

Hopefully the data will eventually all be tabulated, for easy sorting by title/year/series/illustrator/etc. --Quiddity 16:35, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Why is Trivia considered Trivial?

I don't get it, but when something is tagged as trivia to be either absorbed into the article or else, I feel I'm gonna lose some interesting cultural references. Unlike some who know all the injokes and in references when they come up, I appreciate it being spelled out so I can add to my own associations. Can someone tell me why this censure exists?

By the way, I used to read all the Blyton books not realising she wrote the others such as the boarding school and magical ones. She would have given me a taste for sci fi for life. I read so much as a child that I didn't notice the author's name, just the yummy feeling of devouring more and more enjoyable stuff and didn't notice they were aimed at age groups so I just read my way through whatever I could get hold of. At least the kids were co-ed and managed their adventures together.Julia Rossi 02:27, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

You should check out the links which explain why we should avoid trivia sections and how it can be done. The key thing to remember is this is an encyclopaedia, not a fan site or a place for general information about her and her books Nil Einne 19:49, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

School experience

I read on German W.P. that E.B. herself attended a school named "St Clare's", like her characters in some of her novels, and that her real-life experiences inspired those books (or at least that that was what she herself told) - but here I do not find a reference to that aspect of her life and work, so I wonder whether that piece of information is reliable, or, if it is, why you left it out ?!

Also I tried to include a link to "St. Christopher's School", which she attended (afterwards) (acc. to both articles), or rather I checked by this way whether it had an entry or article of itself on W.P., but apparently so far there exists only one for a school of the same name in Virginia (USA). So I wonder, does "her" school in Beckenham still exist or is there just no refenrence in this electr. encyclopaedia ?

I thaught it might be interesting especially for an author who became a teacher herself AND choose schools as setting for a number of her books: so her own school experience very obviously MUST have left quite an "impact", don't you think so ?!

- I also noticed that the article does not say a thing about her teacher training, where and how long and why chosen (German W.P. says the career was chosen against the will of her parents who rather wanted her to become a musician).

Regards,147.142.186.54 15:51, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

Actually, the first part is not true: the German wikipedia only states that Blyton had gone to a boarding school herself and that this boarding school later became a model for St.Clare's.--87.162.176.196 (talk) 06:40, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Famous-five-13-1954.jpg

Image:Famous-five-13-1954.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

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BetacommandBot (talk) 06:42, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

racist quote

On reading an article in the Scotsman [2] that in parts appeared to be derivative of this one, I encountered a quote that could require a shift in the “controversies” section – George was said (by the narration, not just some character) to be “as black as a nigger with soot” (it is Wikipedia policy not to use astericks). A search for it finds some apparently reliable sources. Does anyone have an old book that could be checked to confirm and/or see by what time it had been excised? This would clearly require a prominent place in discussion of whether her books were racist, and would also change the question of whether her books are “staunchly defended” by many people.Billwilson5060 (talk) 10:18, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Unsourced material

The following is unsourced information:

• In a survey of adults between the ages of 25 and 54, conducted by Cartoon Network in England in 2004, The Famous Five was named as the top children's book. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, by C. S. Lewis, came second, ahead of Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island. Tolkien's The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings tied with a second Blyton title – The Secret Seven in fourth place.
• Her nephew was the Doctor Who composer Carey Blyton.
• The name of an important female character in her Malory Towers series (Darrell Rivers) was inspired by the name of her second husband, Kenneth Darrel Waters.
• Letters from Bobs, one of Blyton's early works, sold more than 10,000 copies in just one week.

While this is interesting, we can't use it unless you provide a source. Also, none of this is really trivia, as trivia by its definition is "unimportant information" - it therefore shouldn't be in a trivia section but instead the information should be incorporated into the main article. - Tbsdy lives (talk) 20:12, 16 September 2008 (UTC)