Enid Blyton

by Barbara Stoney

  Many have tried to solve the mystery of her phenomenal success and apparently ageless appeal, but perhaps psychologist Michael Woods, who attempted to analyse Enid – the woman – from her books (see Appendix 9) came closer than most when he wrote:

  She was a child, she thought as a child and she wrote as a child.

  Certainly her emotional immaturity was very evident throughout her adult life, particularly in her relationships with others, but that she never left her childhood entirely behind might well explain her ability to produce the kind of writing to which children of all ages and nationalities seem able to relate. She did, of course, possess extraordinary creative and imaginative gifts, an amazing capacity for hard work and a shrewd business acumen, but she was also able to look with a child’s eye at the stories she was creating and to project herself into them with such enthusiasm that her young readers very quickly became caught up in her excitement, as they avidly devoured each page. As for Enid, they provided an escape into a world of constant enchantment and surprise, where she could put aside those things which were unpleasant and keep only her dreams of life as she would like it to be.

  Some of her work may, as her critics claim, show the occasionally vicious side of her childlike nature or perpetuate views and attitudes that are no longer acceptable to present day society, but those who are worried by complaints that her stories are repetitive, lacking in characterisation and limited in their vocabulary, may like to be reminded that young children generally feel secure when they are covering easy, familiar ground and that as they mature most want to venture further afield – hopefully, in this case, to more demanding literature.

  But perhaps the final words should be left to one of Enid’s millions of readers who, looking back on a childhood in which Enid’s books played an important part, wrote to her from South Africa in 1957:

  … I am in the middle of my final Matriculation examinations and in four weeks’ time will be starting my training as a nurse.

  I suppose you are wondering what on earth this has to do with you and why I should be writing to you? I am just writing to thank you for all the pleasure your books have given me during my childhood. (I am eighteen now, so can afford to speak of the distant ‘childhood’ – I hope!)

  Throughout you have educated me in your English way of life and I have learnt a great deal about your countryside – your nature books were the ones I loved best and from them I got my avid interest in biology.

  Even when I graduated to adult literature, your books never lost their charm and fascination for me. When I was tired, and not in the mood for any serious book, a ‘Fives’ story would soon transport me into a wonderful world of adventure, where my mind could relax completely.

  Another thing, all your characters in the many series are so fine and upright, always striving to right wrongs. Between the strong influences of American cowboys and your enthusiastic adventurers, my friends and I grew up with – I hope – well-formed characters ourselves!

  I must thank you, too, for bringing me my finest glimpses of Fairyland. Grimm, Andersen, George Macdonald and you made my fairy world – especially your books, as there are so many of them! I can still feel the magic thrill whenever I think of the great Faraway Tree.

  Your autobiography and magazine have really brought us into close contact with you, and I do think it is a fine gesture to run those different clubs, each working for such a noble cause. May God bless you in your work.

  Once again, thank you for helping to make my childhood so extremely happy. I hope I can make my children as happy by introducing them to the magic, sunshiny world created by you …

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  Since this book was first published over thirty years ago, Enid’s life and extraordinary writing career have created even more worldwide interest. This has been due in part to the wider use of the internet, fresh information coming to light, the creation of a Society bearing her name and other factors, all of which I have tried to cover in the following new chapter.

  THE ‘PHENOMENON’ LIVES ON INTO THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY

  Most writers of biographies would agree that there are sometimes tantalising missing pieces of the jigsaw they are trying to put together. Occasionally, despite diligent research, there are puzzles which are never fully resolved although, often years later, solutions may be found.

  Twenty-five years after this biography was first published in 1974, a diary belonging to Enid Blyton was found stuffed amongst old files in the offices of Darrell Waters Limited. This discovery was made to the surprise of all concerned for it had generally been assumed that any diaries for this period had been destroyed with others by Enid’s second husband, Kenneth Darrell Waters. The diary was dated from January 1937 to December 1940 and as with those few earlier ones that had escaped his notice, passages of which I was able to use for my biography, the daily entries were always confined to a few lines and revealed little more than I had managed to glean from other sources covering those years. There were, however, one or two exceptions.

  Contrary to what I was first led to believe, the Pollocks continued to own Old Thatch until 1940. From 1938, when the family moved to Green Hedges, the old house at Bourne End was rented out to several tenants before a buyer was eventually found. This explained the puzzling memories Gillian and Imogen both had of returning there from time to time after 1938 to pick fruit and play in the garden. The diaries now confirm that these were the occasions when the property had to be prepared for new tenants and Hugh or Enid, sometimes accompanied by the ever helpful Dorothy, would take the children with them while they supervised the work.

  The 1938 diary also revealed that the actual move to Green Hedges took place when Hugh was still in hospital recovering from pneumonia and that Enid managed to organise the whole operation single-handed, in addition to keeping up with most of her writing commitments and visiting her sick husband. She stayed during this period at a nearby guest-house until he had recovered sufficiently to be taken home. After a few days she then, accompanied by Dorothy, travelled with him to convalesce on the Isle of Wight where Gillian and Imogen had been staying for some weeks with their Nanny. I had been curious about how and when the move had taken place as I thought it must have been around the time Hugh had become ill but I was unable to find any proof. Even Dick Hughes, their faithful gardener, found it difficult to remember details of that period.

  Other entries in the diary confirmed the closeness of her relationship with Dorothy over those years and her genuine anxiety over Hugh’s illness, though no mention is made at any time of his alcoholic lapses nor of what transpired between them during that fateful Christmas leave of 1940 as, curiously, the page for 31 December of that year was left blank. It is even more unfortunate that Kenneth should have destroyed the diaries that followed, including that for the next eventful year when he and Enid first met.

  Although commercially Enid Blyton has remained the most successful children’s writer of the last century, the controversy over the quality of her work still continues into the twenty-first – albeit to a much lesser degree than formerly. Even some of her fiercest critics concluded, at a 1997 conference organised by the National Centre for Research into Children’s Literature, that her stories were, in the words of one speaker, a ‘thumping good read’ and that recognition should be given to the great contribution she had made to children’s literacy.

  As early as 1982 Sheila Ray had commented in her assessment of Enid’s books. The Blyton Phenomenon, that the views of librarians and educationalists had begun to change when they became aware of falling literacy standards and realised that no other author at that time appeared to be capable, to the same degree, of writing the kind of stories which would encourage children to take up a book and read it through to the end. Subsequently more of her work began to appear on school and library shelves although her name did not feature in the 1991 list of approved books for the national curriculum, even though she figured that same year on the Public Lending Rights list a
s being one of the three most borrowed children’s authors. Also in 1991 the Sunday Times included Enid’s name in its list of international figures – 1,000 Makers of the 20th Century – who had shaped and influenced the lives of the British nation. In more recent years her rating on the PLR list has fluctuated but, according to the latest figures for 2005–6, she is still placed sixth in popularity, despite strong competition from best-selling authors such as J.K. Rowling, with her Harry Potter series, or Children’s Laureate Jacqueline Wilson, whose books deal with more realistic and down-to-earth life situations than Enid portrayed in most of her stories. Both writers, incidentally among many others, are said to have read Enid’s stories as children.

  In the early 1990s some of her publishers made certain text changes to her work – mostly to bring her stories into line with modern thought and sensitivities, particularly with regard to what some construed to be snobbish, racist or sexist attitudes. Even names were ‘modernised’ and other seemingly inexplicable alterations are still being made to some of her original stories. Such ‘sanitising’, as one reviewer described these changes, has brought further controversial publicity to Enid’s books for, although welcomed in some quarters, there are also those who see no reason why children should not be allowed to read the unexpurgated versions for themselves, accepting them in the context of the time in which they were written – as they already do with so many other works of fiction. It is, perhaps, interesting to note here that at the last count, thirty-eight years after her death, her books are continuing to sell at the rate of some six to seven million copies each year, in more than forty languages and worldwide sales of her books have remained buoyant.

  There have been several changes in the handling of Enid’s business affairs during the past decade. It was in February 1996 that the shareholders of Darrell Waters Limited, mostly members of the family, decided to sell all the Enid Blyton copyrights to the London-based leisure group Trocadero plc (later to become known as the ‘old’ Chorion) for the princely sum of £14.6 million. The name was then changed to Enid Blyton Limited and Gillian became one of the members of the new board. Until that time, Darrell Waters Limited had run the company dealing with Enid’s considerable business assets since its formation in 1950 and Imogen and Gillian had, during its latter years, both served on its board. In 1982, during this period under Darrell Waters’ management, it was decided that a charitable trust should be established in Enid’s name to help children in need, as her clubs and, indeed, Enid herself had done previously. Imogen was its first chairman and The Enid Blyton Trust for Children continues today with Sophie Smallwood, Imogen’s daughter, at its head.

  Chorion plc was established in May 2002 after the previously AIM-listed company, ‘old’ Chorion, had demerged into two separate AIM-listed entities – Chorion plc and Urbium plc. Chorion plc, having acquired majority shares in Agatha Christie Limited and the plays of Robert Bolt in 1998 and of George Simenon Limited in 2001, went on to acquire worldwide author rights in the works of Margery Allingham, Edmund Crispin, Nicholas Freeling, Raymond Chandler and Roger Hargreaves (of the Mr Men and Little Miss series). This made it a media content company with a portfolio of crime and children’s brands of which Enid Blyton Limited remained at the core. What Enid would have made of having such a diverse collection of writers as bedfellows we shall never know. In May 2006, with the agreement of the shareholders, Chorion plc reverted to private ownership following a take-over by Planet Acquisitions. The new company, Chorion Limited, continues to own all the works and copyrights previously owned by Chorion plc and the business continues unchanged.

  In 1992, Darrell Waters Limited had acquired the full copyright in all the original Noddy illustrations (Harmsen van der Beek and other artists’ work) which from then on brought both copyrights under one ownership. Later that same year a sixty-five-part stop-frame animation series entitled Noddy, based on the original stories, was produced by the BBC and launched on children’s television and merchandise; magazines and TV tie-in books followed. Chorion plc continued to promote Noddy further and in 2000 went on to produce a new 100-episode, computer-generated series entitled Make Way for Noddy with new storylines, which – at the time of writing - is showing on Channel 5 and in America. Noddy plays have also toured the UK and a special show Noddy Live was presented at Wembley Arena in 2005. Together with the publishing, magazines, merchandise, television, video and DVD releases and interactive computer games, the Noddy audience has broadened throughout the world. Say It With Noddy, a language teaching programme for young children, is also being screened at present on Channel 5 and overseas, introducing languages as diverse as Mandarin and Swahili.

  Over the years, many of Enid’s other titles have been released as readings and dramatisations, in English and other languages, on records, audio cassettes and CDs and their success has earned several gold and platinum awards. Films and television series have included two black and white Famous Five cinema films, two Famous Five television series (released later on video) and two Danish Famous Five feature films. An Island of Adventure feature film was produced by Ebefilms Limited in 1982 and a television Castle of Adventure by TVS in 1990. Video releases of all the films have followed. Polygram brought out an animated series of The Faraway Tree and Wishing Chair (under the umbrella title Enchanted Lands) which was shown on BBC children’s television in 1996–7 and later released on video. In 2000 a reading of The Enchanted Wood by actress Kate Winslet was recorded for audio cassettes. The Adventure series and Secret series were both filmed for television in New Zealand by Cloud Nine and have been shown on Channel 5 as well as overseas, with video releases. There has also been a Famous Five Musical performed at the King’s Head Theatre at Islington in London which then toured the UK the following year.

  Other documentaries or drama/documentaries about Enid’s life have also been shown. The first was Story Teller Extraordinary which was broadcast in 1974 as part of the Success Story series for BBC1. This was followed by The Selling of Noddy in 1986, Sunny Stories in the BBC2 Bookmark programme in 1992 and Secret Lives on Channel 4 in 1996. Radio programmes have included A Childlike Person for BBC Radio 4 in 1975, Once upon a Time with Enid Blyton for BBC Radio 2 in 1997 and a Radio Netherlands international award-winning Enid Blyton – the 20th Century Mother Goose in 2003.

  Since this biography was first published in 1974, other books dealing with her life have included: The Enid Blyton Story by Bob Mullan (1987), a tie-up to his TVS film The Selling of Noddy; two books for children written by Gillian, both entitled Enid Blyton, for series issued by separate publishers – Tell me about Writers (1997) and Telling Tales (2000); Nicholas Reed wrote an illustrated booklet about her early life Enid Blyton in Beckenham and Bromley (1997) and her agent, George Greenfield, gave his own interpretation of her work and relationships with those around her in Enid Blyton (1998). The Dorset Days of Enid Blyton (2002) was written by Vivienne Endecott who runs a ‘Ginger Pop’ shop at Corfe in Dorset devoted to Enid and conducts tours of the sites possibly used in her stories. In 2005 Andrew Norman also wrote Enid Blyton and her Enchantment with Dorset. In 1989 Imogen wrote of her own Childhood at Green Hedges, which showed very clearly what I had discovered already through my researches – that Enid was, as one of her publishers remarked, ‘often so busy being a mother to the world’s children, she was not always sensitive to the emotional needs of her own.’

  Among the books concerning different aspects of her writing since 1974, have been: The Blyton Phenomenon (Sheila Ray, 1982); The Enid Blyton Dossier (Brian Stewart and Tony Summerfield, 1999); Who’s Who In Enid Blyton (Eva Rice, 1997 and 2003) and Enid Blyton and the Mystery of Children’s Literature (David Rudd, 2000). Special mention should be made here of another work – the Comprehensive Bibliography of Enid Blyton published in 1997 by Tony Summerfield (secretary of the Enid Blyton Society and editor of its Journal). This was followed some years later by his current 4-volume illustrated edition. It covers all Enid’s known books, magazines, periodicals, sho
rt stories, plays and poems, in addition to details of her publishers and illustrators – the compiling of which involved a highly-specialised investigation into the whereabouts of many of her previously undiscovered works. There is obviously no space here to include Tony’s complete work but I am extremely grateful to him for offering to revise my original 1974 bibliography so as to include some of the information about her books that he has acquired since that time.

  When I was putting together my own listed version, I found that many of the titles I had uncovered elsewhere did not appear in the lists belonging to any of the recognised sources including the British Library or other well-known collections. In addition to this, although Enid mentioned in her early account books and diaries the commissions she had received from Birn Bros. (and had, apparently, delivered to them) no titles for that publisher were included. Birns, I was to discover, no longer existed nor did their records, so all I could do was to quote from her diaries which at least made mention of them. Tony has now been able to reveal most of these for the first time. Since the wider use of the internet and more collectors being in touch with each other – many as a result of the formation of the Enid Blyton Society – a number of hitherto unknown but genuine titles have been discovered. Tony has now been able to record these, together with eight Birns’ books found during this year alone – two of which were sold on eBay for £600.

  Collectors’ interest in her books increased considerably during the 1990s and, as a result, the Enid Blyton Literary Society was inaugurated in 1995 by collectors Norman Wright, Tony Summerfield and Michael Rouse. This followed the success of an Enid Blyton ‘Day’ organised by Norman Wright in 1993. Other meetings of those interested in her life and works were already being held around the country at that time and the Enid Blyton Book and Ephemera Collectors’ Society had been formed earlier by another collector, Richard Walker. When this came to an end some years later, it was decided to drop the ‘Literary’ from the original title of the one formed in 1995 and from then on it has become widely known as the Enid Blyton Society, which now has its own Journal and website: www.enidblytonsociety.co.uk.