The Chalet School 2 - Still talking about it a century later!

Have just realised that I have misquoted from memory -

'Her voice was ever soft, gentle, and low, an excellent thing in woman'

Despite really enjoying both books, I hated the way that Jane was treated. This capable, straightforward (if slightly overly direct) girl just had to have shiny fingernails and shiny hair to be considered acceptable by her brother's pals. Even her brother, who up until that point had seen nothing wrong with her, is unpleasant to her for being herself. And it's all couched as 'it's important to make yourself pleasant looking for others'.

Somewhat similar to Madge's oft repeated diktat of 'her voice was ever sweet and low, a most wonderful thing in a woman'.

Checking into the second thread.

Have been really enjoying these threads. I was a big fan of the books as a small child in the mid-late 80s, and came back to them in my middle age.

As a child, I'd have one or two of the books twice a year at Christmas and birthday, plus my friend's mum (who may be here!) generously lent me her copies. I have enjoyed some of the continuity errors being pointed out here (e.g. Biddy O'Ryan's name change, slightly random ages of the triplets) because I had always thought that the difficulty was that I'd only read a fairly random selection of books and in a completely random order!

And also that the things I thought were odd as a small child (eg the Robin, only a year younger than I was when I started the books, seeming more like a 3 year old; Jo having a zillion babies in quick succession like noone I knew, etc) and put down to the unknowable oddness of the 1920s or the adult world (or just Jo being wholesale, which again I didn't really understand) were in fact extremely weird!

In retrospect, 7 was maybe a bit young to start the books - although perhaps if I had known a few words of German or French it might have been easier! It took me a long time to work out which meal was which, and I never had any idea how to pronounce them (I always read a-BEND-asun). I'm guessing, though, that this was a pretty typical age to start reading?

I got it from Girls gone by when it wasfirst printed, but looks like they don't have it in print now. But the pace to look for it would be Chalet School sales and wants on FB, you can put on a "wanted" post. There's usually a good chance someone has what you want, and it will be a fair price.

They’re both brilliant. (Cyril of course has a giant crush Benedict the hermit. And Jack has some scene going on with Twigg the poacher.)

I loved the scene where Melisande impresses Jack’s school friend by being dainty, and he’s horrified by filthy Jane, so Jane starts a campaign of self-care that involves washing her jodhpurs and not biting her nails. And silly Aunt Rose fat-shames Melisande for the effects of all those high teas.

Aunt Linnie reforms them in Six Cousins, but they relapse in Six Cousins Again under the dastardly influence of their mother Rose, who has the audacity not to want to live on a farm and have High Tea every day. It's not until Rose undergoes a personality transplant by means of donning an overall and getting up at 6am to put the kettle on that they all live happily ever after.

(Despite my facetious summary these are my favourite two Blyton books and Melisande and Cyril were my childhood crushes).

Yes! A wholesome country lifestyle and lots of hearty farmhouse fare sorts them out. I always enjoyed that book.

Was that Six Cousins at Mistletoe Farm? And the aunt reforms them?

I like the Enid Blyton mother who after their house burns down shunts her kids off to the lovely aunt at Mistletoe Farm and checks herself into a wellness facility (not sure what they were called in those days!) for some rest and relaxation.

(edited to add that google tells me she's called Rose Longfield)

That’s a really good point.

....the mould of Blyton etc’s cosy, caring mother whose family was her world.

They weren't all like that.
There was Mrs Mannering, who was off running her own business and leaving Philip and Dinah to spend their holidays fairly miserably
Mrs Arnold(?) in the Secret series who was a pilot who went off exploring with her husband, leaving her children with unsatisfactory relatives, and going missing more than once
Fatty's mother in the Five Find-Outers who was always busy, so that Fatty did as he pleased
The mother in the Faraway Tree who didn't neglect her children, but had to divide her attention between them, running the house and earning a bit of money.

She’s still being babied in the first part of Exile, though, even though she’s 14, I mean, by EBD as well as the other characters — we still, get the fragile, tubercular angelic face etc description, and when she (entirely accidentally) overhears Jem talking about the Nazis, she confesses to Madge like a small child who thinks she’s done something terrible, and is being addressed as ‘Little Bird’ by San doctors and not allowed to be out in the night air. At the same time, she’s the one who runs out to confront the Nazi mob, but that’s as if a different girl is doing it, not the ‘baby’ who’s then too fragile to then walk through the passage to safety, and keeps being carried by Jack and Gottfried.

Then after the break in Exile, she’s started growing her hair and is a very English schoolgirl all of a sudden!

When we’re told she’s got engaged to someone she met at business college, one of the triplets (Con?) says the early engagement is ‘horrid’, despite her own mother getting married very young.

And despite Len & Reg.

I remember Rosemary Auchmuty in A World of Girls (fascinating book about girls’ school stories) talking about Darrell & similar heroines being excellent examples of girls who would find it really hard to fit themselves into the mould of Blyton etc’s cosy, caring mother whose family was her world.

It’s years since I’ve read the book so that’s only an approximation of the quote but I was struck by it at the time.

EBD is really bad at developing married women's characters.

Maybe EBD's married friends, if she had any, were like the ones we read about here, who can only talk about their children!

I find the Robin's growing up a bit jarring. Shes the baby for endless books, then in Exile she's grown up into a teenager. No transition

There's quite a long gap, in school time, between New and Exile. Robin ages from twelve to fourteen. There was supposed to be a book covering Jo and Robin's trip to India which would have fitted in there, which was never published. That might have shown Robin growing up - once she escaped from Jem's suffocating regime.

I agree, but think I assumed that EBD thought that married women, with the exception of Joey (and Madge to an extent, for a while), had no ‘story’, as they’d been assumed into domestic bliss, where only their fertility was allowed to speak for them! So their characters weren’t supposed to be interesting. Their story was officially over.

I hate the way Joan is never fully allowed to reform, and for an unpleasant reason that’s referenced by several characters over the books — her ‘heredity’ is bad. She’s literally ‘ill-bred’. As a pp said, we’re told good things about her, but some new girl dislikes her on sight and when we’re told she’s got engaged to someone she met at business college, one of the triplets (Con?) says the early engagement is ‘horrid’, despite her own mother getting married very young. But everything Joan does is wrong.

Oh thank you! I will do that.

I find the Robin's growing up a bit jarring. Shes the baby for endless books, then in Exile she's grown up into a teenager. No transition

I used to love the Chalet School books. Haven't read one in years but am inspired to to pick one at random on ebay and dip my toe back in the wholesome water.

Try Search: fadedpage.com before you spend any money. You can read and download them all from there for free. They're mostly the original hardbacks, not the abridged Armadas.

Robin is at her best in Exile and Highland Twins. EBD allows her to act her age and have a mind of her own. She's rarely seen after that.

That's one of my favourites too. I love the way the staff fall over themselves to be chummy, 'we're all on first-name terms here' and so on.

I do wonder if EBD tried to run her own school along any of the same lines as the Chalet School - the curtseying, languages and so on.

Also Team Kathie!

I used to love the Chalet School books. Haven't read one in years but am inspired to to pick one at random on ebay and dip my toe back in the wholesome water. (Hopefully the one I pick has little to no mention of the painfully good Robin 😂)

Peril is a good book I really enjoyed it, but I aldo recommend "A Refuge for the Chalet School" - where they arrive in Guernsey.