when the posh children in Enid Blyton have an "ice", I always thought it meant "ice lolly"...

[sadpapercourtesan]

...but I was reading "Five Go To Billycock Hill" last night, and they talked about having an "ice" in a tub with a little wooden spoon...surely that's an ice cream?!

Yes, I have too much time on my hands. I should be doing stuff

Even M&S get macaroons and macarons muddled up. Or was it Waitrose? One of them, I was so shocked it’s caused memory loss!

When Enid Blyton was writing, you could buy ice-cream in tubs, and a little wooden spoon was attached.
We used to get them like that in the cinema too.

I am 70 plus, and in the 40 and 50's era,, we had a nice little Italian man, who came round the streets on his bike,that had a kind of boxy trailer attached to his bike. He had a little written sign on the trailer,saying, Gino's ice cream, and Ices, meaning ice cream And ice lollies.
Gorgeous ice cream, and lovely lollies they were.

Thank you, Tiny and Eddie for identifying those titles for me.
Blyton has her faults but anything that gets kids reading is a positive thing, I think.

We weren’t posh. We called it an ice.

When she was writing in wartime and immediate post-war ice-cream was not available. In 1947 a local newsagents (South London) had a delivery of Wall's ice-cream on Thursdays, so my mother would give me money to buy some on the way home and it would be wrapped in a thick covering of newspaper to keep it frozen.

When Enid Blyton was writing, you could buy ice-cream in tubs, and a little wooden spoon was attached.

I don’t think these ever went away.

It sounds more like someone has read Nancy Mitford and made the mistake of assuming that language has remained in aspic for the past 70 years.

There is some historical Victorian reason why the term 'ice' was used - to do with the fact that it was made in a bucket of ice before freezers existed.

I haven't heard anyone use the term ice since my grandfather died 25 years ago.

What year is the Famous Five based. And I say year because they all stayed the same age every summer - or just had a million adventures in one summer.

I loved the famous five, wouldn’t hesitate to let my child read them.

Oh to row a boat over to my own private island and have a sleep out in the abandoned castle. To be honest there’re times that their parents don’t seem to care that much (you know merrily waving them off to go and fight robbers and kidnappers.....)

the books take such delight in nice food

Glad to read of other EB fans on the board.

I assumed that the lavish food was to make up for the austerity people would be experiencing in real life

Nancy Mitford on the other hand was sending 'em up to earn cash. Sigh.

dont know why they say Enid Blyton is a no no these days i was brought up on her stories did me no harm.
i love her books and if i spot one in a charity shop i always buy it

My gran called them ices and she most definitely wasn't posh. I'll note that her ice cream of choice to buy us was Kwik Save economy. That is not posh by any stretch of the imagination

I'd say imagine FF in about 1953, which is when the 90s TV version was set. They began before then, and finished after them, but that's a reasonable midpoint.

Love Enid Blyton. We had all of them at home but they were banned at school because, according to the headmistress, Enid Blyton only used 200 different words. If she'd said ice cream instead of ice that would have been 201. Shame. I loved the Adventure books the best, Island of, Mountain of, Castle of etc.

I assumed that the lavish food was to make up for the austerity people would be experiencing in real life

I think it was more a reaction to rationing. You see it in a lot of post-war books. Rationing didn't end completely till 1954, so the peak Blyton generation of children would all have had clear memories of food being limited in quantity and variety.

I don't know where you lot live- but ice-cream in little tubs are pretty common in theatres still and haagen-daz even do them- readily available in supermarkets.

Grew up on Enid Blyton. Always thought they meant Crystal meth. Are we absolutely sure it was ice cream?

i’m pretty sure the eclipse/sacrifice scenario was in the lavishly racist Mountain of Adventure.

which i think also featured a storyline where the children believed their parents had died in a hideous plane crash in Darkest Africa. i’m not sure whether they turned out to be alive at the end or not.

Love this thread, sometimes I worry that I’m in my 40s and still read Enid Blyton so it’s nice to know that I’m not alone.

I still get ridiculously excited if I find her books in a charity shop, particularly if it’s one I don’t have (increasingly rare now, as I’ve spent my lifetime collecting them here and there).

😂

I don't really care that other people find faults in the language and content of these books. To me, they were the best part of my childhood. Coming across a Blyton book I hadn't read was like winning the lottery for me as a child.

She taught me to love reading and I have an English degree and read 1000s of books since then. However, I can honestly say I have never read a book since that drew me in like the Famous Five ones.

I used to fancy Julian as a child before realising what an insufferable little creep he was.

Same here.

I hope Anne grew up to be a proper second wave feminist.

Everyone called ice cream ‘ices’ back then, it wasn’t at all a posh word.

@Mrstwiddle

Love this thread, sometimes I worry that I’m in my 40s and still read Enid Blyton so it’s nice to know that I’m not alone.

I still get ridiculously excited if I find her books in a charity shop, particularly if it’s one I don’t have (increasingly rare now, as I’ve spent my lifetime collecting them here and there).

I’m in my (early) 40’s too & you’re not alone 😊

Back in the 50s ice-cream was referred to as an ice by the well to do. Enid Blytons characters were always middle to upper class. 😁😁😁

he also says "rarely" when he means "really"
@sadpapercourtesan
'Rarely' would be pronounced slightly differently. 'Really' has two almost imperceptible vowel sounds which slide into each other in RP. 'Rarely' just has one.

@borntobequiet
We called ice cream ice cream, but it was always cut off a block and eaten between wafers
Same here, and what a treat it was. Sometimes mum bought raspberry ripple ice cream - heavenly.

I was also warned about EB's 'poor use of the English language', @jessstan2, though it was my dad who sounded the alarm bell. I loved them regardless.