to feel uneasy about my son reading Enid Blyton books

[frances5]

My son wants me to read him a book called the "Wishing Chair", I have read two chapters of it and it has a pixie in it called "Chinky". To make it worst the drawing of "Chinky" shows an elf like creature with slitted eyes. However I think my son is totally and utter oblivous to this.

Admitally Enid Blyton lived 50 years ago when people didn't know better. But do you think I am making a mistake letting my son enjoy this book? He is even trying to read it himself that he is so desperate to know what happens next.

When my son chose this book I had no idea that it had a pixie in it called "Chinky" other wise I would have diverted him towards something like Ronald Dahl.

oh thank god for that[grin ]

its my favourite drink, and you really cant buy decent ginger beer in the shops, only rubbishy ginger ale, which is not the same thing at all.

That's the third time today someone's poked their tongue out at me! Is it a new cool form of greeting? The first was DS this am and the second was a tin man in covent garden.

• nite nite quattro - dont stay up too late!

Probably coming in way too late here but by way of throwing the light of reason on the whole EB racist elf debate

1. As someone pointed out earlier EB had a bit of a thing for names like winky, binky etc and she was also a bit of a fan of names that described her characters eg Moonface, Mr Saucepan;

2. a chink is a small thing eg a chink of light;

3. an elf is also a small thing, hence chinky is a descriptive name in this context for a small elf;

4. EB did not illustrate this book as far as I am aware;

5. if the illustrator depicted the elf with slitty eyes isn't it possible he/she saw this as a characteristic of elves in general like pointy ears?

6. even if he didn't any racism involved was down to the illustrator and not EB;

7. Ergo EB's use of the name chinky for the elf in this book was not racist and we are simply projecting our own modern sensibilities (and lack of vocabulary re: knowledge of the word chink) onto her;

8. Also, EB didn't just write famous five etc, she also wrote a children's version of the Pilgrim's Progress (can't remember the name of this) which I remember really enjoying as a child. Plenty of morality etc there;

9. In any case, surely children should be encouraged to read as widely as possible to engender their own critical faculties. A diet of pure classics would be just as limiting as a diet of pure EB and I wouldn't think either was healthy. I read everything and anything as a child and enjoyed lots of things for different reasons. In the same way, as an adult I am happy to read the classics but also am happy to indulge in the odd pulp fiction now and again by way of variety (spice of life and all that ).

Phew! Glad I got that off my chest

Squirrel, JetJets - it's "different from", not "different to" (sorry, teacher's daughter, can't stop myself)
Also, Squirrel, I know heaps of boys who love the adventure of Enid Blyton especially the "Adventure" series.
And finally (drawing breath), I think there is a good ppoint to be taken about whether or not a child is reading these tyoes of books on their own as the opportunity for discussion is more limited. I have never thought about this before and shall duly amend my ways.

Louplet, re 8 - The Land of Far Beyond?

Oh Gawd, thought I had comprehensively demolished the argument that 'racist comments are okay because everybody was racist then'

now there is an argument that it wasn't EB who was racist but her illustrator?

well what about the story about some black doll that wanted to be white?

and gollywogs?

Those down to her illustrator too?

What about the class issues?

The issue of dodgy politics is difficult with books. Loads of them were revolting. Even old shakey had his anti-semitic moments.

But surely our position is different with children? I would not want my dcs to read Mein Kampf. I really wouldn't. I might be pleased that they had moved on from the Simpsons and proud of their precociousness but I wouldn't be comfortable that they were old enough to make mature judgements so would prefer texts that were neutral on race/politics/religion.

HmmI think they'd have to be reading them on their own wouldn't they?

Surely no-one can bear to read them aloud?

Good point about the ignorance of language Louplet. Remember that row a few years ago when some uninformed loon got furious about use of the word niggardly? S/he thought it had something to do with the N word and it didn't occur to him/ her to look in a dictionary.

I was an avid reader when I was small and absolutely loved Enid Blyton (....and Arthur Ransome and E Nesbit and Alan Garner and LM Montgomery and Elinor M. Brent-Dyer and Frances Hodgson Burnett and CS Lewis and .....).

The racism and classism went totally over my head perhaps/probably because what was/is more important is the home environment in which I lived and the standards that were being passed on to me by my parents.

My parents were passionately anti-racist: we had emigrated from South Africa when I was three to escape apartheid and the plitics of racism. They succeeded in bringing me up so "blind" to race and other cultural/race differences that, for example, I was about 29 before I found out that you could tell that someone was (probably) Jewish by their name or their looks.

My mother was also an (I am told very good) English teacher. Although she disliked Enid Blyton for the quality of her writing, she participated in a TV debate in the early 70s arguing strongly in support of her books because - like JK Rowling today - she encouraged people who wouldn't otherwise pick up a book to do so. And the hope is that having done so, children will then gradutate on to "better" books.

But Q, I think if Enid Blyton was the only thing the child was reading, you'd have a point.

But aren't most people talking about having a range of books/ TV/ other influences, which counter the shite you get in EB books?

Children's biggest influences come from their homes. Unless your home has servants and lashings of ginger beer, your child is really unlikely to be heavily influenced by EB. If all my children watched was Tracey Beaker, I'd be really worried. But I know they have access to masses of other influences much stronger than one TV programme.

Message withdrawn

There are many generalisations/assumptions in Enid Blyton that I cannot imagine many of us wanting our dcs to take on, but I would feel uncomfortable cutting them out of the reading list altogether for that reason. I think even quite young children are capable of understanding that an author is a person who has their own views and may project hem into the book.
And re the elf I wouldn't worry at all about a child making a connection between a picture of an elf and any real-life person. It's just us adults who do that.

BTW the depictions of Fagin in Oliver Twist and Shylock in The Merchant of Venice had nothing to do with any political stance or social critique. They were simply demonisations of the jewish characters in each case/use of a jewish character as a pantomime villain type character as was common at these times.

And of course Othello is also an inherently racist play if you read it in any detail.

That's a good point pretty - I am at my wits end as to how to get DS reading more - progession and engagement - yep sounds okay -
Am glad you mentioned Alan Garner - he was a seriously fabulous writer and really didn't get the recognition he shouldve.

IMO

do you think EB should be censored? or not?

I take issue with the idea that Othello is inherently racist.

If you are about to argue that it is racist because Othello is black and (essentially) stupid, then how do you account for the fact that King Lear is white and (essentially) stupid? Don't they all have to have a tragic flaw?

Q - have you tried him on shortish stories?e.g. Sally Garner

No Balls, have not done so, but thank you for the tip, I am amazoning now to have a look.

Nightynight - re: ginger beer - have you tried the Idris stuff? (yummy)

Ooh not sure about Othello being inherently racist.

Don't know the play well enough.

Would like someone to start a new thread about it so that them as know more can discuss it and I can just read.

From what I remember though, it's not that he's stupid, it's that he is jealous. As is Wotsisname in the Winters Tale (Leontes? Laertes? Something else? Can't remember. Anyway, Perdita's Dad.)

Well yes, jealousy hmm. Lear's is vanity. Don't both things amount to stupidity?

Discuss

Personally I wouldn't censor EB - but if ds were to question certain aspects, I'd then use it as the occasion to discuss why things have changed. I'd worry that if I made too much of an issue about it before ds raised it, in a sense I'd be making race differences too important an issue and potentially and unintentionally creating a tension in ds' mind that wouldn't otherwise have been there.

He is at a multi-cultural school where the recently retired head teacher developed a brilliant anti-racist policy (since rolled out across the education authoirty), which is essentially based on respecting everyone for who they are - not matter their colour, religion or ability.

He's not reading enough yet for me to be facing this yet myslef - but I have come across a "lower" level problem of a similar ilk, in that he has disccovered "Capatain Underpants" books, which he loves, but which dh is horrified to discover uses "wrong" grammar. I've told dh I don't care, as they are the first books that ds has tried to read for himself (I'll buy the ot! ) - and that while I acknowledge that the grammar mistakes are an issue, I can turn it around into a learning exercise (eg, why is that the wrong "there" - why should it be "their"?).

OK, will discuss but not at this time of night!

Am off to bed, good night.

Shakespeare and EB do not belong on the same thread. In fact they don't belong on the same planet. You are right, Vicious.

Stupidity implies lack of intelligence. Vanity and jealousy imply self-esteem isshoos of opposing nature.

ooh this IS fun. Erm different forms of stupidity?

Can't we do this instead of discussing EB who is deadly dull and pants anyway.