Sir James Talbot tackles Mrs. Jack Maynard's Displaced Organ

[QuaterMiss]

Would I be unreasonable to initiate legal proceedings against this man?

Previous thread here:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/3624032-Not-to-have-realised-until-now-that-Joey-Maynard-s-displaced-organ-was-a-prolapse?

With thanks to Jemima232 for rifling through Sir James’ archives to supply the title of this one.

Jo wasn’t really absent from Island - just not living next door. She was still very much involved with major events.

I’ve forgotten most of the detail of Peggy (it’s several weeks since re-reading) but Jo’s already had a full chapter of Carola ...

I'm on the uncut version of Exploits at the moment, which is the one where we first see Evil Thekla. It's fascinating even though there's not much of a plot, because it's basically all class war and EBD's awareness that there is trouble on the way. It actually contains the line 'Wolfram had imbibed a good deal of the spirit of Young Germany and she did not want Thekla to be infected.'. This is EBD inserting a hint about the rise of fascism into a children's book, in 1933. For all the daftness, jeezus-jumping, plunges off mountainsides etc, she was a bit outstanding in her time and in her way.

She’s just turned up late at night in New begging a bed for the night as she was helping a lost child and was some distance from home. It’s 10pm and she’s tapping on Miss Wilson’s window. Actually the Prefects are in there so they can catch the Middles on the roof garden so Jo invites herself along to that too! I bet Louise as head girl wanted to tell her to piss right off!

She's in Carnbach at first, but then she buggers off to Canada for a bit after Carola.

@ReanimatedSGB have you read Exile? There's some very dark bits in there, including what happened to the father of two of the girls. EBD was very brave writing it, as well as making the distinction between Germans and Nazis and showing that there were people against the regime.

Exile was published in 1940, though, wasn't it, so while I still think it's the high point of EBD's writing, she was writing about current events, rather than being as prescient as she was in Exploits in 1933, with Thekla's proto-Nazi brother etc.

Incidentally, I came across this, and thought some CS fans might be interested - it's an interview in Der Spiegel with Rachel Johnson, about a novel she wrote about English girls being sent to finishing schools in Bavaria in the 1930s, and which don't sound un-CS-like apart from the sexy ski-instructors and enthusiasm/wilful blindness about Nazism:

www.spiegel.de/international/europe/young-women-from-britain-in-1930s-nazi-germany-a-905617.html

Actually, EBD had some idea of troubles to come right from the very beginning. Remember Frau Berlin, who shows up in the very first book? There are quite a few digs about 'Prussians' and German nationalism slipped in there, as well...

(SLightly OT but this is one of the reasons I love old genre fiction: the little bits and bobs that give you a very clear idea of what was actually happening at the time the book was written - particularly the stuff that seems to have crept in almost unconsciously on the authro's part.)

Ooh, that Rachel Johnson piece is interesting. I might have to try and get the book...

Thanks so much for that reference, Frangible! Fascinating reading ... Though I used the few less enthusiastic Amazon reviews as an excuse not to download it straight away. (Regardless of their individual convictions I feel an inexplicable reluctance to transfer even one penny of my money to the writer’s clan right now.)

Just a pondering..
Do we enjoy the War books as it's a period of history we 'know' and so understand the cultural references like rationing, blackout, evacuees etc?

I think that's part of it @Aroundtheworldin80moves, like there is a bleeding from that world into the 'real' world that we know.

Plus, in my opinion, that the books are the best of the series in terms of plot and writing. The characters are a good blend of familiar and new, we're all used to them but they haven't become stale or overdone yet.

What @funnelfanjo (which is an accurate name for Joey) said. The writing was stronger and a lot of the beloved Tyrol characters, plus some interesting new ones, were in those books. Plus there's the La Rochelle crossover too.

I think it’s the plottiness of the war books for me, and the fact that the setting makes the school being impacted by major political events very natural, so it’s not like those Boys’ Own adventures where a bunch of of twelve year olds single-handedly foil the Gestapo.

It probably does help, also, to modern eyes, that these books aren’t at all jingoistic, unlike a lot of contemporary childrens’ war books.

Huge thank you to @funnelfanjo. She’s now sent me Excitements at the Chalet School in word and Kindle version. I’ll circulate them via the Dropbox link. Happy reading!

Just so you all know, it’s the Armada version of the book, but I believe only minor edits from the hardback. Despite the title, it’s a fairly standard plot, with quite a few WTF? moments at what teenage girls really get excited about, according to EBD.

Also, typing things out forced me to pay attention to stuff I normally skim over, so a fair number of typos in the Armada book - Miss Ferrars switches between Kathy and Kathie for example. I fixed the most egregious of them, but probably introduced my own, sorry.

Sorry I’ve realised I’ve not sent the Kindle version - will send separately

Thanks funnelfanjo and Parker. More gaps being filled I am having trouble deciding between reading in order, which involves re-reading books I have read previously and jumping straight to the ones I have never read.

Thank you, both.
Just reaching the end of New and following an excursion to Salzburg they’ve had to spend the night in the coach due to a storm.
This of course got me thinking, nay, obsessing, with how they’d have managed for the toilet, as presumably no one would have let them go out in torrential rain. And out of several mistresses, Jo, and the Prefects, surely some must have had periods.
Possibly due to my own periods always coming at the most awkward times, I kind of get all panicky and have to remind myself I’m not there and it’s not real!

As a child I enjoyed all the saving the day plots. Having just re-read Joey saving Grizel when she climbs the mountain and going after Elisaveta the plot holes grate a bit! Grizel runs away at 4am, Joey figures it out well after breakfast (so at least 8.30/9am) yet ends up just behind her on the mountain at the key moment. When Joey goes after Elisaveta, EBD even writes about how they were being a bit stupid not to wake a teacher first (not in quite those words). Grizel is at least a bit happier in the early books than she is later on once her life is ruined by being forced to be a music teacher.

Papergirl I always wonder that about the toilet too. How did Elisaveta manage when she was kidnapped? And when the whole school has to sleep in the hut when they get caught in a thunderstorm on Madge's birthday.

Maybe it was one of those coaches with toilets?
Although it would probably be more of a hole in the floor....

I’ve just been rereading New School.

Katherine has turned up, her trunk is late thanks to her disorganised artist aunt - and when Matey is interrogating Katherine about what she needs in the meantime, she remarks that Katherine will be lacking sheets and pillowcases, and lends her some from the emergency stores.

Is that normal for boarding schools? I’d always assumed that basic bedding, sheets, pillowcases etc, would be provided by the boarding school, with the cost of that included in the fees.
Like how when you’re in hospital you get standard hospital sheets rather than having to bring your own ones in.

Aside from anything else it must be a right PITA for the domestic staff doing the laundry having to sort all bedding out by pupil.

Thanks so much @parker231 and @funnelfanjo - I've just finished 'New Mistress' so perfect timing!

Perhaps they took along a potty or something, for travel sickness as well as emergency overnight stays.
When Val is kidnapped in Redheads for about three days is another example of no toilet that worries me...

I need to have a rummage in the bookcase because I have recently bought a few GGB uncut editions (along with that lovely lovely find in the second hand shop) and therefore have some Armada ones surplus to requirements which I will shove on Ebay. Would it be breaking a lot of MN rules to link to the listing when it's up?

Thanks for Excitements, funnel and Parker.

NewSchoolNewName - you mean Wrong, don’t you? I’m reading it at the moment! Bedlinen provision does vary between schools, even between boarding houses, even now. But I’m a bit tired of guardian-aunts - after Island and Carola - so am finding it slow going ...