AIBU To Think That The Chalet School Matron Would Be In Prison Nowadays

[TheShellBeach]

..........................for giving unprescribed sedatives to the girls so frequently.

(lighthearted) (in case a million people tell me that IABU)

The Chalet School Matron was forever doling out sedatives to the girls, without even asking Jack Maynard to prescribe them first.
Shocking stuff. Nowadays, she would be jailed and struck off the NMC Register.

She did go to Oxford but I always imagined Sir Jem with his connections pulled some strings to get her in. I swear she was only in school about 50% of her childhood and she was never mentioned as being particularly bright or a child prodigy

I was trying to count up the (large) number of children who became wards of the Maynards.

The Richardsons, Erica Standish, the Robin, (though she was Madge's), Flora and Fiona MacDonald..........
.........who have I missed out?

Brigid, although that was the guides who adopted her. Then there was the cello player whose aunt died. Juliet too, and didn't Joey adopt a little baby as well. Also the one who was rescued by Robin as a nun and turned out to be related to her. I'm sure there are more!

Were the Lintons made wards, or were they older when their mother died?

Daisy and Primula, but they were related to Jem

The baby she adopted was fished out of the remains of a railway crash wasn’t she?

Yes, the baby was Marie-Claire, who was orphaned in the train crash. Adrienne was the Robin's relation.

And wasn't he suspicious when they showed up. What a tosspot.
Joey bumps into Margot Venables accidentally, lets Jem know, and he struts down to see them all, determined that the supposed Margot is lying.

FFS Jem was an awful man in some ways. You'd think he'd be happy to see her again.

Another train crash!

I only know one person who had a relative in a train crash. They're rare, yet EBD has several throughout the series.
Madge meets Jem in the aftermath of a train crash.

I know. EBD obviously thought continental railways were absolutely lethal

Train crashes did used to be a lot more common. But we're getting better by the early 20th century. They crop up a lot in books from that period though. All the children were killed by one in the last Narnia book

Just been googling and apparently purposely causing trains to crash was common in the US in the early 1900s. It must have been big news. Maybe that's what gave them the idea

Every time I got on a train, in the back of mind I'm convinced it's going to crash and I'm going to need to get out through the window. I now realise where that's come from

(See also convinced cars are going to crash in tunnels and burst into flames, thanks a lot casualty/londons burning)

The cello player was Jacynth Hardy, who was great friends with Gay Lambert.

I left my heated aider on when I went to work yesterday. Convinced the house was going to be burnt down when I got home

Absolutely! So wonderful that she decides to become a nun

Elinor hadn't a fucking clue what to do with her as a grown up. Best shoved out of sight into an order.

The book where we see her again as an adult is absolutely atrocious. Adrienne I think?

It is ironic and sad that EBD, who had a shit childhood, but who managed to establish herself as an independent woman, and who never married or had kids, placed so little value on any future for her characters, apart from shelling out babies.

I'm pretty certain she desperately wanted a husband and children and wrote all her main characters that way to have what she didn't have

I'm sure you're right, but it's sad that society made her feel so little valued. She was right at the age for many potential husbands (assuming that is what she wanted) to have been lost in WW1.

Matron! Matron! Lucy needs a dose - she’s sick!!

Absolutely! Excellent Women by Barbara Pym is an excellent example of a post war woman who doesn't get married because there just aren't enough men to go around.

I wonder if that's why EBD has such a passion for marrying both the girls and the young teachers off to doctors. It's not just the marrying them off, but marrying them off to men who will have a steady stable income and an important position in society in a time where that was still highly valued.

Although interestingly there are one or two who are allowed to be career focused. Eustacia, Mrs Annersley, Mrs Wilson etc (although I suspect Mrs Wilson was a lesbian whether EBD meant to write her that way or not)

You should look at the You Tube videos about the Tunnel of Death.
It's a road tunnel somewhere in Russia in which there are endless, horrendous crashes.

Actually, I love watching them because I'm ghoulish that way

I think there were a lot of obvious lesbians disguised as non-lesbians, throughout the series.

Miss Wilmot and Miss Ferrars, for example.

Tom Gay (dead giveaway) and the obnoxious Jack Lambert.

Noooooooo I've only just convinced myself to go through the chanel tunnel this year and I'm nearly 40. (although it's by train so in fairness it's like two of my fears mashed together)

There are STACKS of girls with boys' names. It does my head in.

Tom Gay. Jack Lambert. Len Maynard. Cecil Maynard. Ted Grantley. Robin Humphries. Dicky Christy. Terry Something-or-other.

There were loads of others, but I can't remember them all at the moment.

Thank you
I had to google Nepenthe!

I clearly haven't read as many of the books as others on the thread but I did make a bit of cash selling the ones I had. I wonder if there was a touch of Penny Dreadful in the tales of woe told?