Enid Blyton (FF & SS) - obsessed with food. Discuss.

[justkeepswimming]

I have been rereading all the Famous Five & Secret Seven books (my DH kept them from when he was a kid & his parents have been clearing out their loft, lol).
Have been chatting to DH about the level of detail she goes into about food.
I mean did people actually normally eat 4 meals a day (bfast, 'dinner', tea and 'supper') ?
Or was she just obsessed with food?
He thought that maybe it was almost like propaganda, given that they started just after WW2, so most people would have been on rations, so it made people feel better to read about lots of food?

What does anyone think?

(leaving aside all sexist crap references for now!)

Who remembers the sweets that got bigger and bigger until they disappeared? Was is toffeeshocks? I always wanted some of those.

i used to love the faraway tree, i think i still have it .. ,,, well in my dm's house

X post Turkeylurkey.

Feenie- does it get on your nerves though how Silky and the girls never get to see any action? IF there's anything dangerous affoot they have to wait in Moonfaces house while the boys sort it out..grrr!!

well i'll be off trawling charity shops soon then, the SS books only take half an hour to read and i've only a few left. have something called the rat-tat-tat mysteries by EB tho, not sure if any good?

let's stay away from sexist stuff or we'll be here all night!!

Yes, it was Toffeeshocks, constance.

It does get on my nerves, Turkey, but in the heavily edited more recent versions they occasionally switch them round. These are the more sensible changes - some are inexplicable - 'extra' chapters which are garbage, like Father Christmas land, or the Angry Pixie chucking purple ink instead of red

god it's years since I've eaten tongue.

Bluergh.

I think the sexism is of its time, and that can be discussed with children - Huckleberry Finn was incredibly sexist, but children still love books like it. The soppy girls can be a talking point, imo.

at Feenie. [i want to be a teacher too emoticon]

The rat tat tat mystery is excellent. Its a series where they all begin with R (ring o bells, rilloby fair etc) There are a bro and sis and a orphaned cousin who come home for the hols and are instantly sent away with a goveness and an apple cheeked woman (to cook obv) and meet up with their aristocratic circus worker friend. They have a monkey and a spaniel.

ps Feenie wasn't it pop biscuits, not cakes? Sorry, not really a pedant but reliving my youth

thanks still waiting, will move onto them after SS

oh and in the FF george gets to take timmy with her to boarding school - anyone ever hear of a school like this????

and (inconsistency alert) at the beginning of FF, J, D & A live a long drive away from G, by the last one they live a cycle ride away? and no-one has mentioned moving house?
and in the last one Timmy is NOT at school with G?
inconsistent....

Ahhhhhh, interesting, Snooks, it was, but in the newer versions they are pop cakes.
What's that about? Is it anything to do with Pop tarts, d'you think?

Reading stories is still my favourite bit of teaching after 15 years. I love it when 30 faces are agog and hanging off your every word! I love stopping at a really exciting bit at half past three and they all wail 'awwwwww!'

sounds fab feenie

i used to help my mum in her classroom and loved the storytime too.
gave me slightly false ideas of what teaching would be like - of course then i went and taught maths

Feenie can you still get pop tarts? (let's hope not) I don't know, that is weird, are biscuits worse than cakes? Pop biscuits just sound so much more...snappy than pop cakes. A soft cake that 'pops' just wouldn't work imo. (Am so glad my parents have my originals mouldering in their loft ready for when the dcs are old enough).

Cannot believe I am pondering this but in my defence have had lashings of red wine ginger beer.

Feenie I remember our teacher (1 in particular) at primary doing just that - breaking off at home time at an exciting bit - happy memories

I think so. They have never darkened my toaster though.

Can I just hi-jack a moment whilst I have a rant. We are about to move house and DH and I were decluttering the house and I had packed up all my Enid Blyton books from DD's bedroom. He wanted to fling them out and made sarky remarks about yeah I wonder when these will ever get read. I have had these since I was a child and always kept them so my own kids could enjoy them as much as me. Given that DD is only 4.5 I know I'll be waiting a while yet but FFS why does he hold books in such disdain. Incidently he never read books as a child. His loss as far as I'm concerned. He still struggles to read a book today and it takes him ages

Glad you kept them Voluptua, yeah, his loss like you say. A real shame though he doesn't like books (and didn't read as a child). At least though your dd will be different to that - and it won't be that long before she reads all the EB classics - or that you (or maybe dh?) reads 'em to her.

Good luck with house move btw. Bloody stressful nightmare.

Evelyn Waugh said something about being embarrassed in retrospect at all the food porn in Bridehead Revisited. He said it was because he wrote it in conditions of rationing and austerity, and everyone at the time fantasised a lot about food. Same for EB?

Well I'll have lashings and lashings of ginger beer, some of Anne's good homebaking, a picnic basket from the local farm and a midnight feast of anchovy paste and toffee pops! And a hot and cold goodie to finish with.

i was always about the times when the Famous five went to a farmhouse and had a slap up tea and then "Ju" politely paid for it at the end.

don't know what i'd think if a load of unknown kids turned up unexpectedly.

I actually thought this was more weird than all the crime busting that went on.

Has anyone seen that 'nostalgia' Ladybird book which came out last year? It contains simple recipes for children to make. From memory, a teatime meal could be produced from 1lb of potatoes, eight fish fingers and 8oz frozen peas - for a family of four.

With those quantities, you'd need breakfast, lunch, dinner and supper just to keep rickets and scurvy at bay!!