Malory Towers - what did I just read?

[FadedRed]

This is a bit light-hearted, and not AIBU, so please don’t send me to Coventry or tell me I’m a cad and a bounder.
I never read these books as a child, despite being a voracious reader. I never really liked Enid Blyton books as a child and my opinion didn’t change when my DC’s were little. Couldn’t really say why, just didn’t interest me, found them tedious, slow and patronising in style.
Having seen a few threads on MN about them recently, I was intrigued and when I saw the one on Kindle at 99p, (First Term at Mallory Towers) I downloaded it and read it, having a bit more free time than usual .
Well, I was so disappointed- it was awful! Sorry to you fans, but it was like Lord of the Flies (well, I know that’s a bit of an exaggeration but...) I thought the characters were mostly very unpleasant girls, Darryl was an bully and how did she get away with two physical assaults on other pupils on her first few weeks at school with no apparent censure?
I know it was written in 1946, and times had changed, but I went to school in the later fifties and through the sixties and hitting ones classmates was definitely not allowed!
What do you think?

Yes they're a bit grim really. As kids these days would say Darryl and her friends are very judgemental and don't treat anyone different to them very kindly! I don't think Enid Blyton was a very nice person herself.

From what I remember, Darrel’s behaviour wasn’t condoned, and a key theme of the series is Darrel learning to control her impulsive temper. One of the things I liked about these books is that they have characters who show development, rather than the heroes and villains in plenty of children’s books. Several of the characters are likeable but imperfect, and plenty are unlikable but turn out to be decent people.

I read them as a child and then as an adult to the DCs. If you read them as an adult they're hilarious.
Someone should really do a parody of them.

Basically anyone who got in any way upset at boarding school deserved what they got. Ditto those who weren't sporty . And the girls were expected to swim in a highly dangerous outdoor sea pool with rocks on all sides.
And there was one girl who galloped to school on her horse.

Not Malory Towers or St Clares but I do remember The Comic Strip did an excellent take on The Famous Five - Five Go Mad in Dorset.
Would love see the girls school books sent up.

I loved the Magic Faraway Tree. Probably first book that I read, and reread. Great ideas. Only other books were Little Noddy, they were good. Seem to be too wordy nowadays for most DCs and considered babyish.

I agree. They're batshit

However if you ever get a chance download the Faraway Tree read by Kate Winslet - she's incredible and makes the books really come to life. My kids were captivated (and I may have listened to them when the kids were at school ) .

This might not appeal to OP but there's a new BBC TV adaptation out, which they've uploaded to Iplayer. I've not watched but from the descriptions on radio and from friends it sounds fun but quite loosely based, and possibly in an improved way, eg less racism and horrible attitudes.

There was a TV programme about EB a while ago, with Helena Bonham Carter in it, that confirmed what my child self thought of her. I still liked the books though.

I really liked Mallory towers as a kid, wouldn’t read them now though as you’re prob right op. However my boys love the magic faraway tree series and have the audiobook read by Kate winslet my son listens every night before bed

Loved them as a child. I was properly obsessed.

Reread them in a nostalgic moment in my twenties and was horrified.

Yes, the type of behaviour they condone is pretty awful. Darrell’s ‘hot temper’ is seen as the right kind of personality quirk to battle, and Darrell remains the heroine of the series, despite arguably being rather nastier than girls like the unfortunate Gwen, who hates games and gets homesick and is weakly unpleasant, but whose character is so deformed by the fact that literally everyone dislikes her, it’s impossible to know what she might have been like if not treated so contemptuously by everyone.

Even as a child it was obvious that there were remarkable double standards. If Darrell or one of the popular girls pushes Gwen into the pool or pulls her under the water, it’s jolly japes and serves lazy, cowardly Gwen right. If Gwen pushes another girl in, it’s bullying.

But I think it’s the collective bullying that’s the worst — that scene in In the Fifth where the silly new girl (whose worst fault appears to be that she has a high opinion of her own abilities) is asked to design costumes and write songs for the pantomime in order to be publicly mocked by her entire form. Or the fact that Belinda, the gifted artist, draws cruel caricatures of the two unpopular girls who have to stay back a year, and everyone approves, including the narrator.

Thanks for all your interesting opinions. I don’t intend to read any more of the series. 😁

What Feawen said.