What’s the appeal of boarding school stories?

[Meduse]

Good morning!having read the long thread about the Chalet school books I’m very interested to discover the ongoing appeal of boarding school stories.It’s an area I’m thinking of studying for an essay so the chalet thread was timely. Malory Towers is still being read ( and has new stories published with new characters) but real boarding schools are less common,especially in the state sector.
I have theories but would love to know any thoughts…
Thanks!

Personally I think part of it is a fantasy about being rich. Only the rich get sent to boarding school. I remember reading these stories about girls who spent holidays in the south of France, and attended schools where they had tennis courts and swimming pools, and they rode horses and put on plays. All of which would have been inaccessible to me as a child being raised in a council house on benefits.

@StrychnineInTheSandwiches

I only read What Katy Did At School once. A sure sign it didn't chime with me.

I adored the books as a child, and reread many times. I didn't detect, then, the slightly preaching tone, some complain about, but it was typical of similar novels of the period.

@ClariceQuiff

Strychnine Just out of curiosity, did you enjoy any of the other 'Katy' books?

'School' is rather odd in that it takes quite a while to get to the school bit - there's the unrelated episode of Elsie and Johnny's disastrous visit to the Worretts' before the events leading to the older girls going to school even starts.

Re. the education on offer - I got the impression the school was almost more of a 'finishing school' than a place where the girls were expected to learn a lot.

Except it seems to be more tokenistic, ie having the fillip of saying you’ve ‘been to school in the east’ (where is Hillsover? Connecticut?) Is but without much actual social finishing? I mean, you’d imagine Cousin Olivia would be very much into that type of social finishing for the ghastly Lily, but there’s no evidence of it.

Boarding school stories create a way to "kill the parents" without killing the parents. Child protagonists need to be somehow separated from the parent characters otherwise they wouldn't have the same level of agency and independence that allows them to navigate the elements of the story. You can do this by killing them off, or by separation. (Or do both, a la Harry Potter!)

Does anyone remember which one had the drawers which they could take out and crawl through into the room next door? I thought that was brilliant. A Big Brother producer must have read it too because they did something similar in one series

It's a form of escapism. I loved Malory Towers as a child. My daughter has discovered the new series of it on CBBC and I have dug out my old books for her!
It's all very jolly hockey sticks, but it's almost like a period drama - a different way of living that most of us didn't/won't experience.

@ClariceQuiff, to be honest, no I wasn’t a massive fan of the other Katy books either. Same with Little Women, read a few of the series but just never really connected with them. I think it was maybe all the piety and selflessness that characterized the writing of that era. All the ‘be a good little invalid’ stuff. Too much emphasis on self-improvement.

Like a PP, I tore my way through the usual series and ended up reading some quite obscure boarding school books - Brownies at St Brides was interesting as the children were younger than usual www.amazon.co.uk/BROWNIES-AT-ST-BRIDES-TALBOT/dp/B000SHOTMU?tag=mumsnetforu03-21

Possibly Hillsover was simply a convenient and 'safe' place to send your adolescent daughters until they were of marriageable age. Dr Carr chose it on Cousin Olivia's recommendation but I wondered if its being so far away was actually a benefit, to give Katy a proper break from housekeeping by making sure she wouldn't be home for the holidays.

I think you're right, and Dr Carr thought Katy had become overburdened by adult cares and housekeeping and so needed a break.

All the ‘be a good little invalid’ stuff.
I loved reading about sickly children who had to stay in bed. I'm surprised I didn't develop Munchausen's syndrome!

@JaneJeffer

Does anyone remember which one had the drawers which they could take out and crawl through into the room next door? I thought that was brilliant. A Big Brother producer must have read it too because they did something similar in one series

That was What Katy Did At School.

Thanks @Erinyes

[quote StrychnineInTheSandwiches]@ClariceQuiff, to be honest, no I wasn’t a massive fan of the other Katy books either. Same with Little Women, read a few of the series but just never really connected with them. I think it was maybe all the piety and selflessness that characterized the writing of that era. All the ‘be a good little invalid’ stuff. Too much emphasis on self-improvement.[/quote]
Oh, the moral lessons of The School of Pain, and Cousin Helen selflessly releasing her fiancé from their engagement once she had her accident, so he could live next door with the woman he replaced her with and call their child after her — no arguments from me that this is the most sinister of Angel in the House stuff.

The bit about holding your forehead smooth with your fingers so it doesn’t wrinkle unbecomingly when you’re in pain stayed with me!

There was a book called Deborah’s Secret Quest that I read umpteen times. It was about a girl whose family pile had been turned into a girls’ school by her uncle. Deborah was fuming at this and vowed to find a way to prove that she was the rightful owner of the house. I wonder if I re-read it will it still be as enjoyable.

@JaneJeffer

All the ‘be a good little invalid’ stuff. I loved reading about sickly children who had to stay in bed. I'm surprised I didn't develop Munchausen's syndrome!

omg, @erinyes, I had forgotten all the layers of weird!

Like Helen wouldn't be sitting in her bed seething at her faithless lover and the strumpet next door he'd taken up with.

@JaneJeffer

All the ‘be a good little invalid’ stuff. I loved reading about sickly children who had to stay in bed. I'm surprised I didn't develop Munchausen's syndrome!

Ha! 'an extra spoon of Calpol, my love, you look so pretty when you lie there all still and calm'.

There was no Calpol in my day @StrychnineInTheSandwiches

"Oh, the moral lessons of The School of Pain, and Cousin Helen selflessly releasing her fiancé from their engagement once she had her accident, so he could live next door with the woman he replaced her with and call their child after her — no arguments from me that this is the most sinister of Angel in the House stuff.

The bit about holding your forehead smooth with your fingers so it doesn’t wrinkle unbecomingly when you’re in pain stayed with me! "

There are some interesting articles on literary invalids. I loved the character of Cousin Helen, but in retrospect it's really quite sad. The father calling her a slattern for her unbrushed hair and cluttered medicine bottles, supposedly a turning point for Helen...

After reading books like Elsie Dinsmore, which were blatantly sanctimonious (amongst other things) the Katy books seemed quite mild by comparison!

There was one book I read which seemed to have every single boarding school trope in existence - a scholarship girl struggling to fit in, who is kidnapped by “foreign villains” because she was actually adopted after surviving a shipwreck and as a baby was the goddess or something of a remote tribe, and is also somehow revealed to be the long lost cousin of the head girl, I am sure the story also throws in some hidden treasure which when found saves either the school, which would have had to close, or the head girls family, which was in dire straits. I may have just added that from another book though!
Certainly the added peril element was there from the early days though, it is not a new thing.

I'm sure there was a third Enid Blyton boarding school series. Maybe just three books rather than the six each for the original Malory Towers and St Clares series. Does anyone remember them? Perhaps with twins and where they could take their own pets.

The Children Who Lived In A Barn is another story where the parents conveniently disappear (but happily arrive back in the end).

@StrychnineInTheSandwiches

omg, *@erinyes*, I had forgotten all the layers of weird!

Like Helen wouldn't be sitting in her bed seething at her faithless lover and the strumpet next door he'd taken up with.

I would so enjoy reading “The Secret Diary of Cousin Helen’, where she gets out of her invalid bed at night to stomp around resentfully to Alanis Morrissette songs:

DID YOU FORGET SBOUT ME, MR DUPLICITY?
I HATE TO BUG YOU IN THE MIDDLE OF DINNER
IT WAS A SLAP IN THE FACE,
HOW QUICKLY I WAS REPLACED
AND ARE YOU THINKING OF ME WHEN YOU (HAVE POLITE MARITAL RELATIONS WITH) HER???

And in the mornings, ex-fiancé comes in and says ‘Did you hear any weird singing last night?’ and Cousin Helen smiles angelically and says ‘No, I was in the School of Pain, being taught lessons about sweetness…’

(I also want the real story of Miss Jane and her missionary…)

@FourChimneys

I'm sure there was a third Enid Blyton boarding school series. Maybe just three books rather than the six each for the original Malory Towers and St Clares series. Does anyone remember them? Perhaps with twins and where they could take their own pets.

The Children Who Lived In A Barn is another story where the parents conveniently disappear (but happily arrive back in the end).

There were the Naughtiest Girl in the School books —I think there are three. Whyteleafe School, co-ed, two heads, and the children make the rules?

@kookievee

For me as a child it was the excitement of midnight treats and being away from parents - I only read Maollory and St Claire's though.

This! I was a military child and had friends who went to boarding school. It sounded great fun, and when they came back in the holidays we just carried on as if they'd never been away. Recently my mother explained why we never went by saying 'I didn't have children to send them away and not see them for months on end' which wasn't something I'd ever considered!

Loved Malory Towers and the series on CBBC at the moment is excellent!