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!

@lucysnowe2

Looking back, Whyteleafe School was remarkably progressive. Rules enforced by the kids, all money shared etc.

Nobody's mentioned tuck boxes yet. Giant chocolate or fruit cakes, giant slabs of toffee, enormous pots of jam - I was a little piggy (still am) so that probably appealed the most!

I always thought how unfair it was if you had your birthday in term time - any money you were sent got shared out. Presumably though if you had it in the holidays you'd have got to keep all of it.

My DB had a proper lockable tuck box for his boarding school. We didn't have them at mine.

@lucysnowe2

Looking back, Whyteleafe School was remarkably progressive. Rules enforced by the kids, all money shared etc.

Nobody's mentioned tuck boxes yet. Giant chocolate or fruit cakes, giant slabs of toffee, enormous pots of jam - I was a little piggy (still am) so that probably appealed the most!

The descriptions of the boxes were mouthwatering. The great quantities of different sweets (my own parents were quite strict where sweets were concerned!)

Looking back, Whyteleafe School was remarkably progressive.

Blyton based it on Summerhill, I think.

I always thought how unfair it was if you had your birthday in term time - any money you were sent got shared out.

I'd have asked my relatives not to send me any birthday money at school, but save it for holiday time.

For those who haven't read it, the Vampire Academy books are entertaining and the appalling film of that name bears no resemblance to the books - fantastic heroine Rose.
I also enjoyed my teenage daughter's cast offs of the Ally Carter spy boarding school series a while back.

I loved Malory Towers, St Clare's, Trebizon and the Chalet School.
The Royal Ballet School Diaries are set at boarding school. Actually the first one leads up to the audition for the Royal Ballet School, but in the second one the main character starts there.
If you search on Amazon it brings up loads of fiction and non fiction about boarding school. Two series for adults that I spotted on there are the St Bride's series by Debbie Young and The Little School by the Sea series by Jenny Colgan.

@LouisRenault

I always thought how unfair it was if you had your birthday in term time - any money you were sent got shared out.

I'd have asked my relatives not to send me any birthday money at school, but save it for holiday time.

I used to love the bits in the meetings where there was always one reasonable request for extra money (e.g. to buy plants for the school to enjoy) and one unreasonable one (e.g. wants to buy birthday card for aunt).

@ScouseQueen

then moved onto all the boys’ boarding school books of the 1930s and 1940s I didn't even know there were boys' boarding school books! I've only read girls' or coed ones (Blyton, Chalet School, Trebizon) *@StrychnineInTheSandwiches* are they very different? How much is gender a factor?

@frogface69 so sorry that happened to you.

Oh there are loads! They tend to be more standalone books than series ones. But similar to the girls' stories. Very much a single sex zone. I don't think a female of the species is so much as mentioned beyond the odd matron, and mater who's sent a tuck parcel. Making the school's First XI cricket team is a big deal. Going out of bounds, looking down on townies, fagging for the prefects, exeats (took me a while to figure out what that meant), gambling features more than in the girls' series , being a good sport. All the familiar themes. I always liked that in the boys' schools they all had their own cosy little studies where they'd toast crumpets. I don't remember that being so much a feature in Chalet School etc.

Tom Brown's Schooldays gives an eye-opening look into what it would have been like as a boy attending a public school in the mid 19th century. Its own brutal little society with a blind eye turned to extreme violence. The boys very much left to get on with it. That one has a Good Invalid character too. All the books at that time had to have one

I didn't even know there were boys' boarding school books!

ScouseQueen, have you read Stalky & Co by Rudyard Kipling? Should be available free on Project Gutenberg or elsewhere online. Partly based on Kipling's own boarding school experiences, and very funny in parts.

@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).

That was the Naughtiest Girl series I think. Loved them as a child.

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
Mary Gervaise series with Georgie Kane and the twins were Patience and Prudence ( but were really called something else)

I can believe we haven’t mentioned Angela Brazil. I was a particular fan of the ones set around WW1 as it was such a different era but just modern enough (in the 1980s) to feel real.

I never quite understood how tuck boxes worked. I mean, I understand the theory that it’s a box of treats, but wouldn’t it all have gone mouldy/stale really quickly and therefore only have been a benefit for a few days? Chocolate and sweets would be fine, but they all seemed to turn up with huge cakes, and I’m sure I remember one description of a tuck box that included a jam sandwich! Although maybe that meant a jam sandwich cake rather than a literal jam sandwich? Anyway, how did this work? If every child turned up with boxes full of cake did they just all gorge themselves for a few days then go without for the rest of term?

Loads of fiction for older children focus on scenarios where a child is away from their parents and has to rely on their own resources to solve problems. In real life children very rarely have the power to make significant decisions or great responsibilities because they are shielded from these things by their parents, but they are aware that the world of adulthood is approaching and reading fiction about how children deal with problems without their parents stepping in to help is a way to prepare for that.

Boarding school stories do this, as well as things like the Hunger Games and other stories in which children are orphaned or put in unlikely situations of self-reliance.

I’m re reading the chalet school books at the moment. It’s pure comfort reading, always helps distract me when I’m stressed.
They were my favourite boarding school series, because they as pp said they literally created a whole other world/ life rather than just being about school life.

I used to enjoy the 'Jennings' books.

@ChessieFL I always got the impression that tuck boxes like that were gorged and/or shared!

For me it was so far removed from my working-class and state school experience that it was bound to be fascinating.
I was baffled but also curious about things like tuck boxes, lacrosse and Latin.