The Chalet School

[ShellacB]

There seem to be plenty of old Chalet School Threads, but I can't find a current one.

In the middle of a re read. I have just finished the Tyrolean and Herefordshire ones. I loved them!

I do remember the Swiss books not being quite of the same quality, so not sure whether to read them all.

Could anyone recommend the best Swiss books if I was to skim through?

I have no evidence but I think EBD intended to keep the international feel of the school after New Chalet School as she took quite a few Tyrolean characters into exile with the school in Herefordshire, and they were mentioned quite frequently. She seems to have abandoned the idea around the time the school moves to the Island. I wondered if readers reacted badly to the plot line where they reintroduce German into school life. They mention quite a few daughters of Old Girls as attending the school but I don't remember any of them playing a major role, which I would have expected given they were children of main characters. Natalie Mensch, Tessa de Bersac, and Josefa von Wertheim all spring to mind.

It was only when I visited museums in Austria and understood more about life there after the war, and the wider political environment, that I really understood why it wasn't possible just to decamp back, and why they had to go to Switzerland instead to get the Alpine vibe back. Presumably EBD herself was hoping the war would be a minor blip, but as the European characters she'd moved over aged out, she couldn't replace them, and it turned into years and years of being stuck in the UK.

I know the one you mean -- it gives Joan a sort of blonde, wet-look perm and a terrifying expression, and she's gripping a racket or hockey stuck as if she's going to hit someone with it!

This was my childhood cover, which gets pretty much everything wrong, apart from Ros running out into the road to grab Joan, who is running away.

Joan looks, if anything, rather more genteel than Ros, with a tidy, somewhat bouffant bob and a politely shocked expression, they're wearing identical dainty pink minidresses, and Ros looks both completely demented, and absolutely delighted to see Joan.

Yes, which, amusingly, shows up as considered a deeply ungenteel cake that 'nice' ladies don't like to serve in their households because it contains lard and is 'low'. There's a bit about making it with fresh lard, and how men love it, but ladies of households not liking it to be served upstairs, in Rebecca West's The Fountain Overflows.

But clearly homemade cake of any kind is better than wolfing shop cake, like Common Joan and her Common Pools-Winning Family.

As an adult, its become apparent to me that EBD didn't really understand child development so her characters go from too young for their age to to old for their age rather quickly. So Robin is basically a toddler when she arrives despite being six.

Joan's got a determined chin on her there though, hasn't she?!

This was my one. I'd be hiding in the school loos from her.

She's terrifying! She looks like Dolph Lundgren in Rocky IV!

I found the Annexe was a bit underused in the Tyrolean books.

When it was developed you would presume there would have at least been one book, or a part of a book focusing on it and that having gone to the bother of establishing Juliet and Grizel as teachers there it would have led to more use of them as central characters. However, Juliet basically disappears from the series after The Chalet School and Jo, despite being referred to as being principal of the Annexe. They might as well have sent her off to marry Donal at the start.

Does Juliet ever pop up again in the Swiss stories, have children that go to the school etc??

I'm not Joey's biggest fan... but wtf is going on with her medical/obstetric history?

Time after time we are told how delicate she is, there's one book where she nearly dies because she stands at an open door in the winter, she collapsed unconscious after Crucifixion play (sorry, have blanked on correct word), the woman even needs sedating after getting stuck in a packing box!

However, she had multiple children+++ and proceeds to go rock climbing after the birth of one pair of twins.

I don't think that EBD even knew anyone who had given birth!

I used to think the babying of Robin and Barbara was ridiculous, but then I had my kids. DD was a mini adult from toddlerhood, but still can’t do her shoulder length hair at 13 and would absolutely leave the bathroom a mess, whereas DS was basically an enormous toddler at 8. I know other kids like that too. He started to grow up at 10. We home educate, which I think makes it more likely, but so were Robin and Barbara to begin with.

I could have passed for middle aged virtually from birth, so it was unexpected!

I used Exile in particular as a jumping off point to teach WW2! It so clearly shows that people did in fact have some idea of concentration camps. We were particularly struck by the girls hoping Onkel Florian (?) was dead because that was the better alternative. I do wish she’d kept Gertrud Becker in the series.

Not that I can remember. Certainly not more than a mention, if that. I always imagine her staring out at the rain from Drippy Dónal's castle (or am I imagining the O'Haras were quite grand?) and thinking 'Staying on at the CS would have been more fun than this.'

As an adult, its become apparent to me that EBD didn't really understand child development

She wasn't the only one. I recall EJ Oxenham having characters talking baby talk at the age of seven. And don't get me started on the Marchwood twins!

EBD was fine with children aged nine or ten and upwards - Daisy or Mary Lou when we first meet them for example speak and act in an entirely age appropriate way.

But didn't Barbara have a short curly haircut? I can imagine someone struggling if they had the heavy, knee-length 'glory' EBD always admired in her European 'fairy princess' types like the Von Eschenaus.

Yes, I remember something about Barbara’s curls rapidly beginning to shine once she brushed them the way Matey showed her.

My main memories of the La Rochelle books are that Janey, who was supposed to be a kind of Jo-style madcap, was proud of doing things the way her husband wanted them done (eg buying stamps in sheets instead of books) and thought it utterly normal that an oldest daughter should have to help run the house & do more than her siblings.

I have very fond memories of one of the books where they go off on Guide camp when Jo was still at school. I was always sad my guide camps weren't that fun.
I borrowed the Wrong Chalet school from the library and really want to re read it. But the first one I ever read was Richenda at the Chalet School which is one of the later Swiss series. It was enough to make me want to go back to the beginning, and go to the Chalet school!

I so agree about reading Chalet School books when stressed, so soothing.

And like previous posters I'd suggest Barbra and New Mistress. The later ones get a bit tedious and the story lines more predictable and thinner. I do however have a soft spot for Prefects, though I know others will disagree! And I also like Jo and Co in Tirol, its one of the ones I can remember reading as a child.

Was that the one when they were chased by hornets , or was it wasps?

I hate the holiday ones. Everyone is always clearing tables and packing and discussing who goes in which car. I can just go on my own family holiday for that.

Yes, that is Camp. I was slightly bemused by the laundry scene... they had schlepped soo many products including starch!

I hate the holiday ones.

They're not my favourites. I don't mind Rescue so much. It's nice to see more of Frieda, Simone and Marie, and I like EBD's descriptions of the Yorkshire countryside in summer (she had lived in Leeds, I believe). But I could do without both of the Tyrol ones featuring the Maynards.

I actually liked Camp and I loved Jo to the Rescue!

Jo to the Rescue wasn’t a children’s book at all. It was a book about adults and while I loved it reading it for the first time as an adult I don’t think I would have loved it if I had read it as a teen!

Re Joey, I thought she was a brilliant character in the early Tyrolean books. Likeable and gutsy but no goody two shoes. She does become irritating later when she keeps turning up at school as an adult and can’t let go. Mary Lou, on the other hand, I remember finding irritating the whole aay through and could never understand the love for her even when I read them as a child!

@MalvinaRussell , would you be able to recommend any Austrian museums in particular? I LOVE museums and always like to visit them, especially if they're related to areas of interest like WW2.

Despite my misgivings about some of the books in the series, I am glad to have the whole set. I just need a few bookcases and I can dig out the old favourites when I'm not feeling well! I always had a soft spot for The School at the Chalet, Exile and The Wrong Chalet School (I think that was the first one that I read). I'm not sure how they all stayed wonderfully slim and svelte (and not severely diabetic), despite the vast amounts of kaffee und kuchen that they consumed!

There's a CS page on FB with a lot of info about visiting if you are interested.

Ooh, thank you, @ByLimeAnt ! It might make a nice change from the American advertisements that seem to take over my feed 😊