The Circus Book - a book that's well worth having!

[Rob Houghton]

Here's not a bad priced copy of The Circus Book - 1949 first edition. It's quite a difficult book to find, as it is Enid's only book not to be published as a paperback (if I remember rightly!) Hopefully someone might be interested. It's well worth having!

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Enid-Blyton-E ... SwB4NW013D

[Tony Summerfield]

I do hate it when sellers put things like 'a genuine first edition' because it isn't! It is just a reprint of the News Chronicle book, which was also published by Newnes.

[pete9012S]

Thanks Tony and Rob for the info.
I'm guessing it's definitely worth £4.99 though?

[Rob Houghton]

Tony - I agree in a way - but I would also consider it a 'first edition' because it's completely different to the original - different illustrations, and a much smaller sized book. Also, the fault isn't really the seller's in this instance, as the publishers do indeed list the 1949 edition as a first edition - 'first published, 1949 by Latimer House' and without including any other past-publishing information.

However, I agree it's not strictly a first edition.

It's far better than advertising a 1961 copy of 'Five Go Off to Camp' as a 'first edition' though - which happens extremely often!

[Rob Houghton]

Thanks Tony and Rob for the info.
I'm guessing it's definitely worth £4.99 though?

Definitely, I would say. Mine is the same 'first' edition - but has a much more ripped dust wrapper. It cost me £16.50 and that was over 10 years ago. Also, as it's a less well-known Blyton book, it's unlikely to go up and up with multiple bids.

There is another one going for £280 though!

[Courtenay]

This is intriguing, considering how much I like circus stories. But is this one comparable in quality to the Galliano series, or is it a poor relation? I'd love to hear any thoughts on it from anyone who's read it, WITHOUT any serious spoilers, of course.

On the other hand, I still haven't yet got around to reading Come to the Circus!, which someone on these forums persuaded me to buy some months ago, so maybe I don't need to extend my backlog of unread books any further!!

[Rob Houghton]

I think it's certainly as good as the other circus-based stories. It was originally published in 1939, so it's actually a contemporary of Mr Galliano's Circus. It has quite a few strong adult characters and some fairly adult elements in the plot.

Whoever persuaded you to buy 'Come To The Circus' should be ashamed of themselves!

[Courtenay]

Whoever persuaded you to buy 'Come To The Circus' should be ashamed of themselves!

Yeah, especially since I haven't even read it yet! Maybe I should start it tonight...

[Tony Summerfield]

I agree that is a good price (if it stays there!) and definitely worth buying - you probably know my theories on this as I believe it is the resurrected version adapted for children of Enid's adult book, The Caravan Goes On - I won't bore you with my reasons but they are in the Cave. I will add that when I put my theories to Barbara Stoney, she thought I was probably right, but we knew there was no way that it could be proved.

Technically the book on ebay is a 3rd edition, although it could be correctly described as a '1st edition as such'.
Annoyingly so, Rob, your Five Go Off to Camp example (which has to be 1960 as there wasn't a 1961 printing) is correctly a '1st edition, 10th impression' although all collectors that I know (including me!) would call it a 10th edition.

Having said this, I like that book and it was one of the longest novels that Enid wrote and I found to my cost that the edition I have illustrated above had more illustrations needing to be scanned than any other EB book!

[Courtenay]

Well, I've put in a bid for it, so if I do get it, I'll be very interested to read your theories, Tony — but after I've read the book myself, otherwise I'll probably hit too many spoilers! Thanks to you and Rob for the recommendations.

[Tony Summerfield]

My theory has no spoilers as it doesn't discuss the story at all. It is underneath the review in bold and you can miss the review and go straight down to the bottom if you want!

[Courtenay]

Ah, I see. Thanks for that, Tony! Here it is from the Cave:

Tony adds: I have always been intrigued by the unanswered questions and mystery that surround the initial publication of this book. It was published by the News Chronicle and all the other books that they published simply contained recycled short stories, previously published by Newnes. Yet this book was a novel and had never been published before. Enid never liked to waste anything, and my theory is that this is a resurrected version of her unsuccessful adult novel, The Caravan Goes On, that had been rejected by Newnes several years earlier. At the time of its publication, Enid was in the middle of the Galliano series for Newnes, and this adds weight to my theory that the book had been written some time before, as Enid is unlikely to have written another circus novel in the middle of a popular series. This might further explain the somewhat bizarre title, Boys' and Girls' Circus Book, as anyone glancing at it from the cover would probably take it as a non-fiction book, and Newnes may have insisted on this title so as not to detract from the Galliano novels.

Both this title and the one adopted in a Latimer House reprint, Enid Blyton's Circus Book, also had the effect of misleading potential publishers many years later, as it is the only full-length Blyton novel never to have been issued as a paperback. The original book, which was illustrated by Hilda McGavin, also has the distinction of being the only Enid Blyton novel to contain over 100 illustrations.

[Rob Houghton]

By the way, if you've ever read 'Happy Hours Storybook' then you might have already read the first two chapters! For some reason they were shoved in at the end of the book!

[Courtenay]

I haven't, so it'll be a totally new story to me if I do get the book!

[Tony Summerfield]

I was thinking last night after posting that it had a rather bizarre title, just what could you call this book - a knotty problem! You couldn't really call it Mr. Phillipino's Circus, coming out a year after Mr. Galliano's Circus and in the same year as Hurrah for the Circus! and another Galliano book, All About the Circus in the Old Thatch Series. Even in 1942, when the Newnes edition came out with a dustwrapper, it would have clashed with the third Galliano book, Circus Days Again.

Perhaps somebody reading this thread might come up with a bright idea for a better title!