The Enid Blyton Society

If it came to an election, I'm pretty sure Eileen Soper would get in with a decent majority!

Even PR wouldn't help Maxey.

Five on Kirrin Island Again- Comparison Eileen Soper/Betty Maxey

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I do find it interesting that a lot of the time, Maxey illustrated the same specific scenes that Soper did. Just with far less artistic flair and competence.

I've often thought that with quite a few illustrators. I wonder if it was to make the job of slotting in illustrations easier for the printer? No type would have to be reset, just new illustrations added, so it made sense to just reillustrate the same scenes?

I too have noticed that with quite a few illustrators. I was looking at Dylan Roberts' illustrations for The Secret Mountain yesterday and some of them were based very closely on Harry Rountree's originals.

Great illustrations from both Soper and Maxey for Five on Kirrin Island Again. My favourites are Eileen Soper's picture of the children gazing down at Mr. Curton when he's broken his ankle, and Betty Maxey's picture of George striding along with Timmy by her side (first internal illustration).

In the early 1970s I had a mix of books, but only three of my collection were illustrated by Betty Maxey.
It is interesting that I actually preferred the Maxey illustrations, because they looked like children of a similar age to me, not young adults.
The first Five book I read was Mystery Moor (Soper) and they look very mature in that one, when I eventually got hold of some of the earlier ones in the series, Eileen Soper drew them looking young and I could relate to them better.

Now as an adult I prefer the originals because they are in period. However they look like undergraduates in many of the illustrations and they have an air of Hitler Youth, with their clothes and hairstyles, of course I didn't pick up on this at age ten, but I couldn't relate to them.Did children really wear ties and blazers on holiday in the 1950s?

Betty Maxey uses line and composition extremely well and the expressions of the children and adults are often excellent. Neither she or Eileen Soper do horses very well though. Eileen Soper's proportion is often strange, the fallen ash tree in Smuggler's Top, some very big shoulders, arms and legs, and enormous dressing gown tassles spring to mind!

Owl's Dene wrote:Did children really wear ties and blazers on holiday in the 1950s?

I didn't, unless it was to church.

Maybe you just weren't posh enough

Owl's Dene wrote:In the early 1970s I had a mix of books, but only three of my collection were illustrated by Betty Maxey.
It is interesting that I actually preferred the Maxey illustrations, because they looked like children of a similar age to me, not young adults.

Its interesting to read this, because as a child in the 1970's, I judged the books and illustrations in completely the opposite way! My sister (six years older than me) had the entire set of Famous Five paperbacks with Betty Maxey covers, and I rarely got further than looking at the covers before thinking these books were 'too old' for me. I figured that books about teenagers should be read by teenagers, and that's the main reason I never read more than 2 Famous Five books as a child (and these were both annual versions). I always felt Betty Maxey made the children look older and made the books look more grown up, so I was put off them.

Moonraker wrote:

Owl's Dene wrote:Did children really wear ties and blazers on holiday in the 1950s?

I didn't, unless it was to church.

In the late 40s and early 50s children often only had a school blazer and a raincoat as outer garments, so if the weather required it, the blazer was needed.

Here's some non Enid Blyton artwork by Betty Maxey that some may have seen before:



The top left pic was published in 1969

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With the fame from the Enid Blyton books, Betty’s work also worked well for Noel Streatfeild and some of her well-known seventies books for girls.

I have no criticism of the above illustrations. All the people are complete and look normal. I feel the Fives internal illustrations don't do her justice.

I agree, Daisy. Her cover artwork was always superb and by far her greatest strength.

Are you sure that top left hand cover is really Betty Maxey, Pete? Looks completely different to her usual style!