The Enid Blyton Society

Famous for illustrating the second Adventurous Four Book,The Adventurous Four Again! in 1947.
She also illustrated the Adventurous Four short story,Off With The Adventurous Four Again!

The illustrations are in the cave!

http://www.enidblytonsociety.co.uk/book ... ustrations" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Andy seems to have completely lost his facial features in one of the illustrations.
Don't know how that got past quality control??

Thanks for posting those, Pete. Personally, I found them rather charming, in a simple way.

If you look closely,some of the pics are signed 'BEATTIE'.Can anyone solve that mystery??



Looking through his illustrations for The Adventurous Four Again!,they are signed as LAND...
Also I'm assuming JESSE LAND is a man not a woman,I hope that is correct?

You need not have taken the trouble to do those, Pete, as the are all sitting in the Cave, but as always you have done them very nicely.

http://www.enidblytonsociety.co.uk/book ... ustrations" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

You will also see that I have put that they were illustrated under the pseudonym of Beattie, although the title page of the book does say Jessie Land.

The name is Jessie and not Jesse and I have always believed that it is a 'she' not a 'he', but I could be wrong!

CheersTony.I looked in the cave but couldn't see them!
I've altered the link in my first post to the cave,rather than my scans.

I think I didn't scroll down far enough.
We've also solved the mystery of the pseudonym of Beattie and also resolved the gender of the artist!

All in all a good morning's work,thanks!

I'd always presumed Jessie Land was a women. For one thing, I've never really come across Jessie as a man's name, although I guess it could be, and for another, somehow, the illustrations feel like they were drawn by a woman. Don't ask me how, they just do, compared to those in The Adventurous Four. Somehow you could tell EH Davie was a man.

As I've said before, I've never been a big fan of Jessie Land...probably I rate her just a bit better than J Abbey!

Robert Houghton wrote:Somehow you could tell EH Davie was a man.

Was E. H. Davie definitely male? We only have the initials, so E. H. Davie could have been female.

Robert Houghton wrote:Somehow you could tell EH Davie was a man.

You must know something that I don't, Rob, because all my efforts to find something out about E H Davie have fallen on stony ground and I still have no idea whether he/she is male or female. I have always imagined that he was a man too, but there are a number of people I have spoken to who think that 'she' is a woman!

Tony Summerfield wrote:

Robert Houghton wrote:Somehow you could tell EH Davie was a man.

You must know something that I don't, Rob, because all my efforts to find something out about E H Davie have fallen on stony ground and I still have no idea whether he/she is male or female. I have always imagined that he was a man too, but there are a number of people I have spoken to who think that 'she' is a woman!

Anita Bensoussane wrote:

Robert Houghton wrote:Somehow you could tell EH Davie was a man.

Was E. H. Davie definitely male? We only have the initials, so E. H. Davie could have been female.

That's sort of what I meant - not that I know 'he' is a man, but looking at 'his' illustrations, I would guess 'he' was I'd be willing to bet EH Davie was a man anyway!

I think the pictures are quite good in a general sense, ie setting the scene, but the facial features (or lack of) rather lets them down.

Initials don't tell the whole story - I am currently reading a book by H.L. Dennis and as this is a current children's author I happen to know from her website that she is Helen Louise Dennis! Just a quick glance at my book file shows me seven or eight children's authors just using initials and they are all women.

I agree. That's the one thing that does make me wonder about EH Davies - but I still have a gut feeling it's a man! It would be really interesting to be proved wrong, however. Maybe one day someone will find out the truth!

I've always assumed E.H. Davies was a woman, actually. Don't know why!

I don't think I ever gave much thought to illustrators until I joined the forums, so hadn't formed an opinion other than I either liked a drawing or I didn't.

I think it's amazing that there's no record of who these illustrators are/were. Surely they must have had cheques paid to them which were sent by post? If so, there must be census records which would include their names, or income tax records, or Kellys directories etc.? Were all those details destroyed over the years, or has no one ever had the time to investigate further?

I find it interesting about EH Davie. How many men assumed 'he' was a man and how many women assumed 'she' was a woman, I wonder? Whichever he/she is, they are one of my favourite illustrators.