The Enid Blyton Society

I have been sent a couple of YouTube links by one of our Swiss members, but she didn't think that her English was good enough to post on the forums so I am doing it for her.

I can't place where they are from, but someone will know! Whilst some of the pictures were very familiar, others didn't ring too many bells.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Tlv_PAJLCE" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0bi0klepQo" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I really enjoyed watching this link from You Tube. Some of the clips I've seen before, but the majority I haven't. It was interesting listening to Imogen speaking of her mother. And she mentions that she was in one of Enid's books, as Isobell, was it? Can't quite remember which chacter Imogen mentions. Which book is this from does anyone know?

A real pleasure to watch.

Goodness - are these clips taken from the notorious Secret Lives programme, I wonder? If so, it seems that it may not have been quite as scathing as I'd imagined - but perhaps that's because the programme's "revelations" are well-known now so don't have the same ability to shock. And if the clips are taken from Secret Lives (which might not be the case, of course), I think there are some parts missing?

It's fascinating to see some unfamiliar photos in the programme, including ones of Theresa (Enid's mother) as a young woman, Enid's brother Hanly, Enid as a teacher at Southernhay in the 1920s and Enid with the young Gillian and Imogen. Oh, and the one of Kenneth looking several years younger than in the usual pictures we see of him.

Thomas Blyton fathered three children by his mistress, not two as reported in the programme, although the second child (a boy) died as a baby. And the statement that Enid Blyton became governess to the Thompson children in 1921, but that she was living with the Thompsons at the time of her father's death in 1920, doesn't make sense. I believe that she had actually become governess to the four Thompson boys in 1920, some months before her father's death.

Is that one of Enid's real diaries at 8:58 (Part 1)? It's hard to make out the writing but there's something about "Nanny bad" (presumably meaning that her pneumonia was bad) and "Hugh quite self-centred."

Theresa spent the last twenty years of her life in a nursing-home?! I hadn't realised she had been so seriously ill for as long as that.

Sad that Imogen was unable to get really close to her mother even during the final years of Enid's life, when she felt that the old hostilities had evaporated and Enid was reaching out to her.

Thanks very much to the person who sent in these links. It's always interesting to see new (or long-lost!) Blyton-related material.

You are absolutely right, Anita (as usual! ) that was indeed from Secret Lives, which is the one programme that I don't have on video. I couldn't remember some of those photos and goodness knows where they got them from. As you suggest there was a great deal more to it than that, I specially remember a venomous interview with Ida Pollock (Crowe) where she went on about nude tennis parties!

Thanks, Tony. I've just got down my copies of Green Hedges Magazine and found the write-up of Secret Lives by Alice Maughton (aka Michael Rouse?!) in Issue 24, autumn 1998. According to the article, the programme was first broadcast on 16th December 1996 on Channel 4. You're right that the complete programme included comments from Ida Crowe/Pollock as well as Glenys Robey (daughter of Enid's gardener, Dick Hughes), Barbara Stoney, George Greenfield and others. Nude tennis parties were referred to, and Enid's alleged lesbian relationship with Dorothy Richards. Glenys Robey claimed that Enid once locked either one or both of her daughters in a cupboard for two or three hours so she could work undisturbed, and that Enid took very little notice of her dogs - they were shut away from her. The ancedote about Lucy Nottingham was included as well. Five-year-old neighbour Lucy Nottingham was singing loudly in her bedroom with the window open, annoying Enid while she was typing, so Enid put her into a story called 'Lucy Loud Voice' in which a noisy girl named Lucy is punished. Later on, the title of the story was altered to 'Linda Loud Voice'.

Julie2owlsdene wrote:It was interesting listening to Imogen speaking of her mother. And she mentions that she was in one of Enid's books, as Isobell, was it? Can't quite remember which chacter Imogen mentions. Which book is this from does anyone know?

Imogen said it was a short story about a rude girl named Isabel, who was punished by her toys. The only story I know that fits that description is 'The Little Girl Who Was Rude'. It begins:

Once upon a time there was a little girl called Isabel, and she lived with her mother and father in a house with "Happy-home" on the gate.
But, wasn't it a pity, it was a very unhappy home - and all because of Isabel. She had a nice mother and a jolly father, but she was just as rude as she could be to both of them!

Later:

One night after Isabel had gone to bed her mother sat in the nursery and cried because she was so sad about Isabel. She had so much wanted a dear, loving little girl, and it was dreadful to have a nasty, rude little daughter instead.

Isabel's dolls, teddy, golliwog, bunny and elephant get together and are rude and naughty to the little girl in order to teach her a lesson. She is upset and, when she realises that she has been upsetting her mother by her own bad behaviour, she turns over a new leaf.

'The Little Girl Who Was Rude' was first published in Sunny Stories for Little Folks Number 152 in October 1932, several years before Imogen was born, so it couldn't have been about her. However, it was reprinted by Evans in Rainy Day Stories in 1944 so Imogen may possibly have read it then and drawn the conclusion that Isabel was based on herself, as she had a difficult relationship with her mother. It's even possible that Enid may have hinted that Imogen was like Isabel in some respects, although it was merely a coincidence. My copy of Rainy Day Stories is an Armada paperback dating from 1970, which still contains the Nora Unwin illustrations. Funnily enough, Isabel has been drawn with a mop of fair hair which does make her look rather like the young Imogen.

Why was Lucy Loud Voice changed?
Did Lucy's parents complain?

Thanks for the info, Anita and finding the book - The Little Girl Who Was Rude. As you say, as this story was written before Imogen was born, then it couldn't have been about her, but reading it as she may have done, probably saw some resemblances.

I felt sorry for Imogen as both she and her sister Gillian have completely different memories of their childhood, and sometime different circumstances can be misinterpreted, as being not what they are. No one will ever know only Imogen herself, and childhood scares do cut deeply and never really heal.

Michelle Rowatt wrote:Why was Lucy Loud Voice changed?
Did Lucy's parents complain?

They most certainly did! Lucy Nottingham wrote an article about it in one of our early Journals.

Anita Bensoussane wrote:Sad that Imogen was unable to get really close to her mother even during the final years of Enid's life, when she felt that the old hostilities had evaporated and Enid was reaching out to her.

Let bygone be bygone especially with your own mother!

Life will complete its circle.

To love when that love is not returned, is the hardest kind of love to give.

Nigel Rowe 2010

Moonraker wrote:To love when that love is not returned, is the hardest kind of love to give.

Nigel Rowe 2010

What a wise old thing our Moonraker is!

It's only occurred to me today about trying to search Enid Blyton in Youtube. I have found one Enid's interview in this link :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vMh7BUpmZzc" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

so, I am very happy to hear Enid's voice, my first time ever. (I hope the audio is real!).

Then I try to search this forum for more resources and come to this thread. However, the links are no longer active in the OP first post, I wonder what it was and how can I view it again.

If you want to hear ENid Blyton reading Noddy In Toyland - with songs from the West End show of the 1950's, - listen to this link.

It's about as close to hearing Enid read us a story as we are ever likely to get!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZTErZJG_8I

It's from the 45rpm records produced by Enid in the 1950's.

Thanks for that link!
Just listened to seven minutes of Enid Blyton' voices! That piece of audio book is well done. There is also real Noddy song, this should counted as official canon of Enid Blyton.