The Five Find-Outers (1 Viewer)

[Moods For Mallards]

The best mystery-solving gang of home counties kids on summer break from boarding school in literature, bar none.

THe Mystery of the Spiteful Letters was probably my favourite, but I might need to refresh my memory.
The one where Fatty dresses as Napoleon is great too.

 

[jonah]

I was thinking about this the other day, jesus! I only read one, I got it on hardback when I was about six or so and read it on the train to Waterford with my Great Aunt, lying across the seat with my head sticking out into the aisle.

God I'm trying to remember which one it was now.. I think it was this one.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mystery_of_the_Missing_Necklace

Man, I'm going to go look through my old books now, I've got about 400 books stored in the attic from when I was a kid. I was an absolute nerd. Was...yes.

 

[Moods For Mallards]

THe Missing Necklace is the one where Fatty dresses as Napoleon. Deed and it is.
I read all 15 but I'm struggling to remember the plots of more than a few. But that wasn't the point. The point was the excellent manners and the ice-cream parlours, mostly.

 

[тхеодоре кацзынски]

i remember this,great memories,gonna go look for them tomorrow.which was the one where they got locked in a room,knocked the key outta the door onto a piece of paper then pulled it through and freed themselves?or was that the secret seven?

 

[Lili Marlene]

here, was enid blyton like spencer krug?

"Oh hmm, this mystery has got more of a Five Find Outers feel than a Secret Seven or Famous Five. The fans will understand......"

 

[jonah]

there were subtle but important differences.

 

[nlgbbbblth]

I am re-reading a load of Blytons at the moment.

In the last month I have gone through
The Island / Castle and Valley of Adventure
The first three St Clare's
Five Find Outers - Burnt Cottage and Disappearing Cat

currently on The Secret Island. Self sufficiency! while The Rockingdown Mystery is also in the bag in the event of the bus not showing up.

The Five Find Outers is my favourite Blyton series though. Of 'em, the Pantomime Cat, Spiteful Letters and Holly Lane are up there. Fatty is pretty obnoxious in the first one. Gets nicer.
Goon never got promoted.
Enid had a bad experience with a gardener.

I have to say though that reading these in public seems to attract attention. I was in the Bull and Castle having some ale and food before the last BMusic and I whipped out The Mystery Of The Burnt Cottage to while away the time. Got a few quizzical stares.

This site is good. Forum is interesting and the three-times-a-year journals are a blast.

Needless to say if anyone is considering buying Enid Blyton books then steer clear of any editions printed after the mid 1980s. Re-writes and edits abound. Dragon and Armada paperbacks are your friend.

 

[jonah]

My personal favourites were the mallory towers ones and the magic faraway tree (MOONFACE!).

I had absolutely tonnes of the mixed story ones when I was really little too, my dad and I used to do paintings together of the brownies and imps and what not from the covers

 

[nlgbbbblth]

My personal favourites were the mallory towers ones and the magic faraway tree (MOONFACE!).

I had absolutely tonnes of the mixed story ones when I was really little too, my dad and I used to do paintings together of the brownies and imps and what not from the covers

The Faraway Tree ones are excellent. So were The Wishing Chair.

Vincents in Phibsboro has a few hardbacks for 50 cent each - some mixed stories, a Wishing Chair, possibly an Amelia Jane too.

Our teachers used to read Faraway Tree to us in class. Jo, Bessie and Fanny. No more Fanny in the new editions. Pricks.

 

[Reets]

Needless to say if anyone is considering buying Enid Blyton books then steer clear of any editions printed after the mid 1980s. Re-writes and edits abound. Dragon and Armada paperbacks are your friend.

Ah crap, I just bought the kid a tonne of new Enid Blyton books today.
Borders are having a closing down sale so figured I'd stock up for Christmas.

 

[Lili Marlene]

and yet she never won the carnegie medal.


I guess critically she's more coronation street than the wire

 

[jonah]

The Faraway Tree ones are excellent. So were The Wishing Chair.

Vincents in Phibsboro has a few hardbacks for 50 cent each - some mixed stories, a Wishing Chair, possibly an Amelia Jane too.

Our teachers used to read Faraway Tree to us in class. Jo, Bessie and Fanny. No more Fanny in the new editions. Pricks.

You seem to be an authority on the subject! I still have most of mine, somewhere though if Im in Phibsboro I might pop in.

 

[Gambra]

i remember this,great memories,gonna go look for them tomorrow.which was the one where they got locked in a room,knocked the key outta the door onto a piece of paper then pulled it through and freed themselves?or was that the secret seven?

Holy shit, nostalgia bomb.

This was the crowd that had Fatty as the master of disguises wasn't it? There was one book where he went off to the fancy shops in London and when he came back they couldn't recognise him at all.

I remember one about some abandoned house where they knew one room was in use high up in the house so they kept climbing up a tree to see in to figure out what was going on.

 

[Gambra]

I remember about some abandoned house where they knew one room was in use high up in the house so they kept climbing up a tree to see in to fighure out what was going on.

Yep, I was right. Pretty sure I've read this entire series.

 

[Gambra]

Needless to say if anyone is considering buying Enid Blyton books then steer clear of any editions printed after the mid 1980s. Re-writes and edits abound. Dragon and Armada paperbacks are your friend.

That because of all the dodgy remarks about gollywogs and the like?

 

[Thebeard]

Tally-Ho Cottage was my favorite.

 

[Denny Oubidoux]

i remember this,great memories,gonna go look for them tomorrow.which was the one where they got locked in a room,knocked the key outta the door onto a piece of paper then pulled it through and freed themselves?or was that the secret seven?

i think that was the mystery of the hidden house. there were bad guys refusbishing stolen cars in the basement of a house and the five findouters solved the mystery. goons nephew ern is in it too. the spiteful letters was superb.

my favorite series was the adventure ones with phillip, dinah, jack, lucy-ann and kiki the parrott, and the secret island, secret of spiggy holes etc were also deadly. never took to the famous 5 or secret seven for some reason.

 

[therealjohnny]

goons nephew ern is in it too..

haha-Ern

Geez nostalgia central here

 

[Moods For Mallards]

The Spiteful Letters is amazing. The way they figured out that the cuttings in the nasty letters were from the Rangoon Times (???) was an inspiration to sleuths and stalkers alike.

 

[nlgbbbblth]

That because of all the dodgy remarks about gollywogs and the like?

They are only part of it.

The first book to feel the pinch was The Three Golliwogs.

Originally published in the 1940s; the golliwogs names were changed in the late 1960s. They were not portrayed negatively in this book but their names were deemed racially insensitive.

The golliwogs got replaced in the Noddy books - by goblins. Again, they were mostly good, but in one instance, were responsible for mugging Noddy and nicking his car - Noddy Gets Into Trouble.

Otherwise.
Currency updates after decimalisation in 1971. Not too serious.
The bulk of the changes came post 1987 when the golliwogs got the boot from all her books, some character names were modernised, clothes were updated and anything deemed politically incorrect was removed.
All of this happened on a gradual basis and depended on the respective publisher but as a general rule of thumb, any edition from the mid 1990s will be changed.

The main criticisms levelled at Blyton were her stereotypes [sexism in male and female relationships] and her portrayal of Britain's class system. The working classes aren't always presented in a very favourable light. Also - foreigners were painted as "dodgy" - and were frequently the villains.

In The Island of Adventure the main bad guy was black and named Jo-Jo. His colour is mentioned repeatedly in the text. Now he's white and called Joe.

People need to realise that the books are products of

1) The time in which they were written
2) The author's background

Ultimately the edits don't take away too much from the stories and for a child reading them now, they won't know any better. The difficulty for me is that I grew up reading 1960s and 1970s editions and don't feel comfortable or agree with any amendments.