| Malory Towers |
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| enid blyton series | |
| fictional schools | |
| childrens literature | |
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The series follows the heroine Darrell Rivers from her first year at Malory Towers to when she leaves. Other characters include Sally Hope (Darrell's best friend), Felicity Rivers (Darrell's sister), Gwendoline-Mary Lacy, Alicia Johns, Mary-Lou, Jean and Wilhelmina (Bill). The characters tend to be stereotypes and are very similar to the set of characters in the St Clare's Series , which Blyton also wrote. The series is believed to be semi-autobiographical, and the name "Darrell Rivers" is clearly drawn from Blyton's second husband's name, Kenneth Darrell Waters. Darrell, the main character in the story, begins her career ingloriously - determined to do well and make friends, she falls under the spell of the brilliant but mischievous Alicia Johns, neglecting her schoolwork in favour of fooling around and playing pranks on the staff. The reader is treated to an early exposition of her violent temper (inherited from her father) when she rescues Mary-Lou, a smaller, weaker girl in her form, who is being held under water by the malicious Gwendoline Mary Lacy - and delivers a stinging rebuke to Gwendoline with the flat of her hand. She cruelly rebuffs Mary-Lou's attempts to make friends and clashes with fellow new girl Sally Hope, who insists that she is an only child despite written and verbal reassurances from Darrell's mother that she has an infant sister. This leads to another altercation, in which a violent shove from Darrell exacerbates Sally's smouldering appendicitis, forcing Darrell's father (a surgeon) to perform an impromptu appendicectomy in the school's sick-bay. Sally's attitude is revealed as pathological jealousy, which is resolved by her parents leaving her infant sister behind to visit her. Sally and Mary-Lou later stand by Darrell during a malicious episode (orchestrated by Gwendoline) in which Darrell is initially (and unjustly) blamed for the destruction of Mary-Lou's fountain pen. The first book ends with Darrell and Sally being firm friends and Mary-Lou an associate. Darrell's career from this point is smoother, and she eventually covers herself in the personal, scholastic and sporting glory that was originally expected of her: she is head of the fourth form, games captain of the fifth, and head-girl in her final year as well as being a successful lacrosse and tennis player. In all of the books she plays a pivotal role, though she is not always successful in her endeavours and indeed is temporarily stripped of her fourth-form captaincy (she is caught assaulting a smaller girl who revealed a misdeed of Darrell's out of personal spite), though she gets it back again by resolving a particularly nasty case of sibling rivalry. She is on friendly terms with most of her classmates and even makes her peace with Gwendoline Lacy at the end, when a personal tragedy strikes the vain, selfish class outcast. At the end of her school career, Darrell is bound for St Andrews University . The six books are: #''First Term at Malory Towers'' (1946) #''Second Form at Malory Towers'' (1947) #''Third Year at Malory Towers'' (1948) #''Upper Fourth at Malory Towers'' (1949) #''In the Fifth at Malory Towers'' (1950) #''Last Term at Malory Towers'' (1951) The German translation of the series adds several books occurring after the sixth, with Darrell returning to Malory Towers as Matron. Later she marries one of her colleagues, has a baby girl and finally becomes matron of the famous "North Tower" where she resided as a child. Although these books also bear the author's name Enid Blyton, they seem not to be translations of any English books, and some serious fans question their authenticity and their right to be counted as 'canon'. The author who wrote the books about Darrell's return to Malory Towers as Matron is probably Rosemarie von Schach who uses several pseudonyms - such as Enid Blyton and Claudia Jones. She is best known as Tina Caspari and the likeness between Tina Caspari's books (most of them are about girls or horses) and the added Malory-Towers-books is striking. Characters included:
Blyton wrote two other series about life at a boarding school: St. Clare's and the Naughtiest Girl series. |
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