Blyton Enid - Enid Blyton : the biography

Cover Illustration: Enid Blyton in 1923.

First published in 1974

This edition first published 2006

The History Press

The Mill, Brimscombe Port

stroud, Gloucestershire, GL 5 2 QG

www.thehistorypress.co.uk

This ebook edition first published in 2011

All rights reserved

Gillian Baverstock 2006, 2011

The right of Barbara Stoney, to be identified as the Author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyrights, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the authors and publishers rights, and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

EPUB ISBN 978 0 7524 6957 7

MOBI ISBN 978 0 7524 6958 4

Original typesetting by The History Press

S ome years ago, in the course of an evenings conversation, my Mother expressed the hope that I would write her biography if it ever came to be written in the future. I would have liked to carry out this wish of hers and, indeed, gave much thought to doing so in the months immediately after her death. At that time we had recently moved to Yorkshire and my family of four children were all still young. It was difficult enough to get down to London once a month with my husband, to see friends, never mind to find the time to carry out lengthy interviews all over the South of England with people connected with my Mothers life. I decided that a biography would have to wait for a few years until I had more time on my hands and was freer to travel away from home. In the following year, one of my Mothers closest friends became very ill and died a few months later. Some of those acquainted with my Mothers youth were now very elderly, some a little younger than she had been when she died; I realised that the documentation of her early years could no longer be delayed.

Very soon after my Mothers death, a number of people wrote to me asking for permission to write her biography. Most were genuinely interested, but they seemed to me to be unsuitable for the task, either because they were young and unmarried, or because they were male, and I thought that to fully understand my Mothers life, a mature woman with experience of marriage and children was essential.

About this time, Barbara Stoney wrote to me. She had been working on the life of a master thatcher, who had roofed my Mothers home Old Thatch. He had taken her to see the house at Bourne End, and living there still were the people who had bought it from my parents. Mrs Stoney was particularly interested in talking to them because it had been suggested to her by a publisher that she might contribute to a biographical series for children and she had considered Enid Blyton as a possible subject. The series was temporarily shelved but she had become so intensely interested in my Mothers life she had continued to search out material, reading everything that had been written about her and talking to everyone she could find who had known or worked for Enid Blyton.

I agreed to meet Mrs Stoney and discuss the subject of the biography with her. To my surprise, she had more information on those days at Old Thatch than I had, even though I had lived there as a child. She seemed to have an instinctive understanding of the sort of person my Mother was and to be particularly interested in the way her environment had formed her character and affected her life. Very quickly I agreed that she should write my Mothers biography and that I would let her have all the papers and diaries that existed. Unfortunately, much of importance had been destroyed before my Mothers death, and of the many diaries she had kept throughout her life, only the early ones were left. This meant that she left behind her very little personal evidence as to her thoughts and feelings from that time onwards.

We agreed that the book would be the story of the life of Enid Blyton: it would not be a book of literary criticism nor would it be a deep and learned psychological study of why she wrote as she did. We were concerned that the book should reveal as far as possible the human being with all her faults and virtues who was known to so many as Enid Blyton. It was not an easy task. Vital witnesses to her early years were either untraceable or dead. My Father, her first husband, died just after Mrs Stoney had discovered where he was then living. As must often happen in biographies, one persons memories completely contradicted anothers, and trying to ascertain the true facts must have been extremely difficult. I know from my conversations with the author that there were many such incidents during the three years in which she worked on this book.

One of her publishers, Paul Hodder Williams, with whom my Mother had worked closely for many years and who knew her well, confessed that he had been surprised to discover details of her early life that he didnt know about at all. I was too, despite the fact that I was very close to my Mother, and talked with her freely from early childhood. But she is an important writer for children all over the world. And it is best that the very private drive and the very personal talent that made her so should be known and understood. It is best too that this should be done by someone as honest and as detached as Barbara Stoney.

Gillian Baverstock

I t would have been an impossible task to chart the life story of Enid Blyton without the generous assistance I have received from many quarters, in particular from Mrs Donald Baverstock, who gave me not only access to her mothers papers, but great help and encouragement throughout. I am also indebted to Enid Blytons younger daughter, Mrs Imogen Smallwood, and to Mr Hanly Blyton, who gave much time and thought in helping my research into his sisters early years and with his cousin, Mrs Sylvia Conway provided me with many valuable photographs from family albums.

Among those who also lent photographs and letters or supplied personal recollections of Enid Blytons early life, I would like especially to thank: Miss Mabel Attenborough, Miss Margery Dawson, Dr Mirabel Harrison, Mary Potter (ne Attenborough) and Mrs Phyllis Samuel (ne Chase); Mrs Ida Haward (ne Hunt), Misses Kathleen and Nan Fryer, Miss J. Gilchrist, and Mrs Ann Style, Secretary of Ipswich High School for Girls; Mrs Joyce Dunn (ne Brandram), Mr A. Robert Dickinson, the Reverend M. Martin Harvey, Mr Derek Hudson, Mr T.R. Twallin, and Mr E.I. Childs, Headmaster of Bickley Park School; the Thompson family Messrs. David, Brian, Peter and John Mrs Frances Peterson, Miss E.D. Moore and others associated with Southernhay during the 1920s.

I am grateful, too, for all the other help I have received during my research into the writers later years, particularly from her executor, Mr Eric Rogers, and his daughter, the late Miss Patricia Rogers; solicitors, J.D. Langton and Passmore; literary agents, Mr George Greenfield and Miss Rosica Cohn; medical advisers, Dr Raymond Daley and Dr R.M. Solomon; and representatives of her many publishing houses especially the directors and staff of Evans Brothers Limited, the Hon. Mrs Audrey Evans, Miss Audrey White and Mr Ronald Deadman and the editorial department of