Enter the world of mysteries, adventures, school tales, and stories in magic lands interspersed with mouthwatering descriptions of afternoon teas, picnic lunches, midnight feasts and what-nots!
Imagine this flashback! An open book in one hand, a few more stacked nearby, a snug couch to sink into, a plateful of freshly-cut cheese and chutney sandwiches next to me - this picture of moi as a skinny pigtailed school girl, totally immersed in the flowing narrative of an Enid Blyton book, still lives fresh in my memory!
Blyton’s books, even today, make her a popular and voraciously read author. Her output? 700+ books between 1922 and 1968 and 600 million copies sold and still selling!
However, decades later, some of Blyton’s writing had beenacknowledged as rather politically incorrect. Racist references abound to dark-skinned people, golliwogs and gypsies as thieves; the sexism is evident with Mother mostly always being in the kitchen, cooking, baking or cleaning; and tomboy George of the Famous Five series craving to be treated like one of the boys, but constantly being ‘shown her place’ as a girl; or then, there’s Wilhelmina (Bill) at Malory Towers, adored for her ‘boyish’ bravado and also for her single-minded love for horses,and particularly her own horse, Thunder. Also, in retrospect, the food and customs depicted in the writings don’t exactly do much to embrace a multi-cultural Britain either.
That being said, the books for me then, and with nostalgia now,retain plenty of heartwarming qualities. And somehow, then not only would all my travel to far-flung destinations be through the words of this author, the meals rustled up in her narratives were also devoured with wide-eyed wonder!
Particularly for this blog post, I’d like to focus on how thesedescriptions of food as an essential part of most of her books, introduce an appealing aspect to readers between nail-biting adventure and mystery plots, lively school stories and enchanting tales of magic.
Sample some of these extracts on food from her books:
1. ‘Five Go Off in a Caravan’
Soon they were all sitting on the rocky ledge, which was still warm, and watching the sun go down into the lake. It was the most beautiful evening, with the lake as blue as a cornflower and the sky flecked with rosy clouds. They held their hard-boiled eggs in one hand and a piece of bread and butter in the other, munching happily. There was a dish of salt for everyone to dip their eggs into.
“I don’t know why, but the meals we have on picnics always taste so much nicer than the ones we have indoors,” said George.
2. ‘The Secret of Moon Castle’
She (the house-keeper) had cut them potted meat sandwiches, tomato sandwiches and egg sandwiches, and had put out some buttered scones, some ginger buns and some boiled sweets, too. And then, there were bottles of iced lemonade.
3. ‘The Upper Fourth at Malory Towers’
There were great chunks of newly-made cream cheese, potted meat, ripe tomatoes grown in Mrs Lucy’s brother’s greenhouse, gingerbread cake fresh from the oven, shortbread, a great fruit cake with almonds crowding the top, biscuits of all kinds, and six jam sandwiches!
4. ‘Five Go Down to the Sea’
The high tea that awaited them was truly magnificent. A huge ham gleaming as pink as Timmy’s tongue; and a salad fit for a king. In fact, as Dick said, fit for several kings, it was so enormous. It had in it everything that anyone could possibly want.
“Lettuce, tomatoes, onions, radishes, mustard and cress, carrot grated up — that is carrot, isn’t it, Mrs. Penruthlan?” said Dick. “And lashings of hard-boiled eggs.”
There was an enormous tureen of new potatoes, all gleaming with melted butter, scattered with parsley. There was a big bottle of home-made salad cream.
“Look at that cream cheese, too,” marvelled Dick, quite overcome. “And that fruit cake. And are those drop-scones, or what? Are we supposed to have something of everything, Mrs Penruthlan?”
To children the world over, it was as if Blyton had opened the door to the quintessential English larder of her times to fill their dreams with descriptions of a wonderful variety of food! As a child, I particularly looked forward to the ‘super’ high teas, especially in some of her farm-based novels (Mistletoe Farm and Willow Farm).
Think of delicious, fat and red strawberries with cream, homemade apricot and raspberry jams, tinned chunks of pineapple, tinned sardines, tinned tongue (as a child, this fascinated me endlessly. Although I must confess I still haven’t eaten it!), quivering and colourful jellies, jammy buns and tarts, gingerbread straight out of the oven, huge bowls of fresh salad, succulent meat/pork pies and “lashings” of hard-boiled eggs (Indeed, Blyton was perhaps the only author to create such a sense of anticipation for this humble protein, and is perhaps theone reason I still love it so!), spiced sausages, macaroons, buttered crumpets and scones - even plain old bread and butter sounded fancy in her books! Not to mention, the many flavoursof ice creams, lemonade, orangeade, iced lime juice, grapefruit juice and ginger beer in the village shops - and really, the list is quite endless.
In a strange way then, Blyton was almost a food-blogger of her times! She didn’t even need our 21st Century app, the very visual Instagram to communicate. Her simple but intensely evocative descriptions were enough for readers to experience and feast on the described food in the most immediate way imaginable. She really knew how to build an atmosphere and how!
So, what is there in these descriptions that make this experience possible?
One remarkable point to note about her food writing is that she celebrates the fresh, wholesome and unpretentious. Not for her the packaged cereals and ready-to-eat dinners. Her food descriptions centre on frothy, freshly extracted milk, or butter churned on a farm in its cool pantry, juicy and ripe tomatoes that make you want to bite into them, or freshly dug-up runner beans, radishes and turnips. In the first book of the Secret series, we have the children growing vegetables on the island and when these are finally ready to be harvested, the readers can almostfeel that very real satisfaction of a budding farmer enjoying their harvest!
Another quaint ritual celebrated in the Blytonian world is that any meal in any of the houses or schools she writes about, is always announced with a dinner gong!
And, this leads to my second point. Her narrative is extremely sensory. We can imagine the visual, naturally. The above extracts are example enough. The auditory comes in through the ‘sizzle’ of frying or the soft bubbling of something ‘simmering and boiling’ on the stove, or even the ‘pop’ of toast as it flies out of the toaster, and so on. And, of course, there’s taste - think of the aroma and heat in ‘pickled onions’! Or the very satisfying word, ‘munching’!The children ‘happily munch’ their sandwiches: an act, in my opinion, of utter enjoyment. So is the sense of touch in words like ‘juicy’, ‘gooey’, ‘crisp’ (lettuce), or ‘creamy’ (milk), etc. And then there is the sense of smell: we are transported into kitchens exuding the wafting aromas of the food being cooked; or as in one of the school books, during a secret midnight feast, one hungry second former rather bravely fries kippers (fish) on a small stove in a saucepan smuggled from the kitchens earlier. The strong smell floats into the bedroom of a sleeping house mistress and gently tickles her nose! Suffice to say, the wrongdoers breaking this rule, are speedily caught and repentantafter their punishments!
Thirdly, the action in her plots is never hampered by these food breaks. In fact, we readers rather look forward to these interruptions. Often, mysteries are solved while eating food and discussing it. Indeed, the ‘taste of adventure’ may make our mouths water even more. Or as in the school books, there would be bonding after a quarrel while sharing food. It would seem Blyton knew human psychology pretty well. Often, one of the children’s adult friends would take them out for a treat as areward for solving a difficult mystery. In ‘Mystery of the Burnt Cottage’, Superintendent Jenks takes the five children and their dog out for a celebration. He says:
“Isn’t there some place here that sells ice-creams and macaroons?
“Ah here is the place I mean. Yes. Best macaroons I ever had in my life came from here.” (They go in and he places the order.)
“Er, twenty-one macaroons, please. Oh, I beg your pardon, Buster, twenty-four, I mean.”
(That’s three each, as there are the Five Find-Outers, Jenks and Marian (plus Buster, their dog).
Last but not the least, and as the above extract also shows us, how well the author interlaces her love for animals in her narratives! Of course, this sweet treat is extremely rare for dogs, as it would be harmful for them. But what is important is that,for Blyton, animals are ‘family’ and this idea is rather heartwarming. There is always a large and juicy bone packed for the dogs - Timmy, Buster and any others - when the children are out picnicking! In the lesser-known ‘The Children at Green Meadows’, we are introduced to a family of animal lovers and it is a book that is still one of my favourites, just for the way animals are treated.
Apart from all the above ‘food-reasons’, what else would make Blyton’s books memorable?
I would have to say the countless life lessons that she adeptly slips into her stories. Besides introducing us to delicious food, refreshing and intriguing characters, interesting plots, her books are full of gentle platitudes interwoven in her plots. This one is a favourite of mine:
“The best way to treat obstacles is to use them as stepping-stones. Laugh at them, tread on them, and let them lead you to something better.” (‘Mr Galliano's Circus’)
Her words do have a way of staying with you!
To quote the author herself on this:
“Oh, voice of Spring of Youth
Heart’s mad delight,
Sing on, sing on, and when the sun is gone
I’ll warm me with your echoes
Through the night.”
(E. Blyton, Sunday Times, 1951)
And with this, I sign off.
A steaming hot spinach, tomato and cheese pizza has just arrived home from this new pizzeria in our city which makes freshdeep-dish pies with unique fillings.
And guess what I have dug out from the back of my shelf? Yes, an Enid Blyton book, which I will relish with my slice - in memory of a time when I was the greatest of fans of a comforting and more uncomplicated world!
-Sushama Kapur
Visiting Faculty, ELTIS