Following on from the review I did of the First Term at Malory Towers audio before Christmas I finally caved and brought an downloadable version of The Second Form at Malory Towers because I couldn’t find my cassette tape.
Anyway, once I had downloaded all the technology, thanks to Amazon for making it a chore and a half, I was able to transport myself back to my childhood when this was the first Malory Towers I had encountered.
I knew there were books, but I was at the awkward stage where I wasn’t really reading but still liked stories. My parents allowed me to listen to cassette tapes in bed to go to sleep so they brought me some. I suspect that the only ones available at the time were Second Form, Third Year and Upper Fourth, because for a very long time that was all I believed existed of Malory Towers.
On to the point, we’re rushed very quickly through the introductions again, to Darrell heading back to school with Sally Hope, as the two have now become best friends. A rather quick introduction is standard really for the audios which only have an hour to play out everything. One thing I do like about this intro is that they equality of the driving situation between Darrell’s parents is highlighted. Its made clear that Mr Rivers does most of the driving but there is a nice point where, even in the book, Blyton has Mrs Rivers take the wheel of the car to relieve her husband. I do believe that Blyton herself loved going out in the motor car and I believe she could drive as well, which is why she felt it was appropriate to put into the book that Mrs Rivers could as well.
In rather quick succession when we arrive at Malory Towers we are introduced once more to all of the girls, some of them we never get told who they are which leaves us guessing and who have deliciously plummy accents. If you want proper English toffiness, this is the audio to listen to!
The new girls are also introduced very quickly and then each of them throughout the episode has a main part of the story but then go very quiet. As a purest, the fact that so much is left out of the dramatization is distressing because you pick up on bits that they have missed and add so much more depth to the story.
Its not a bad adaptation but hearing it read aloud as it were makes me annoyed at the girls’ immaturity in some cases, such as handling the problems with Ellen, but I have to remind myself that they are like 14 years old, and that I wasn’t very mature at that age. I also don’t like the way the mistresses seem to lack knowledge about what’s being said around the school and acting on the silly rumours. Malory Towers will always be my favourite place to want to go to school but I do think there are some holes somewhere in the lax teaching style when the girls are not in lessons!
Overall, even for the nostalgia kick, this is a better adaptation than the first, I think the cast probably were finding their feet more and gelling more. So overall, this is a pretty good one, apart from the gaps, but then as a perfectionist and purest I hope I can be forgiven for wanting the perfect recording?
Next review: Third Year at Malory Towers: Audio adaptation
Or read a review of the Second Form novel here.
Fiona
pippastef
worldofblyton
World of Blyton 
Thank you Stef – a very interesting review. Particularly good point about the shared driving.
I cannot imagine anyone better to make comments on these adaptions of the Malory books.
Francis
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Lovely to read of your nostalgia kick Stef. As I’m totally blind, all my experience of Blyton’s work up until quite recently was audio adaptations. I’d heard a few unabridged readings, mostly Famous Five, but precious few. In the pre-download age, a recording of a full Malory Towers would have taken up a pretty bulky box of cassettes… and come with a pretty hefty price tag.
Ironically, as I went to special schools for the blind, boarding from the age of four, I first heard many of Blyton’s books, and all of her school stories (those that I heard at the time) in my dormitory at boarding school. We never had any midnight feasts, but we did often stay awake half the night talking. We used to sit in the library and watch The Famous Five. Always singing that song. (We had a piano in the library too. “Silence please”… not a chance!)
Actually reading blyton’s actual books, in electronic format via a braille display, has been a delight and a revelation… with occasional unsettling moments I must admit. Many of her books are now available as unabridged audiobooks, but I largely refuse to listen to them… on account of being driven up the wall by all the alterations made by mamby-pamby modern publishers haha.
It’s been depressing to discover just how far back this fiddling started. If you want to be sure you’re reading unadulterated Blyton, your books must have been printed no later than 1966!
But yes, there is so much to discover in the actual books versus the audio adaptations I grew up on. In particular the massive gulf between the way we think, and the way Blyton’s generation thought, is vividly illustrated. One really delightful thing though is the deft use of punctuation to show how characters spoke, or just to break the sentences into managable parts. I find older texts much easier to read aloud than newer ones.
You commented on lax teaching between lessons, the way mistresses seemed not to know what was going on. In those days, teachers seemed to see themselves as being there to teach, and not much else. I’ve reason to suspect that day-to-day discipline was left to the prefects. (interestingly neither St. Clare’s nor Malory Towers really seems to have them.)
“The house mistress only talked to you if you were ‘in trouble’.”
“Pastoral care, as we have come to expect it today, simply didn’t exist.”
These are (likely not too accurate) quotes from Ysenda Maxton-Graham’s book Terms and Conditions: Life in girls’ boarding schools, 1939-1979. So I can well believe that mistresses would have had little idea of what went on among the girls ouside their classrooms, or not under their direct gaze. I also reckon this would have been exactly how the girls wanted it… most of the time.
“We didn’t want them to be our friends.” (Terms and Conditions again.)
Daniel
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It was really interesting to read about your time at boarding school and particularly about your experiences as a blind Blyton fan reading her work through audio and braille. I’d love to know more – if you’d be at all interested in writing an article about “Blyton in Braille” or similar I’d publish it on the blog.
You’re right about the updates to the books, the only way to be sure you’ve got unedited text is to get very early editions. Definitely pre 1970, else the Famous Five will be wearing jeans!
Thanks for the quotes from Maxton-Graham – it really was a different world then, wasn’t it?
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