World of Blyton

I’m only just over half way through the book (57% according to Goodreads) and I’ve already written two posts! There is just a lot to write about between all the characters, new lands and crazy adventures. I’m sure there will be a lot more adventures, and I’m thinking the children are a bit mad to keep going through the clouds not knowing what land will be there or if they will ever make it back. But then there wouldn’t be much of a book let alone a series if they had one bad visit and never went back!

IN NEED? TAKE WHAT YOU WANT

In a rather contrived ‘coincidence’ of convenience (try saying that ten times fast!) the next land that they visit is the exact one they need in their lives.

They haven’t been to the wood in a while, not because they’ve come to their senses about the risks of the disappearing lands, rather, they’re in disgrace for getting so grubby in the last land especially when their clothes are in short supply. Suddenly it’s a big deal that the family are poor and we are spend a few moments in what feels like a Family-at-Red-Roofs type story. The children are hungry, the family grow their own veg. They long for hens, a goat, a new spade for digging.

Before you know it Moon-Face sends a message inviting them to visit The Land of Take-What-You-Want where everything is free. Me being me I immediately start to wonder how they’ll explain coming home with livestock, and that becomes even more of a wonder when the hens they find are green and yellow and the goat has blue spots. But mother just says Oh, you must have been to the Enchanted Wood, as if that’s all perfectly normal!

What’s rather less convenient is that the land leaves the tree before the children, Silky and Moon-Face can leave. The children are a bit upset, the land does have everything anyone could ever want apart from freedom, but they are not nearly as freaked out as you would expect! Obviously Blyton didn’t want to concern her readers much at all because within a few paragraphs they’ve found an aeroplane that’s as easy to fly as pressing a lever to go up, down, left and right and so obviously they can escape…

 THE INFAMOUS DAME SLAP

The adventure is extended when the plane gets tired and they land in a safe-looking land outside a green cottage. Only that cottage turns out to be the school of Dame Slap where the sumptious spread of buns, biscuits, cakes and lemonade. Only the buns turn to stale bread and the lemonade to water when the children help themselves. Then there are the impossible puzzles to solve in class if you take away three caterpillars from one bush how many gooseberries will there be left?

At least the children don’t get spanked after lunch with all the other pupils as Dame Slap knows they weren’t misbehaving. Still, they’re keen to escape, wouldn’t you be?

THE FARAWAY TREE UNDER SIEGE

In a nice way to keep things fresh the next adventure is in the woods – the children can’t get up the tree because its inhabitants are being held hostage by marauding red goblins.

On a tip from the wisha-wisha-ing trees however they scale the slippery-slip up to Moon-Face’s house and with the help of the brownies they capture the goblins and free the folk of the Faraway Tree.

Another overly-convenient coincidence occurs next, when a wizard comes from the next land looking for a hundred servants, and wouldn’t you know, there are a hundred goblins trapped on the slippery-slip, and that problem is dealt with neatly.

BIRTHDAYS, CAKE AND MORE COINCIDENCES

Blyton really didn’t hold back on the coincidences in this book! It’s Bessie’s birthday coming up, and it just so happens that the Land of Birthdays is coming to the top of the Faraway Tree (some lands are scheduled now?). Needless to say their resolve to never visit another land crumbles when they hear you can wish for anything you like in the Land of Birthdays, but you can only go when someone in the group has their birthday.

The Saucepan Man’s deafness is actually a part of the plot here, rather than just an amusing quirk. He mistakes talk of a wishing cake for fishing, and accidentally wishes them all to a deserted island populated only by fishing gear. Luckily Bessie has a piece of the cake still and wishes them back. The other wishes are less disastrous – a pony for Jo, a talking doll for Fanny and real flying wings for Bessie (Moon-Face wishes for her as she used her wish to rescue everyone).

I don’t know how they explained those to Mother when they got back!

MY THOUGHTS

Although I like fantasy and supernatural books, Blyton’s fantasy books are not amongst my favourites of hers. I didn’t read a lot of them as a child – Amelia Jane being one of the few I did read.

That said, The Enchanted Wood has a lot going for it. It really shows off her inventive and creative side – the pop biscuits and toffee shocks (they grow huge and then explode to nothing in your mouth, giving you a shock) are clever and quite unique. I liked the steps made of saucepans down to the Saucepan Man’s house, and Silky’s walking clock.

The different lands keep things fresh and interesting, and also show off Blyton’s vast imagination. Lands that rock and roll? Lands that spin around? Lands that provide you with anything you want, and lands that house dangerous goblins, bears, giants… you never know what you’ll get.

It’s just a pity Blyton wasn’t as creative with her solutions – there are too many huge coincidences and problems solved in a second. While the concept of visiting a land which may be dangerous and may trap you forever sounds dark and scary Blyton goes wholly in the other direction and it’s almost a jolly laugh to be lost forever!

Next post: The Magic Faraway Tree

We also have The Enchanted Wood reviewed by Laura

So here we are, ready to see what lands the children will visit and what other strange characters they will meet.

THE FIRST LAND AND THE SLIPPERY-SLIP

Arriving at the top of the tree the children creep through a hole in the clouds and find themselves in The Roundabout Land. All ideas of just peeking at it were clearly forgotten! The land is playing a tune like you hear on roundabouts, and then the land starts to swing around. I think we can see why it’s called the Roundabout Land already.

The Faraway Tree’s top branch is lost and the children need help from some rabbits to escape. They meet Moon-Face once they are back in the tree and use his slippery-slip to slide quickly back to the ground. Moon-Face is a bit of a strange one (like anyone in this book is normal!) he seems very jolly and kind but demands payment in toffee for the use of his slide.

THE NEXT ADVENTURE(S)

I had thought the book would be very episodic with a new land every chapter (like Mr Pink Whistle meets a new child every chapter) but I was wrong. The Land of Ice and Snow lasts for five chapters. Jo goes up alone (having learnt nothing from the last time) and ends up trapped by the mad snowman who is king of the land. The rescue involves a trip for Moon-Face and the other children to see Goldilocks and the Three Bears, a snowball fight and a very cosy cottage. There are shades of The Rat-a-Tat Mystery in it for definite. Moon-Face isn’t all bad then, and of course it has a happy ending.

As Moon-Face handled the rescue of Jo, it’s only fair that the children rescue him when he is trapped in the Land of the old Saucepan Man, even though they had planned to take a break from visiting any lands at the top of the tree.

It’s here I think I started to think how dark the idea is, that you go up a tree and into a strange land… and if you don’t come down quickly enough then the land sails off with you stuck on it forever! There’s no mention of times I don’t think so it seems madness to enter a land that might disappear with you on it in five hours or maybe only five minutes! They do say there’s a new land every day so perhaps they are there for 24 hours which would mean you had some warning, but it’s still scary stuff despite being handled very lightly by Blyton.

THE SAUCEPAN MAN COMES TO VISIT

As of yet I don’t know why the Saucepan Man is covered in saucepans. He’s not made of them, he just wears them all over himself. This makes him quite deaf (perhaps selectively so at times) so there are a lot of good laughs to be had at him mishearing things.

Perhaps they also make him a bit stupid, as next thing he turns up at the children’s home! Now he’s not a talking rabbit or an elf or anything otherwordly but he’s incredibly odd all the same and you’d think there’d be some sort of rule about not being seen by any grown ups. Children are generally OK, most books and films have child characters helping or getting involved with otherwise secret species. But when grown-ups find out there are Borrowers under the floorboards that’s when it all goes wrong and they end up exploited or hunted.

Mother finds the Saucepan Man quite queer but is happy for her children to go talk to him in the garden so that she can get on with the washing, and then she lets them go off with him for the afternoon. Perhaps she is doing what so many grown-ups do when faced with the completely bizarre and unexplainable, she’s thinking she has imagined or exaggerated the weirdness and he is just an ordinary travelling saucepan sales-man.

Referring back to my comments about the land(s) potentially disappearing with you on them, the opposite has now happened. The Land of the old Saucepan Man has gone, and left the Saucepan Man behind! So either there isn’t a set time or the Saucepan Man is so addled he forgot about it.

The land he and the others end up on is one that rocks and rolls and causes everyone to tumble about and it’s quite a feat to escape.

Blyton’s ‘fantasy’ books aren’t my favourites of hers, I prefer her mystery/adventure, school and family titles (in that order) but I can see why children would love the Faraway Tree. There are some very clever ideas for lands already and a lot of funny moments.

Next post: The Enchanted Wood part 3

For those who are unaware – I have a shameful secret. I have never read The Enchanted Wood or any of the other Faraway Tree books. Take away my Famous Five Club badge and don’t tell me the next password for the Secret Seven’s shed, that is how heinous a crime I have committed.

But here I am about to put it right! I have all three in early(ish) hardbacks – one of them even has a dustjacket! – but I never had them as a child so that’s my excuse.

WHAT DO I ALREADY KNOW?

I may not have read the books but I have a rough idea what they are about. Three children visiting a magical tree called The Faraway Tree, and at the top they can visit whichever magical land is there at the time. I believe sometimes they have wonderful fun and other times get themselves into trouble. I have read many a mention of the tree’s features like the slippery-slip, and its inhabitants like Dame Slap, Moonface, Silky the Elf and the Angry Pixie so let us sally forth and meet them properly!

JO, FANNY AND BESSIE

Jo is not short for Josephine as in other Blyton titles, as Jo is a boy and the older brother to Fanny and Bessie. The three are typical Blyton children from the outset – they can’t wait to move from their smelly, dirty town and into the countryside.

You won’t have any more adventures in the country than you will have in the town. I dare say you’ll find it all very dull.

– Father

Well, I expect he will be proved very wrong, don’t you?

THE ENCHANTED WOOD

Their adventures start the next day when they go exploring and discover a mysterious wood where the trees say wisha-wisha-wisha-wisha-wisha.

Its name is actually The Enchanted Wood, that’s not just what the children call it.

A week after moving, they finally get to visit the wood with their packet of sandwiches and a bottle of milk. They supplement this with some wild strawberries and as they sit to eat a very strange thing happens. Six toadstools grow out of the ground before their eyes. They may be town children but they know that this isn’t normal. The wood doesn’t just feel magic – it IS magic.

This is proven without a doubt when along come a group of brownies.

THE FARAWAY TREE

They stumble upon the tree when they chase an ugly gnome up it, having stopped him stealing the brownies’ bag. The brownies are afraid of the tree and warn the children not to climb it – as you never know where you will end up.

Naturally the children ignore this! Jo, as the boy, worries about keeping his sisters safe but he reasons they can’t get into too much trouble if they only look at the land at the top of the tree.

Only it isn’t that easy to find the tree! I’m desperate to know what land they visit first but first they get stuck because the trees are too close to get through, then they find a pond with yellow water. I can only imagine that either grown-ups never venture into the woods or they somehow can’t see the weird things that go on in there!

They end up calling on the brownies for help – and we get a funny but unusual bit of humour from Blyton.

I didn’t think rabbits got the measles said Bessie, astonished.

They more often get the weasels, said Mr. Whiskers. Weasels are even more catching than measles as far as rabbits are concerned.

He grinned as if he had made a huge joke, but as the children had no idea that weasels were savage little animals that caught rabbits, they didn’t laugh.

The measles/weasels joke is a funny one on its own, and I’m sure Blyton just wanted to explain what a weasel was to her audience but it ends up as quite dry humour ending on ‘the children didn’t laugh’.

As soon as they climb the tree they discover it’s not an ordinary tree – beyond the fact it branches into magic lands, I mean! It grows acorns but also conkers. And it has windows!

THE FOLK OF THE FARAWAY TREE

Behind the window is our first denizen of the Faraway Tree – the Angry Pixie. As his name suggests he is not happy to find three children climbing past his house. He throws water at them and complains that people are always peeping into his window when they pass.

Undeterred they decide to knock at the next house, which has a little yellow door. That’s brave of them!

It is Silky who lives there so they are quite safe. She invites them in and offers them pop biscuits, which actually go ‘pop’ when you eat them and fill your mouth with honey.

Silky tells them about other inhabitants like Mister Watzisname who doesn’t know his own name and Dame Washalot who does a lot of washing and pours water down the tree. On their way up they see the former asleep and snoring and the latter pours her water right down on Bessie.

This is such an important book that I’d like to do it justice and therefore I’ll split my review into a few parts. So far I’m intrigued to see what lands the children will visit and to see more of the characters whose names I’ve heard so many times.

Next post: The Enchanted Wood part 2