Enid Blyton
I watched the repeat of the film ‘Enid’ shown on the BBC last night. Golly gosh! Turns out Enid Blyton, adored by millions to this day, wasn’t such a nice person in real life. A bit of a control freak, in fact. She drove her first husband to drink and neglected her two daughters because all her emotional input went into her writing and her adoring fans.
By heck she worked hard though, banging out 6000 words a day. 6000! I nearly fell of my chair when I heard that. I don’t think I’ve ever written more than 2000. In the end she had something like 750 books published and people were starting to ask whether she could possibly be writing them all herself. That upset her more than anything. Writers don’t like having their integrity questioned.
I can understand why her books were so popular. Her Famous Five and Secret Seven stories painted a perfect picture of childhood where friends had amazing adventures without any boring old grown ups around telling them what to do. You’d think today’s children, who have much more choice, not just of books but other forms of home entertainment, would overlook her but the fact that Egmont chose her books first to convert to Nintendo DS format tells you something. Enid still rocks and I am so jealous!