The Enid Blyton Society

On the anniversary of Enid's death, November 28th, one of Enid's illustrators, Marjorie L. Davies died at the age of 101. Although she was never responsible for illustrating any full-length books, she produced a large number of illustrations for Blyton's short stories throughout the 1950s, including the covers for the final two issues of Enid Blyton's Magazine for the story 'A Dog Called Timmy' and also the only Noddy story to appear in Sunny Stories.

Seven years ago, I went with Imogen to see her at her picture postcard cottage in Chailey, and it was wonderful to see some of the records of her work that she kept, along with original artwork. We wrote an article about this in Journal 13.

Thanks for that, Tony. I'm sorry to hear that Marjorie Davies has died but it sounds as if she had a busy and productive life right to the end.

Anita

Just found this article - might be of interest.

Marjorie L. Davies - illustrator of 'A Dog Called TImmy'

I was surprised to learn that Marjorie L. Davies apparently turned down the opportunity to illustrate the Famous Five books?

As soon as Blyton saw Davies's artwork, early in 1950, she
commissioned her to illustrate some of the Sunny Stories
magazines and for the next 10 years Davies was one of
Blyton's favourite artists, producing over 100 drawings and
pictures for her many children's magazines and books, most
notably the Bedside, Holiday and Flower annuals.

Working for Enid Blyton was, Davies said, the happiest
period of her professional life, though she sometimes
regretted turning down the chance to illustrate The Famous
Five, laughingly calling it the worst commercial decision
she ever made.

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic ... YC98uNq0yk" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

With the Five's starting back in 1942 would this have been paperbacks /replacing Eileen Soper/or something else?

I noticed this on Heather's Blyton Pages - (which don't seem to exist anymore):

Marjorie Davies was born in Hampstead, London.

In 1923 she attended St Martin's Art School of Art in London, and went on to illustrate Blackie's Annual in 1931, Bo Peep's Bumper Book (Amalgamated Press, 1929), and famously, the colour plates for Lewis Carrol's Alice Adventure Stories (Hutchinson, 1934). She also created artwork for wallpaper and friezes for Shand-Kydd.

Marjorie completed over 90 commissions for Enid Blyton, although she turned down offers to illustrate Noddy, as well as the Famous Five after Eileen Soper's death.

As Eileen Soper passed away in 1990 I am none the wiser?

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I have just dug out and re-read Journal 13 Dec 2000 which included a comprehensive resume of Marjorie's career,including a letter to her from Enid after The Enid Blyton Magazine stopped being produced.

The Journal article is most interesting. There is no reference to Marjorie being asked or turning down illustrating The Famous Five though.

Intriguing! Maybe it was just a legend that Marjorie Davies made up, regarding the Five! But if it was after Eileen Soper's death, then surely she wouldn't have been commissioned to re-illustrate a whole series of books in her 90's?!

It's a mystery to me Rob - similar to why exactly this illustration came about??



Five Go Off In A Caravan - Mary Gernat
http://www.enidblytonsociety.co.uk/foru ... 91#p252291" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

pete9012S wrote:I have just dug out and re-read Journal 13 Dec 2000 which included a comprehensive resume of Marjorie's career,including a letter to her from Enid after The Enid Blyton Magazine stopped being produced.

The Journal article is most interesting. There is no reference to Marjorie being asked or turning down illustrating The Famous Five though.

As the co-author of that article about Marjorie Davies, I am slightly puzzled about this Famous Five remark. Imogen and I spent a fair amount of time with her and Sally Varlow who wrote her biography after her death was also present. We were shown a lot of things from her various files and she also talked about her illustrations of Noddy for the Sunny Stories story, but at no stage did she mention anything about the Famous Five, so I am really not at all sure where this came from. Eileen Soper started illustrating the Famous Five in 1942 and continued to do so until the final book in 1963, so there is no way that Enid would have asked anybody else to illustrate them in this period. Marjorie Davies started working for Enid in 1950 and produced her final work in 1959, so I'm afraid I have to take these comments about the Famous Five as totally wrong.

Yes,I totally agree Tony.The alleged statement does not dovetail comfortably or feasibly alongside the Famous Five illustrator's extant historicity.

I am going to quote a whole paragraph from her Biography which might explain things better.

"The years working for Enid Blyton were, she said, the happiest times of her professional life. She often laughingly recalled her worst commercial decision as her refusal to take over illustrating one of Enid's main story-book series. Blyton's annuals and magazines always contained illustrations by several different artists, but for her series Enid liked to use only one of her favourites, so that the images remained consistent. Eileen Soper always illustrated The Famous Five, Harmsen van der Beek did Noddy (until his sudden death) and for the first four Secret Seven books, Enid chose George Brook. But in 1952 she was considering a different artist for the Secret Seven, and it seems most likely that those were the characters she offered Marjorie, though Marjorie's later recollections implied it was The Famous Five."

It would look as if Sally Varlow, who wrote the Biography, thought like many others that Enid really only wrote three main series and it therefore had to be one of these that Marjorie was being offered, but there are one or two other possibilities! Obviously the Famous Five illustrating was just speculation, but as so often happens with these things it can quickly turn into fact somewhere down the line.

I will try to add a picture of the Biography cover, it is an excellent book.

I would personally say, given the time-frame, that The Secret Seven was a more likely contender - after all, Burgess Sharrocks wasn't much good! Of course, it could also have been The Five Find-Outers or even the Barney series for Rat-a-Tat...

Thanks Tony. That really seems to clear things up a lot.

I've been trying to get hold of a copy of A Brush with Enid Blyton: The Life and Work of Marjorie L. Davies by Sally Varlow but it is proving quite elusive!

Hurrah!
Just bought it from Pomegranate Press for £12.50 inc delivery.

http://www.pomegranate-press.co.uk/nonf ... index.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I have never seen it for sale anywhere but if you can find a copy it is a really nice book.



You found a copy whilst I was scanning mine, Pete!

Thanks for the scan Tony - Yes,it looks like a very good book.