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Re: Writing Blytonian stories of one's own.

Posted: 15 Jun 2010, 17:26
by Julie2owlsdene
You should try and write that plot as a book, Anita. I think most of us love a good ghost story that keeps us on the edge of our seats. My favourite film is The Ghost and Mrs Muir. The love story between them both is lovely and very sad.

At Christmas I saw a film called The Ghost of Greville Lodge, which I thoroughly enjoyed and so looked for the DVD on Amazon and bought it.

Maybe I will look up my old script and dust off the cobwebs. Daisy, you can read it, if I can find it and I'll drop it off for you when we're up in your part of the woods. I can collect it a few days later when we travel back down again. I'll let you know when. If you enjoy it, then I can pass it on to Anita.

8)

Re: Writing Blytonian stories of one's own.

Posted: 15 Jun 2010, 18:31
by Leslie
This is the kind of place where I can meet others like me! Great! My colleagues think I am a little 'strange' because of my many interests, one of them being writing!
I always wrote stories as a child - my mother said I had a vivid imagination - and never stopped! I wrote one or two stories which could probably be a novel and one which might be considered more a series about a group of friends. I've never submitted them to any publishers - I'm my own worst critic because I don't think they are good enough.
I've been obsessed about The New Professionals for some time and it got me into reading fan fiction which inevitably led to me thinking I could write stories for the Pros. I've written umpteen (and done the ultimate that no one should do by including myself!) I've also moved on from that and crossed it with other things including Dr Who. I've also got the beginnings of a Dr Who story which has him ending up in a Famous Five story! I recently began a story about the Famous Five when they're grown up. Needless to say, I've committed the sin of putting myself in it again... I decided (some time ago) that I fancied letting other people read the fan fiction but not my 'real' work so I put them on a website! My life isn't exciting enough! Either that or I'm just completely and utterly mad!

Re: Writing Blytonian stories of one's own.

Posted: 15 Jun 2010, 20:18
by Anita Bensoussane
Julie2owlsdene wrote:Maybe I will look up my old script and dust off the cobwebs. Daisy, you can read it, if I can find it and I'll drop it off for you when we're up in your part of the woods. I can collect it a few days later when we travel back down again. I'll let you know when. If you enjoy it, then I can pass it on to Anita.
Sounds good to me!

I hadn't noticed you had a link (or button) to a website, Leslie. I'll have a look at that later.

Re: Writing Blytonian stories of one's own.

Posted: 15 Jun 2010, 21:48
by Dick Kirrin
Another idea would involve another set of characters in the present (or maybe past? - questionable if you are not deliberately pastiching Blyton), and would be just straight adventure stories.
Good adventure stories tend to be a bit timeless as examples like Robinson Crusoe or Treasure Island show, so there is nothing wrong with using the period of time one likes.

There is just one thing that I'd think about, going back in time will always reflect our views about that period. The popular fanfic theme using grown-up Famous Five characters and setting that in the 1960s or 1970s will highlight the thing we nowadays remember about that time. Therefore, it can't be as authentic as something set in the present days. There may only be better and worse descriptions of the 1940s or 1970s.

As I wrote before, I can see it done, though I personally frown at Julian taking out his I-phone. :D

Cheers

Dick Kirrin

Re: Writing Blytonian stories of one's own.

Posted: 15 Jun 2010, 22:09
by Daisy
Julie2owlsdene wrote:

Maybe I will look up my old script and dust off the cobwebs. Daisy, you can read it, if I can find it and I'll drop it off for you when we're up in your part of the woods. I can collect it a few days later when we travel back down again. I'll let you know when. If you enjoy it, then I can pass it on to Anita.

8)
that would be great Julie! When are you coming this way again??

Re: Writing Blytonian stories of one's own.

Posted: 15 Jun 2010, 22:31
by Tony Summerfield
Back in my teaching days I wrote and produced about twenty plays. I was contacted out of the blue a week or two ago by email from someone who was in one of my plays thirty years ago (he Googled me!). The title didn't ring any bells, so I looked it up and started to read it. It still meant absolutely nothing to me at all, I felt that I was reading something that I had never read before - and I wrote it! :roll:

It is sad when the memory starts to go! :cry:

Re: Writing Blytonian stories of one's own.

Posted: 16 Jun 2010, 00:31
by lizarfau
Julie, you really should revisit your ghost story and try to get it published. You got so close to it in the 1980s, really! And the market is much better in terms of ghost stories now than it was then. It sounds excellent.

Re: Writing Blytonian stories of one's own.

Posted: 16 Jun 2010, 07:46
by Ming
Tony and Julie, if either of you have soft copies of your stories I'd love to read them. I've got all summer. :D

By the way, Julie, I picked up a new Put-Em-Rights today so the reading and dissecting will begin tomorrow.

Re: Writing Blytonian stories of one's own.

Posted: 16 Jun 2010, 09:12
by Tony Summerfield
Mine were plays, not stories, Ming. I should have said that the title of the one that I was talking about in the previous post was called 'The House of Missing Memories' - very apt in retrospect! :lol:

What did please me was to see ideas that I had used surface as later TV programmes. In a play titled 'The History of Fred' I took a central character through various periods in history, an idea that was later used in the 'Black Adder' series. In another play, 'Whistling in the Dark', my central character, a colourless little man, suddenly froze the action and burst into song and dance, miming to songs from the 20s and 30s. The award winning 'Singing Detective' used a similar approach.

All I do now is write the occasional article about some Enid Blyton book! :cry:

Re: Writing Blytonian stories of one's own.

Posted: 16 Jun 2010, 09:19
by Julie2owlsdene
Tony Summerfield wrote: All I do now is write the occasional article about some Enid Blyton book! :cry:
Don't knock it, Tony, we all love to read your articles. As for the Singing Detective, etc. Can you not claim copyright?

Infact, we now know what Tony can do for the next EB Day. Write a play to be performed on stage. Gary and Markus and Julie Davis can be the stars! :P

Well done on picking up a new edition copy of Put-em-Rights, Ming. I'll be interested to hear what you say about it. :D

8)

Re: Writing Blytonian stories of one's own.

Posted: 16 Jun 2010, 09:35
by Tony Summerfield
I don't think you can copyright an idea, Julie. Most of my plays were simply intended to make the audience laugh, but I did have a few slightly darker ones. In one I had a German SS officer billeted on a reluctant family in Denmark during the war. I remember a particular nightmare scene which I did under strobe lighting, where a group of Jews in striped pyjamas gradually surrounded his bed and closed in on him - not exactly cosy school play stuff!! :roll:

Re: Writing Blytonian stories of one's own.

Posted: 16 Jun 2010, 09:50
by Muminah
I have also written some stories. :) I remember a short horror story that I wrote with two of my friends when I was eleven years old. But before that I wrote a few really short ones, which when I read now are really funny and quite silly. They are about friendly ghosts, poor girls, magic shoes etc. I have also written a couple of poems which don't even rhyme. :lol: But the reason that I wrote them are for my own amusement.

I remember a story that I started but never completed. It is very similar to the Famous Five. Instead of the character of Uncle Quentin, I created a character of a Business Man. There are characters similar to The Five.And the reason that I stopped it was because I thought that I was doing something wrong writing in the same style of Blyton's.This idea came to me as I had read about Anne-Mary (St.Clare's) who copies the work of other poets. :oops:
There is another story which I never started but only roughly sketched the idea in a brand new note book,hoping to complete it but didn't until now.Another horror story remains incomplete somewhere in my mini library in my room.
When I think of all this now I realise that I am not so good at writing stories just as much as I imagined. :lol: :lol: :lol:

But I have all my stories with me, which I enjoy going through sometimes. :D

Re: Writing Blytonian stories of one's own.

Posted: 16 Jun 2010, 10:55
by Ming
Tony Summerfield wrote:I did have a few slightly darker ones.
Somehow I can't imagine you having a dark side, Tony, you're too nice! :)

Re: Writing Blytonian stories of one's own.

Posted: 16 Jun 2010, 12:05
by Anita Bensoussane
Your plays sound very imaginative, Tony. I wonder if any of them could be revived to be performed in schools once again?

Re: Writing Blytonian stories of one's own.

Posted: 16 Jun 2010, 12:27
by Eddie Muir
Anita Bensoussane wrote:Your plays sound very imaginative, Tony. I wonder if any of them could be revived to be performed in schools once again?
I'd love to read them, Tony and I'm sure I speak for other forum members too. :D