Here it is -
The cover shows an illustration from the uncollected short story It Happened So Suddenly! - a 'Safety First' story. The illustrator for this story is uncredited - but I generally like the style. The internal illustrations that accompany the story are well drawn and very much of their era, but the cover illustration is badly 'staged' with some poor perspective, and people drawn out of proportion - though it works okay as a whole until you look more closely. The little girl and the pram look almost flat - while the woman bending over them looks like a giant. Its an odd illustration!
But the story is a good one - based on a true story, as far as I can tell - from a newspaper cutting. I thought it was particularly good at portraying the horror Paul felt, and shows us how well Enid was able to get into the mindset of her child readers. The way Paul reacts - panicking and worried and fearing the worst - is just how I would have reacted in a similar situation. I would probably have run away like Pal, too - even though I feel ashamed to admit it. You can read the story by following the link below. Sadly, its the only uncollected short story in this week's issue.
I've been trying to work out why this issue only has one short story, plus the two continuing serials. It has the same number of pages, and yet the last issue had two short stories. I guess the extra pages were taken up by a Safety First information page about traffic lights, a painting competition, a picture crossword and several other bits and pieces - but this issue certainly seems less value for money than the last one.
In Enid's Editorial Letter we hear as usual about the animal life at Green Hedges - and also that Enid is about to embark on another holiday to Dorset. This is interesting to me, given that the magazine had only two more issues to go until the printer's strike. One would imagine that usually Enid would be two or three issues ahead, at least...and yet she seems not to have been, given that there are two more, then a break until the last issue in September. I would have thought she would already have written the contents to any other magazines to cover the two weeks or more that she would be in Dorset. Maybe that was all she wrote.
Enid also tells us about how she recorded 'some stories 'on HMV gramophone records'. I presume, from Enid's description, that these are the Noddy stories, containing songs that had appeared in the Noddy Pantomime. Enid describes how she sat in a booth and recorded these stories, sound effects etc being added later. Reading between the lines, I wonder if Enid had found the routine a bit troublesome - and maybe had even made a fe mistakes - as she tells us the 'first time' she did it she had to stop every time a red light came on and wait while music was played etc...but the second time she was able to just read the story all the way through without stopping, and they would add music and sound effects afterwards - which sounds more sensible. I can imagine her not stopping when the red light came on, and having to record things again and again because she hadn't noticed the red light...so maybe the manufacturers decided it was better to let her just read them all the way through instead!
After It Happened So Suddenly! we have a nice painting competition page - showing Dick Whittington and his cat. The past owner of my magazine has coloured it in with blue Biro, Green Biro and a pink pencil crayon. I don't think they had any other colours by the look of it! Then we have Bonfire Night for the Secret Seven - chapter 15 - and a rather nice Burgess Sharrocks illustration. Its fairly unusual to see all the Secret Seven 'from a distance' so to speak, so it makes a pleasant change. Pity it wasn't used in the book though.
Here's the magazine illustration -
And the illustrations for this chapter as used in the book -
All three illustrations aren't too bad, for Sharrocks - although I like the first and third illustrations best.
After the next instalment of The Goblin Shop which can be read by following the link, and a picture crossword, we have Police Signals and Traffic Light signals - STOP!' - which can also be viewed by following the link, thanks to Tony for scanning these. Then we have chapter 20 of The Ragamuffin Mystery. Again, this story has two illustrations...a sign that the magazine was distinctly lacking in content, maybe, and so space needed to be filled. Both of these appear in the book version as well as the magazine. I like the first one - a typically 'Blytonian' picture of the gang searching a secret passage with a torch.
And so this issue comes to a close - with the usual Puzzle Page - which can be read by following the link, and also the Letters Page, which shows mainly letters about fund raising for the Spastic Centre.
Lastly, an advert for two of Enid's books - Six Cousins at Mistletoe Farm and Six Cousins Again I found the advertisers description rather amusing, as it doesn't really do these two books justice. It reads - In the first of these books a trio of town cousins goes to stay with three country cousins on their farm. In the second book the town cousins have a farm of their own. Each story is full of excitement and adventure! What a pedestrian description of two of Enid's finest, most enthralling and entertaining novels!
Until next time - here's the link!
https://www.enidblytonsociety.co.uk/mag ... ?magid=962
When I was scanning 'It Happened So Suddenly!' I kept thinking that I had seen the story before, but I couldn't think where and thought I must be thinking of a similar story, but if I had used it before I was sure somebody would point it out.
