Recent interesting Australian article about Enid Blyton

[Maureen1954]

Hi everyone!! I dont think this has been posted before here on the forum its dated July 12 ......


http://blogs.theaustralian.news.com.au/ ... ton_alone/

Cheers and Gingerbeers

Maureen

[Lawrie]

I enjoyed this Maureen; it's always a relief to see a bit of common sense. I personally prefer to read the original books, but appreciate that perhaps they could do with a bit of updating regarding race and sex - especially race, I have to admit I do wince a bit at Jo Jo's rolling eyes - but golly gosh not the language! I agreed with her point about having to explain current American words to her Australian son - here in Belfast we talk about footpaths, not pavements, but I didn't sit scratching my head wondering what on earth these were. Children can cope with Harry Potter; they can surely cope with Enid. And even worse than tinned tongue, I remember literal tongues in the butcher's window - reeevolting!

[joanne_chan]

You know, when it comes to versioning, most of us over time learn to handle different terms and the odd spelling difference as our Language is global with local differences.
Timeless language is a worthy objective for anyone that writes fiction even though over time in English words fall from favour and others shift in the main meaning but the informal brisk style of "Hi!, Hey!, and So?" that the new versions adopt themselves risk becoming dated apart from being removed from the then current formal style of conversation in British English in the 40's and 50's .

[Lawrie]

over time in English words fall from favour and others shift in the main meaning.

Absolutely - language is constantly evolving and changing, whether we like it or not.

[Maureen1954]

Language changes every decade and new words come in all the time,and it is nice to hear old expressions from other era's.

I used to laugh when my Mum told us in the 1940 era that when she went to dances with her girlfriends to meet young men they called it "Clicking" and I would reply "what did you do click your fingers at the boys to dance ?" No yer daft apeth when we hit it off with the boys at our first meeting as in love at first sight so to speak lol!!!