Who is Enid's worst villain?

[pete9012S]

I've always thought the kidnapping and treatment of the very young Jennifer Mary Armstrong by the Stick family and their cohorts was an extremely evil and villainous act.

[John Pickup]

The more I think about them, the more villainous the Sticks become. Keeping a very frightened little girl captive and attempting to poison Timmy make them an awful, wicked family of crooks.

[Katharine]

Yes, the Sticks do seem particularly nasty. Especially at the end when they are upset about Edgar being locked in the dungeons, with no thought that they'd already done the same to someone a lot younger.

[Debbie]

I think for things like threatening to whip Snubby and Goon caning Ern have to be seen in the context of the time. If we look at it through today's eyes then it looks scandalous behaviour. At the time it would have been seen as a proportional reaction I suspect! Snubby (if I remember rightly) is indignant but not too daunted by the threat, and the Find Outers are definitely upset that they caused Ern to get the caning, but I don't recall them feeling that Goon was overstepping his rights.

Today's children would see it as more of an offense, and make them more of a villain. Fairly recently I reduced my two younger (teenage) children to almost speechlessness, a very unusual occurrence, when I casually mentioned that the cane had been in existence when I was at school. I think they'd thought it had gone out with the Victorians!
Having said that I can remember one of them being slightly bemused by "Dame Snap" in the Wishing Chair books because they couldn't see that what she was doing was as scary as the reactions got. When I explained (and found original books) that had originally been "Dame Slap" and she'd hit them, they felt that was a better story.

I agree about the Sticks, but I don't think they saw beyond the money. I don't think they saw Jennifer as a person with feelings, simply a way of getting money.
(The 90s version had Jennifer far too old and too confident, don't know why they did that!)

[Katharine]

Debbie, I agree about the caning etc. It was quite normal when I was growing up (during the 1970s and 80s), and I wouldn't have thought someone was a villain if they slapped a child for trying to spy inside their caravan.

I'm intrigued by the update to Jennifer in the 1990's - do you mean text has been changed or was it in the TV series?

[Debbie]

The TV series. Jennifer was about same size as Anne, and very confident just after she's been arrested-if I remember rightly she says she fought the kidnappers because "she's a general's daughter" or something like that.

[Katharine]

Thanks Debbie.

I can understand maybe having to cast an older actress for the role, but the comment about her having fought the kidnappers seems silly. Why do people want to alter things so much, especially when they'd taken the trouble to set the series in the era it was written.

[Deejay]

The Sticks are very unpleasant in the books and the 90s TV series! A great shout that.

For me the Famous Five books easily have the best villains compared to any other series. I can’t think of anyone that unpleasant in Secret Seven or the Find Outers. Goon is horrible to the children but no villain as others have said.

[MJE]

For me the Famous Five books easily have the best villains compared to any other series. I can’t think of anyone that unpleasant in Secret Seven or the Find Outers.

     Perhaps one of the most threatening villains in the Secret Seven is the leader of the dog thieves in "Go Ahead, Secret Seven" who catches three of the boys in the cellar and set an Alsatian onto them, presumably to bite them if they didn't comply, and who then had them locked inside dog cages. (I'm not quite including old John Pace, the apparently senile old man who acts as a kind of guardian for the dogs, who laughs at the boys in the cages. Sort of nasty, but too weak and senile to be seriously nasty. He's the one who actually locks the cage doors, but it's completely clear that the other man is in control of everything.)
     I agree that the Famous Five have some of the worst villains, but I think some of those in the Adventure series are on a similar level, perhaps sometimes even worse. Scar-neck and some of his colleagues in "The Castle of Adventure" were pretty frightening; and when I read "The Valley of Adventure", I was quite chilled by the cold-hearted way Juan and Pepi kept poor old Otto Engler prisoner, tightly tied up and starved until he complied with their demands to reveal where the treasure was. If I recall correctly, he was finally so weak that he was incapable of complying. And it was extremely cowardly, utterly disgraceful, to treat violently a tied-up and weak-from-starvation prisoner: striking him and pushing him over.
     I found all that utterly chilling especially as a child reading this.

     Well, I said earlier I wasn't going to try to select any especially bad villains - but I have ended up doing so without quite deciding to.

Regards, Michael.

[dsr]

Were there some kidnappers in Malory Towers as well? Book three, tried to kidnap Zerelda?

[Courtenay]

     I agree that the Famous Five have some of the worst villains, but I think some of those in the Adventure series are on a similar level, perhaps sometimes even worse. Scar-neck and some of his colleagues in "The Castle of Adventure" were pretty frightening; and when I read "The Valley of Adventure", I was quite chilled by the cold-hearted way Juan and Pepi kept poor old Otto Engler prisoner, tightly tied up and starved until he complied with their demands to reveal where the treasure was. If I recall correctly, he was finally so weak that he was incapable of complying. And it was extremely cowardly, utterly disgraceful, to treat violently a tied-up and weak-from-starvation prisoner: striking him and pushing him over.
     I found all that utterly chilling especially as a child reading this.

Good points, Michael. I agree that some of the villains in the Adventure series are worse than anything the Famous Five face. Apart from the rather chilling climax of Five on Kirrin Island Again, where the island is in danger of being blown up, I don't remember any time in the FF when the lives of the children, or any other "goodies", are under serious and immediate threat. But there are several times throughout the Adventure series where the villains could have seriously harmed or killed someone, and in some cases definitely tried to. The treatment of Otto Engler really upset me too when I first read Valley (and I was an adult then!).

[MJE]

I can’t think of anyone that unpleasant in Secret Seven or the Find Outers.

     Oh, I think there are a few, actually. I mentioned the "Guv'nor" (leader of the dog thieves) in "Go Ahead, Secret Seven" previously - he's probably the worst in that series.
     In the Five Find-Outers series, how about Finnegan and Lammerton who catch Fatty in the secret room ("The Mystery of the Secret Room") and effectively torture him to give them information? That was the very first book in that series I read early in 1967, aged nearly 13, and it was a quite chilling introduction to that series (if possibly a slightly atypical book in that series). They would surely have to get at least a dishonourable mention in the contest for worst Blyton villains.
     Mr. Tupping, Lady Candling's gardener in "The Mystery of the Disappearing Cat", was probably not a seriously dangerous person, but he was extremely nasty, even sadistic, to little girls and dogs, and we all know that, in Blyton-land, that makes one a Very Bad Person. George Kirrin always maintained that anyone who didn't like dogs, especially Timmy, was no good at all.
     The car thieves and re-birthers (in today's terminology) in "The Mystery of the Hidden House" who also kidnapped Ern were pretty nasty people, with whom it was absolutely clear they would let no-one stand in their way, and would do anything to anyone to further their ends.
     And I would not have enjoyed encountering the "prince-nappers" of "The Mystery of the Vanished Prince" either - especially in a treacherous marsh riddled with horrid, sticky little flies you have to keep slapping away. (That setting would have to be one of Enid Blyton's darkest, most atmospheric settings. I loved it when I first read it as a boy.)

     In general, to find the worst villains in Blyton, I think you have to look at the books (a minority in some series) where some or all of the children are actually kidnapped or taken prisoner in some way, as against merely going around solving clues and revealing the culprit.
     In contrast, in those books where no-one is captured or in any kind of physical danger, the crooks are usually merely skulking around hoping that they can keep their anonymity and avoid being connected with the crime they committed. When they are finally uncovered, they are rarely dangerous, but just defeated and maybe weepy (e.g., Mrs. Moon in "The Mystery of the Spiteful Letters").

Regards, Michael.

[MJE]

Apart from the rather chilling climax of Five on Kirrin Island Again, where the island is in danger of being blown up, I don't remember any time in the FF when the lives of the children, or any other "goodies", are under serious and immediate threat.

     I think occasionally F.F. criminals did threaten to drop someone into the sea from a helicopter or into sucking marshes - but such things can probably be taken as little more than threats uttered in anger. But those who so threatened were the kind of people with whom you would seriously wonder whether they might do such things.

But there are several times throughout the Adventure series where the villains could have seriously harmed or killed someone, and in some cases definitely tried to.

     Jo-Jo certainly comes out on top here. He very definitely tried to, and it was a series of fortunate strokes of luck that enabled everyone to escape.
     I'm not sure whether the villains in "The Mountain of Adventure" count or not. To be sure, they did plan to make people try flying with the wings; but if they really believed they would work, it could be argued that they are scientifically gullible, but not that they intended to kill their guinea-pigs. Certainly a reckless disregard for someone's life could be claimed, though. (But I do recall Philip saying that when he put the wings on, offering to be the sacrifice, he definitely felt lighter - so it seems likely Enid Blyton wrote the story on the premise that the wings did work, at least partially.)

The treatment of Otto Engler really upset me too when I first read Valley (and I was an adult then!).

     That was the kind of scene that might be more in place in a modern novel about ruthless terrorists than a child's adventure story.

Regards, Michael.

[dsr]

If I'm allowed to drift off topic, the worst villains in children's literature are the Ivy Wallace villains (yes, she who wrote Pookie books) in the Young Warrenders series. (4 books). The last one, The Snake Ring Mystery, is the only children's book I have ever read where the children realised they had to get away because they could identify the villains and they knew the villains were going to kill them.

[Irene Malory Towers]

A few good points - yes you are right - MJE that Snubby did deserve a punishment for trying to peer in the Tonnerre's home - I had forgotten that (minor) point. Secondly re the comment about caning being quite normal and that was why they FFO's were upset but not unduly alarmed when Goon caned Ern - and I am revealing my age again - in my brother's school they had the cane. And that was less than 60 years ago - in fact when he left the school it would have been around 42 years ago, so it was acceptable. Astonishing.