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Miss Wilson

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#1: Miss Wilson Author: Josie, Location: London

Posted: Mon Apr 18, 2005 9:58 am

Please discuss Bill and her sarcasm here...

#2: Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent

Posted: Mon May 02, 2005 9:59 pm

Had to do - felt sorry for poor Nell!

Miss Wilson joins the CS early in its life - she is already an established member of staff in Princess making her longer serving that Miss Annersley, Jeanne de Lachennais and any number of other 'old timers'. She becomes a very popular member of Staff and has a great deal of 'air play' - she is integral in the forced march with the Saints, the one who hurt her foot in Eustacia and the Guide Captain in Camp. She is also Head of St Clares.

Sarcastic and somewhat short tempered, she nevertheless has a good rapport with the girls becoming, with Con Stewart, probably the most popular mistrresses while in the Tyrol.

She forms strong friendships, both with Con Stewart and with Hilda Annersley. When Hilda becomes Head she is Senior Mistress, and when Hilda is injured she deputises for her for a year. She is then Co-Head. Altogether a very strong character for the years in the UK.

Moving to the Oberland with the finishing branch appeared to be a good move, but after the initial book, it meant that, so far as the books were concerned, she was side-lined, almost as though EBD didn't know what to do with her. A great pity as I feel her character was a very strong one and was wasted.

With one exception, she is my favourite character, and, in fact, I feel that she and Hilda Annersley work best as a team (Now that surprised everyone didn't it! Wink

)

#3: Author: Cazx, Location: Swansea/Bristol

Posted: Mon May 02, 2005 10:09 pm

I actually prefer Bill as a character to Miss Annersley, and wish we'd seen more of her when the school moved to the alps. I really like how authoritive she is in Gay, and how she handles Miss Bubb, despite not being as fully fit as she makes out.

#4: Author: KB, Location: Melbourne, Australia

Posted: Mon May 02, 2005 10:24 pm

Lesley wrote:

Moving to the Oberland with the finishing branch appeared to be a good move, but after the initial book, it meant that, so far as the books were concerned, she was side-lined, almost as though EBD didn't know what to do with her.

I think that's exactly what does happen to EBD. She has created two characters of equal strength and, literally, there isn't room for both of them in the book. She tries to balance them once Hilda returns to school in Rosalie and, sometimes, ends up doing a sort of siamese twin act where they share the same study and sit with each other in the evenings instead of invading the staff-room.

By getting Nell out of the way, EBD gets the chance to allow Hilda to take over the Headship alone, as she has done for the war-time books (excluding, of course, Gay and the long short-stories). Perhaps EBD intended to write other Millies books about Nell, but found that she couldn't get enough good story-lines to make it worthwhile, as the jealousy and childish behaviour doesn't carry over to girls older than eighteen. Considering Oberbland, this was probably a smart decision, even if it does sideline a great character.

#5: Author: Kathy_S, Location: midwestern US

Posted: Tue May 03, 2005 6:40 am

Bill was always my favorite staff member in the books, and not just because she was the token scientist. Her flashes of temper, her involvement with Guides, her friendships, her role in the escape -- all sorts of things combined to make her very much a real person to whom I could relate. Miss Annerley, by comparison, often seemed rather remote, a bit more up on a pedestal. Until certain drabblers came along, that is. Very Happy

#6: Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent, England

Posted: Sun Jun 19, 2005 2:57 pm

I always used to wonder if when Mlle became ill, Miss Wilson would have liked to be made Head herself. I know she later became head of the Millies but I was wondering if she was after the main Headship herself?

#7: Author: joelle, Location: lancashire, england

Posted: Sun Jun 19, 2005 4:52 pm

yea i wonder how much of a difficult choice it was to pick miss annersley over miss wilson? they were treated like equals then suddenly miss annersley is in charge

#8: Author: Chair, Location: Rochester, Kent, England

Posted: Sun Jun 19, 2005 5:54 pm

I think it might have worked better if they were made joint Heads from the start of when Mlle became ill.

#9: Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent

Posted: Sun Jun 19, 2005 7:52 pm

Miss Annersley was Senior Mistress - had been from when Miss Maynard left - if Miss Wilson had any issues I would have thought it would have been then.

#10: Author: Susan, Location: Carlisle

Posted: Sun Jun 19, 2005 11:17 pm

I like Miss Wilson, she is well rounded as a teacher and we get a lot of glimpses of her in her free time too.

She was obviously good at getting on with others given her close friendship with Con Stewart and later Miss Annersley. It is a definite shame that she was moved to Millies and that we see such a lot less of her in the later books. I would have liked to see the co-headship continue just to see how she coped with lots of the later problems.

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