Leaving the Bettany children behind
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#1: Leaving the Bettany children behind Author: Róisín PostPosted: Wed May 17, 2006 4:00 pm
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We were sort of discussing this in Mia's fine drabble, but that wasn't really the place. I don't know if this has been discussed before.

Why was it ok for Mollie and Dick to have children, only to abandon them to Madge and Jem for years and years. I find it really hard to get into the mindset of the period with this point. Why did they have them at all if they knew that that's what was going to happen?! It's not like there wasn't contraception around.

I realise that the feeling at the time was that white children would not prosper in that climate. But then the Second Twins managed not to die. I know the War came at that point, so they couldn't get back, but there are plenty of other unlikely wartime travellers in Chaletland.

I just can't get over the fact that they had these children and then didn't see them grow up, by choice. I have no sympathy for Mollie in Jo Returns (?) when she is upset over leaving the kids behind - nobody was making her, Dick's job was *just a job* and he chooses to leave it later on when they inherit the Quadrant anyway.

/rant

#2:  Author: ibarhisLocation: London and Hemel Hempstead PostPosted: Wed May 17, 2006 4:14 pm
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I think it was part of the mind set of the time. Responsible middle class parents in the period didn't expose their children to the climate; did ensure they had an English education and were grateful when they had relatives who were willing and able to house the children in their stead.

Dick had to have a job and India was his best bet; in his mind set, I'm sure he and Mollie came back as soon as they could, ie. when they inherited a suitable property.

The scenario happened often enough that it is clear that EBD is writing about something which she feels her contemporary readers will understand.

#3:  Author: RachelLocation: West Coast of Scotland PostPosted: Wed May 17, 2006 4:16 pm
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It is one of those things that I think you need to have been around at the time for it to seem in any way reasonable! To our way of thinking, it is completely horrendous to contemplate having kids and then handing them over to othjer people for several years (although there are days when...) but at the time EBD started writing, that's just the way it was.

I'm not an expert, but I don't believe the contraception available back then was nearly as reliable as we have available now, and a womans place then was with her husband - it would have caused a scandal for a woman to either choose to part from her husband to care for her children OR to ask her husband to give up his job.

I always got the impression that inheriting the Quadrant came at a time when Dick wasn't actually working for the forestry anyway so giving up work didn't come in to it.

Even those parents who did keep their children with them in India nearly always end up having to despatch them off to boarding schools in the cooler regions (Felicity Kendal talks about this in her autobiography White Cargo ) and of course, for certain class of people, there would be a nanny or governess looking after the kids from infancy and as soon as the kids became old enough, they were sent to boarding schools so not living with their parents anyway!

So although I find it hard to imagine doing it with my own kids, I always read it as just what was done at the time, and leave it at that!

#4:  Author: FatimaLocation: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Wed May 17, 2006 4:27 pm
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There are lots of expat workers here, from places like the Philippines, who come to work in Qatar as housemaids, school assistants, whatever, and who leave their children behind. Their husbands remain in the Philippines and care for the children. Some of these ladies are very well qualified, lawyers, teachers etc, but they have to take on menial jobs here in order to support their family. It's very difficult to understand how they can do it, and must be so upsetting for the whole family, but it makes me thankful that I can work and live with my family. It's quite acceptable in the Philippines for women to do this, though; as it was in England at that time. I guess that doesn't always make it easier for people to understand, though.

#5:  Author: Róisín PostPosted: Wed May 17, 2006 4:39 pm
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I don't think that money was that much of an issue though, with the Bettanys. They weren't in India because they had no other option. The family in general weren't poor, and did have lots of private income. There is no reason, in my opinion, that they couldn't have lived like the Christys did - quietly, in a smaller house, until the bigger one became more viable, or vacant in the Bettany's case.

#6:  Author: FatimaLocation: Sunny Qatar PostPosted: Wed May 17, 2006 4:42 pm
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But weren't they poor in the same way that Madge and Jo were poor, necessitating the move to Tyrol? And better the job you have, wherever it may be, than jacking it in and taking your young family to uncertain prospects.

#7:  Author: LollyLocation: London PostPosted: Wed May 17, 2006 5:07 pm
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Fatima wrote:
There are lots of expat workers here, from places like the Philippines, who come to work in Qatar as housemaids, school assistants, whatever, and who leave their children behind. Their husbands remain in the Philippines and care for the children. Some of these ladies are very well qualified, lawyers, teachers etc, but they have to take on menial jobs here in order to support their family. It's very difficult to understand how they can do it, and must be so upsetting for the whole family, but it makes me thankful that I can work and live with my family. It's quite acceptable in the Philippines for women to do this, though; as it was in England at that time. I guess that doesn't always make it easier for people to understand, though.


I worked - very briefly - in domestic recruitment and came across a lot of Filipina staff in this position. Their children were usually being brought up by the grandparents but, as Fatima says, also by the fathers in some cases. I can't really express how impressed I was by the attitude of the women I met. I'm child-free myself but it seems to me a tremendous act of self-sacrifice to go so far away and work so hard to ensure a better life for one's child.

I heard so many appalling stories of the treatment given to domestic staff and will never forget being told by one woman, a nanny/housemaid, that she had been prevented from taking her annual two weeks holiday by her employer which meant that she effectively wasn't going to be able to see her child for two years, but she didn't feel that she could quit her job because the money was so desperately needed at home.

It really brings it home, how lucky we are to live here and how much we take for granted.

Sorry, ranting.

#8:  Author: Kathy_SLocation: midwestern US PostPosted: Wed May 17, 2006 5:16 pm
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The Bettany situation did seem to be a social norm, as strange as it may seem to us now. It certainly wasn't invented by EBD!

In School of, the only private income mentioned is a hundred a year, and that and Dick's salary aren't enough to maintain Madge & Joey in England, so I can't think money isn't an issue. And if Dick's training is in forestry, he has to go where the jobs are, or somehow retrain. There's no guarantee at all that he'll be left a house with income!

#9:  Author: RobLocation: Derbyshire, England PostPosted: Wed May 17, 2006 5:40 pm
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Kathy_S wrote:
The Bettany situation did seem to be a social norm, as strange as it may seem to us now. It certainly wasn't invented by EBD!


I quite agree ... and social norms change with time. My dad's cousin and her husband are both high-powered doctors (she's one of the big cheeses at the main hospital in Guernsey btw - my claim to chalet fame - though they live in the West Midlands). They had a nanny for their two boys due to the hours that they had to work etc and loads of people criticised them for not being more hands on (not least because the boys would listen to the nanny but not to their mother! Laughing ). In EBD's time this was perfectly normal, in fact it was those without help who were considered unnatural!

Considering all the nannies and governesses etc mentioned in the chalet books, the kids don't seem to have spent a great deal of time with their folks anyway - at least at a young age? Even Joey just seems to trot the kids out to show them off and then send them back to the nursery. So did the Bettanys really miss out on a lot?

There is another way to look at it of course ...

If Dick and Mollie had kept their children with them (as social norms nowadays would dictate) then Bride and Peggy wouldn't have been able to go to the Chalet School Laughing EBD certainly wouldn't have wanted that!

#10:  Author: MaeveLocation: Romania PostPosted: Wed May 17, 2006 5:49 pm
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Not only does the Bettany situation seem the norm for the time, but they don't seem that different from many of the other characters in the books. There are scads of semi or real "abandoned" children in the series: Carola, whose parents are in Africa; Katherine Gordon, whose parents are in China; the Robin, whose father is in Russia; Verity Ann, whose father is in South America; Juliet, whose parents leave her; Ted, whose mother doesn't want to be bothered her; Annis Lovell, with her nasty aunt; someone like Grizel, whose parents don't care for her; and lots of people with one parent who is away - the Wintertons, Mary Lou. Parents, except for Joey and Jack and, to some extent, Madge and Jem, don't feature much in the books, except to be audience at plays, etc. I guess their absence makes room for Madge, in the early books, and Joey, in all of the later ones, to take their place. And for the school to become their family.

Sorry - maybe this should be a separate thread. Confused

#11:  Author: JoyfulLocation: Manchester PostPosted: Wed May 17, 2006 6:12 pm
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I think that they were doing the best for their children according to the accepted beliefs/norms of the time. Not only are the children kept away from a damaging climate, but they stay with relations who can provide the love and support of family. In a time when children were going to boarding school from a young age (even when their parents were in the country), they are well cared for.
Preumably it was thought of as a sacrifice the parents made for the good of their children, and keeping their children with them would have been selfish.
Not at all what we would do nowadays, of course, but I think I can see how it would have been right to them.

#12:  Author: CazxLocation: Swansea/Bristol PostPosted: Wed May 17, 2006 6:53 pm
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This had been happening for many years before EBD wrote about the Bettany's. Kipling and his sister were left behind in England by their parents, who preferred to leave them with strangers who weren't supposed to be very nice rather than a) take them to India with them or b) leave them with their aunts. At least Peggy, Rix, Bride and Jackie were living with relatives.

#13:  Author: MelLocation: UP NORTH PostPosted: Wed May 17, 2006 7:09 pm
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I think it was the norm and Mollie cannot be accused of being heartless, but I do wonder why it took them so long to return after the war. Surely Dick would be due some furlough. What does surprise me, when they are reunited, is that Mollie doesn't know that Bride wears glasses and Maeve has never seen any snaps of her sisters as she doesn't know which is which!

#14:  Author: MiriamLocation: Jerusalem, Israel PostPosted: Wed May 17, 2006 7:40 pm
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Would Dick and Mollie have paid anything towards their support, or would that have been entirely on Madge and Jem?

I'm not sure about Maeve. It could be that she had seen photos ut hadn't paid much attention to them, seeing her sisters as vague figures who didn't really have much to do with her. Peggy was very small, and Bride fairly tall, so they were proably about the same hight, so that wouldn't have helped. I could also have been that Maeve was feeling left out of the excitement of the reunion, and wanted to reming people that hse was there - so asked a fairly obvioud questionin order that people would answer her. We hear later that she has trouble settling down to a 'younger sister' position, and this could be a foreshadowing of it.

#15:  Author: PatLocation: Doncaster PostPosted: Wed May 17, 2006 8:55 pm
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To go back to the question of contraception, there really wasn't much choice according to my Mum who got married in 1947. she said you cuold either use withdrawal, rhythm, or the sheath. she said the rubber used in the latter was quite thick and cut down on sensation so much that they gave it up!!! Embarassed

#16:  Author: TaraLocation: Malvern, Worcestershire PostPosted: Wed May 17, 2006 11:06 pm
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From our perspective, children at the time were treated with a casualness that is shocking. Obviously, parentless (or almost) children are a plot device in a lot of children's books, but RL parents did think it was better for the kids to be left, for all the reasons people have said. It wasn't all about money, either; there was also, I think, a feeling of responsibility towards the Empire, which had, of course, to be staffed. What has often struck me is how these 'abandoned' children are, nonetheless, expected to relate immediately and wholeheartedly to their biological parents, whom they haven't seen for many years, and are castigated as unnatural if they exhibit distress at being taken away from the carers who have brought them up. Children are adopted in an extremely casual way, and for very trivial reasons (in one of DFB's books, one twin is chosen because the other is crying at the time) - it's just how it was. Children were often, of course, farmed out, for financial reasons, to other, possibly childless, members of the family to bring up, again hoping to give them a better life. And it's not that different from boarding school. I've lived for over 25 years in an area where there was a rash of prestigious boarding schools. Over that period, they have gradually died out until we are left with only two. Autre temps, autres moeurs - thank goodness.

#17:  Author: jenniferLocation: Taiwan PostPosted: Thu May 18, 2006 3:03 am
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Tara wrote:
What has often struck me is how these 'abandoned' children are, nonetheless, expected to relate immediately and wholeheartedly to their biological parents, whom they haven't seen for many years, and are castigated as unnatural if they exhibit distress at being taken away from the carers who have brought them up.


That's always puzzled me too - Bride in particular is twelve and hasn't seen her parents since she was a toddler. EBD does mention conflict between Peggy and Maeve, as Peggy attempts to mother and discipline her younger sister, who resents the authority of an older sister she's never seen before (similar to Sybil's resentment of being mothered by an older cousin).

The Bettanys do return during the war, apon inheriting property (it's in Tom, which is still the war years, however, I think EBD had sort of forgotten about it while writing the book). In School, it says that Dick doesn't plan to get married, as India is not a good place to take a wife, but marries Mollie who is already down there. At that point he would have to quit his job in India and find new employment in England which would support them in the style to which they were accustomed, without a private income.

I get the impression that the attitude towards raising children was much more hands off than in modern times. Joey keeps her children to nursery meals until they are five, and sends the boys to boarding school in another country at age seven.

From a practical viewpoint, families were typically larger in those days, and there was a lot more physical work involved in running a house. These days we tend to lavish individual attention on one to three children which would not be possible if you had seven kids and were keeping house with no electronic appliances.

#18:  Author: MaeveLocation: Romania PostPosted: Thu May 18, 2006 6:22 am
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Maybe family history also influences the Bettanys. Joey,
Quote:
Like her brother and sister, ... had been born in India; but, unlike them, had come home at the early age of seven months. The frail baby who had never known her mother or father had thriven in the soft Cornish air of their home till she was four years old.


If it wasn't for Joey, Madge might have gone out to India with Dick, but they are sure that India is bad for children.

Then, too, Madge is the more dominant twin. Dick
Quote:
...knew very well that Madge had set her heart on this project, and that he had neither the strength of will nor the authority to turn her from her purpose. They were twins, and all their lives long she had been the one to plan for them both. If she had determined to start this school, nothing he could say or do could prevent her.


So if Madge (thinking of Joey's frail past and how bad India would have been for her) and Jem (who always knows best about health matters) thought that India would be bad for the Bettany children and agreed to care for them, and if general conensus said the same,I can't see Dick and Mollie rebelling against this.

#19:  Author: patmacLocation: Yorkshire England PostPosted: Thu May 18, 2006 6:28 am
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It certainly was the norm for children of 'Empire' families to be sent back to England. Part of this was the climate itself and partly to shield them from diseases like malaria. They also needed to come back to England to get a good schooling - particularly the boys, where there was an 'old boys' network based on the Public Schools which they really needed in order to be successful in their careers.

I don't think that we can quite realise the strength of feeling of 'Service to the Empire' there was right up to the second world war. Terribly misguided to our eyes but that's with hindsight.

This did carry on through into the 50s and there was a girl in my form who was 'Anglo Indian' and arrived at 11 years old and didn't see her parents again till she went back to India at 16.

Quote:
Children were often, of course, farmed out, for financial reasons, to other, possibly childless, members of the family to bring up, again hoping to give them a better life.


That went right across the social classes. My mother's three oldest siblings were left with an aunt when the family moved to Lancashire. Incidentally, by all worldly measures, they did considerably better than the ones who went with their parents.

#20:  Author: PollyLocation: Essex PostPosted: Thu May 18, 2006 6:52 am
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It can still happen today. Don;t forget that many children of Service families may be sent back to boarding school in the UK. When we were abroad in the 1970s (all 3 of us were born abroad) there were not only day schools run by SCE, but also boarding schools for older students. My dad taught at a day school in both Malta and Germany, but we could quite easily have been sent to one of the boarding places in Germany, or even back in the UK, when we got to Secondary age. We actually moved back to the UK when I was still at Primary school anyway.

My point is that there are far fewer schools for such children these days (fewer bases, fewer personnel and therefore fewer schools needed), and they may well be sent to boarding school in another country (the UK or wherever) whilst their parents are based somewhere else, as that is the only option.

#21:  Author: CarolineLocation: Manchester PostPosted: Thu May 18, 2006 8:07 am
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Rachel wrote:
It is one of those things that I think you need to have been around at the time for it to seem in any way reasonable! To our way of thinking, it is completely horrendous to contemplate having kids and then handing them over to other people for several years (although there are days when...) but at the time EBD started writing, that's just the way it was.


And if you think about it, it's not that dissimilar to sending them to boarding school at the age of 7, which again is presented as being entirely normal and acceptable. OK, so if they were at boarding school they would see their parents in the holidays, but....

Caroline.

#22:  Author: KatherineLocation: London, UK PostPosted: Thu May 18, 2006 8:16 am
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One of Jane Austen's brothers was adopted by a rich, childless family. I guess because they were rich.

And think of Fanny in Mansfield Park. Her mother asks Lady Bertram (Fanny's aunt, her mother's sister) to take on one of her children as she has too many mouths to feed. While Fanny does feel the loss of her family, it's all for the best in the end.

Also, today, plenty of people have kids they don't live with or see. Usually down to divorce/relationship breakdown but there's a lot of kids who don't see both parents.

Having said all that, I did find it bizarre when I was a kid the was Dick and Mollie just left them with the Russells. I did wonder how the Russells, particularly Jem, felt about it, but then they probably felt it was their duty and just got on with it.

#23:  Author: RobLocation: Derbyshire, England PostPosted: Thu May 18, 2006 8:25 am
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Katherine wrote:
I did wonder how the Russells, particularly Jem, felt about it, but then they probably felt it was their duty and just got on with it.


I wondered more about Molly. She left the twins with Madge and Jem the first time she met them! (I think!). I always thought that she would probably have prefered leaving them with her sister. Was Austria considered healthier/safer than Ireland at the time? Or was Bridgets family too big to be added to? Or is it just a case of the 'men' deciding what was best?

#24:  Author: CarolineLocation: Manchester PostPosted: Thu May 18, 2006 12:31 pm
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Ireland in the 1920s was in the midst of partition from the UK, and there was plenty of violence around in the aftermath of civil war, I think. So, Austria probably was the safer option.

The other thing is that Dick met Mollie in the first place becuase her father was his boss in India. So, it could very well be that any siblings she had were also in India living with their parents, rather than in Ireland with homes of their own.

Also, EBD probably didn't invent any sibs for Mollie until she (EBD) decided she (Mollie) needed some for plot reasons - is Bride Leads the first time we learn of her sister(s)? Or is it when Bride is born that we find out Mollie had a sister who died? I really can't remember.....!

Anyway, point is, there may not have been any siblings for her to send her children to.

Caroline.

#25:  Author: KarryLocation: Stoke on Trent PostPosted: Thu May 18, 2006 1:40 pm
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Doesnt it mention that Bride is called Bridget after the sister who died - and then in Bride leads, Auntie Bridget comes to look after Mollie?

#26:  Author: MaeveLocation: Romania PostPosted: Thu May 18, 2006 2:11 pm
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Caroline said,
Quote:
Ireland in the 1920s was in the midst of partition from the UK, and there was plenty of violence around in the aftermath of civil war, I think. So, Austria probably was the safer option.
and EBD refers to this her self in School when Dick asks Madge where she is thinking of having the school:
Quote:
‘Then where were you thinking of?’ he demanded, not unreasonably. ‘Ireland? Shouldn’t advise that! You might wake up one morning to find yourself burnt out!’

#27:  Author: MichelleLocation: Near London PostPosted: Thu May 18, 2006 7:16 pm
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Karry wrote:
Doesnt it mention that Bride is called Bridget after the sister who died - and then in Bride leads, Auntie Bridget comes to look after Mollie?


Yes - that always confused me. But is Aunt Bridget a real aunt or a brevet aunt, perhaps a friend of Mollie's? There is reference to a cousin, but I think someone told me that the children of brevet aunts and uncles were known as cousins - there are a few references to Nita Eltringham's being a cousin of the Lucys'.

But I bet it's just another EBDism. I don't think Aunt Bridget is the only character to come back from the dead.

Michelle

#28:  Author: LyanneLocation: Ipswich, England PostPosted: Thu May 18, 2006 7:34 pm
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My husband was born in 1970, his mother is English & father American, then in the US Navy. They spent the first 10 years of his life in America or Italy on US Bases, coming to UK in 1980. Husband didn't get on well in UK schools, so his father offered him the chance to go to a US forces school (in Oxfordshire, I think), where he would have boarded.

#29:  Author: TiffanyLocation: Is this a duck I see behind me? PostPosted: Fri May 19, 2006 4:20 pm
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Michelle wrote:
Karry wrote:
Doesnt it mention that Bride is called Bridget after the sister who died - and then in Bride leads, Auntie Bridget comes to look after Mollie?

But I bet it's just another EBDism. I don't think Aunt Bridget is the only character to come back from the dead.

Maybe Mollie's sister Bridget died, and when another sister was born she, too, was named after the dead Bridget? But it's odd the living one wasn't mntioned in connection with Bride's name...

#30:  Author: RobLocation: Derbyshire, England PostPosted: Fri May 19, 2006 7:04 pm
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Tiffany wrote:
Maybe Mollie's sister Bridget died, and when another sister was born she, too, was named after the dead Bridget? But it's odd the living one wasn't mntioned in connection with Bride's name...


I know that this often happened (researching my family tree we found one family who had three attempts at a John!) but I think in this case it is probably an EBDism. If Mollie's sister Bridget had died when Bride was born, but then another sister was born after this and re-named Bridget then that would mean her sister was younger than Bride; when Peggy is told that she is to finish the year at Welsen because Auntie Bridget is coming to keep house for the Bettany's, she (Auntie Bridget) is supposed to be waiting a year before going out to Africa? to live with her newly married daughter. I don't think EBD would have approved of a 16/17 year old with a married daughter!

#31:  Author: Laura VLocation: Merseyside, UK PostPosted: Sat May 20, 2006 3:14 pm
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I always felt so sorry for the elder Bettany children. I suppose the War did play a big part in the Dick and Mollie not seeing their kids for so long. How long would a journey to India have taken in the 1930s?

#32:  Author: JaneLocation: Southampton PostPosted: Tue Jun 20, 2006 11:48 am
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It was completely standard to send children out of India because of the climate - I don't suppose not to do so crossed anybody's mind. As for returning immediately after the war, IIRC India gained independence in 1947 which probably meant a period of handover before that, followed by the end of Dick's job in the Forests at which point they came to the Quadrant, or at least so I've always imagined.

When I was teaching in an independent (day) primary school, I became the librarian and we still had an ancient copy of Stalky and Co on the shelves, which was considered an exemplar of children's lit both by EBD (Jo recommends it to Polly in Jo Returns) and also by the incomparable E Nesbit (in the Treasure Seekers). Not only is it set in a boarding school specifically for the sons of colonial workers, which really existed and which Kipling attended (after leaving his not just 'not very nice' but hideously sadistic carers) but the values of the book now seem utterly alien; the level of bullying, prejudice, imperialism and general nastiness would be completely unacceptable at any modern school. I whipped it off the shelves pretty sharpish. However, as a period piece and window into the mores of Empire I'd recommend it to anyone here...

#33:  Author: Cath V-PLocation: Newcastle NSW PostPosted: Wed Jun 21, 2006 12:06 am
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I have read somewhere that Stalky is "a gangster story in a school setting".... which sums it up fairly well I think!
Having said that, I do love it - and yes I agree about the bullying prejudice, imperialism etc

#34:  Author: Elder in OntarioLocation: Ontario, Canada PostPosted: Wed Jun 21, 2006 1:00 am
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I saw this quite by chance - I've read Stalky on and off for the last 50 years and still love it, warts and all.

I agree wholeheartedly about the bullying etc. but if read as an illustration of the times in which it was written, it's a wonderful, if often horrifying, picture of what went on - even more horrifying when we remember that Kipling drew pretty heavily on his own experiences in writing it.

Coming back on EBD topic, in leaving their children with relatives in England, Molly and Dick were certainly only following what was considered normal practice for the times - the climate of India was definitely considered not to be suitable for children. In fact, Molly and Dick were lucky that Madge and Jem could become guardians to their children - at least this meant the two of them could stay on in India together - so often, this practice of repatriating the children meant that their mothers, too, had to remain in England with them, enduring separation from their husbands for months if not years at a time.

#35:  Author: SquirrelLocation: St-Andrews or Dunfermline PostPosted: Wed Jun 21, 2006 7:50 pm
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For me, the book which comes to mind again and again when thinking of children sent from their parents in India is "A Little Princess" which formed one of the non-Chalet books I have read over and over. In fact I came upon it again recently, and you never know... Well, as long as I wasn't mistaken and can actually work out where I put it of course!

Having read this, probably before I read of the Bettany childrens exile, I think I took it all as generally acceptible behaviour.

#36:  Author: JennieLocation: Cambridgeshire PostPosted: Thu Jun 22, 2006 10:20 am
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The way Mary was being brought up at the beginning of 'The Secret Garden' is also pretty typical of life in India.

#37:  Author: LuluLocation: West Midlands, UK PostPosted: Fri Jun 23, 2006 7:44 pm
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In the 1930s and 40s, my aunts and uncles (four of them) were first sent to boarding schools in cooler parts of India and then sent to England to stay with relatives they'd never met. They were all about five or six when they were first sent away, and my mother was only not sent away because the family moved when she was nearly two. Apparently her brothers used to threaten her with boarding school when she annoyed them!

#38:  Author: moonlitsparkleLocation: Yorkshire, England PostPosted: Sun Jun 25, 2006 7:34 pm
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Because most of my childhood books were stories like the Chalets, The Secret Garden, A Little Princess etc I was really under the impression that the Empire still existed (this in the early nineties) and wondered why none of my relatives were off in India! It seems to play a big part in children's stories of that era.

#39:  Author: Mrs RedbootsLocation: London, UK PostPosted: Wed Jul 05, 2006 4:10 pm
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moonlitsparkle wrote:
Because most of my childhood books were stories like the Chalets, The Secret Garden, A Little Princess etc I was really under the impression that the Empire still existed (this in the early nineties) and wondered why none of my relatives were off in India! It seems to play a big part in children's stories of that era.
It was a big part of life in that era! My mother and her sister were there as small children - they were "army brats", and a posting to India was as normal a part of an army career as a posting to Germany or Northern Ireland is today.

Their aunts, at one stage, ran a school/boarding-house for children whose parents were in India. I hope they were kinder to them than Kipling's guardians were!

Even when I was at school, in the 1960s, we had several girls whose parents were working in Singapore or Malaya. By then, though, the parents had to appoint guardians in this country so the school had someone to turn to if necessary, and the children had somewhere to go for the Christmas and Easter holidays - they usually only joined their parents in the summer. Gradually, though, more and more parents returned to England, although their daughters stayed at school until at least post O-level!

#40:  Author: JayBLocation: SE England PostPosted: Wed Jul 05, 2006 4:38 pm
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My brother in law works in Kenya and my sister and their youngest child are out there. The three eldest children all went to boarding school in England from just before their 14th birthdays - the two eldest are now at university in England. It was entirely their choice - they all had the option of going to school in Nairobi if they wanted. Nowadays, of course, with air travel being the norm, it's possible to fly out for the half term week as well as Christmas and Easter holidays, and my sister flies over for school concerts and matches. And bro in law flies over on business and sees the boys too. So they're not out of touch as parents were in the past.

Jay B.



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