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Enid Mary Blyton (11 August 1897 – 28 November 1968) was an English children's writer who also wrote under the name of Mary Pollock.

She is noted for numerous series of popular books based on recurring characters and designed for different age groups. Her books have enjoyed huge success in many parts of the world, and have sold more than 600 million copies.

One of Blyton's best-known characters is Noddy, intended for early years readers, but her main work is the genre of young readers' novels in which children have their own adventures with minimal adult help. Series of this type include The Famous Five (21 novels, 1942–63, based on four children and their dog), The Five Find-Outers and Dog (15 novels, 1943–61, in which five children regularly solve crimes before the local police), as well as The Secret Seven (15 novels, 1949–63, a society of seven children who solve various mysteries). She also wrote some lesser known poems and books.

Blyton's books are still enormously popular throughout the Commonwealth and across most of the globe. Her work has been translated into almost 90 languages, and her literary output was an estimated 800 books over roughly 40 years.

Chorion Limited of London owned and handled the intellectual properties and character brands of Blyton's estate but following financial difficulties in 2012, sold its assets. Hachette UK acquired world rights in the Blyton estate in March 2013, including The Famous Five series. The rights to Noddy were sold to DreamWorks Classics (formerly Classic Media, now a subsidiary of DreamWorks Animation) in 2012.

Early life

Blyton was born on 11 August 1897 at 354 Lordship Lane, East Dulwich, London, England, the eldest child of Thomas Carey Blyton (1870–1920), a salesman of cutlery, and his wife, Theresa Mary Harrison Blyton (1874–1950). There were two younger brothers, Hanly (1899–1983) and Carey (1902–76), who were born after the family had moved to the nearby town of Beckenham. Blyton adored her father and was devastated after he left the family to live with another woman; this has often been cited as the reason behind her emotional immaturity. Blyton and her mother did not have a good relationship, and later in life, Blyton claimed to others that her mother was dead and ultimately did not attend either of her parents' funerals.

From 1907 to 1915, Blyton was educated at St. Christopher's School in Beckenham, leaving as head girl. She enjoyed physical activities along with some academic work, but not maths. She was close to her French teacher, Louise Bertraine, who took her to her holiday home in Annecy. Blyton was a talented pianist, and had intended enrolling at the Guildhall School of Music, but decided that she was best suited to being a writer. Blyton moved away from home and stayed with Ida Hunt, a teacher at Ipswich High School, who lived on a farm near Woodbridge in Suffolk. Blyton was introduced to the children at the kindergarten there, and recognising her natural affinity to children enrolled in a teacher-training course at the school in September 1916. Blyton later professed that "my love of children is the whole foundation of all my work".

Life and career

1920s

Blyton accepted a post as a teacher at a small independent boys school in Bickley, Kent in January 1919, and the following year she joined the school at Surbiton, serving as nursery governess to the four Thompson boys there. She later worked in Chessington, and began writing in her spare time. On 28 August 1924, Blyton married Major Hugh Alexander Pollock, DSO (1888–1971), editor of the book department in the publishing firm of George Newnes, which published two of her books that year. They initially lived in a flat in Chelsea, then in Elfin Cottage in Beckenham in 1926, and then in Old Thatch in Bourne End, Buckinghamshire (Peterswood in her books) in 1929.

Blyton's first book, Child Whispers, a 24-page collection of poems, was published in 1922. This was followed by Real Fairies: Poems and Responsive Singing Games in 1923, The Enid Blyton Book of Fairies, Songs of Gladness and Sports and Games in 1924, and the Book of Brownies in 1926. Blyton began establishing a reputation as a children's writer that year when she began writing for the magazine Sunny Stories, which typically included the re-telling of legends, myths and stories and useful articles for children which became very popular. She used the pseudonym Mary Pollock for a few titles (middle name plus first married name). In 1927 she published several books of plays including A Book of Little Plays and The Play's the Thing (with illustrator Alfred Bestall), and authored Silver and Gold and The Animal Book. In 1929 Blyton published The Book Around Europe and Enid Blyton's Nature Lessons, described as a "floral fantasy in an Old English Garden".

1930s

Blyton had two children in the 1930s; Gillian Mary Baverstock (15 July 1931 – 24 June 2007) and Imogen Mary Smallwood (born 27 October 1935). Blyton developed an interest in writing tales related to ancient Greece and ancient Rome and myths. In 1930 she published The Knights of the Round Table, Tales of Ancient Greece and Tales of Robin Hood. In Tales of Ancient Greece Blyton retells 16 well-known Ancient Greek myths, but uses the Latin rather than the Greek names of deities and invents conversations between the characters. In 1934, a particularly productive year, she released The Adventures of Odysseus, Tales of the Ancient Greeks and Persians, Tales of the Romans, The Enid Blyton Poetry Book, The Strange Tale of Mr. Wumble and her "Round the Year" nature series. In 1935 she authored The Children's Garden, reprinted in 1948 as Let's Garden and The Green Goblin Book, and the following year worked with illustrator Benjamin Rabier to publish The Famous Jimmy.

Blyton's first serial story and first full-length book, Adventures of the Wishing Chair, was published in 1937. In 1939 Blyton published The Enchanted Wood, the first book in the The Faraway Tree series based around a magic tree, influenced by Norse mythology which had fascinated her as a child. These fantasy books of Blyton typically involve children being transported into a magical world in which they meet fairies, goblins, elves, pixies, or other mythological creatures. In 1937, Blyton's magazine was renamed Enid Blyton's Sunny Stories in 1937, when it began serving as a vehicle for Blyton's books, appearing as serials. It returned to its original title in 1942, and became a fortnightly publication. In 1938 Blyton and her family moved to a house in Beaconsfield, named Green Hedges by Blyton's readers following a competition in her magazine.

1940s–'50s

By 1939, Blyton's marriage to Pollock was in difficulties, and she began a series of affairs. In 1941 she met Kenneth Fraser Darrell Waters, a London surgeon with whom she began a relationship. During her divorce, Blyton blackmailed Pollock into taking full blame for the failure of the marriage, knowing that exposure of her adultery would ruin her public image. She promised that if he admitted to charges of infidelity, she would allow him unlimited access to their daughters. However, after the divorce, Pollock was forbidden to contact his daughters, and Blyton ensured he was unable to find work in publishing afterwards. He turned to drinking heavily and was forced to petition for bankruptcy. Blyton and Darrell Waters married at the City of Westminster Register Office on 20 October 1943, and she subsequently changed the surname of her two daughters to Darrell Waters. Pollock later remarried. Blyton's second marriage was very happy and, as far as her public image was concerned, she moved smoothly into her role as a devoted doctor's wife, living with him and her two daughters at Green Hedges.

In the 1940s, Blyton not only exhibited how prolific she could be as an author, but displayed a "marketing, publicity and branding that was far ahead of its time", contributing to her major success during this period. Helena Bonham Carter, who played Blyton in the 2009 BBC film Enid, described Blyton as "a complete workaholic, an achievement junkie and an extremely canny businesswomen" who "knew how to brand herself, right down to the famous signature". In September 1942, Hodder & Stoughton published Blyton's first Famous Five novel, Five on a Treasure Island. The series became tremendously successful and resulted in the writing of 21 books between then and 1963. The characters of Julian, Dick, and Anne, George (Georgina), and Timothy the Dog became household names in Britain. Blyton also showed an interest in writing biblical stories. The Land of Far-Beyond (1942) is a Christian parable along the lines of John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress (1698), with modern children as the central characters. She also produced retellings of Old Testament and New Testament stories.

In 1946, continuing her boarding school story genre of books from the St Clare's series and the Naughtiest Girl books, Blyton published First Term at Malory Towers, the first of six books based around schoolgirl Darrell Rivers. The name is evidently derived from her second husband. In 1949, Brockhampton Press published Blyton's first novel of the The Secret Seven to cater to her younger readers with an easy reading alternative to the Famous Five. 15 books and several short stories were produced about a fictional group of child detectives who form the "Secret Seven Society" to fight crime; the last novel, Fun for the Secret Seven, was published in 1963. As a result of her wealth generated from her 1940s books, in 1950 she established the company Darrell Waters Ltd to organize her affairs. Sunny Stories ceased production in February 1953, succeeded by Enid Blyton's Magazine, which ran until September 1959.

By the 1950s Blyton's books were becoming increasingly controversial with the public, and libraries began to ban her works from the shelves. Many were critically assessed by teachers and librarians, deemed unfit for children to read in their development, and taken off syllabuses and out of the libraries. In a 1958 article in Encounter, Colin Welch remarked that it was "hard to see how a diet of Miss Blyton could help with the 11-plus or even with the Cambridge English Tripos". The Nottingham and St Pancras libraries especially were well-publicized in their banning of Blyton's books, and by the early 1960s Blyton had become strongly associated with the criticism of children's literature across the globe. Criticism continued in following decades; in 1973 top children's literary critic Margery Fisher likened Blyton's books to "slow poison". Her books nonetheless continued to be best-sellers and attract new generations of young readers.

Death and aftermath

Blyton's second husband Darrell Waters died in 1967. During the following months, Blyton became increasingly ill. Afflicted by Alzheimer's disease, Blyton was moved into a nursing home three months before her death; she died at the Greenways Nursing Home, London, on 28 November 1968, aged 71, and was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium where her ashes remain.

Since her death and the publication of her daughter Imogen's 1989 autobiography, A Childhood at Green Hedges, Blyton has emerged as an emotionally immature, unstable and often malicious figure. Blyton's daughter Imogen considered her mother to be "arrogant, insecure, pretentious, very skilled at putting difficult or unpleasant things out of her mind, and without a trace of maternal instinct. As a child, I viewed her as a rather strict authority. As an adult I pitied her." However, her eldest daughter, Gillian, did not hold the same view toward their mother, and Imogen's biography of Blyton contains a foreword by Gillian to the effect that her memories of childhood with Enid Blyton were mainly happy ones.

Blyton's home, Green Hedges, was demolished in 1973. The area where Green Hedges once stood is now occupied by houses and a street called Blyton Close. An English Heritage blue plaque commemorates Blyton at Hook Road in Chessington, where she lived from 1920 to 1924.

Critical appraisal

It was frequently reported in the 1950s and from the 1980s onwards that various children's libraries had removed some of Blyton's books from the shelves. Some librarians felt that her restricted use of language, a conscious product of her teaching background, militated against appreciation of more literary qualities. Although Blyton's works have been banned from more public libraries than those of any other author, there is no evidence that the popularity of her books ever suffered, and she remains very widely read.

From the 1930s to the 1950s the BBC had a de facto ban on dramatising Blyton's books for radio, considering her to be a "second-rater" whose work was without literary merit; Jean E. Sutcliffe of the BBC's schools broadcast department wrote of Blyton's ability to churn out "mediocre material", and that "Her capacity to do so, amounts to genius ... anyone else would have died of boredom long ago." It was not until 1954 that the BBC broadcast the first of Blyton's stories. Michael Rosen, the former Children's Laureate, said of the BBC's attitude towards Blyton "the quality of the writing itself was poor ... it was felt that there was a lot of snobbery and racism in the writing ... There is all sorts of stuff about oiks and lower orders." Blyton's response to her critics was that she was uninterested in the views of anyone over the age of 12, and claimed that half the attacks on her work were motivated by jealousy and the rest came from "stupid people who don't know what they're talking about because they've never read any of my books".

Racism and xenophobia

Blyton's books are very much of their time, particularly those published in the 1950s, reflecting attitudes about the UK's class system. Jamaica Kincaid considers the Noddy books to be "deeply racist" because of the blond children and the black doll golliwogg. Modern reprints replace golliwogg with teddy bears or goblins. In her 1944 novel The Island of Adventure, a black servant named Jo-Jo is depicted as an enemy of the British. Although he is portrayed as very intelligent, Jo-Jo functions as a spy for the Nazis and is particularly cruel to the children. Another example of alleged racism is "black as a nigger with soot" which appeared in Five Go off to Camp. Some of the publishers' responses to contemporary attitudes on racial stereotypes have themselves drawn criticism from others who view them as tampering with an important piece of the history of children's literature.

Accusations of xenophobia were also made. A publisher rejected one of her stories in 1960, commenting "There is a faint but unattractive touch of old-fashioned xenophobia in the author's attitude to the thieves; they are 'foreign' ... and this seems to be regarded as sufficient to explain their criminality."

Sexism

There have also been suggestions that Blyton's depictions of boys and girls are sexist. A 2005 Guardian article suggested that The Famous Five series depicts a power struggle between Julian, Dick and George (Georgina), with the female characters either acting like boys or being heavily put upon, as when Dick lectures George: "it's really time you gave up thinking you're as good as a boy". Similar gender issues also surface in Five Have a Wonderful Time, in which Anne says "I don't expect boys to tidy up and cook and do things like that but George ought to because she's a girl". The children's author Anne Fine presented an overview of the concerns about Blyton's work and responses to them on BBC Radio 4 in November 2008, in which she noted the "drip, drip, drip of disapproval" associated with the books. In an effort to address criticisms levelled at Blyton's work some later editions of her books have been altered. References to George's short hair making her look like a boy were cut in revisions to Five on a Hike Together, reflecting the idea that girls need not have long hair to be considered feminine. Similarly, Arabella in The Naughtiest Girl series originally wore slippers with swansdown trimmings, changed to "blue silk slippers" in editions published since the 1970s, out of deference to modern views on animal rights and animal welfare. The Faraway Tree's Dame Slap, who practised severe corporal punishment, was changed to Dame Snap who no longer did so, and references to characters in the Malory Towers and St. Clare's series being spanked, or being threatened with a spanking, were changed to their being scolded or threatened with a scolding. In the 1990s Chorion, the owners of Blyton's works, edited her books to remove passages that were deemed racist or sexist.

Selected works and legacy

Blyton wrote hundreds of books for young and older children: novels, story collections and some non-fiction. Notable book series include Noddy, The Famous Five, The Secret Seven, Malory Towers, the St. Clare's series, The Wishing-Chair series, The Magic Faraway Tree series, The Five Find-Outers (also known as Enid Blyton's Mystery series), The Adventure Series, the Barney Mystery series, the Circus series, the Mistletoe Farm series, the Naughtiest Girl series, The Young Adventurers Series, The Adventurous Four Series, and The Secret Series. Her books have sold more than 600 million copies. From 2000 to 2010, she was still listed as a Top Ten author, selling 7,910,758 copies (worth £31.2 million) in the UK alone. In 2003, The Magic Faraway Tree was voted no. 66 in the BBC's Big Read. In the 2008 Costa Book Awards, Blyton was voted Britain's best-loved author.

The Enid Blyton Trust for Children was established in 1982 by Blyton's daughter Imogen, and in 1985 the trust established the National Library for the Handicapped Child. The Enid Blyton Society was formed in early 1995, with the aim of providing "a focal point for collectors and enthusiasts of Enid Blyton" through its thrice-annual The Enid Blyton Society Journal, its annual Enid Blyton Day, and its website. In 1996, Trocedero purchased Blyton's Darrell Waters Ltd and established a subsidiary, Enid Blyton Ltd, to deal with her books and media. Chorion Limited of London owned and handled the intellectual properties and character brands of Blyton's estate but following financial difficulties in 2012, sold its assets. Hachette UK acquired world rights in the Blyton estate in March 2013, including The Famous Five series. The rights to Noddy were sold to DreamWorks Classics (formerly Classic Media, now a subsidiary of DreamWorks Animation) in 2012.

In February 2011, the manuscript of a previously unknown Blyton novel, Mr Tumpy's Caravan, was discovered in a collection of her papers that had been auctioned in 2010 following the death of her eldest child in 2007.

Stage, film and TV adaptations

A number of Blyton's works have been adapted for stage, film and television. In 1955 a stage play was produced based on The Famous Five, and in 1997 a musical was produced to commemorate her centenary. The Famous Five has been adapted for television several times; by the Children's Film Foundation in 1957, Southern Television in 1978–79, and Zenith Films (1995–97).

The story of Blyton's life was turned into a BBC film entitled Enid with Helena Bonham Carter in the title role, which first aired in the United Kingdom on BBC Four on 16 November 2009, followed by a documentary on Enid Blyton. Matthew Macfadyen and Denis Lawson played Blyton's first husband, Hugh Pollock, and Blyton's second husband, Kenneth Darrell Waters, respectively.

See also

• Enid Blyton Society
• Enid Blyton's illustrators

References

Citations

1. Index Translationum, UNESCO http://databases.unesco.org/xtrans/stat/xTransStat.a?VL1=A&top=50&lg=0, retrieved 12 July 2007 {{citation}}: |contribution= ignored (help); Missing or empty |title= (help) This index contains titles in all the translated languages. The top five are: Walt Disney Productions, Agatha Christie, Jules Verne, Shakespeare, Enid Blyton, and the next five: Vladimir Lenin, Dame Barbara Cartland, Danielle Steel, Hans Christian Andersen, and Stephen King
2. Thompson & Keenan (2006), p. 77
3. Stoney (2011), 289–295
4. ^ Ray, Sheila (2004), "Blyton, Enid Mary (1897–1968)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.), Oxford University Press, retrieved 19 June 2008 (subscription or UK public library membership required)
5. "Enid Blyton: Remembering the Creator of Noddy and The Famous Five", BBC http://www.bbc.co.uk/archive/blyton/, retrieved 22 January 2014 {{citation}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
6. Old Thatch Gardens, retrieved 21 May 2011
7. Stoney (2011), 642
8. Bluemel (2009), p. 209
9. Book Collecting and Library Monthly. 1970. p. 31.
10. Brazouski & Klatt (1994), p. 25
11. ^ Matthew (1999), p. 70
12. ^ Jenkins, Garry (15 November 2009), The Telegraph http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/6570310/Why-Enid-Blytons-greatest-creation-was-herself.html, retrieved 22 January 2013 {{citation}}: |contribution= ignored (help); Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |work= (help); Missing or empty |title= (help)
13. Murray (2010), p. 120
14. Antiquarian Book Monthly. ABMR Publications. 1994. p. 18.
15. Brandreth, Gyles (31 March 2002), "Unhappy Families", The Age, retrieved 29 March 2010
16. Stoney (2011), p. 117
17. "Blyton, Enid (1897–1968)", English Heritage http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/discover/blue-plaques/search/blyton-enid-1897-1968, retrieved 4 August 2012 {{citation}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
18. Tucker (1990), p. 7
19. Adams, Stephen (15 November 2009), "BBC Banned Enid Blyton For 30 Years", The Telegraph, retrieved 20 January 2014
20. "'Small beer' Blyton banned by BBC", BBC News, 15 November 2009 http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8361056.stm, retrieved 20 January 2009 {{citation}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
21. Will Pavia in The Times 16 November 2009
22. Stoney (2011), 2567–2573
23. Druce (1992), p. 77
24. Cockin & Morrison (2010), p. 74
25. Bouson (2012), p. 207
26. Edwards (2007), p. 257
27. "Buy Enid Blyton Books", Enidblyton.net http://www.enidblyton.net/buy-enid-blyton-books.html, retrieved 22 January 2014 {{citation}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
28. The Sydney Morning Herald, 21 November 2005 http://www.smh.com.au/news/books/when-blyton-fell-out-of-the-good-books/2005/11/21/1132421603094.html, retrieved 22 January 2014 {{citation}}: |contribution= ignored (help); Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |work= (help); Missing or empty |title= (help)
29. Mangan, Lucy (22 December 2005), The Guardian http://books.guardian.co.uk/departments/childrenandteens/story/0,,1672558,00.html, retrieved 22 January 2014 {{citation}}: |contribution= ignored (help); Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |work= (help); Missing or empty |title= (help)
30. Fine, Anne (27 November 2008), A Fine Defence of Enid Blyton", BBC Radio 4, retrieved 22 January 2014
31. The Sydney Morning Herald, 1 July 2012 http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/books/rewrites-a-blight-on-blytons-legacy--by-golly-20120630-219f0.html, retrieved 22 January 2014 {{citation}}: |contribution= ignored (help); Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |work= (help); Missing or empty |title= (help)
32. Geoghegan, Tom."The Mystery of Enid Blyton's Revival". BBC News Magazine. 5 September 2008.
33. MacArthur, Brian (22 December 2009), "Bestselling Authors of the Decade", The Telegraph, retrieved 20 May 2011
34. "The Big Read", BBC, April 2003 http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/bigread/top100.shtml, retrieved 9 December 2008 {{citation}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
35. "Blyton Voted 'Most Loved Writer'", BBC News, 19 August 2008 http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7570106.stm, retrieved 22 January 2014 {{citation}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
36. "Britain's Best Loved Authors", CostaBookAwards.com http://www.costabookawards.com/reading/britains_best_loved_authors.aspx, retrieved 22 January 2014 {{citation}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
37. "Welcome!", The Enid Blyton Society http://www.enidblytonsociety.co.uk/, retrieved 22 January 2014 {{citation}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
38. "Hachette Snaps Up Blyton Estate", The Bookseller, 20 July 2010 http://www.thebookseller.com/news/hachette-snaps-blyton-estate.html, retrieved 19 January 2014 {{citation}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
39. "U.S. Group Classic Media Grabs Rights to Iconic British Creation Noddy From Chorion", The Hollywood Reporter http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/classic-media-noddy-rights-chorion-297387?newsfeed=true, retrieved 19 January 2014 {{citation}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
40. "Unknown Enid Blyton Story Found", The Guardian, Press Association, 22 February 2011
41. Youngs, Ian (22 February 2011), BBC News http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-12511512, retrieved 22 February 2011 {{citation}}: |contribution= ignored (help); Missing or empty |title= (help)
42. "BBC producing Enid Blyton film", Digital Spy, 21 May 2009 http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/tv/a156696/bbc-producing-enid-blyton-film.html, retrieved 22 January 2014 {{citation}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)

Bibliography

• Bluemel, Kristin (2009), Intermodernism: Literary Culture in Mid-twentieth-century Britain, Edinburgh University Press, ISBN 978-0-7486-3509-2
• Bouson, J. Brooks (2012), Jamaica Kincaid: Writing Memory, Writing Back to the Mother, SUNY Press, ISBN 978-0-7914-8292-6
• Brazouski, Antoinette; Klatt, Mary J. (1994), Children's Books on Ancient Greek and Roman Mythology: An Annotated Bibliography, Greenwood Publishing Group, ISBN 978-0-313-28973-6
• Cockin, Katharine; Morrison, Jago (2010), The Post-War British Literature Handbook, Continuum, ISBN 978-0-8264-9502-0
• Druce, Robert (1992), This Day our Daily Fictions: An Enquiry into the Multi-million Bestseller Status of Enid Blyton and Ian Fleming, Rodopi, ISBN 978-90-5183-401-7
• Edwards, Owen Dudley (2007), British Children's Fiction in the Second World War, Edinburgh University Press, ISBN 978-0-7486-1651-0
• Matthew, Colin (1999), Brief Lives: Twentieth-century Pen Portraits from the Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, ISBN 978-0-19-280089-3
• Murray, Shannon (2010), "A Book for Boys and Girls: Or, Country Rhimes for Children: Bunyan and Literature for Children", in Dunan-Page, Anne (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Bunyan, Cambridge University Press, pp. 120–134, ISBN 978-0-521-73308-3
• Stoney, Barbara (2011) , Enid Blyton: The Biography (Kindle ed.), History Press, ISBN 978-0-7524-6957-7
• Thompson, Mary Shine; Keenan, Celia (2006), Treasure Islands: Studies in Children's Literature, Four Courts Press, ISBN 978-1-85182-941-5
• Tucker, Nicholas (1990), The Child and the Book: A Psychological and Literary Exploration, CUP Archive, ISBN 978-0-521-39835-0

Further reading

• Enid Blyton (1952) The Story of My Life
• Willey, Mason (1993). Enid Blyton: A Bibliography of First Editions and Other Collectible Books. ISBN 0-9521284-0-3. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |separator= ignored (help)
• S. G. Ray (1982) The Blyton Phenomenon
• Bob Mullan (1987) The Enid Blyton Story
• George Greenfield (1998) Enid Blyton
• Enid Blyton: An Illustrated Bibliography, Parts I–IV, Tony Summerfield
• Sunny Stories 1942–1953: An Index by Tony Summerfield and Norman Wright
• The Enid Blyton Dossier, by Brian Stewart and Tony Summerfield

External links

• Enidblyton.net
• Watch & Listen to BBC archive programmes about Enid Blyton
• Enid Blyton letters from the BBC archive
• Enid Blyton Collection
• Newsreel footage of Enid Blyton at home with her family, 1946
• Seven Stories' Enid Blyton Blog

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• Use dmy dates from July 2013
• 1897 births
• 1968 deaths
• British children's writers
• Deaths from Alzheimer's disease
• People from East Dulwich
• People from Hampstead
• English children's writers
• Enid Blyton
• People educated at Ipswich High School
• 20th-century British novelists
• 20th-century women writers