"I suppose what it brings home to me above all is that in this books the Marlows really are generations older than in the later ones, and all this worshipping of Daddy and his naval career and family duty therefore reads very differently. But, being more comfortable with the later books, I find it incredibly jarring. I'm glad AF continued the Marlows over such a long time period, and I'm sure she made the right decision to update the backround - putting them in 1940s aspic would just have been too odd and lost them any contemporary audience I think - but there is a price that it produces this kind of dissonance. For me that happens in the earlier books, though I guess others may find the later books more jarring."
I feel the complete opposite. I wish all the books had been set in the late 40s period because I find certain details in the later books very jarring. I found it odd reading them in the 80s that although the twins and their friends were my age they behaved and talked completely differently to my peers. I think if they had been kept in one period, they might have been more widely read and known, as things that contemporary readers didn't 'get' would have been accepted as part of the period. Arthur Ransome's books are still in print and Enid Blyton seems to be having a revival, not to mention all the classics set in the past. Readers accept the 'two-servant poor' family in a book set in the past but it's very odd set in the eighties.
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timeasmymeasure
Re: Rowan's decision
Date: 2014-07-27 05:37 am (UTC)I feel the complete opposite. I wish all the books had been set in the late 40s period because I find certain details in the later books very jarring. I found it odd reading them in the 80s that although the twins and their friends were my age they behaved and talked completely differently to my peers.
I think if they had been kept in one period, they might have been more widely read and known, as things that contemporary readers didn't 'get' would have been accepted as part of the period. Arthur Ransome's books are still in print and Enid Blyton seems to be having a revival, not to mention all the classics set in the past. Readers accept the 'two-servant poor' family in a book set in the past but it's very odd set in the eighties.