trennels | The world of AF; where fathers are absent and mothers are incompetent (Reply)

carmine_rose here quite a lot of debate was engendered by the question as to what conclusions could be drawn about Pam Marlow's parenting abilities with regard to two specific incidents, namely whether Nicola should be withdrawn from Kingscote if absence of funds prevented all five girls from remaining there to complete their education, and her sale of the Last Ditch in order to purchase Catkin for Ginny and Chocbar for herself. If you want to continue discussing that aspect, then it's probably worth continuing in that forum.

Actually, my own view is that Pam Marlow is a pretty competent parent given the competition, and especially given what a ghastly manipulative old harridan she has for a mother. Mme Orly is one of my favourite characters, but given what we know of her parenting style it's a remarkable tribute to Pam Marlow's innate strength of character than she came out as well as she did.

But given the choice between having Mme Orly for a mother, or Mrs Frewen - ugh! One has to put one's money on the mad hyper-critical old bat (who not only tells you that your bum does indeed look big in that, but shares her views with the whole of the Meet, to boot) if the alternative is Dog-Murdering Drippsley.

Helena Merrick is probably the nearest to a human icicle one ever gets to meet . Nice as Anthony Merrick is for a Tory MP, you also have to wonder about someone who only actually realises that his son is acutely unhappy at school (something he has been mentioning regularly over breakfast for several terms now) when he's on the point of expulsion.

Considered as a father, Edwin Dodd - well! Slashing
minors across the face with riding crops generally provokes adverse comment as a personality trait. And sometimes the negative attention of social services.

Mrs West - well, we never get to see her, because she's off solving the problems of the Middle East (if that's in the same manner as her parenting style, probably by sending the competing factions for ice-skating lessons). Mr West, however, is a sweetie and his daughter self-evidently adores him.

I have always taken the view that Mr Keith was probably an irresponsible git, though possibly his decision to leave his country of birth and move erratically around without leaving forwarding addresses was merely an effort to avoid his sister.

Mrs Todd is not presented in a positive light. And as for Mr Hopkins - shudder, shudder!

Of course it is to some extent a children's fiction trope that you clear the parents off the scene before the action starts, but it is fairly interesting, at least to me, just how much we actually get to see of some pretty indifferent (perhaps one might say; realistically indifferent) parenting in Antonia Forest's world.

So, any thoughts? Class, era, cynicism about the human race in general?