Mask of Apollo and "Restricted Books"

[elizahonig.livejournal.com]

I think I've asked this before and nobody came up with any suggestions, but I'm doing another edit and thought I'd try again.

Nicola gets in trouble at some point because she takes this Mary Renault novel to school with her and not only is it an extra book, and (I think) from the local library, but in the Kingscote library it's Restricted or Limited or whatever the term is.  We've talked before about her take on why it should have been Restricted; and I am sad to think that it would probably still be the equivalent of Restricted in many American school libraries today.

My question was:  what other books would have been restricted in an English girls' school?  Books that would have been deemed suitable for the Seniors but not for the Juniors?  I need something written before 1938, something that might have appealed to an adventurous 12-year-old.  I need this for my own children's book, and it's the kind of thing that's impossible for a 20-year-old American RA to figure out!  I thought that somebody here might have an idea, though.

Comments

[legionseagle.livejournal.com]

I assumed that "It don't foller" related to the incident of the "Wunnerful hairy man" not after all producing offspring and that Mrs 'Odges and Mrs Ruddle were producing anecdotal evidence of a lack of correlation between male body hair and virility.

But I agree that Mrs R. couldn't really have reached the "mother naked" conclusion from just waist-height and above, since "wearing pyjama bottoms" would have been the natural conclusion. Unless she was exaggerating for dramatic effect?

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

I assumed the hairy/offspring business was there as well, but that perhaps Mrs Ruddle was nudge/winking further corroborative evidence to an otherwise bald and unconvincing narrative – possibly along the lines of its being true what they say about men with big noses.

Exaggeration wouldn’t be out of character, but genuinely “mother naked” could also fit in with the impression of the new neighbours being decadent aristocratic/Hollywood types, as opposed to the Mr Ruddle characterised as going to bed with his boots on in a non-Duke of Marlborough manner.