 |
| source |
Many folk of a certain age will be familiar with Richmal Crompton’s Just William books from their childhood. Maybe later too.
From Wikipedia
William is the leader of his band of friends, who call themselves the Outlaws, with his best friend Ginger and his other friends Henry and Douglas. His scruffy mongrel is called Jumble.
A William story often starts when William or the Outlaws set out to do something — put on a play, collect scrap metal for the war effort, look after Violet Elizabeth Bott for example. William always manages to get into trouble with his parents, although he can never see why. Often his well-meaning efforts result in broken windows and hysterics among Mrs. Brown's friends.
William is the leader of his band of friends, who call themselves the Outlaws, with his best friend Ginger and his other friends Henry and Douglas. His scruffy mongrel is called Jumble.
A William story often starts when William or the Outlaws set out to do something — put on a play, collect scrap metal for the war effort, look after Violet Elizabeth Bott for example. William always manages to get into trouble with his parents, although he can never see why. Often his well-meaning efforts result in broken windows and hysterics among Mrs. Brown's friends.
What may be less well known is that the character of William
was probably inspired by and to some extent copied from an earlier book –
American writer Booth Tarkington’s novel Penrod. Penrod Schofield is the hero
of Tarkington’s novel and no William fan could possibly read it without
recognising the similarities.
“Penrod Schofield!”
Mrs. Lora Rewbush had come out into the hallway. And now, in this extremity,
when all seemed lost indeed, particularly including honour, the dilating eye of
the outlaw fell upon the blue overalls which the janitor had left hanging upon
a peg. Inspiration and action were almost simultaneous...
Mr. Samuel Williams,
aged eleven, and congenial to Penrod in years, sex, and disposition, appeared
in the doorway, shaking into foam a black liquid within a pint bottle,
stoppered by a thumb. “Yay, Penrod!” the visitor gave greeting.
“Yay,” said
Penrod with slight enthusiasm. “What you got?”
“Lickrish water.”
Penrod is eleven years old, he had a mongrel dog, a nineteen
year old sister, a middle class family life, frequently gets into scrapes and
collides with authority and with enormous relish he drinks a concoction called liquorice water. Tarkington refers to him several times as an
outlaw which as we recall is the name
of William’s gang – the outlaws.
From a piece on William in Quadrant -
The boy hero he is
most like is Penrod Schofield, created by Booth Tarkington (who wrote The
Magnificent Ambersons) about ten years before William. Though her biographers
stoutly deny it, Richmal pinched some of his plots. And why not? She made the
stories better, funnier.
More importantly she pinched the character. To my mind she improved on Penrod as she adapted him for a British audience but it
seems odd that she didn’t disguise this by avoiding some of the more obvious
similarities. My guess, and it is a guess, is that she saw Penrod in boys that
she knew and her imagination took it from there. And why not?
5 comments:
I think you are right. We don't just see things; we see them in the light of our past experiences, and some of the most powerful experiences are literary. It's quite possible that Crompton read the Penrod stories, completely forgot about them, but had her imaginings of rascally boys changed forever.
It's worth considering that had she done this in our age of instantaneous communication, some American lawyer would have been aiming to make her a lot poorer for her efforts.
The closest boy in Enid Blyton's stories, was Snubby, who had a dog called Loony...
(I had to check that...)!
Interesting, didn't know that last week. But I'm older than that now.
I am writing a six volume book on The History of the Decline And Fall of the British Empire, hoping to knock it out in a few days. I confess to looking occasionally at Wikipedia.
Sam - yes it's a problem with blogging too. I sometimes wonder if what I've written came from a forgotten piece by someone else. It's inevitable and not easy to guard against.
Scrobs - Snubby and Loony could even be nicknames for the Tory and Labour parties.
Sackers - but not disappointed I hope.
Demetrius - and if your book gets into Wikipedia we'll have a complete circle going faster and faster and faster...
Post a Comment