Help! The Chalet School has stolen my brain!

[elen_nare]

Q1: Given a person who is obsessively reading every Chalet School book (boarding school stories for girls, published 1925-1970) she can get her hands on, and gleefully enjoying them, estimate her age.

Q2: Knowing she is, with equal delight, writing slash fic about the mistresses, revise that estimate.

...

Seriously, these books - and the resultant fic - have taken over my brain. I've already posted the first two I wrote here (Pretence of Decorum and Swiss Mail), and I'm currently writing, and posting on a fandom-specific forum, a new multi-chapter one. I've never written multi-chapter fics before! The people in the forum are really nice, though, and I'm having fun writing it. I'll cross-post once it's done :)

As for the pairings, I defy anyone who's read the books to tell me it's impossible to read Hilda Annersley & Nell Wilson, and/or Kathie Ferrars & Nancy Wilmot, as couples :P
I'm perfectly aware that's almost certainly not the reading the author intended, but I think it's fairly plausible, and I like it.

(This post was brought to you by sleepy Elen who is sleepy and had more to say but is too sleepy to remember it!)

Comments

[thisbluespirit]

There are some rl parallels and things in them. (For instance, Elinor had a rl adopted sister, like Robin, called Hazel.) However, clearly a lot of it is based on general observation, and it was a thought that struck me on this re-read, but it would be impossible to ever know.

was reading "Coming of Age", and it's Biddy who's Kathie's closest friend. I wonder which book starts the "Miss Ferrars and Miss Wilmot, greatest of friends"?

I can't quite remember - but presumably it happens after Biddy marries and leaves, I suppose.

We don't seem to see Hilda's feelings (about anything!) so much - she's more reserved, even with the readers.

Yes, I think that's a very good point - and what probably trips me up sometimes. I shipped them much more this time, but I swing from friendshipping to shipping with them quite frequently and then back again. I like them either way, but, yes, Hilda's reserve is very true.

(And, :lol:, yes about Nell and Con!)

And, yep, so many crushes - lots of people towards Jo (she's immensely attractive to other girls!), and the most open one is Tom's for Daisy Venables, where she even loses her appetite over the whole business. But I think, for all the less realistic attitudes, Elinor was very truthful about people's characters, and teenage girls in an all-girls environment like that will have crushes, and while she's careful to point out nobody's being "silly" or "sentimental" (as she puts it), she still acknowledges it's real, so it is very interesting, really. (There was also, c. 1930, following a court case, a scandal over lesbianism and more awareness of it than there had been before - a lot of girls' school stories from that time also seem to feel the need to defend themselves against (a now unseen) accusation in that regards. The Dimsie books have an anti-soppist campaign (and try to put a stop to the other girls who are giving older girls flowers and collecting pictures of them and such things), but it even comes up in Sayers's Gaudy Night.

Wanda and Marie are just admired like works of art... :-D

And thanks for the friending back! And, yes, feel free to poke around the comment fest.

Are you taking part in fic_corner, btw? Nominations are still open and there seem to be a fair few Chalet School fans on board, looking at it. (And I noticed you doing things for fan_flashworks for quite a few child. lit tiny-fandoms).

[elen_nare]

I didn't know Elinor had an adopted sister... I don't really know much about her beyond the wiki article, really.

I had to look it up now I'd thought of it... the perils of a detail-obsessed mind, lol. I'm half-way through "Richenda" at the moment, and Kathie is currently bewailing the fact that Biddy's leaving at the end of term. The next one I have is "Ruey", and by that one they're 'great friends', most of their scenes are with each other, and they even get a Saturday together in Basle ;)

Look at Hilda's nickname, even: 'The Abbess' seems more distant than 'Bill', 'Charlie', 'Willie', 'Ferry' and the rest. Another thing I noticed is that I can't think of a book in which she gets much of the spotlight. Nell has "Gay from China" (not just the speech I mentioned, we learn about her family, too), "Exile" during the escape, and in "Oberland" she's pretty much the only adult character. In the Swiss books, the younger mistresses (mainly the Old Girls plus Kathie) are the Staff characters of choice as I recall. Hilda... I suppose there's "New Chalet School", with her becoming Head and the part about her mother (which is so sad!), but I can't think of any other.

But Jo is The Perfect Chalet School Girl That We Must All Aspire To Be Like, don't you know? :P (I like Jo, but I'm not above poking fun at the idealisation of her). Is Tom's crush on Daisy during "Tom Tackles..."? I haven't read that one.

The bit about the court case and the scandal is really interesting! I'd no idea, but I had noticed a marked decrease of sentimentality between writers like Angela Brazil and L T Meade (read the first chapter of this, and tell me it isn't the slashiest thing you've ever read!), and more 'modern' ones like Elinor BD or Enid Blyton. I just put it down to changing tastes in writing - the 'soppiness' of the earlier ones seemed to go hand-in-hand with the more purple prose.

Poor Marie, though - whenever anyone mentions how beautiful she is, someone always retorts that Wanda was much prettier!

Are you taking part in fic_corner, btw?
*groan* Now this is the time when I should be sensible and say no, I'll have a lot to do for uni, I shouldn't be writing fic... but let's be honest, I'm going to be writing anyway, I might as well give and get gift-fics out of it :P Especially since it's a kids-lit fest! Now what to nominate? CS, probably Swallows and Amazons, what else? Hmm...

[elen_nare]

I've signed up for the Fic Corner exchange. I blame you :P
Are you taking part?

[thisbluespirit]

\o/

Yes, though only just!

[elen_nare]

\o/ last minute sign-up by any chance?