Naughty and Nice

Belle found this one in her stocking this morning. I think Santa selected wisely.

Russell says all names are really just disguised descriptions. So why shouldn’t that be a perfectly grammatical title? We haven’t read it yet, but the series sounds intriguing:

… Though the story is similar to Blyton’s other school series St. Clare’s and Malory Towers, the setting, Whyteleafe School, is a very different kind of school. It is coeducational and extremely “progressive”. The students hold a weekly meeting, presided over by a Head Boy, a Head Girl, and a group of Monitors, at which decisions are made and troublemakers are disciplined. The children only apply to the teachers when there is a problem they feel they cannot solve.

Though a student-run school might sound to some like a recipe for a cross between 1984 and Lord of the Flies, in The Naughtiest Girl in the School, it is used to emphasize the lessons which Elizabeth needs to learn. (For a very different view of “progressive school” in the era, see the beginning of C.S. Lewis’ The Silver Chair, where Eustace and Jill have their lives made unbearable by the children at “Experiment House”.) As with Blyton’s other stories, a premium is played on getting on with communal life, sharing, and the favourite (if vague) expression having “your corners knocked off”. Selfishness and cowardliness are the two greatest crimes, both of which Elizabeth comes to suspect herself of, and vows to change.

The Naughtiest Girl in the School is very much a Blyton book in its style. The writing is not demanding, or even very interesting: Elizabeth always seems to express anger by stamping her foot, and the vocabulary is extremely limited. Adjectives and emotions rarely get further than “rude”, “jolly”, “queer”, “funny”, etc. Possibly because of the “progressive” setting, Whyteleafe School lacks the sense of place and the school ethos which St. Clare’s and Malory Towers provide.

The Naughtiest Girl Is A Monitor has an especially attractive, panoptical patina, to my eye; who will recycle Juvenal for the juveniles?

Basically, there is something very wholesome about the cosmic, yin/yang wossname of naughtiness and niceness; the siren allure of niceness. As Tom Waits sings, “Goddamn there’s always such a big temptation to be good, to be good.” The spice of the naughty. I am reminded of a seasonally-appropriate bit by Steve Martin:

Carolyn wanted so much to give Roger something nice for Christmas, but they didn’t have much money, and they had to spend every last cent on candy for the baby. She walked down the icy streets and peered into shop windows.

“Roger is so proud of his shinbones. If only I could find some way to get money to buy shinbone polish.”

Just then, a sign caught her eye. “Cuticles bought and sold.” Many people had told Carolyn of her beautiful cuticles, and Roger was especially proud of them, but she thought, “This is the way I could buy Roger the shinbone polish!” And she rushed into the store.

Later at home, she waited anxiously as Roger came up the steps of their flat. He opened the door and wobbled over to the fireplace, suspiciously holding one arm behind his back.

“Merry Christmas!” they both said, almost simultaneously.

Roger spoke. “Hey, Nutsy, I got you a little something for Christmas.”

“Me too,” said Carolyn, and they exchanged packages.

Carolyn hurriedly opened her package staring in disbelief. “Cuticle Frames?! But Roger, I sold my cuticles so I could afford to buy you some shinbone polish!”

“Shinbone polish!” said Roger, “I sold my shinbones to buy you the cuticle frames!” Roger wobbled over to her.

“Well, I’ll be hog-tied,” said Carolyn.

“You will? Oh, boy!” said Roger.

And it turned out to be a great Christmas after all.

I hope you had a Christmas as nice as that.