Rewriting History Books Will Lead To An Unhappy Ending

Now I know why I have grown up to be such a bigot – it is all those evenings tucked up in bed in the 1970s reading the adventures of the Famous Five. Or that is what English Heritage seems to want me to think.

- Ross Clark

It has just published a “reappraisal” of the author Enid Blyton, whom in 1997 it honoured in a blue plaque on a building in Chessington, Surrey, in which she once lived.

She wouldn’t get a blue plaque now, for sure. The online information “informs” us that “Blyton’s work has been criticised during her lifetime and after for its racism, xenophobia and lack of literary merit”. Citing the decision of the Royal Mint not to put Blyton’s work on a special edition of the 50 pence coin it calls her a “sexist” and “homophobe” to boot.

My, that is quite a litany of charges. It is hard to know where to start. But from my own recollections I seem to remember the Famous Five going sailing, drinking copious quantities of ginger beer and, by good luck, helping police to arrest a criminal or two.

I don’t remember them once going on a National Front march, insulting a gay couple or telling a female character not to get above herself or that her rightful place was in the home.