English Children's Literature: School Theme--Individual Books
Figure 1.-- One of Meredith Fletcher's school books is about the younger of the Jefferson brothers at a public school. The tradition was to refer to boys by their last mane. If there were brothers, senior or junior would be added. The book is "Jefferson Junior". It was published by Blackie and Son Limited. It was illustrated by J.R. Burgess. Note the style of the school buildings in the background. The caption reads, "He strode on with calm deliberation, as if he cared not a jot." Image courtesy of the AM collection.
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Large numbers of books were written with school settings. Several have been of special importance. The first school story was Thomas Hughes' Tom Brown’s School Days (1857), but it was more adult than children's literature. Not as well known is Eric but published about the same time by Frederick W. Farrar (1858). Kipling’s Stalky and Co. (1899) is perhaps the next most famous school story. Several authors wrote numerous indivisual books with school themes. Many are not well known today, but the school stories were very popular in their day. A look at some of the books provides an interesting look at contemporary values, clothing, and society. And of course the school stories are an extensive source of information on school life, especially life at porivate schools. The titles here are just a few samples of a very large body of work, but they do give a idea of what these books were like and how they were illustrated. The images provide a fascinating glimpse at school fashions. Of course actual books are only a partr of the very extensive body of British school stories. Weekly papers like The Magnet caried many school stories--A subject worthy of an entire website.
Titles
Here are the school story titles that wer are familiar with.
Boys of Priory School
The The Boys of Wynport College: A Story of School Life is a classic school story. It was written by Frederick Harrison and published by Blackie and Son Limited. There is no date but in the book's opening pages, it's dedicated to 'Tully', 1922. The author also wrote The Choir School of St. Bede's. It is interesting to note, when skimming through the opening pages of the book that the opening of the story also includes a dramatic departure by train from a small station. This was a common theme it seems, to introduce the reader to the principle character(s) and the motive and reasons of why he is going to a public school. The association of train journey always conjures up dramatic moments of event changing happenings and a precursor of exciting and new experiences in store of a dramatic new environment--the public school. This was put to good in effect J. D. Rowlings Harry Potter.
(The) Choir School of St. Bede's
The Choir School of St. Bede's was written by Frederick Harrison.
Not as well known is Eric but published about the same time as Tom Brown's School Days. It was written by by Frederick W. Farrar in 1858. The actual title of the book is "Eric, or Little by Little". The author wrote the following preface to the 1889 (24th) edition: "The story of `Eric' was written with but one single object - the vivid inculcation of inward purity and moral purpose, by the history of a boy who, in spite of the inherent nobleness of his disposition, falls into all folly and wickedness, until he has learnt to seek help from above. I am deeply thankful to know - from testimony public and private, anonymous and acknowledged - that this object has, by God's blessing, been fulfilled."
A particularly well known school story is Talbot Baines Reed's The Fifth Form at St. Dominics published about 1900.
It concerns Stephen Greenfield, a new boy at St. Dominic's, where his elder brother, Oliver, is already a pupil. Stephen is led astray by Loman, the school cad, and a much older boy. Loman loses money in gambling, and involves Stephen. As an indirect result of this, Oliver is falsely accused of cheating in his bid to win a scholarship which would help to pay his school fees. All comes
well in the end; Loman is disgraced and Oliver is cleared of any wrongdoing. It is typical of this genre, uprightness and decency triumphing over badness exemplifying Victorian morality.
(The) Hero of St. Basil's
This was the public school that C. Serjeant wrote about. We do not yet know much about these books or the author. St. Basil's looks to be a boys' public school. The book here is The Hero of St. Basil's. It was first published in 1932. The edition seen here
was published in 1958 by Pickering and Inglis Ltd. There is no indication of who the illustrator is, but the cover illustration looks to have been updated. The boys look most smart in their blue blazers featuring a white border. Note the pockets which are
stuffed with pens and papers. They wear grey long trousers and caps.
Housemaster
Ian Hay also wrote Housemaster which was filmed in the 1930s.
An American reader might think this was about a junior high school named after President Jefferson. Actually this school story written by Meredith Fletcher is about the younger of the Jefferson brothers at a public school. The tradition was to refer to boys by their last mane. If there were brothers, senior or junior would be added. A third brother might be called minimus. 'Jefferson Junior' by Meredith Fletcher is published by Blackie and Son Limited. There is no publishing date but it seems to be
from the 1900s. It is illustrated by J.R. Burgess. The illustrations are very similar to Harold Copping but Burgess seems to focus on the zenith of the moment in a far more dramatized fashion. The story, it is written in the first person and judging by the heightened moments in the illustrations, the boy's (10 years old) account of Redshaw School is adventurerous and laden with excitement. Interesting to note (as observed in other stories and remarkably similar to Harry Potter), the story starts with the departure by train from a small station where he meets his bosom friend to be
on the carriage. There are moments of heightened emotion as the train pulls away from the platform.
Another fascinating book is The Lighter Side of School Life by Ian Hay. It was published by T. N. Foulis. I'm not sure when it was originally printed, but the second printing was in 1915. It was printed in Edinburgh, Scotland, but I don't notice any especially Scottish conent. It's quite a fascinating book by the way it is constructed. I speak under correction but it seems the book was not wholly bound by machine. It has high quality paper but is not uniformly cut and it appears the guillotine used to cut the pages was not always sharp. The illustrations are by Lewis Baumer are wonderful and I think of great interest. The illustrations are printed on a different type of paper compared to the text and are covered by a preceding page of a heavy duty type of rice paper. What makes the illustrations especially delightful is that they are coloured in by a pastel type crayon. Besides still looking remarkably fresh, the illustrations look like the original art but no doubt is the type of print used. The use of crayon seem to give the art a contemporary type of look. Note the illustration where pink is used.
Meredith Fletcher, an author of other school stories, wrote The Pretenders - A School Story. It was published by Henry Frowde & Hodder & Stoughton in 1908. We do not yet know the plot. Yhe book is narated by a boy nammed Durrant. There are school scenes which give a wonderful feel for a British private school in the early 20th century. There are six wonderful colour illustrations in the book by Harold Earnshaw with the cover depicting two schoolboys in typical Edwardian school wear. Actually different uniforms are depicted. Except for the Eton collars and red caps, we are not sure just what the uniform was.
(The) Senior Prefect
Stanley Morris wrote The senior Prefect. The book was illustrated by J. Philips Patterson.
Stalky and Co. (1899)
Kipling’s Stalky and Co. (1899) is perhaps, next to Tom Brown's School Days, the most famous school story.
The first school story was Thomas Hughes' Tom Brown’s School Days (1857), but it was more adult than children's literature. English authors have published countless school tales. The first of this genre and perhaps the most famous has been Tom Brown, a thoroughly British gutsy boy who as a new boy confronted the bullies at his public school, in his case Rugby. His adventures were chronicled in Tom Brown School Days and were contemporary with reform-minded headmaster, Dr. Arnold. This school story
tells about the friendship of three boys called Tom, East and Arthur. They are boarders who come into conflict with the school bully called ‘Flashman.’ It also depicts life of the boarding school at that time. Rugby was the school William would go to when he
was 11. Because accounts of the school in the early 19th century are limited, we can use the Tom Brown account to get an idea what the school was like in the 1820s when William attended. The school depicted in Tom Brown's School Days was a very rough place, especially for the younger boys. This was the situation at other public schools as well. Hughes book is a fictional account. but is believed to accurately describe school life at the time.
We note Talbot Baines Reed's The Willoughby Captains. The images sent to us were the Oxford University Press edition of 1935. This appears to be a reprint. I'm not sure when the book was originally printed. There are some attractive illustrations, but I am not sure who did them. The school blazers are prominetly depicted on the cover. We do not have details on the plot of the book.
We have not included the titles of the individual books in series here. There is, however, extensive information available on HBC on several school series. Some series were based more on the school than the boy, such as Priory School--of course a public school. Several authors in publications like the Boy's Own Paper wrote numerous stories about the same fictious school. We have very little information about the fictious schools that were commonly addressed in the periodicl publications including annuals. Later several authos wrote series of books with school settings. Enis Blytons "Famous Five" and "Secret Seven" often had school settings. The "Jennings" series was set at a prep school. The Billy Bunter series was set at a public school. Here we are just beginning to collect information.
Production Quality
The production quality of many of these books was quite low. A reader writes, "I speak under correction but it seems the book was not wholly bound by machine. It has high quality paper but is not uniformly cut and it appears the guillotine used to cut the pages was not always sharp. I think all books were once sold with the pages uncut. The reader was expected to cut them by hand. I'd guess The Lighter Side of School Life was issued uncut and you have seen a badly cut copy.
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Created: April 4, 2003
Last updated: 3:07 AM 12/15/2004