Enid Blyton By Megan .C 1. Noted for numerous series of books based on recurring characters and designed for different age groups, her books have enjoyed popular success in many parts of the world, and have sold over 600 million copies. Enid Blyton with her daughters Gillian and Imogen in 1946 2. Enid Blyton was born on August 11th 1897 and she died November 28th 1968 aged 71. 3. Enid Blyton's most famous series was The Famous Five. Its central characters were Julian, Dick, Anne, George, and the dog Timmy. Her works celebrated good food, enjoyment of picnics in the idyllic English countryside, outdoor life, spirit of comradeship, and honesty. By the 1980s, Blyton's books had sold some 60 million copies and had been translated into nearly seventy languages. Anne saw some cows pulling at the grass in a meadow as they passed. 'It must be awful to be a cow and eat nothing but tasteless grass,' she called to George. 'Think what a cow misses – never tastes an egg and lettuce sandwich, never eats a chocolate aclair, never has a boiled egg – and can't even drink a glass of gingerbeer! Poor cows!' (From Five Get Into Trouble, 1949) 4. Enid Blyton was born in London, in a small flat above a shop in East Dulwich. She was the eldest of three children. Her father, Thomas Carey Blyton, had many talents: he painted in water colours, wrote poetry, learned to play piano, taught himself foreign languages, and was a photographer. After working as a cutlery salesman, he joined his two older brothers in the family 'mantle warehousing' business of Fisher and Nephew. Theresa Mary Hamilton, Enid's mother, did not share her husband's interests, and she did not approve that Enid kept her nose in a book all the time. After Thomas started an affair with another woman, she moved with her children, Enid, Hanly, and Carey, to Beckenham. Thomas established a successful wholesale clothing business in the City of London. He took care of his children's private school fees and sent regularly money to support his family. Blyton's father died in 1920; she did not attend his funeral. 5. Blyton, who was trained as a kindergarten teacher at Ipswich High School, opened her own infants' school. When the literary commitments increased, Blyton devoted herself entirely to writing. In 1926 Blyton took on the editing a new magazine for children, Sunny Stories for Little People. Her stories, plays, and songs for Teachers' World were received with enthusiasms. She also compiled a children's encyclopaedia, but it was not until in the 1930s, when her stories started to attract a wider audience. 6. Blyton's first full-length children's book, The Secret Island, was published in 1938. This fast-moving story led to such series as The Famous Five, directed for readers between nine and thirteen years, The Secret Seven, for readers between eight and nine years, the Adventure series, the Mystery series, and the 'Barney' Mystery books. Her young characters are courageous and resourceful children, who encounter adventures without having adults hanging over them. " 'I only like adventures afterwards,' said Lucy-Ann. 'I don't like them when they're happening. I didn't want this adventure at all. We didn't look for it, we just seemed to fall into the middle of it!' " (in The Castle of Adventure, 1946) 7. Enid Blyton was also known as Mary Pollock. Her work involves children's adventure stories, and fantasy, sometimes involving magic. 8. The Adventure series by Enid Blyton was one of her most successful series. These books feature the same child characters: Philip, Jack, Dinah, and Lucy-Ann, along with several adult characters. Jack's pet cockatoo, Kiki, is also a standard feature in each novel. 9. The stories show the four children off on their own, discovering and solving mysteries without much adult assistance. Although the publication dates span a decade, Blyton reportedly wrote each of the novels in less than a week. The colourful dust jackets and line illustrations were by Stuart Tresilian They where many book’s in the series: The Island of Adventure The Castle of Adventure The Valley of Adventure The Sea of Adventure The Mountain of Adventure The Ship of Adventure The Circus of Adventure The River of Adventure From The Adventure Series by Enid Blyton Dorris Day 1. Doris Day supported animal welfare as well as being a famous singer and actress. 2. Her real name was Doris Mary Ann Von Kappelhoff, Doris Day was created because Dorris Kappelhoff was too long 3. Doris was born to German Catholic parents in 1924. She had a brother Richard, who died before she was born and Paul, a few years older than her. Her father and mother split when she was about eight. At twelve, she had a dance act with a boy called Jerry Doherty, with whom - after winning $500 in a talent contest - she went to Hollywood. On returning to Cincinatti, aged fourteen, Doris was in a terrible car crash which almost ended her dancing career. 4. At the age of sixteen, Doris then discovered that she could sing and began touring with the Les Brown Band, where she met Al Jorden, who she later married. Al turned out to be a violent man and soon after the birth of her son Terry in 1942, she initiated divorce proceedings. In 1946, after entertaining the troops for a couple of years, she met and married George Weidler; this liason lasted only eight months. 5. In 1948 she made her first film, "Romance On The High Seas". Whilst filming for Warner Brothers, she met Marty Melcher who became her agent and later on her 27th birthday her husband. In 1958 her brother Paul died and it was around this time that Marty started to make her sign to do films that she did not want to. This eventually led to Doris becoming ill from nervous exhaustion. By the time that Marty died in 1968, Doris was bankrupt and owed thousands of dollars, but she was eventually awarded $22 million by the Courts. She married for the fourth time in 1976 and since her divorce in 1980 has devoted her life to animals.