(no subject)

[tree_and_leaf]

In non-plague news, today I learned that Val McDiarmid was inspired by childhood reading of the Chalet School:

in one of the more bizarre examples of literature influencing life I was guided by the Chalet School books, which I loved. It is through these that I realised that being a writer was actually a job. And all these girls went on to higher education at either the Sorbonne, the Kensington school of Needlework, or Oxford.

Comments

[mrs_redboots]

She was the guest speaker at the New Chalet Club AGM in 2017, and spoke then about her love for all things Chalet School. Nice woman. I liked her, even if I don't like her books much! The other author who spoke on that occasion was Gill Sims, of "Peter and Jane" fame, who is also a Chalet School fan and a member of the NCC Facebook page.

[white_hart]

She always seems like such a good egg that I wish I liked her books more, but psychological thrillers just aren't my kind of thing.

[mrs_redboots]

I have tried to like her books, but they just don't do it for me!  Except her retelling of Northanger Abbey, which was brilliant.

[legionseagle]

It is really good; Northanger Abbey is my least favourite Austen (too much secondhand embarrasment) and she managed to make me absolutely love the premise while executing it beautifully.

[white_hart]

I was distinctly underwhelmed by it, but then I rather like the original and find it hilariously anti-romantic.

[antisoppist]

That is good to know. I have similar problems with Northanger Abbey and haven't re-read it since I was about 20. I like her Kate Brannigan and Lindsay Gordon crime fiction but then she got too gory for me.

[angelofthenorth]

How interesting

[white_hart]

I seem to recall that she presented a Radio 4 documentary about the CS some years ago.

[clanwilliam]

I don’t know Val, but I do know Chaz Brenchley who she hauled in for it. Someone on Twitter once joked about no-one being able to name all the Maynard kids and she replied “Chaz Brenchley can.” He promptly did it - in order of course.

[white_hart]

I'd be surprised if there's anyone in the comments to this entry who couldn't!

[highlyeccentric]

I binge-read all of my friends' copies of the Chalet school books (not the entire series, but nearly) some years ago, but now her collection is in storage, and they're nigh unobtainable!

That is how I learned what an alp, singular, is - it's not the pointy bit, it's the pasture. This made a lot of things make sense, in swiss context.

[conuly]

Learned something new today!

[perennialanna]

The Puffin translator of Heidi made it clear. The un-named translator in the battered 1950s hardback I had did not.