Posted by Peter Ceresole on March 19, 2009 at 19:22:05 user PeterC.
In Reply to: Re: Coot Club & Big Six posted by Matthew on March 19, 2009 at 16:24:49:
For example we never find out what the Swallows life is like outside of the summer holidays.
It's true; AR is a very practical author- and he had plenty of training in sticking to the point. What he was trying to produce was a story for children and so it was important to get on with the knitting, focus on the adventure. Also, for his own purposes it seems pretty certain that he was evoking his own memories and feelings about the lakes and his own childhood. He didn't enjoy his school days and I doubt that he was keen to relive them.
However, from the start of SW we get a good introduction to the children's relationship to their father, and their mother, and in WH Titty and Dorothea talk a fair bit about their schools, health certificates and all. And John tells us that he will have to make up a lot of leeway getting into the XV. Touches of colour, not long descriptions, but we get a quite good idea of their non-holiday lives.
But sure, we don't know exactly where they live, or what train exactly they take on their way up to the Lakes. In fact of course a lot of TARS detective work has gone into clarifying that... And isn't that fun?