Posted by Ed Kiser on January 17, 2003 at 19:30:14 from 152.163.188.167 user Kisered.
Reference: Swallows and Amazons, Chapter 9.
John wakes up before the others, gets up, puts his sandshoes on,
carries his clothes in a bundle and a towel to the landing-place
where he went in and swam and floated about for a bit. He got
out, ran to the harbour, dumped clothes and towel into the boat
along with the milk-can and rowed to the mainland below Dixon's
to go get the milk. He was almost dry when he got there, but
used the towel for finishing touches, and finally put his clothes
on to go up to Dixon's to get the milk.
This strikes me as a bit daring. At no time is the mention of
using any bathing things, leaving one to assume that he did not
bother with such, especially since there was no one else up yet.
The impression one gets is that he rowed across to the mainland
with nothing on, getting dressed only after reaching the
mainland.
Maybe when camping out, one is a bit less formal regarding proper
dress codes.
It has struck me a bit odd that there is so much changing of
clothes with very little regard to the presence of others, even
if the "others" involves mixed company. This "don't care"
attitude is shown in various places in the other stories as well.
When the Swallow was wrecked (Swallowdale) there seemed to be a
lot of wet people changing their clothes there on the beach.
During a rain in the Swallowdale camp, John ran out in the middle
of the night to adjust the guy-ropes on the tents for the
dampness in a mode that is described as "Naked Savage" (Chapter
19).
I just have a feeling that times must have changed, for if I were
to row from that island to the mainland with no clothes, I feel
sure there would be some negative reactions from somebody as a
result of that procedure.
Are such relaxed attitudes regarding clothing a feature of the
times, or is such customary in that part of the world even today?
I really would have expected John to have put on his bathing
things while in his tent, went swimming, came out and dried off,
went back into the tent, got rid of his wet bathing things and
got dressed in normal clothing, then go out of the tent to the
boat in the harbour and run his errand while fully clothed.
That is not what happened.
This bothered me as a child when I first read this, and continues
to make me wonder today.
--------------- And on a different subject --------------------
A line or two further down, as John goes to Dixon's to get the
milk (now he is properly dressed), she offers him toffee and
says...
[I'd nothing to do last night so I fettled you up a baking.]
Interesting word, "fettled". There is English and then there is
English. We surely do not talk the same language, but there are
some similarities that make us think we can still communicate.
Of such is the wonder of reading all things Ransome...
Ed Kiser, South Florida