Posted by Jock on June 27, 2007 at 21:56:12 from 87.105.81.146 user Jock.
In Reply to: Re: The Real St Trinian's posted by Rob Boden on June 27, 2007 at 16:03:37:
Rob,
It's always difficult to answer this sort of question without sounding too professorial [pauses to polish spectacles], but here goes.
First of all, although the Amazons, and particularly Nancy, play such an important part in all the stories, they are glimpsed as though 'through a glass darkly'. The camera never, as far as I remember, follows the action sitting on Peggy's shoulder and only sits on Nancy's on a couple of occasions. We learn a huge amount of background about the Swallows' lives when they are not being explorers, we get to learn a lot less about the lives of the Amazons when they are not being pirates. Even if AR had some notions about where his Amazons went to boarding school he left us precious few clues. Neither Iain Hobbs, nor anyone else as far as I am aware has researched where the fictional Amazons went to school.
That leaves us with the Crossley girls. Iain Hobbs, I believe, identifies Ruth and Pamela 100% with the original Amazons. So for him - if Ruth and Pamela went to a particular boarding school - the Amazons went to the same school, full stop. His article on IND... is written very much with this hypothesis in mind. I start from a different viewpoint. I start with the Swallows. It is clear that the Altounyan children inspired AR's creation of the Swallows, but we can also see where his creation differs from the originals: 'Susan we thought a little too good', the eldest Swallow was a not a girl. I would also like to refer here to some original research by Peter Hyland who found that some of the internal dynamics of the Swallows were similar to the interactions of Dr Dolittle's menagerie. (The Dr D series was written before SA.) So there could be an additional source for some of the Swallows' character traits.
Having carefully considered Iain Hobbs's research, AR's article (1) published in the USA explaining his reasons for disguising the Swallows and Amazons; having taken into consideration the contributions that have appeared on TarBoard and also having carried out a little research of my own, I have concluded that the relation of the Crossleys girls to the Amazons is similar to the relation of the Altounyan's and the Swallows. The latter inspired the former. But there is not a 1:1 correspondence. There are differences. (One of the most important of these was that the house on Windermere was the Crossley's holiday home. Their principal residence was (2) Combermere Abbey.) There are also other people for whom a good case can be made as having contributed to the characterisation of the Amazons. Exactly the same qualifications as in my comments about the Altounyans/Swallows. This is the reason why I have chosen to complement Iain's article on IND... with AndyB's thoughtful essay The Cairn on Kanchenjunga.
Which brings us to Iain's research. He wrote to the Crossley family and received what I consider to be a fobbing off reply (3). He also wrote to a number of girl's boarding schools that were in business in the 1920's and received friendly letters, but drew a blank. St Trinnean's is one of the schools that he would have liked to have written to had it still been in business today. It seems in many respects to have been tailor made for Nancy!
(2) An interesting pub.
(3) There is an opportunity here to carry out some original research. Perhaps someone with the appropriate background and credentials could reapproach the Crossley family and seek an interview. (Do we have a Lord or Professor or something similarly distinguished in the ranks of TarBoarders?) There might also be some value in repeating the boarding school research on a larger scale.