The Family from One End Street (A Puffin Book)

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Further Adventures of the Family from One End Street is an English children's book by Eve Garnett which was first published by Heinemann in 1956. It is the first of two sequels to Garnett's Carnegie Prize-winning book, The Family from One End Street, which was published by Muller in 1937. I loved learning, as an adult, that this beloved book was ground-breaking for being the first British children's book to depict the everyday lives of normal working-class kids, instead of the polished "desirable" lives of upper-class children. There is a wholesomeness and innocence to these stories, and a feeling of nostalgia for a time when things were more straightforward and less complicated, which make them very appealing in today's current climate of increasing materialism and toxic social media. The Ruggles family is at the center of this book. Mr. and Mrs. Ruggles are a dustman and a washerwoman, and they have seven children: Lily Rose, Kate, Jim, John, Jo Jr., Peg, and William. In each chapter, a member of the family has a problem or adventure which the reader experiences through that character's point of view. These include Lily Rose's accidental destruction of an article of clothing belonging to one of her mother's laundry customers, Kate performing well enough to be admitted to a school for which the cost of uniforms might be far outside the family budget, and William being entered in a baby show, which he would have a better chance of winning if only he would cut a tooth. Though the family is poor, there is very little in these episodes that would elicit pity from a child reader. Rather, the Ruggles have just as much fun - and get into just as much trouble - as any Melendy, Pye, Moffat or other literary heroine found in the children's books of the 1930s and 1940s. Not everyone agreed with the praise heaped on this book; some found it patronising and unacceptable – the book continues to be read and the arguments about it go on.

THE FAMILY FROM ONE END STREET by Eve Garnett is the story of everyday life in the big, happy Ruggles family who live in the small town of Otwell. Father is a dustman and Mother a washerwoman. Then there's all the children - practical Lily Rose, clever Kate, mischievous twins James and John, followed by Jo, who loves films, little Peg and finally baby William. The Family from One End Street was born from author and artist Eve Garnett’s (1900 – 1991) eye-opening experiences of the poverty in London. Coming from a middle-class family, she trained as an artist in London in the 1920s and there observed the day to day realities of working class children. Initially publishers were reluctant to publish the book, saying the content was unsuitable and in recent years it has been accused of being condescending rather than ground breaking but her close observation of the children she used to draw in the street makes the children of her story lively, full of character and very real – and a generation of working class children got to see the world they were growing up in portrayed in print. Garnett has a wonderful ear for dialogue and a true understanding of the way kids' minds work. Though many of the concerns the Ruggles kids struggle with are not relevant to the worries of contemporary kids, their feelings of embarrassment when they do something wrong and their spirit of adventure when a new opportunity arises can be understood by children from any time period, and readers of any age. This book was really a treat, and well worth the long while I had to wait to get my hands on a copy. Strangely, I actually think it will be easier for me to get a hold of the sequels, Further Adventures of the Family from One End Street and Holiday at the Dew Drop Inn, which I hope to read soon. This was the first book with urban, working class children as its heroes – and for many years was the only book about working class children.Episodically structured, it became therefore the first book I loved for its characters rather than its plot. And it was the first book not only for me, but for all of its readers when it was first published in 1937, to make urban, working-class children its heroes. Some critics detected a patronising tone towards Garnett's characters, but others praised her for avoiding both sentimentality and condescension and replacing them with what one called "a careful truthfulness" instead. I desired their lives pretty wildly as a kid. The twins' adventures - and determination to create adventures in their lives - really jumped out at me the most as a child. I dreamed of the birthday cake at that party one of them gets accidentally invited to for years - "chocolate and coffee, mixed" - with a lattice of frosting and little silver balls all over it! who wouldn't? I'm sure several generations of children by now have dreamed about that cake. and their stories are all so funny and engaging!

We have all loved us some Famous Five. Whether it were boat-trips to family islands or bicycle trips to farmhouses run by rosy-cheeked farmwives or the endless summer trips that were remembered for the glorious picnic baskets; we loved them all. The writing structure is very clear, but I never felt it was unnecessarily simplified. There are strong characterisations of most of the Ruggles family, even William, although Peg perhaps get a bit over-shadowed. It attempts to portray life of a working class family with seven children. They seem to make do and get by, which I suspect might be slightly optimistic for the mid 19930s (but see above about churlishness). I particularly enjoyed the chapters where the three boys have their adventures. Eve Garnett lived in Lewes, Sussex for the last half of her life. She published more books but her greatest interest was in painting and she had several London exhibitions.However, I see no harm in occasionally revisiting novels you read as a child and trying to assess it objectively. Now for our modern sensibilities, The Family From One End Street might very well sometimes feel a bit politically and socially awkward and uncomfortable, but for its time, for 1937, it was indeed and truly an absolute break-through in British children's literature, being one of the very first novels conceptualised for children that did not specifically focus on upper middle and/or aristocratic characters, but on the labouring classes, on a working class family with seven children where the father is a dustman and the mother a washerwoman. And from a historical point of view, Eve Garnett (who wanted with her The Family From One End Street to raise public awareness about what family life, what life in general was like for a large working class family living, existing just above the poverty line) actually did very much succeed with and in her endeavour, even if today's readers might consider especially her tone of narrative voice a bit patronising at times and feel that the presented text is more like that of a distant outsider-narrator and observer looking in, as Garnett herself was of course not of the labouring classes (was upper middle class) and had therefore never experienced poverty or life just above, just skirting the poverty line. However, in my opinion, with Garnett's novel, with The Family From One End Street, the barriers of the working classes not being considered as adequate and as acceptable main protagonists in British children's literature, were definitely even if not right away completely broken, at least rendered more open and as such more probable. The US Library of Congress gives a longer title, The Family from One End street and some of their adventures, for its oldest holding, a 1939 UK edition. [1]

Every family member is given one chapter, including the baby William, and then the last chapters are about the family and their bank holidays, particularly their bank holiday to London for one day. Oh, when you read a description of how the family walks to catch the train for London, with their hodgepodge bags and clothing and so proud. Rose tells Old Jo not to wave with his left arm because he has a slit under the sleeve! But what about the (slightly) shabbily shod children who leaned over the fence and watched the FIVE ride along in their quaint caravans? What did those kids do to enjoy summer in all it’s sweltering glory? It's the classic story of life in a big, happy family! And with seven children, you know there won't be a dull moment. Each chapter introduces you to a different child and tells of their adventures. From Lily Rose's plans to assist her mother with the laundering, to the twin's joining a "gang" (great laughs here!), to baby William being entered in a baby contest, it's fun twists and laughs ahead for everyone. Garnett subsequently wrote a final book in the series, Holiday at the Dew Drop Inn, which details Kate's return visit to Upper Cassington alone the following summer, with the setting remaining as the late 1930s. This was first published by Heinemann in 1962. I first heard about The Family from One End Street: and Some of Their Adventures by Eve Garnett from the BBC television special, "Picture Book: An Illustrated History of Children's Literature", which my husband and I watched together a few years ago. In a segment of the show, Jacqueline Wilson, author of The Story of Tracy Beaker, spoke of the way Garnett's portrayal of working class life resonated with her as she grew up in similar circumstances. She identified the book as the first children's novel to show what it was truly like to be from a poor family. We have hunted high and low for this book for years, and it was only a shot-in-the-dark search at OpenLibrary.org that finally led to me finding and reading it. It was an added bonus that the book won the 1938 Carnegie Medal, making it possible for this to be the first book I will review for the Old School Kidlit Reading Challenge.In 1938, Garnett won the second annual Carnegie Medal awarded by the Library Association for The Family from One End Street, recognising the best children's book by a British subject for the previous year. [2] On the 70th anniversary of the Medal it was named one of the top ten winning works of the previous seventy years, selected by a panel from a public ballot to propose the all-time favourite. [3] lying on a beach with your talkative family and wriggling your toes in the sand as you snarfed down sandwiches and slabs of fruit cake. Recent British editions have been published by Puffin. The Family first appeared as a Puffin Book in 1942, under the editorship of Eleanor Graham, only a year after Penguin Books introduced the imprint. I have mixed feelings about nostalgia. I want to avoid a mindset that irritates me in others, that there is inherent value in something that merely serves as a prompt for memories of times past. The memories are good, but the book is only a prompt. Who wants to live in the past? Especially if rose-tinted memories may seem more attractive than the mixed experience of living in the present. the nervous excitement of visiting your first ever unsupervised birthday party and then returning home with that pleasant tiredness.

William, the youngest Ruggles child, is entered in the Annual Baby Show, but the family is concerned as he is a late teether. He wins his age category (6–12 months) but an older competitor wins the Grand Challenge Cup as William has no teeth. The Ruggles return home only to find that William now has a tooth. It's only as I'm writing this it dawns on me that the boys are more strongly portrayed than the girls, although I didn't realise that while reading. Not just because the boys roam further unsupervised but because the author gets deeper into the thoughts of the boys. The story begins with Lily Rose, the eldest child, trying to help her mother Rosie with the ironing and ruining a green petticoat. She apologises to its owner, Mrs Beaseley, who forgives her. Mrs Beaseley also gives Kate (the second eldest child) her niece's cast off clothes for her new school, as the government funds to help with this are paid in arrears. Kate loses the school hat, and tries to sell mushrooms to pay for a new one, but the original is eventually found. Josiah Ruggles works for Otwell council as a dustman and his wife Rosie takes in washing. They have seven children, so life is hard, but they are a happy family. Meet The Ruggles family that lives at No.1 One End Street in the fictional town of Otwell. Jo Ruggles is the local dustman and his wife Rosie is the local washerwoman. Jo and Rosie’s singular source of pride is their large brood of seven children. Yep, you read it right. Seven children. And each of these seven children has a distinctive personality and the promising ability to get into all kinds of mischief and mayhem. The Ruggles family is always low on funds but never on dignity. The Senior Ruggles rule their little clan with a blend of old-fashioned discipline, gentle cajolement and a gruff optimism.This, when I was growing up, was pretty near being The Best Book Ever. I read it over and over again, and it delighted me every time.