FIVE LIVE FOREVER: AGAIN - THE FAMOUS FIVE...

Copyright Hodder & Stoughton Ltd L et me set the scene.  It's a medium-sized bedroom containing two single beds, one on either side of the room, with an old  Singer  treadle sewing machine between them.  The sewing machine, situated below a wide window, is usually topped with books, comics, or even an assembled model kit or toy.  A wardrobe, chest of drawers, a wooden chair, a tartan single 'bed settee' (and perhaps a small bamboo table) are the only other items of furniture present. *   ( * Incidentally, I still own the wardrobe, the chest of drawers, the wooden chair, and the bamboo table.  My parents dispensed with the other items decades ago.) It was in this room I shared with my brother between 1965 and '72 that I first became acquainted with Enid Blyton's Famous Five .  As recounted in a previous post, I no longer recall precisely how many of their adventures I read back then, perhaps three or four at the very most.  I recently bought the first ten books in the series (in paperback) and showed you the cover artwork, but since then I've purchased the remaining eleven tales (21 in all) and now present them as well. I've already read more of the Five's books in the here-and-now than I did in the late '60s, and when I eventually finish the remaining tales, my grown up encounters with them will far outweigh those of my childhood by an even wider margin.  Strangely, I yet associate the 'quintet' with my former home where I first 'met' them, more than I do my current one.  In my mind's eye, I seem to recall these covers gracing the top of that old sewing machine in my former bedroom. I suppose some associations are difficult to shed (not that I'm trying to), but perhaps, with the passing of the years, I'll eventually come to view the Five in the context of my present abode as well as my former one.  Time, as they say, will tell - assuming I'm blessed with the luxury of the continued presence of ol' Mr. Fugit for a good while longer. Anyway, once again conjuring up a vanished age, here are the remaining covers in this entertaining series of books.