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The Fair to Middling
When the disabled orphans from Alderman Winterbottome's School were treated by their 'gracious benefactress' to a visit to Middling Fair, they found not only the pleasures of the merry-go-rounds and dodgems, but a strange world which offered them a chance to become like ordinary children. But what is the price they would have to pay?
192 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1959
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
August 18, 2020
Arthur Calder-Marshall "The Fair to Middling"
This is one of the strangest books ever written for children - and funny!
Published in 1959.
Written by a man who was better known as a writer for adults, but now rather forgotten.
Illustrated by the great Raymond Briggs!
Imagine a blend of morality tale, Lewis Caroll, G.K. Chesterton (as in "The Man Who Was Thursday"), Roald Dahl dilemmas, choices, and consequences, Edith Nesbit when she is a bit spooky, and much extravagant word-play.
There is also a hint of the kind of moral puzzle that occurs, for example, in C.S. Lewis's "Narnia" stories, such as "The Voyage of 'The Dawn Treader'" when Lucy finds a magic book that lets her spy on a friend, and as a result hears something unpleasant; or where the voyagers encounter the island where dreams come true, which initially sounds like a marvellous place, until you remember the bad dreams that still haunt you.
(Fantasy Rule Number 17; Be careful what you wish for.)
Middling is a typical small English village, and one typical English summer August Bank Holiday a Fair comes to Middling. (That explains the odd title that alludes to, but does not overtly use the common saying about a situation being fair to middling, or, more or less OK.)
But the Fair is not so typical. (It is very different from the Fair that comes to "Miss Read"'s "Thrush Green" on May Day.)
This Fair includes, among many strange side-shows and attractions, the "Able See Men", and Mr Scratch.
And Middling has Winterbottome School for Incapacitated Orphans, a strange school with an ominious name, a charity school, founded by Sir Percy, for children who have no parents, and who also have some (minor) disability.
The teachers have unusual characteristics.
As noted, each of the children has a disability of some kind: one is an albino, another has a thyroid problem, another is colour-blind.
Each child hopes for a change, as an adult, or sooner, if possible.
The school's current patron, Lady Charity Armstrong, lets the children have a day at the Fair, and gives each child half a crown (a single coin that was roughly comparable to an American quarter, if we are counting pennies).
A crown was five shillings (before New Pence), so half a crown was half of this, two shillings and sixpence.
In 1959 this would have been a sizeable amount for a child to spend at a Fair, perhaps comparable to the money Fern and Avery are given when the go to the County Fair in E.B. White's earlier "Charlotte's Web".)
Each child finds something on offer at one of the attractions of the Fair.
Each child is confronted with a moral dilemma: will the offered "cure" or "solution" be as good as the child hopes? will the price be personally affordable? is the offer genuine?
By the end of the day, each child has chosen, and faced the consequences of the choice and the price.
(Remember the characters, ambitions, and comeuppances that occur through Dahl's "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory"? Each child gets what he or she deserves, as the Oompa Loompas gleefully warn and then comment on, like a blend of Furies and Greek Chorus.)
And, such is the nature of this sort of fantasy-moral-entertainment, one of the teachers returns to the school at the end of the long, arduous and remarkable day, and begins to write the first sentences of the book that has just been read.
(E.R. Eddison did this, famously, in "The Worm Ouroboros", as did James Joyce with the starting sentence and final sentence of "Finnegans Wake", and many other stories as well, such as S.E. Hinton's Young Adult novel "The Outsiders".)
(Also check the online notes at [...])
This may be the most unusual chikdren's book you will ever read, apart from Lewis Carroll's "Alice" dream books.
John Gough - Melbourne, Australia
This is one of the strangest books ever written for children - and funny!
Published in 1959.
Written by a man who was better known as a writer for adults, but now rather forgotten.
Illustrated by the great Raymond Briggs!
Imagine a blend of morality tale, Lewis Caroll, G.K. Chesterton (as in "The Man Who Was Thursday"), Roald Dahl dilemmas, choices, and consequences, Edith Nesbit when she is a bit spooky, and much extravagant word-play.
There is also a hint of the kind of moral puzzle that occurs, for example, in C.S. Lewis's "Narnia" stories, such as "The Voyage of 'The Dawn Treader'" when Lucy finds a magic book that lets her spy on a friend, and as a result hears something unpleasant; or where the voyagers encounter the island where dreams come true, which initially sounds like a marvellous place, until you remember the bad dreams that still haunt you.
(Fantasy Rule Number 17; Be careful what you wish for.)
Middling is a typical small English village, and one typical English summer August Bank Holiday a Fair comes to Middling. (That explains the odd title that alludes to, but does not overtly use the common saying about a situation being fair to middling, or, more or less OK.)
But the Fair is not so typical. (It is very different from the Fair that comes to "Miss Read"'s "Thrush Green" on May Day.)
This Fair includes, among many strange side-shows and attractions, the "Able See Men", and Mr Scratch.
And Middling has Winterbottome School for Incapacitated Orphans, a strange school with an ominious name, a charity school, founded by Sir Percy, for children who have no parents, and who also have some (minor) disability.
The teachers have unusual characteristics.
As noted, each of the children has a disability of some kind: one is an albino, another has a thyroid problem, another is colour-blind.
Each child hopes for a change, as an adult, or sooner, if possible.
The school's current patron, Lady Charity Armstrong, lets the children have a day at the Fair, and gives each child half a crown (a single coin that was roughly comparable to an American quarter, if we are counting pennies).
A crown was five shillings (before New Pence), so half a crown was half of this, two shillings and sixpence.
In 1959 this would have been a sizeable amount for a child to spend at a Fair, perhaps comparable to the money Fern and Avery are given when the go to the County Fair in E.B. White's earlier "Charlotte's Web".)
Each child finds something on offer at one of the attractions of the Fair.
Each child is confronted with a moral dilemma: will the offered "cure" or "solution" be as good as the child hopes? will the price be personally affordable? is the offer genuine?
By the end of the day, each child has chosen, and faced the consequences of the choice and the price.
(Remember the characters, ambitions, and comeuppances that occur through Dahl's "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory"? Each child gets what he or she deserves, as the Oompa Loompas gleefully warn and then comment on, like a blend of Furies and Greek Chorus.)
And, such is the nature of this sort of fantasy-moral-entertainment, one of the teachers returns to the school at the end of the long, arduous and remarkable day, and begins to write the first sentences of the book that has just been read.
(E.R. Eddison did this, famously, in "The Worm Ouroboros", as did James Joyce with the starting sentence and final sentence of "Finnegans Wake", and many other stories as well, such as S.E. Hinton's Young Adult novel "The Outsiders".)
(Also check the online notes at [...])
This may be the most unusual chikdren's book you will ever read, apart from Lewis Carroll's "Alice" dream books.
John Gough - Melbourne, Australia
November 20, 2023
I read old, out-of-print paperbacks preferentially. I can't even begin to explain why - it's just become my thing. As such, I'm wholly reliant upon the reviews of other readers to provide me with information beyond the tagline on WorldCat (if they have one for it).
Consequently, I've been known to be rather irritated by incomplete reviews (or worse, a 2-star rating, followed by the 'review' of "It was ok", which is exactly what the goodreads hover-over tool-tip says in the first place when you move your cursor over that second star... idiocy!).
I have to apologise if I felt that way towards any previous reviewer of The Fair to Middling. Because now, I too, have no idea how to adequately summarize this book.
I think the closest I can do is say that it's like Something Wicked This Way Comes by the incomparable Ray Bradbury which collided with legendary The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster, and that the resultant pile-up was, just maybe and perhaps, attended to by The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis.
I didn't enjoy all of it. I'm not trying to score any 'woke' points by saying that it was written by a bloke in the late 1950s who thought a colourblind female child's chief concern in life was retaining a male mate she'd be lucky enough to catch without a good colour-matching sense for dresses to go with her red hair (I'm not joking, and neither was he, I don't think. It came up twice). She was worried that if she'd be able to snag a man, she'd be unable to keep him because other women would look better put-together than she ever could. I can't even tell if he was trying to show how naive that was, and assumed that the reader would know that a good man would love her irrespective of her lack of colour-coordination and not leave her, or not. I couldn't tell. And it nagged.
The story is about a school of orphans who are all disabled or disfigured in various ways (blindess, colour-blindness (complete colour-blindness in a female is rare, isn't it?), albinism, just being fat, flabby and ugly... what was wrong with Wally Stubbs?!, and did Florence have a port-wine stain on her face? I wasn't quite sure etc.). It's not the dated language that even bothers me, it's tone, and the superficiality of them all, which I found a bitter pill to swallow. A mild thematic spoiler follows for benighted app users: . It's just that it takes a long, winding, and painful route to get there, and, as I said, living in the very vain and superficial world my grandparents knew, is not entirely comfortable or enjoyable for me. I found it depressing, even when the conclusion was very hopeful indeed.
Lots of Mephistopheles and Faustian devilry here, more puns than I care for (I have a friend who absolutely lives for them - the sort of person who gives The Phantom Tollbooth a 5+ star rating!), and some very, very dated references, I can only really recommend this to the sort of people who would join the Forgotten Vintage Children's Lit We Want Republished! group. ;) (You are welcome to join, too!), with the caveat that I'm not sure it warrants republication. A scan and upload to OpenLibrary or Archive.org, absolutely. But probably not reprinting. ;)
Consequently, I've been known to be rather irritated by incomplete reviews (or worse, a 2-star rating, followed by the 'review' of "It was ok", which is exactly what the goodreads hover-over tool-tip says in the first place when you move your cursor over that second star... idiocy!).
I have to apologise if I felt that way towards any previous reviewer of The Fair to Middling. Because now, I too, have no idea how to adequately summarize this book.
I think the closest I can do is say that it's like Something Wicked This Way Comes by the incomparable Ray Bradbury which collided with legendary The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster, and that the resultant pile-up was, just maybe and perhaps, attended to by The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis.
I didn't enjoy all of it. I'm not trying to score any 'woke' points by saying that it was written by a bloke in the late 1950s who thought a colourblind female child's chief concern in life was retaining a male mate she'd be lucky enough to catch without a good colour-matching sense for dresses to go with her red hair (I'm not joking, and neither was he, I don't think. It came up twice). She was worried that if she'd be able to snag a man, she'd be unable to keep him because other women would look better put-together than she ever could. I can't even tell if he was trying to show how naive that was, and assumed that the reader would know that a good man would love her irrespective of her lack of colour-coordination and not leave her, or not. I couldn't tell. And it nagged.
The story is about a school of orphans who are all disabled or disfigured in various ways (blindess, colour-blindness (complete colour-blindness in a female is rare, isn't it?), albinism, just being fat, flabby and ugly... what was wrong with Wally Stubbs?!, and did Florence have a port-wine stain on her face? I wasn't quite sure etc.). It's not the dated language that even bothers me, it's tone, and the superficiality of them all, which I found a bitter pill to swallow. A mild thematic spoiler follows for benighted app users: . It's just that it takes a long, winding, and painful route to get there, and, as I said, living in the very vain and superficial world my grandparents knew, is not entirely comfortable or enjoyable for me. I found it depressing, even when the conclusion was very hopeful indeed.
Lots of Mephistopheles and Faustian devilry here, more puns than I care for (I have a friend who absolutely lives for them - the sort of person who gives The Phantom Tollbooth a 5+ star rating!), and some very, very dated references, I can only really recommend this to the sort of people who would join the Forgotten Vintage Children's Lit We Want Republished! group. ;) (You are welcome to join, too!), with the caveat that I'm not sure it warrants republication. A scan and upload to OpenLibrary or Archive.org, absolutely. But probably not reprinting. ;)
January 26, 2012
I loved reading this with my eleven-year-old son who fell in love with it. It is incredibly prescient, one chapter of the book portrays a set up similar to today's Big Brother programme. It is a magical morality tale with a subtle message about dealing with life's hurdles, and never forgetting the joy in life. It is a truly special book that today's children whould read.
July 3, 2020
I really love this book, not so much for the way it is written, but the underlying message to children and people in general, you need to help yourself if you want to overcome your problems, but you also need to accept support and help from the people around you, because life can be very hard to deal with if you feel abandoned and your life has no value. But everyone has the possibility of change and reaching out either to get help or to give help.
September 23, 2024
I read this book because my Grandma gave it to me as one of the most impactful books from her childhood with the theme of disability. I did enjoy it kind of, the narrative was very surreal though and the sense only really pulled together in the last few pages. For its time and the Christian lens, it does very well.
July 25, 2020
A very strange book for children with numerous play on words and hidden meanings all wrapped up in a strange other worldly fairground that appears when a real fair comes to town.
November 7, 2024
I read this in 1969 “for the first time in years. Better than I thought it would be—quite good, in fact.”
I suppose I’d read it as a small boy; in 1969 I was 15. I probably haven’t read it again since then, and don’t have a copy of it.
I suppose I’d read it as a small boy; in 1969 I was 15. I probably haven’t read it again since then, and don’t have a copy of it.
August 7, 2016
I loved this book. I read it aged about 12 years old, re-read it in my late teens and again in my twenties. I would love to read it again but lost my (well thumbed) copy many years ago.
October 4, 2014
How come I have never read this book before??? Great story.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews