This classic children’s book 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.
Reviewed by Kate Tyte in Slightly Foxed Issue 66.
Keeping up Appearances
KATE TYTE
As a child I wore a lot of brightly coloured jumpers, frequently hand-knitted by my grandmother. They were itchy and they tended to shrink. Whenever I became trapped in one, arms waving helplessly above my head, my mother would tug it off crying, ‘I can’t breve! And the sleeves is all wrong!’ The line comes from a scene in The Family from One End Street, in which a young boy named Jo becomes trapped in a shrunken jumper and multiple members of the family have to ease him out of it. The accompanying line drawing illustrates the problem perfectly. I don’t know how old I was when my mother first read the book to me, but ‘I can’t breve!’ soon became a family catchphrase.
Extract from Slightly Foxed Issue 66, Summer 2020
Keeping up Appearances
Eve Garnett’s children’s novel was first published in 1937, with her own illustrations. At least eight publishers had rejected it on account of its supposed ‘grittiness’. Here was a story...
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