Would this be appropriate?

I am in my 60s and I was never physically punished by my parents nor did I ever hit my own children, but I knew it happened. We all know it still happens behind closed doors today and to pretend it doesn’t is an injustice to all the children who suffer at the hands of abusive adults!

You know what, a child reading, or being read to, is such a great thing it’s almost irrelevant what the story is. I still love reading, I read all the famous five and Mallory Towers stories when little (a long time ago), Just William, Swallows and Amazons, Heidi, 5 children & It, The Secret Garden, Black Beauty.... I loved them all ! A great mix of reading books is always good, if you’re not sure check with parents first

I liked some Enid Blyton, particularly the Famous Five. I liked the Faraway Tree and my daughter loved it. I hadn’t thought about the issue of spanking nowadays. I think there is probably racism too. It is a very modern thing now to feel children need protecting from everything. It seems strange to people of our generation. I was thinking about playing in the river and no-one worrying about safety. What a loss it would have been if I could only have gone there with adults. It seems there must be cultural protection as well. I would check with the parents. Are children still read to from Grimm? Much more disturbing I would think. Also the bible is pretty disturbing. And they will be on the internet soon enough. I think

I don't think the thought of other children in a story getting a spanking will bother modern five year olds. EB wrote some lovely stories and it would be sad to ignore them all together. If they ask just explain that it was more common to spank children in those days. It's likely they have friends who are spanked or smacked anyway. Although it's a different age group to your GC, when reading Swallows and Amazons I had to explain that Tittie was a girl's name at that time and not a slang word for breast. After the initial shock and sniggers they just accepted it and thought nothing more about it.

Iif they are banning Enid Blyton presumably parents are banning most fairy stories, such as Red Riding Hood etc ? And it seems like a double standard to allow Roald Dahl, considering the content of his books!
Before you know it you will be banning half of children's literature.

As some posts have said, explaining that these are stories, so not real, is all that is needed. The explanation about how methods of bringing up children have now changed, can come later; after all, if you are going to have that discussion in all honesty you would have to say that physical punishment of children ( and adults) still happens in some cultures.
Presumably you will allow schools to teach history to your children, much of which includes far more brutality and devastating violence? Part of growing up is to learn gradually that attitudes, customs, opinions change over time - and not always for the best.

Aside from that, if you're unsure what books to buy for children there's a good website where you can find synopses and reviews of books and a guide to age suitability.
It's www.lovereading4kids.co.uk
Note the number 4 instead of 'for'. Amazon is also useful if you know what book you want to find out about, as they include reviews.
Please please please encourage reading - so many children only encounter ipads and tablets these days, even in school too.

Enid Blyton is a product of its time. There are issues with children being hit, gender roles, middle class suburban life that will need so much explaining . As a result explanations of these things will be long and tedious. Don’t go there it’s not relevant apart from an example of how people used to think years ago.
It was banned in my local library 50 years ago because of the above and even more problems with Noddy!

EB books are period pieces. If it is explained to the child that things were different "in Granny's time", what's the problem? The stories are great.
By the way, I know a reluctant reader aged 11 whose school has given him some Famous Five books.
And what about Thomas the Tank Engine? Another period piece but I haven't come across a 5-year-old boy who didn't love him.

Why not visit the library and borrow books, I used to love being able to borrow different books when I was little, still do

Interesting about fairy stories. I have my old Hansel and Gretel, with illustrations, and was terrified by them. My mother had Perrault’s Fairy Tales on a high bookshelf, I climbed on a chair and reached it, read Bluebeard....aaarghh! Never forgot those, or Jack and the Beanstalk, where the Ogre killed his daughters. I think these stories have more of an effect than we think!

Dear Havemercy I have 4 grandsons and must admit I have built them each a library of books and they love being read too, the eldest 2, both 6 will now read to younger brothers, 4 and 2. I have bought books from The Works and Waterstones and from being young they were able to choose. Stories should inspire them to use their imaginations. Last christmas instead of buying advent calendars I bought 24 books for each of them, individually them and put numbers on. It was the best thing i have ever done as they all loved having a new book every day, all age appropriate. It took time to do, but I've been asked to do again by each of them, even parents enjoyed.

I think the advice to read them and say 'we don't do that now' is absolutely spot on. Why deny children the pleasure of good well-written stories because they are not quite PC. When a child, I was terrified of stories by the Brothers Grimm. They were thought to be good classics for children, but being put into ovens, lost in woods, or being eaten by giants was horrifying. Hans Anderson wasn't much better either.

Good stories will enable learning of good English and how to express themselves, and a little logic and reason, plus as one contributor said, good is rewarded, naughtiness is punished in some way or other.

Not sure Enid Blyton can be classed as well written.

I am.

There are lots of adult books which are badly written. We can’t ban them all, why should we try as long as someone is getting pleasure from them.

I get that it’s different, young minds and all that. But I can’t help thinking there’s a bit of snobbery in the “I’d never let my children read EB”

Go on, let them enjoy an awfully good adventure.

My GC’s in The Netherlands until recently, loved Julia Donaldson but especially books by Oliver Jeffers. At least one has been made into an animation. I read to them and they are lovely books for 3-6 year olds. Youngest GD, 17 months is getting very into Julia Donaldson now especially Room on the Broom.

Difficult in this day of "political correctness" and "wokeness"!! Enid Blyton had an uncanny ability to appeal to children and most children love Enid Blyton books. My grandchildren absolutely adored the Magic Wishing Chair and The Faraway Tree series and that is really only going back about 10 years ago. Maybe try them - do not remember any spanking in them! However children are well aware that times have changed and have a lot more common sense than adults give them credit for, The main point is that you are reading to them and encouraging reading something much neglected these days!

As a youngster I remember quivering with excitement at the anticipation when I was given an Enid Blyton book. Many years ago, as an adult I reading several William books which made me laugh out loud and would strongly recommend them today.

I would make a plea for some understanding here ( I speak as someone who was fairly often subjected to a spanking or a 'clip' around the ear, both at school and at home). Please don't deprive young children of such reading pleasure - it's easy enough to explain that such things happened many years ago, but no longer.

Would you deprive them of reading Treasure Island? Coral Island? Rider Haggard? Grimms Fairy Tales? Or even the Bible, with its murder, rape and even incest?? BTW, I'm atheist. And when they are older, how will you deal with the shock of Shakespeare and the horrors of Macbeth, Julius Caesar and Richard III? No, please don't, with sufficient advice they can cope and they will be better read and better informed in the future!

We loved Enid Blyton in our era, although you remember they with great fondness, why not discover new books and new authors with your grandson?

Dick King-Smith has written some wonderful animal stories that you could discover together, and would be appropriate for his age, with you reading.
Or go really adventurous and read him Terry Pratchett's children's books: Truckers, Diggers and Wings, though you will appreciate the humor more than he will!

Cossy's list could be mine with the addition of The Secret Garden, and The Secret Seven. In the past EB got us reading and most people read them when very young, by the time I was 9/10 I had discovered Agatha Christie and spent a Summer working my way through all the murders and mysteries. At least the famous five are outdoors and doing things, although this would probably more alien to modern children than the smacking! Any problems in the script can be talked over with the child but I suspect most of them would soon be caught up in the adventure.

I had a treasured book of Anderson's Fairy Tales, as a child, which I read over and over. I never tired of it. Re-visiting it, as an adult, I was amazed at how scary some of the stories were.

We can't censor everything that children read. Explaining how times and attitudes have changed over the years leads to interesting conversations.

There are so many non dodgy alternatives in the childrens adventure genre such as murpurgo etc there really is no need for them to read EB.

I bought a whole bundle of EB when mine were little hoping that at least one of them would be benign: I read them myself first and none were! Im not talking about them being a bit outdated, they were horribly overtly racist etc.

Yes, we read them growing up, but with so many alternatives I think that kids can read good adventure books without the problems in EB

And yes my kids read plenty of the classics. We do not shy away from darker themes.

Thats not the same as the overt unpleasantness normalised in EB

And p.s. E.B. isnt "banned" by "political correctness"
You can still easily buy them.

But with the amount of childrens books in that genre, you dont need to to fulfil that niche on their bookshelves

When my children were at school at the same age a letter came home asking us not to buy Enid Blyton books for our children as they were “not well written”.

When my youngest was at school Hollycat, Jacqueline Wilson was very much frowned upon.

I agre with those who say the variety of books for all ages is amazing, I love spending an hour in Waterstones with one of my granddaughters, she always chooses a little pile of very diverse books, but there will often be an Enid Blyton in there. Personally, I can’t see the harm.