Sunday 25 February 2018



This was going to be my handbag book this week. (Can't get on the Tube or a bus without a book!) But I dipped into it in bed last night and now I've kind of had enough, because there's only so much schoolgirl enthusiasm you can take: 'Super - dead thrilling - Latin was simply unspeakable - Ye Gods! - The lower VI concert was terrific.'

I'm flagging - but in small doses it's fascinating as a window into the unsophisticated life of a 15-year-old in 1954. Margaret thinks boys are soppy and girls who are into boys are even soppier. She washes her 'mop' once a fortnight and helps her mum with housework on Saturday mornings. She thinks lipstick is 'muck' and despises those girls who try to look 20. 'Give me socks, flat heels, no makeup & teenage clothes any day!' 

Less than 20 years later, I was also a northern schoolgirl, equally set on getting into university but rather less assiduous when it came to revising. I would have died rather than wear socks. I haunted the makeup counter in Boots (Miner's lipstick, Kiku perfume) and my biggest interest in life (apart from boys) was my split ends, discussed endlessly with my best friend. We fervently believed that a much-advertised shampoo called Protein 21 would miraculously mend them. We hated Latin, never helped our mothers and ached to be grown-up.

I was never going to win any scholarships. But my spelling was much better than Margaret Forster's!

13 comments:

Vronni's Style Meanderings said...

I'm taking it that these are her actual diaries from 1954 and not her reminisces of those times? I like Margaret Forster's books, I've read them all except the latest one which I will get round to getting from the library sooner or later. I have an almost complete collection of her books.

I remember Kiku and Miner's makeup- a long time ago, Mary!

And as a symptom of my old age here's what I did recently. I borrowed Marina Lewcyka's latest book from the library before Christmas on my grandson's library card as I hadn't brought mine with me. I received a letter from the library a couple of weeks ago saying I had fines on it and to return it (they seem to be much kinder to child borrowers) and then I realised I had sent it to the charity shop as a donation thinking I'd bought it in a library sale....doh!

Gina said...

I think we are probably a similar age and we certainly had similar interests. I'd forgotten all about Protein 21... it never did mend my split ends!

Sue said...

My mother in law was at school in Carlisle with Margaret Forster, and we have both read a lot of her books. I really admire her - knowing where she was from, she must have had an amazing amount of determination and grit to get to Oxford. When I was in Durham a couple of weeks ago I saw Hunter Davies' book on a northern childhood and I was tempted, but as you say, it can get a bit wearing however amusingly written. (I do love all her other books though)

Mary said...

Oh, dear Veronica - I hope you got it back! No fines for children here so you'd get away with it - although perhaps not indefinitely. Yes, this is her actual schoolgirl diary, found in the attic after her death. If anyone pulls a stunt like that on me, I'll come back and haunt them!

Gina, we should ask for our money back!

I hope her spelling improved when she got there, Sue - for a 15-year old who's supposed to be a reader, it's diabolical! I think maybe it would have been easier for her to get to Oxford back then - with 11-plus/grants/scholarships - than for girls from a similar background today. Though I was glad that when I applied to do history, there was no requirement to pass A-level Latin!

Pam said...

How interesting about her spelling! I was 15 in 1965 and did keep a diary. I must remember to root it out and burn it!

Lucille said...


Of course hairdressers always wanted to cut them off but this was torture if you were trying to grow your hair.
Growing ones hair or fringe out featured heavily in my diary as an activity. Washing hair was an Event. I used Lanolem and a rubber contraption that you had to attach to the taps.

mary said...

Oh, I'd forgotten those rubber things, Lucille - usually came off and it went all over the floor! I was desperate to have straight hair - how I'd have loved all the straighteners they have today - and my greatest ambition in life was to even out a kinky wave in my fringe. No way, would I have cut it - I could hardly see out of it!

Nan said...

Gee, I was just thinking about split ends the other day, and what a big deal they were. At 70, I don't have any. Makes me wonder, is it just a young girl thing?? ;<))

mary said...

I think I probably get my hair trimmed more often, Nan - and I don't devote so much time to splitting them. I mean double maths/Latin - that was an hour and a half of uninterrupted hair-tugging and looking out of the window. Who has so much time to be bored? (Unless it's snowing. Split ends would have been a welcome diversion today!)

Lucille said...

Re fringes and kinky hair, mine started dead straight and my mother used to put it into pin curls with kirby grips each night - very uncomfortable to sleep on. Then just when I needed long straight hair it turned wild and curly. I blamed the chlorine in my school's swimming pool. I was in despair. I hit on a method of weighing down my fringe with grips and even resorted to ironing it under sheets of brown paper. My mother even co-operated with the straightening quest to the extent of buying some Perma-Strate
which must have been the final straw (literally) for my poor hair. Looking back at photos I now see it as quite pre-Raphaelite in style but of course it was all wrong for the times. Like you I would have loved ceramic straighteners and good conditioner.

mary said...

Lucille, I look back on my brown, shiny, waist-length Pre-Raphaelite mane and think I didn't know how lucky I was, give or take a few split ends. Although maybe I should have been vintage 1850s not 1950s. I did that thing with the grips, too - was it an idea from a magazine? Anyway, it didn't work. I so fervently believed in magazines!

Lucille said...

Petticoat and Jackie were my bibles. NME and Fab208 also essential reading. Not sure why I didn't read Melody Máker. Do you remember the free gifts? Peel off eyeliner in different thicknesses hugely exciting.

mary said...

There was another - rather down-market - called Romeo. I read some awful rubbish. Lord knows how I ever talked my way into university. My mum tried to ban Petticoat which she didn't think was 'suitable' and the nuns would confiscate all of them. We did become adept at reading tucked behind files/folders.