Blyton Illustrators M - S

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McGavin, Hilda
Main, Jean
Michel, Sally
Nixon, Katherine
Openshaw, Olive F
Payne, Roger
Probst, Pierre
Robinson, Gordon
Rountree, Harry
Rowles, Daphne
Schermelé, Willy
Sharrocks, Burgess
Soper, Eileen
Steed, Cicely

Kathleen Nixon illustrated the interior of The Animal Book (Dust wrapper illustration by Ernest Aris), The Adventures of Binkle and Flip (Newnes 1938) and The Enid Blyton Book of Bunnies (Newnes 1925). She also created illustrations for Blyton's The Boys' and Girls' Annual and The Boys And Girls Story Book Number 2 (both published by News Chronicle).

Images below by Katherine Nixon (L-R) The Enid Blyton Book of Bunnies (Newnes 1925), The Trail of the Caribou in watercolour.

Olive F Openshaw

Olive F Openshaw illustrated most of Blyton's very collectible Mary Mouse strip books (Brockhampton) and The Babar Story Book retold by Enid Blyton (Methuen 1941). She also illustrated The Twins strip books by HL Gee (Brockhampton) which were published in the early 1950's and I Wish I Were You by Cynthia Asquith (Childrens Books Ltd 1949).

A full list of Mary Mouse books is contained on Mason Willey's website.

Images below by Olive F Openshaw (L-R): Cover art, title page and interior illustration from Little Mary Mouse Again, How Do You Do Mary Mouse, Here Comes Mary Mouse Again, Mary Mouse and the Noah's Ark, The Twins on Holiday and a sketch by Openshaw.

Roger Payne

Pierre Probst (3 Dec 1913 - )

Pierre Probst is a prominent French artist, who worked mostly in the 1950's and 60's as a childrens book author and illustrator. His bright, cheerful artwork add a wonderful feel to the books he illustrates.

Pierre Probst was born in Mulhouse, France. As a teenager he attended the Mulhouse School of Art, and at the age of 18 he began to draw paperboards for silk trade. He then moved into drawing for the press and advertisements before making a proposal to the editor Hachette in 1947. He wanted to create a series of small animals including kittens Pouf and Noiraud, and puppies Bobi, Pipo and Youpi. His proposal was accepted, and he began to draw - but in 1953 Hachette decided they wanted a central character to pull these animal characters together. This was the beginning of Probst's famous series Caroline, which is still in print today.
In 1966 Probst created Fanfan, another popular character who defended nature and wild animals. The series ended after 7 books.

Probst began his affiliation with Enid Blyton in the early 1950's, and in 1955 through Collins they quickly released several books together including Bimbo and Blackie Go Camping, Bobs, Enid Blyton’s Sooty, Away Goes Sooty, Christmas With Scamp and Bimbo and Scamp at School. There is some conjecture that many of these may not be Blyton's own work, and that she took some of Probst's own earlier characters, translated from the French and rehashed them slightly. However, this is only one school of thought, and Blyton's imagination was such that I personally cannot understand why she would resort to plagiarism of this type.

In an interview in 2004, Probst revealed that he based the character Caroline on his daughter, and that she was different because she always wore an overall, while girls of the day always wore skirts. He also related a story where, in preparation for drawing a bear, he crossed the fence in the zoo to get a closer look and was almost mauled! His passion for drawing animals does not relate to real life, however – he doesn’t own any pets.

Images below by Probst (L-R): Pierre Probst in 2004 at age 91; Sooty; Bimbo and His Cousin; Christmas with Scamp and Bimbo, Scamp Goes to the Zoo, Caroline Et Son Cousin, Caroline Aux Indes, Caroline's Grand Tour (English translation), Bobby The Dog, Interior illustration from Bobby The Dog, Puff the Blue Kitten (a Little Golden Book).

Gordon Robinson

Harry Rountree

Harry Rountree illustrated the dust wrapper for The Secret of Spiggy Holes.

Daphne Rowles

Wilhelmina (Willy) Schermelé (4 August 1904 - ?)

Thank you to Deb Stephens for providing some of the scans in this section.

Willy Schermelé was an illustrator and writer of children's books.

Beginning her career as a journalist, she quickly moved into the art world. She created comics for the Neerlandia Press during the 1930's, illustrated the fashion pages of Amsterdam's Daily Telegraph from 1928 and later wrote tales for the children's pages as well as creating artwork for several postcards. She moved to England for a period, where she continued illustrating childrens' books including Blyton's Good Morning Book and . She then returned the The Netherlands and began writing the famous Winkie series in 1957.

She also wrote and illustrated several other books including Peter and his Magic Pebble and Peter and his Pony (Mulder & Zoon Amsterdam), The Chimpy Family, The Piggies' Picnic (Clifford Series), The Teddy Bears' Picnic (Juvenile Productions), Margie Merry-Mouse (Ramboro Books), Goodnight Stories (Juvenile Productions), Fairyland Secrets (Juvenile Productions) and Poekie en Pluusje (Van Holkema en Warendorf, 1958).

Schermelé also illustrated reprints of several classic books including Dick Whittington and His Cat (retold by Phyllis Egan, Purnell 1967), Alice In Wonderland (Juvenile Productions 1952) and Goldilocks and the Three Bears.

Images below by Willy Schermelé (L-R): Cover illustration and title page of My Enid Blyton Story Book, Enid Blyton's Good Morning Book (1952), Peter and his Pony, Peter and his Magic Pebble, Winkie & Wobbleena, The Chimpy Family, Poekie en Pluusje, Het grote muizenboek, Bunnikins, Dick Whittington and His Cat, Alice in Wonderland, and five assorted postcards.

Burgess Sharrocks

Eileen Soper (26 Mar 1905 - 18 Mar 1990)

Eileen Soper was an incredible artist who, over the space of almost twenty years, illustrated every one of the 21 Famous Five books - the only long Blyton series where the same illustrator was used throughout. Also in her enormous portfolio are The Moods Story Books (Happy, Merry, Jolly, Sunny, Gay, Lucky, Bright, Friendly), The first three Colours Story Books (Blue, Red, Green), Tales After Tea, Tales After Supper, The Childrens Life of Christ andTales From The Bible (Methuen 1943 and 1944), The Train That Lost Its Way (Brockhampton 1946), All of the Macmillan short story books, The Little White Duck, Polly Piglet (Brockhampton 1943), The Twins Little Book series (Brockhampton) and The Secret of Killimoon, just to name a few.

Apart from her illustrations for other authors, Soper also wrote and illustrated over twenty books of her own, chiefly nature series. They include: Eileen Soper’s Book of Badgers, The Wildlife Series (Routledge c.1965), When Badgers Wake, Wild Encounters and Wild Favours (Routledge 1955, 1957 and 1963 respectively).

Born in Enfield, she moved at a young age to Harner Green in Hertfordshire. Soper was a gifted child, encouraged in her art by her father George, an artist himself. She developed her craft at a very young age, and had her first exhibition at the Print Makers Society of California in 1921. Queen Mary herself purchased one of Soper's prints - Flying Swings. She moved primarily to illustrating during the 1940's.
Soper helped to found The Society of Wildlife Artists, and was also a member of The Royal Society of Minature Painters. Her sister Eva was her only companion during the later part of her life, and Soper passed away only recently in 1990 at the age of 85.

Eileen Soper also produced so many etchings it's impossible to show them all here. A few of these can be viewed at Brunswick Gallery and British Watercolors.

Images below by Eileen Soper(L-R): Five Are Together Again, The Jolly Story Book, Secret of The Old Mill, More Adventures on Willow Farm, The Secret of Killimoon, Tales From The Bible, The Train That Lost Its Way, The Little White Duck, Polly Piglet, Come Along Twins, Babies of the Pond and Streams by Marla Tyrrell (Blackie & Son), Holidays by Sea and Riverand Country Holiday - both part of the Holidays series by Elizabeth Gould (Blackie & Son c.1935), Wild Favours, A Paragon Nursery Porriger featuring Soper artwork.
Note the similarity between the illustrations for Secret of The Old Mill and Come Along Twins.

Cicely Steed

Cicely Steed illustrated Down At the Farm With Enid Blyton published by Sampson Low in 1951, and created the colourful endpapers for The Seventh, Eighth, Ninth and Eleventh Holiday Books (also published by Sampson Low). She also illustrated My Enid Blyton Book (Marks and Spencer 1949) and My Second Enid Blyton Book (Latimer House 1953).

She worked on many childrens stories by other authors, including The Birthday Plan by Elizabeth Batt (Junior Gateway Books); The Sea Queen by Constance Savery , The entire Stories of Jesus series (6 books) by Betty Smith (Lutterworth); Johnny's Stolen Pet by Christine Wood; The Wonder ABC Book (Collins c.1950); Nelson's 1966 edition of The Water Babies; A Day In School (c.1950), the third in Evans Brothers' My First Little Books series; The Golden Path Adventure by Mary Gervaise (Nelson 1953); McMillan's Picture Books Games Book 11 by E. R. Boyce (c.1950); Evelyn Powell-Price's The Pumpkin Palace (Warne, 1949); and Rud and Robinette by Gladys Taylor (part of Blackie and Son's Anytime Series 1955).

Images below by Cicely Steed (L-R): Down At the Farm With Enid Blyton, My Enid Blyton Book, Airedale: The Wonder ABC Book, Johnny's Stolen Pet, The Sea Queen, Friends of Jesus, The Birthday Plan, Interior illustration from Golden Path Adventure, Rud and Robinette.