Jennings (novels)

The Jennings series is a collection of novels written by Anthony Buckeridge (1912–2004), as children's literature, and concern the humorous escapades of J.C.T. Jennings, a schoolboy at Linbury Court preparatory school in England. There are 23 novels in the series, excluding reprints and other material. The first of the series, Jennings Goes to School, appeared in 1950, and new titles were published regularly until the mid-1970s (the last was Jennings at Large, published in 1977, the only novel to feature Jennings during the school holidays), with two more volumes following in the 1990s (Jennings Again in 1991, and That's Jennings in 1994).

The earliest ten novels in the series were reprinted in the UK in paperback, by Armada Books, in the late 1960s; and many of the novels were translated from the original English into foreign languages. Quite often, the character's name was not even retained: when published in France, Jennings' name was changed to "Bennett"; in Norway he was known as ""; and in Brazil, when published during the 1970s, the character's name became "Johnny".

Much of the humour rests on misunderstandings attributable to Jennings's literal-mindedness and impetuosity. In the earliest novels in the series there are some Latin puns (typically omitted from later reprints), but Buckeridge discontinued these, apparently to maximise their appeal. The earlier novels present an idealised version of rural or small-town, middle class English life in the years between the Second World War and the social revolution of the 1960s; the later ones are still rooted in this era (as Buckeridge admitted) but reflect the changing times surprisingly well. Unlike many of his fans, Buckeridge tended to prefer his later books to his earlier ones, possibly because he was a man of the Left and had more positive political memories of the post-1964 period; when the books were reprinted in paperback in the late 1980s, he chose some of the later books for early publication ahead of those originally written in the 1950s.

The stories invented some vernacular language for the boys to use. In particular they coined the word "ozard". The post-war slang "wizard" generally meant "good" or "very good". "Ozard" derives from "Wizard of Oz" and was used to describe anything the boys disliked or dreaded. It was also used to describe the anger of Mr. Wilkins, which could be "ozard", "ozard squared" and occasionally "ozard cubed". An alternative possibility is that "Ozard" was simply short for "The Opposite of Wizard" i.e., bad.

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