Judy stories I want to find

[Phoenix]

Thanks to a single issue eBay win that arrived this morning, I have now discovered, Tammyfan, that Hard Times For Helen started in Judy 1302 (Dec. 22 1984). So, you now just need 1302, 1303 and 1305 to have the complete story, unless you've bought any of them since last July.

[Tammyfan]

Thank you, Phoenix, for the information. And no, I don't have those issues yet.

[Tammyfan]

Thanks to a single issue eBay win that arrived this morning, I have now discovered, Tammyfan, that Hard Times For Helen started in Judy 1302 (Dec. 22 1984). So, you now just need 1302, 1303 and 1305 to have the complete story, unless you've bought any of them since last July.

Phoenix, is it possible to at least have a synopsis of part one, please?

[Phoenix]

Phoenix, is it possible to at least have a synopsis of part one, please?

Hard Times For Helen starts with 14-year-old Helen Shaw alone at home one evening. She has just finished her homework, and is wishing her widowed mother would hurry up home from her busy life as a charity worker. In fact, she doesn't see her mother until she comes down to their kitchen diner for breakfast, where her mother tells her that the local charity organisations have voted her Superworker, and that there is to be a ceremony that morning after coffee with the Mayor. At this point, Helen gets saddled with all the jobs that her mother hasn't time to do, despite the fact that it will make her late for school, where she gets told off by Miss Pringle. When she gets home from school, there is hardly anything in the fridge, and although it is the day for shopping at the supermarket, her mother gets home too late to do it. After school the following day Helen attends an audition, and gets the part of Kate in the school production of The Taming Of The Shrew, but when she gets home to give her mother the great news, she finds a note and the money for Helen to do the shopping, as her mother has been invited out to a meal with the organiser of the international charities week. However, due to the auditions, it is too late to do the shopping, so she takes some of the money and goes to the fish and chip shop. On her way home she is seen by Miss Pringle, who not only tells her off for eating in the street but says she is a disgrace to her mother. At this point Helen starts to wonder whether she is going to start having a hard time due to her mother's newly acquired fame.

[Tammyfan]

Thanks, Phoenix! It sounds like Helen was suffering even before her mother became Superworker.

Further thoughts: when Miss Pringle tells Helen off for being late, is it just for being late? Or is Miss Pringle already comparing Helen unfavourably with her mother? And is there any indication about what Miss Pringle is like, particularly with Helen, even before Superworker?

[Phoenix]

It sounds like Helen was suffering even before her mother became Superworker.

No, I don't think we can infer that at all from the strip. The problems only start after Helen's mother is voted Superworker, because that is when more demands are being made on her time. Helen is actually showing a greater sense of responsibility than her mother.

when Miss Pringle tells Helen off for being late, is it just for being late? Or is Miss Pringle already comparing Helen unfavourably with her mother?

There is certainly a comparison that is unfavourable to Helen. As Helen is rushing up to the school entrance door, Miss Pringle says, You're late, Helen Shaw! This will not do! And what a mess you look! You're not very well-organised, are you? Not at all like your mother!

And is there any indication about what Miss Pringle is like, particularly with Helen, even before Superworker?

That rather depends on how you read her only other remark to Helen when she sees her eating her chips in the street. She says, I don't care much for finding one of my pupils in the street like this! Really, Helen, you're a disgrace to your mother! You would really need to know more about Miss Pringle before determining the extent to which she is a snob, or a teacher who expects high standards of behaviour from her pupils in and out of school, or whether she genuinely believes that the reputation of Helen's mother is at risk from something that her daughter does that most people would consider fairly normal and perfectly acceptable behaviour. What is true is that Miss Pringle's comment is further emphasised in the next panel when two other women see Helen enjoying the chips, and one says to the other, Just look at Helen Shaw, hanging around in the street of an evening! And her mother's such a kind, hardworking woman!

Before I retired from schoolteaching, I always had a tutor group for registration etc., morning and afternoon, and whenever a pupil arrived late, my first question to them was always something along the lines of Why are you late? Miss Pringle never asks Why? She makes unwarranted assumptions. Of course, from the point of view of the plot, such an attitude sets Helen up for the various degrees of unhappiness and misery she will have to endure until the last instalment, when someone will feel guilty. I'm assuming that will happen because I haven't yet read any other instalments, although I did acquire all the rest from eBay yesterday, apart from the two you still need, curiously.

[Tammyfan]

Thank you Phoenix. From the other episodes, it looks more and more like Miss Pringle is simply bullying Helen, and latching on even the slightest excuse to zap Helen with the ceaseless criticism, "You're not at all like your mother!" This includes things that are pretty minor and/or have nothing to do with her mother. Well, for crying out loud - what has eating chips in the street got to do with Helen's mother?

All the other teachers act the same way towards Helen. She is frequently accused of being lazy, badly behaved and even being jealous of her mother. Not one teacher thinks that maybe they're going about things the wrong way and should try a different approach. I used a sample of this story in the bully teachers thread as the school's treatment of Helen definitely looks like bullying. And it all seems to be directed at Helen as none of the other pupils seem to be singled out for criticism.

There are a lot of people like Miss Pringle who use criticism as a form of bullying, latch on the slightest excuse to make harsh and unfair criticisms, and make big mountains out of molehills. At one point I had an encounter with such bullies myself.

In the final episode, Miss Pringle asks Mrs Shaw to help at her drama society. Miss Pringle uses this to cricise Helen again: "is it too much to expect you'd be helping?" (But she hasn't even asked Helen to help, so why expect her to?) Inwardly, Helen realises she is caught in a 2-2. If she does not help, Miss Pringle is on at her about it - but if she does, she will not be able to do her homework, and will be in trouble for that. "I can't win with old Pringle!"

Later, Mrs Shaw tells Helen that what happened at the meeting opened her eyes. "[Miss Pringle's] such a false woman and some of her harsh criticisms of you were unfair." Further indication that this is bullying. The episode does not say how things continue with Miss Pringle after that.

The person who ends up feeling guilty is Mrs Shaw. Whether Miss Pringle does, we're never told. Somehow, I doubt it.

But I don't think I'll discuss what else happens in the final episode.

And you're right about Helen showing more sense and maturity than her mother. That is perhaps the greatest and cruellest irony of this serial.

[Tammyfan]

I am still looking for Hard Times for Helen episodes from #1302, #1303 and #1305. Can anyone help, please? Thanks.

[Phoenix]

I am still looking for Hard Times for Helen episodes from #1302, #1303 and #1305. Can anyone help, please?

I can help with one third of your requirements, Briony, the bonus being that it is the first third. See below.

[Tammyfan]

Thank you, Phoenix. Just two left to find now. I see the rumours that Helen is jealous of her mother start already in the first episode as her classmates misconstrue her facial expressions. I wonder how Pringle and the teachers take up the jealousy rumour later? It must have happened in #1305 because in #1304 it just seems to be still the classmates (though I could be wrong as I don't have the next episode to see how it shapes up). But by #1306 it has become so entrenched at school that Mrs Pringle misinforms Mum about it.

I reckon when Helen said her mother never refused a helping hand to anyone, she struck the key that becomes the heart of the trouble - Mum cannot say no to anyone. She always says yes, so more and more demands get made on her and Helen takes the brunt.

[Phoenix]

I needed two days in the British Library this week (Monday and Tuesday) to add the starting and finishing dates and issue numbers of all the serials in Judy that I hadn't already noted down. I didn't have time to read any of them, unfortunately. I say 'all the serials' but I never saw issue 1303 (Dec. 29 1984). It was unavailable as it hadn't been bound into the relevant volume. Consequently I am having to assume that the final instalment of The Fugitives is in that issue, and as I don't feel comfortable assuming anything, if anyone has that issue in their collection I would be grateful if they would confirm that my assumption is actually a fact. Thanks in anticipation.

[geoff42]

It's exchanges like this that convince me that a encyclopaedic format for all comics is needed. My vision is: "A Year in British Comics 1977" ( that's my favourite year) but then, it expands to 1978, 1979, or even regress to 1976, 1975... and so on. A volume for every year that categorises every newsstand publication in Britain that gives a synopsis of every story, shows every free gift that was offered, shows every cover page of each title, and even (where possible) give the artist/writer for every story. A hell of a task, I know. But... I would love such a volume in my lap right now. Maybe... in time

[Tammyfan]

I am still looking for part 2 (Judy #1303) and 4 (Judy #1305) of Hard Times for Helen. Thank you in advance for any help from anyone.

[Phoenix]

I am still looking for part 2 (Judy #1303) and 4 (Judy #1305) of Hard Times for Helen.

Issue 1305 is in the relevant bound volume in the British Library, Tammyfan, and is therefore copyable, but as I said in June, issue 1303, the final issue of 1984, should have been bound in to the final volume for that year, but wasn't. I will be going to London again sometime in January so I could get the 1305 instalment photocopied for you then. In the meantime it would be interesting to find out whether any of the other five copyright libraries have a copy of 1303. I'll ring the British Library tomorrow or Monday to ask them for the relevant phone numbers, because as a member I might be able to get a photocopy of that missing instalment. Nothing ventured, nothing gained!

[Tammyfan]

Thank you for your help, Phoenix! And good luck with finding your number.