Story Chronology

Although the modern Marlow stories cover under two and a half years of the characters' lives, each book is set at the time of writing, which is spread over the much longer period between the late 1940s and early 1980s. (Publication dates of all Antonia Forest's books can be found in the bibliography.) There are gaps in the sequence which no book covers, but also some books which follow on immediately from each other. The periods covered by each book are shown on the Marlow Timeline. The wide spacing of books in real time while the characters barely age has produced an interesting dual timespan effect.

There are two timescales at work within the Marlow series. The first is the time elapsing from the characters' point of view -- so far they have aged about 2 years 4 months. By setting the fictional events contemporaneous with the writing and publication of each book Antonia Forest has created a second timespan from discrete intervals taken from over thirty years. It is as if the Marlow world and that of the reader have separate timelines which only occasionally intersect.

A fan reading the series straight through in order for the first time writes:

"An amazing experience. The temporal background changes so quickly while the characters remain absolutely consistent."

Avril, girlsown email archive

Some of the reasons behind this style of writing were described by the author in 1964, and the constancy of the details was touched upon in the 1995 interview:

"Since it would be a bore ... to keep strictly to period time ... each story has been given a background more or less consistent with the year in which it was written. ... say that the fictional time in which the Marlows exist is the period called Since The War; and that anything true during that time can be true and happening 'now' in the books I write about them."

Antonia Forest, note at start of The Thuggery Affair

"... I don't feel the need to reconcile anything as regards the contemporary scene. It's the characters and their doings which come first, and if the contemporary scene at the time of writing is useful, I use it. As far as details are concerned, ... in favour of relying on my memory ... and referring to the books themselves if I'm not sure."

Antonia Forest, in [Sims 1995]

Another reader points out that, given the large gaps between the publication of the books (there are thirty-four years between the first and the most recent), the dual timespan method is probably the only way possible without making the later stories hopelessly dated -- an outcome unlikely to appeal to publishers or new audiences.

The preferences of existing fans are split, but the majority seem happy with the dual timespan effect. Here are two contrasting opinions:

... probably the only thing I don't like about [the Marlow books]... I know it was meant to solve the Dartmouth problem, but if she'd left them in the late '40s it wouldn't have been a problem. However, the problem with this making them contemporary is that in Autumn Term it is obviously the late 1940s, but in Attic Term (only two years later in real terms) it is equally obviously the 1970s - the clothes from the swap shop, e.g. ... I'd have preferred them to stay in the late 1940s where they started out.

Karelia, girlsown email archive

I like this non-chronological feel to the books, because AF does have a good grasp of pop culture, so when she has her characters refer to what is going on, they seem to be real teenagers. I much prefer AFs kind of anachronism to the EBD variety of pretending it is still 1945 when it is 1960 ... [Elinor M Brent-Dyer's] timing is neither internally nor externally consistent.

Robyn, girlsown email archive