Was trolling the top 10s at The Guardian (http://books.guardian.co.uk/top10s/0,,84468,00.html), and Julie Burchill reminded me of Enid Blyton:
9. The Malory Towers books by Enid Blyton
Pashes, petulance, pillow fights – and the heroine is called “Darrell”! Hel-LO? Sub-textual dyke action ahoy!
Always ripe for a sniff at the secretly-lesbian cult children’s author trail (Louise Fitzhugh, anyone?), I looked up old Enid on Wikipedia. Turns out Darrell is her second husband’s name, so Burchill’s Malory Towers lesbian subtext is not so lesbian in origin as it would appear. It’s okay. We still have George and Timmy. But it made me want to read the Malory Towers books, for a brand new, horrible-wonderful Enid Blyton experience (swarthy villains! nut-brown white kids!).