Rosemary Manning (1911–1988)

[This is a review I wrote in 2017]

A friendly green dragon, a mermaid, Arthurian legend and eight-year-old Sue who is on holiday at the Cornish seaside with her parents. Add together these ingredients for a magical, gentle children’s story.

First published in 1957; I don’t know how I missed this growing up as I LOVED green dragons… but perhaps they didn’t have it in my local library. Anyway, I’ve just finished reading Green Smoke and I’m about to go on the hunt for the sequels: Dragon in Danger (1959), The Dragon’s Quest (1961), and The Dragon in the Harbour (1980). Original editions are hard to find but second-hand Puffin paperback reprints aren’t too tricky to track down.

“A story about life-long friendship and magical adventures – a happy book, with lots of jokes” – Amanda Craig

So Sue is on holiday in Constantine Bay. Perhaps I should let the author introduce Constantine Bay – this is how the story opens:

‘This is a story about a girl called Susan, or Sue for short, who went for a seaside holiday to Constantine Bay in Cornwall. Perhaps you have never been to Constantine Bay. Perhaps you have never even been to Cornwall. That won’t matter at all. Just think of the rockiest rocks, the sandiest sand, the greenest sea and the bluest sky you can possibly imagine, and you will have some idea of Constantine Bay.’

There is a high cliff with a lighthouse, a ridge of rocks jutting into the sea, sand dunes ‘with hummocks of tough grass, and little hot sandy paths running in and out like yellow streams’.

Idyllic, yes? I think so.

It’s on the third day of the holidays, early in the morning when there aren’t many people about, that Sue is scrambling about on the rocks by herself and she hears a sound like a very loud sneeze and sees a little puff of green smoke come out of a cave nearby. Sue goes to investigate and another sneeze erupts and with it a paper bag comes flying out of the cave. Sue goes to bury the paper bag in a hole and cover it over with sand when a voice comes out of the cave to thank her for burying their rubbish. Sue keeps the conversation going with the mysterious voice until she can coax it into telling her who it belongs to… a rather surprising Mr R. Dragon; Cornish, green and a friendly, if occasionally grumpy, dragon.

R. Dragon and Sue become firm friends and Sue visits nearly every day to share her picnic, or a bun or a biscuit, to hear the dragon’s tales and to go on the occasional adventure. Dragon is some 1500 years old and he’s quite lonely in his cave so he loves spending time with Sue and gets quite grumpy if Sue misses a visit due to bad weather or a day spent with her parents! However, his manners are impeccable, he’s very polite and he’s lived a long, long time, so has some fabulous tales to tell. Most of R. Dragon’s tales relate to Arthurian legend as he lived for a time at the court of King Arthur so knows all about the legend of the sword Excalibur, the Lady of the Lake and Arthur and his knights.

As to why he’s called R. Dragon… well, he can’t tell Sue his full name. If a dragon or a mermaid or a fairy tells you their name then you will have complete power over them and that can be a very dangerous thing…… (altro)

A delightful old-fashioned read, and a worthy sequel to "Green Smoke", though part of the charm of the first book was that Susan could talk to her mother about the dragon and her mother went along with what she believed was her daughter's game. Here everyone can see him (but that's kind of the point now).
Just a quibble: the old pre-decimal amounts have been updated, a bit haphazardly, (fancy Puffin bothering!), to make it more understandable for 1970s kids no doubt. But set in 1959 it should be shillings and pence. Otherwise "A Flat Iron for a Farthing" of 1872 would have to become "A Flat Iron for Something Considerably Less than Half a P". And then, what's a flat iron? etc etc.... But 25p = 5 shillings (or it did in 1971), and 5 shillings in 1959 would have bought you a heck of a lot of icecream. I wonder what the original edition says.… (altro)

I remember borrowing "Green Smoke" from the library when quite young (I asked my 91-year-old Dad if he remembered it, and he did!) It was probably the first "Arthurian" book I ever read. So when I saw "The Dragon's Quest" in a charity shop I decided to get re-acquainted, and I'm glad I did. There was also a copy of "Dragon in the Harbour" , but it is vastly inferior, having been written thirty years later. It is a dull story of petty smuggling at the seaside, and R Dragon, always a bit tetchy, appears to have regressed from being the noble companion of Bewmains to a state of even more grumpiness, greed and vanity.
This copy of "Green Smoke" has been signed by the author.… (altro)

This is a brief chapter book, with most chapters containing a story within a story - there's an argument that much of Green Smoke is simply an excuse to retell Cornish myths, and it was probably one of my earliest points of entry to Arthurian legends.

Young Sue stumbles across Mr R Dragon on her first day of a 2-week visit to Constantine Bay, and the two quickly forge a friendship based on a shared love of iced buns, stories, and genteel politeness (they meet when Sue buries a paper bag that the dragon has accidentally sneezed out of his cave). Objectively, Mr R Dragon is in fact a fairly self-absorbed, grumpy old man - he doesn't like it when he isn't the centre of attention, he dislikes interruptions and being contradicted, and he gets very snappy when he doesn't get fed his own way.

In spite of this, there's an irresistible charm about their relationship - and when Sue calls him on one unreasonable grump, he cheers up as quickly as he clouded over. Sue herself is delightful, as is her relationship with her mother.

Needless to say, I devoured the whole thing and intend to read the sequels again in due course. Absolute joy.… (altro)