Reading the Hardy Boys in late middle age because I didn't in pre-adolescence. Is this the first - perhaps only - to feature a gay character? And whatever happens to Frank and Joe's ice boat? brianbusby.blogspot.com/2025/02/the-... #canlit #hardyboys - ThreadSky

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brianbusby.bsky.social • 2 days ago

Reading the Hardy Boys in late middle age because I didn't in pre-adolescence. Is this the first - perhaps only - to feature a gay character? And whatever happens to Frank and Joe's ice boat?

https://brianbusby.blogspot.com/2025/02/the-case-of-queer-antique-dealer.html

#canlit #hardyboys

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patrickmurtha.bsky.social•2 days ago

In The Melted Coins (1944), there is a homoerotic scene in which a maniac sailor captures Joe Hardy and starts to tattoo him on the chest.

-"I'll tattoo you if it's the last thing I do!”…he reached down and ripped open the boy's shirt…"The mark will stay with you for life," cried the pirate.”-

brianbusby.bsky.social•2 days ago

Another McFarlane-penned Hardy Boys novel! His second to last, I can't help but think he was having some fun.

patrickmurtha.bsky.social•2 days ago

The earlier novels and editions in all the children’s series - Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, Tom Swift, etc - are a quantum leap beyond post-1960 waterings-down in sophistication and quality, even considering changes in social attitudes.

patrickmurtha.bsky.social•2 days ago

The plot of The Melted Coins is as complicated and difficult to summarize as Dickens's Little Dorrit, and like that great novel, lends itself readily to a Marxist interpretation, since everything in it revolves around the theme of money.

brianbusby.bsky.social•2 days ago

From what I've read of the 'sixties rewrites what surprises most is that they are considered more racist than the originals. I've not read any so can't weigh in on the validity of this opinion, but will say that the 1966 Mystery of Cabin Island appears one such case.

patrickmurtha.bsky.social•2 days ago

Similarly, in the 1933 Nancy Drew that I read, The Sign of the Twisted Candles, Nancy is bold and pretty astonishingly feminist, and I take it that was all diluted or eliminated in the revisions.

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