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Noddy
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Noddy is a character created by British children's author Enid Blyton, originally published between 1949 and 1963. The television show based on the character is the longest running show in British television since 1955, and continues to appear to this day.
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Noddy is a little wooden boy who lives in his own little House-for-One in Toyland. He is something of a loner. Noddy got his name because his head is on a spring and when he gets excited his head cannot stop nodding.
Noddy loves driving his friends around Toyland and delivering parcels in his little red and yellow taxi. You can hear him coming by the "Parp, Parp" sound of his little taxi's horn or by the jingle of the bell on his blue hat. Often he uses his airplane to get around to visit all the places in Toyland.
Noddy is kind and honest, but he often gets in trouble, either through his own misunderstandings, or because someone has played a trick on him, like the naughty goblins, Sly and Gobbo.
His friend Mr. Plod catches the mischief makers on his police bicycle, by blowing his whistle and shouting "Halt, in the name of Plod!!" before locking the culprits up in his jail.
- Big-Ears, a wise, bearded gnome who lives in a toadstool house outside of Toytown. He is Noddy's best friend and can make magic spells.
- Bunkey, a thoroughly mischievous character, who purports to be half bunny and half monkey. He is later exposed as a fraudulent monkey who escaped from a travelling circus.
- Mr. Wobbly Man, a funny little man who cannot lie down.
- Master Tubby Bear, Mr. and Mrs. Tubby Bear's son
- Clockwork Mouse, a toy mouse who often requires winding up.
- Dinah Doll, a china doll who sells all kinds of everything in the market. A later addition, not in the original books.
- Tessie Bear, A clever and kind teddy bear and a great friend of Noddy.
- Mr Sparks, Toyland's handyman, who can mend anything. His favourite saying is "A Challenge? I Like it!"
- Miss Harriet the Pink Cat (aka Miss Pink Cat), a cat who sells ice cream.
- Mr Jumbo, an elephant friendly with Clockwork Mouse.
- The Skittles, a family consisting of Mrs Skittle and her many children of various sizes. Skittles are red and yellow in colour with black hands.
- Twinkly, a star who appeared in the episode "Catch A Falling Star".
- Stinkly ,A tramp who has never washed in his life .
- Little-Ears, Big-Ears' brother who looks just like Big-Ears, but his ears are much smaller.
Early Noddy books have become collectables, along with other Blytons. The total number is hard to count: the Noddy Library (Sampson Low) of two dozen titles, which became the New Noddy Library when revised, was just part of a big production in the 1950s, with Big Noddy Books of larger format, and strip books. There were numerous spin-offs, also. Widely-differing estimates can be found.
Sales of Noddy books are large, with an estimated 600000 annual sales in France alone, and growing popularity in India, a large market for Blyton books. The Noddy character is owned by Chorion.
This is the original Sampson Low series. Volumes 1-7 were illustrated by Van der Beek, who created the main characters. Blyton scholars are still working on the attributions to other artists.
- Little Noddy Goes to Toyland (1949)
- Hurrah for Little Noddy (1950)
- Noddy and His Car (1951)
- Here Comes Noddy Again!(1951)
- Well Done Noddy! (1952)
- Noddy Goes to School (1952)
- Noddy at the Seaside (1953)
- Noddy Gets into Trouble (1954)
- Noddy and the Magic Rubber (1954)
- You Funny Little Noddy (1955)
- Noddy Meets Father Christmas (1955)
- Noddy and Tessie Bear (1956)
- Be Brave, Little Noddy! (1956)
- Noddy and the Bumpy-Dog (1957)
- Do Look Out, Noddy (1957)
- You're a Good Friend, Noddy (1958)
- Noddy Has an Adventure (1958)
- Noddy Goes to Sea (1959)
- Noddy and the Bunkey (1959)
- Cheer Up, Little Noddy! (1960)
- Noddy Goes to the Fair (1960)
- Mr. Plod and Little Noddy (1961)
- Noddy and the Tootles (1962)
- Noddy and the Aeroplane (1963)
- The Adventures Of Noddy (1955–1961)
- The Further Adventures Of Noddy (1963–1975)
- The Classic Adventures Of Noddy (1975–1982)
- Noddy's Toyland Adventures (1992–1994)
- Noddy's New Toyland Adventures (1996–1998)
- Noddy (1998-2000)
- Make Way For Noddy (2004–Present)
- Say It With Noddy (2006–Present)
The original Noddy stories featured Golliwogs — black-faced woollen dolls. These dolls were popular in the UK at the time the stories were written, but have fallen out of favour and are now often considered racist. The main villains became two goblins named Sly and Gobbo in 1989.
In the two TV series and a new series of books, Noddy has been updated, with the original Golliwog characters replaced by other sorts of toys. For example, Mr. Golly who ran the Toyland garage was replaced by Mr. Sparks who in the new 2004 version of the series appears to be Scottish, and the addition by the BBC during the 1992–1994 series of Dinah Doll, described as "a black, assertive minority female."
It returned between September 2003 and January 2004 for a new series, which was eventually named Make Way for Noddy. This was created by Chorion, on Five and the episodes were filmed from 2001–2004 externally.
In the autumn of 2004, a set of 100 new 2-minute TV interstitials were created by Chorion. These interstitials, entitled Say it With Noddy, feature Noddy learning words in a variety of foreign languages. They also introduced Noddy's new friend Whizz from Robot Village, who presses a button on his chest to play recordings of native speakers saying the new foreign words Noddy was to learn.
Make Way for Noddy is an animated series for children produced by Chorion of the United Kingdom in conjunction with SD Entertainment in the United States. Based on Enid Blyton's Noddy character, it originally aired in 12-minute segments as part of the Milkshake! program on Britain's Five.
- In The Navy Lark, Lt. Phillips is sometimes called Noddy, since he can usually be found reading a Noddy book instead of studying the art of navigation. Lt. Phillips once said he was frightened of Big-Ears.
- Noddy has been a frequent suggestion for various scenes in the British Whose Line Is It Anyway?. More often than not, Big-Ears is mentioned at least once in said scenes. In one episode, American comic Greg Proops was expected to guess that Tony Slattery was impersonating Noddy, and failed because he had absolutely no idea what was being referenced.
- Noddy is sometimes used as an adjective to describe something as small or childish, for example a "Noddy bus" being a single-decker omnibus, or a "Noddy guide to electronics" being a simplified primer. (Compare with "Mickey Mouse".) In the early 1960s British police rode "Noddy bikes", slow, quiet Velocette LE motorcycles.
- A "Noddy suit" is British armed forces slang for a NBC suit.
- In France, Noddy is called "Oui-oui" (Yes-yes) due to his approving nod.
- In the original televised Versions, Noddy used pounds,shillings and pence. In the Chorion version he is seen using dollars. In the PBS Sprout series, the currency is simply referred to as "coins".
- In the film "The Sweeney", Police panda cars (those clearly marked as Police vehicles) are known as "Noddy Cars" and the term was subsequently used in slang.
- In Dickens' Our Mutual Friend (1864-5), Nicodemus Boffin is colloquially known as "Noddy".
- 'Noddy' was the name the British Secret Intelligence Service used to refer to a Polish agency that they infiltrated during the Cold War.
- Portuguese metal band Moonspell did a cover of the Portuguese version of the show's theme song for a comedy show (Gato Fedorento) that became very popular on the Internet, with its videos reaching hundreds of thousands of views on YouTube. This version is a gothic version of the theme song, keeping the same lyrics (one of the actors of this show called the song "Noddy Lord of the Darkness", and said he was ashamed of Portuguese lack of death metal for children).
- Noddy inspired the Apocalyptic folk music album, Swastikas For Noddy, released by the English dark folk group, Current 93, in 1987. The title and every Noddy reference on the LP was changed to Goddy for the CD reissue.
- Noddy is the name of a simplified programming language included with the MTX500 series of microcomputers. The command used to run a program is "PLOD".
- A noddy is a small, usually two-wheeled, one-horse hackney vehicle formerly used in Ireland and Scotland.
- Noddy, official website
- Noddy's Summer Tour (UK)
- Noddy - A Parent's Guide
- The Unofficial Noddy Site