The "Scouting For Boys: The Original 1908 Edition" Book Review

[Its Me 10]

 

Ok technically I haven't finished the book yet so this is a review in progress.

 

 

I read the first 75 pages or so of the Baden-Powell writings what struck me was the sort of the creative fun he inspired in his leaders to take. His writings are more "Well this os what a scout should be taught and here is one way to teach it."

 

But the introduction by Elleke Boehmer, OMG! This is a total psychological analysis of Baden-Powell. According to her if he succeeded (the town siege in the Boer wars) it was luck. If he failed (getting into Cambridge) he lacked ambition and drive. If he tried to do his job as an officer by going on patrols he was a thrill seeker.

 

I fail to see why such an opinionated psychoanalysis belongs in this book.

 

The sort of macro analysis of Edwardian Britain was interesting. How the Boer wars shocked the British into believing that the empire was fading due to a slackened male profile. But the critical and demeaning way in which she handles Baden-Powell is strikingly meant to de-hero Baden-Powell. I had to double check to make sure her name wasnt Mrs Merlyn_LeRoy.

 

 

 

 

[Miki101 14]

Not to worry.

 

Elleke Boehmer got railed in the British press for totally mis-reading the intentions of Scouting for Boys. Scouting experts and scholars recoginze her poor interpretations as revisionist that do not in any way rely upon what Baden-Powell actually wrote.

 

The biggest attempt to make him look like some sort of pervert was her completly ignorant interpretation of "Continence." I will not elaborate on it any more in this forum due to a sense of proper decorum.

 

David C. Scott