Transports of Delight: Pastoral, Nostalgia and Railway Travel in Post-WWII Genre Fiction

In the mid-twentieth century, Britain’s railways underwent a range of significant developments. A transport network that, in many ways, had not changed substantially since the Edwardian period, was transformed by events such as widespread route closures, a diesel revolution, and the growing popularity of private motoring. This paper aims to examine how the significance of railways in British literature of this period changed as a result, with particular focus upon two areas of genre fiction: crime and detective fiction, and children’s literature. I am particularly concerned with the ideals of heritage and preservation which emerged in Britain in the 1950s and 1960s, and how these encouraged the presentation of railways in a more sentimental light than had previously been seen. Most importantly, the paper examines in depth the genre fiction of the mid-twentieth century, seeking to identify the ways in which the work of authors such as Agatha Christie, Enid Blyton, and the Reverend Wilbert Awdry displays a continuity with, and nostalgia for, the interwar and Edwardian periods.