Not that I'd want 'em," he added hastily, "if I hadn't em." "William!" screamed Mrs. Brown in horror. "How can you be so ungrateful!" "I'm not ungrateful," explained William wearily. "I'm only being truthful..." The books within this series often reflected current events within the 20th century. "William the Conqueror" (1926) for example reflects pre-World War I imperialism, while 1930s books like "William The Dictator" (1938) dealt with Fascism and 1940s books like "William and the Evacuees" (1940) were set against the backdrop of World War II. Later on, "William and the Moon Rocket" (1954) and "William and the Space Animal" (1956) were written during the space race. Despite the changing events, William and other characters do not age. The series was first serialised in "Home" magazine and then "Happy Mag" but after being serialised were printed as books of short stories. All the William books until "William and the Witch" published in 1964 were illustrated by Thomas Henry in ink, with water colour illustrations for the front covers. After Henry's death in 1962, Henry Ford and Lunt Roberts (who had previously illustrated her "Jimmy" books) continued in his style. Crompton continued to write "William" books right up until her death in 1969 with the last, "William the Lawless", being published posthumously in 1970. The publication dates are for the UK. Note that although George Newnes continued to issue reprints of the series until the late 1960s, from 1963 Newnes began to abridge their editions, typically omitting between two and four stories. Abridged editions became the standard versions of the books through the reprints by other publishers in the 1960s and 1970s, until the Macmillan reprints of the 1980s and 1990s restored the full texts, with the exception of "William the Detective". Editions highlighted in are complete, while editions highlighted in are abridged. Crompton wrote a one-act play featuring the character:   Crompton wrote 55 play scripts for the BBC, broadcast from 1946. These were first collected for publication in 6 volumes from 2008-10, including several unbroadcast scripts. Nearly half of the plays were original stories, not derived from the books:  Though credited to Crompton, this was merely authorised by her, but not written by her.