The Book of Dragons
Dec. 10th, 2003 02:54 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
memelainaI'm reading E. Nesbit's The Book of Dragons. It's a collection of eight short children's stories about, you guessed it, dragons. I have a copy of this book that ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lisajulie gave me many years ago. I also found (on doing some bookshelf consolidation) that I have another copy. I think this one is probably the original that my first husband, David, and I bought in a little indie bookstore in Great Falls, Montana many many years ago. I took it down out of the library thinking that perhaps I would send it to him (or at least to his parents' house) and then started reading it. Nesbit's style is very conversational. I wonder if that is a turn of the century thing, or more individual to her? She talks to the children she is writing for and makes wonderful allusions to everyday bits of Edwardian/Victorian life in her comparisons to the life, times, feelings, and appearance of dragons. There's certainly an element of the "moral tale" bit - good children are rewarded for good things - but it's very painless and her subject matter just outré enough to make it all great fun.
lisajulie gave me many years ago. I also found (on doing some bookshelf consolidation) that I have another copy. I think this one is probably the original that my first husband, David, and I bought in a little indie bookstore in Great Falls, Montana many many years ago. I took it down out of the library thinking that perhaps I would send it to him (or at least to his parents' house) and then started reading it. Nesbit's style is very conversational. I wonder if that is a turn of the century thing, or more individual to her? She talks to the children she is writing for and makes wonderful allusions to everyday bits of Edwardian/Victorian life in her comparisons to the life, times, feelings, and appearance of dragons. There's certainly an element of the "moral tale" bit - good children are rewarded for good things - but it's very painless and her subject matter just outré enough to make it all great fun.
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Date: 2003-12-10 07:56 pm (UTC)But I'm curious about other children's books of the time. I can find much before (The Children of New Forest and Tom Brown's School Days) and after (Swallows and Amazons). Maybe Dr. Doolittle? There must have been something written for children - maybe it was so horrible it just vanished?
Caveat: the search for books was made in my bookshelves and no further.