The Golden Age is a collection of reminiscences of childhood, written by Kenneth Grahame. Typical of his culture and his era, Grahame casts his reminiscences in imagery and metaphor rooted in the culture of Ancient Greece. This edition also includes a biography of the books author, Kenneth Grahame.
The British author Kenneth Grahame is celebrated for creating ‘The Wind in the Willows’, one of the most beloved tales of classic children’s literature. He also wrote ‘The Reluctant Dragon’, as well as endearing short stories and thought-provoking essays. This comprehensive eBook presents Grahame’s complete works, with numerous illustrations, rare texts appearing in digital print for the first time, informative introductions and the usual Delphi bonus material. (Version 1) * Beautifully illustrated with images relating to Grahame’s life and works * Concise introductions to the texts * All the tales and essays, fully illustrated, with individual contents tables * Includes rare works appearing for the first time in digital publishing, including BERTIE’S ESCAPADE * Images of how the books were first published, giving your eReader a taste of the original texts * Excellent formatting of the texts * Famous works such as ‘The Wind in the Willows’ are fully illustrated (Paul Bransom) with the original artwork * Includes Grahame’s rare non-fiction work, FIRST WHISPER OF ‘THE WIND OF THE WILLOWS’ – available in no other collection * Features two biographies, including Chalmers’ seminal work - discover Grahame’s literary life * Scholarly ordering of texts into chronological order and literary genres Please visit www.delphiclassics.com to browse through our range of exciting titles CONTENTS: The Children’s Books THE WIND IN THE WILLOWS THE CAMBRIDGE BOOK OF POETRY FOR CHILDREN BERTIE’S ESCAPADE The Short Story Collections PAGAN PAPERS THE GOLDEN AGE DREAM DAYS THE HEADSWOMAN The Non-Fiction FIRST WHISPER OF ‘THE WIND OF THE WILLOWS’ The Biographies KENNETH GRAHAME LIFE LETTERS AND UNPUBLISHED WORK by Patrick Chalmers THE CHILDREN’S ADVOCATE: KENNETH GRAHAME by W. M. Parker Please visit www.delphiclassics.com to browse through our range of exciting titles or to purchase this eBook as a Parts Edition of individual eBooks
Kenneth Grahame’s most famous works are collected in one large book. This edition also includes a biography Grahame. The collection includes the following books: Dream Days The Golden Age The Headswoman Pagan Papers The Wind In the Willows
The Reluctant Dragon" is an children's story by exclaimed author Kenneth Grahame (originally published as a chapter in his book Dream Days). It served as the key element to the 1941 feature film with the same name from Walt Disney Productions. This edition also includes a biography of the books author, Kenneth Grahame.
LOOKING back to those days of old, ere the gate shut to behind me, I can see now that to children with a proper equipment of parents these things would have worn a different aspect. But to those whose nearest were aunts and uncles, a special attitude of mind may be allowed. They treated us, indeed, with kindness enough as to the needs of the flesh, but after that with indifference (an indifference, as I recognise, the result of a certain stupidity), and therewith the commonplace conviction that your child is merely animal. At a very early age I remember realising in a quite impersonal and kindly way the existence of that stupidity, and its tremendous influence in the world; while there grew up in me, as in the parallel case of Caliban upon Setebos, a vague sense of a ruling power, wilful, and freakish, and prone to the practice of vagaries-'just choosing so': as, for instance, the giving of authority over us to these hopeless and incapable creatures, when it might far more reasonably have been given to ourselves over them. These elders, our betters by a trick of chance, commanded no respect, but only a certain blend of envy-of their good luck-and pity-for their inability to make use of it. Indeed, it was one of the most hopeless features in their character (when we troubled ourselves to waste a thought on them: which wasn't often) that, having absolute licence to indulge in the pleasures of life, they could get no good of it.
IN the matter of general culture and attainments, we youngsters stood on pretty level ground. True, it was always happening that one of us would be singled out at any moment, freakishly, and without regard to his own preferences, to wrestle with the inflections of some idiotic language long rightly dead; while another, from some fancied artistic tendency which always failed to justify itself, might be told off without warning to hammer out scales and exercises, and to bedew the senseless keys with tears of weariness or of revolt. But in subjects common to either sex, and held to be necessary even for him whose ambition soared no higher than to crack a whip in a circus-ring-in geography, for instance, arithmetic, or the weary doings of kings and queens-each would have scorned to excel. And, indeed, whatever our individual gifts, a general dogged determination to shirk and to evade kept us all at much the same dead level, -a level of ignorance tempered by insubordination.Fortunately there existed a wide range of subjects, of healthier tone than those already enumerated, in which we were free to choose for ourselves, and which we would have scorned to consider education; and in these we freely followed each his own particular line, often attaining an amount of special knowledge which struck our ignorant elders as simply uncanny. For Edward, the uniforms, accoutrements, colours, and mottoes of the regiments composing the British Army had a special glamour. In the matter of facings he was simply faultless; among chevrons, badges, medals, and stars, he moved familiarly; he even knew the names of most of the colonels in command; and he would squander sunny hours prone on the lawn, heedless of challenge from bird or beast, poring over a tattered Army List. My own accomplishment was of another character-took, as it seemed to me, a wider and a more untrammelled range. Dragoons might have swaggered in Lincoln green, riflemen might have donned sporrans over tartan trews, without exciting notice or comment from me. But did you seek precise information as to the fauna of the American continent, then you had come to the right shop. Where and why the bison "wallowed"; how beaver were to be trapped and wild turkeys stalked; the grizzly and how to handle him, and the pretty pressing ways of the constrictor, -in fine, the haunts and the habits of all that burrowed, strutted, roared, or wriggled between the Atlantic and the Pacific, -all this knowledge I took for my province. By the others my equipment was fully recognised. Supposing a book with a bear-hunt in it made its way into the house, and the atmosphere was electric with excitement; still, it was necessary that I should first decide whether the slot had been properly described and properly followed up, ere the work could be stamped with full approval. A writer might have won fame throughout the civilised globe for his trappers and his realistic backwoods, and all went for nothing. If his pemmican were not properly compounded I damned his achievement, and it was heard no more of.
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