This collection gathers beloved classic stories perfect for reading aloud to children. It features timeless tales from authors like Hans Christian Andersen, Lewis Carroll, and Mark Twain, alongside poems and excerpts from well-known works. Share these cherished stories and introduce young readers to the magic of literature.
William F. Russell is the author behind the widely used Prentice Hall Literature series. His work focuses on making classic and contemporary literature accessible for students.
Hans Christian Andersen was born in Odense, Denmark, to a father who claimed to be related to nobility. After school, he worked as a weaver's apprentice and as a tailor's assistant. At 14, he moved to Copenhagen to be an actor, and was accepted into the Royal Danish Theatre. His career ended when his voice changed, and he decided to become a writer. He published his first story, The Ghost at Palnatoke's Grave, in 1822. An acquaintance paid all expenses to send him to grammar school in Slagelse....
Nathaniel Hawthorne was an American novelist and short story writer.
Nathaniel Hawthorne was a 19th century American novelist and short story writer. He is seen as a key figure in the development of American literature for his tales of the nation's colonial history.
Shortly after graduating from Bowdoin College, Hathorne changed his name to Hawthorne. Hawthorne anonymously published his first work, a novel titled Fanshawe, in 1828. In 1837, he published Twice-Told Tales and became engaged...
Lewis Carroll is well known throughout the world as the author of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass. Behind the famous pseudonym was Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, a mathematical lecturer at Oxford University with remarkably diverse talents. ([Source][1].)
[1]: http://lewiscarrollsociety.org.uk/pages/lewiscarroll/life.html
Mark Twain, born Samuel Langhorne Clemens, was a prolific American author and humorist. Twain is best known for his novels Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884), which has been called "the Great American Novel", and The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876). He is extensively quoted. Twain was a friend to presidents, artists, industrialists, and European royalty. ([Source][1].)
[1]:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Twain
"Before she settled in the scrub country, Marjorie Rawlings had been a newspaperwoman in Louisville Kentucky, and Rochester New York. Tiring of a life that seemed "scrappy and always in a hurry," she turned her hand unsuccessfully to short-story writing. She had almost given up when, at 32, she used a small legacy to buy her 72-acre orange grove at Cross Creek. The people and the country inspired her to continue writing. Increasingly, her fiction reflected her deepening knowledge of her chosen p...
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon". His surviving works, including some collaborations, consist of 38 plays,[c] 154 sonnets, two long narrative poems, and several other poems. His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright. He...
Edgar Allan Poe was an American writer, poet, editor and literary critic, considered part of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is considered the inventor of the detective-fiction genre. He is further credited with contributing to the emerging genre of science fiction.[1] He was the first well-known American writer to try to earn a living through writing alone, resulting in...
Shirley Hardie Jackson (December 14, 1916 – August 8, 1965) was an American writer, known primarily for her works of horror and mystery.
Source: [Shirley Jackson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shirley_Jackson) on Wikipedia.
John Griffith London (born John Griffith Chaney; January 12, 1876 – November 22, 1916) was an American novelist, journalist, and social activist. A pioneer in the world of commercial magazine fiction, he was one of the first writers to become a worldwide celebrity and earn a large fortune from writing. He was also an innovator in the genre that would later become known as science fiction.
His most famous works include The Call of the Wild and White Fang, both set in the Klondike Gold Rush...