Everyman's Library CHILDREN'S CLASSICS

Written in six weeks, and at first thought by its editor to be 'dull', this story of an American family - four sisters and their mother living through the months while father is away in the Civil War - has a universal and enduring appeal. The reason is clear. Louisa Alcott based her story on her own experience of family life. 'Not a bit sensational', she wrote, 'but simple and true, for we really lived most of it. ' When published in 1868, the book was illustrated by May Alcott, Louisa's mother. GOOD WIVES, a sequel to LITTLE WOMEN, was published in 1869, taking up the story of Meg, Jo, Beth and Amy three years on. In 1912 an English artist, Millicent Etheldreda Gray, with a reputation for closely-worked studies of domestic settings, was commissioned by Hodder and Stoughton to paint twelve watercolours for this most long-lasting of all family stories. A new feature film of LITTLE WOMEN written and directed by Greta Gerwig was released in December 2019, starring Saoirse Ronan as Jo, Florence Pugh as Amy, Emma Watson as Meg and Eliza Scanlen as Beth.

This classic story of a Swiss family - pastor, wife and four sons -shipwreaked on an uninhabited island (most fortunately blessed with an unlikely profusion of natural resources) was written by a Swiss army chaplain for the entertainment of his own four sons. The family adventures in survival; also provided a useful starting point for lessons in natural history. First published in Zurich in 1812-13, the story was translated into French and English shortly afterwards and has appeared in many versions ever since. When, in 1909, the American artist Louis John Rhead was invited to illustrate the Robinson's adventures, he based his numerous drawings on 'sketches made in the tropics. '

The first major retelling of the Greek myths and legends, A WONDER-BOOK was published in 1852. The American novelist Nathaniel Hawthorne was a friend of the poet Longfellow and had much earlier suggested they collaborate on a story for children based on the legend of Pandora's Box, but this never materialized. Hawthorne went ahead on his own, adding five other myths which he adapted very freely in a romantic and readable style, used deliberately to remove the classical tales from what he called 'cold moonshine. ' Hawthorne's book was criticized by adults for his bowdlerization, but it has always been popular with children and has attracted many illustrators, none more distinguished than Arthur Rackham who made his pictorial contribution in 1922.

Described on the title-page of the first edition as 'the autobiography of her horse, translated from the original equine', BLACK BEAUTY was Anna Sewell's only book, written when she fatally ill but determined to record her passopnate indignation at the insensitive behaviour of people towards animals. It has been loved by children ever since its first publication in 1877, just a few months before the death of its author, whose declared aim had been to 'induce kindness, sympathy and an understanding treatment of horses'. The illustrations by Lucy Kemp-Welch first apperared in 1915.

Master storyteller Roald Dahl is by far the most popular children's writer of the late twentieth century, and The BFG (the Big Friendly Giant), recently adapted for the stage with great success, is set to become a claasic of its period (it was first published in 1982) This story of a vegetarian giant who disapproves of eating children has all the Dahl ingredients of humour, irreverence and verve that have made readers of countless youngsters. The humour is perfectly matched by Quentin Blake's irresistible drawing.

One of the great nineteenth-century folklorists, Joseph Jacobs collected stories from oral sources and made scholarly notes on their origin, but he deliberately recorded them in a plain and direct style which he thought suitable for children and which makes them 'supremely tellable'. First published in 1890, his famous collection includes all the well-known tales, such as JACK AND THE BEANSTALK and DICK WHITTINGTON, as well as British variants of stories common to many cultures. The illustrations by John Batten are taken from the first edition.

The legends of King Arthur - the most revered hero of British Mythology - have been retold many times, but Roger Lancelyn Green's version has become a classic since its first publication in 1953. Using as his sources not only Malory's MORTE D'ARTHUR but other chronicles, poems and romances, he has made each adventure of Arthur's knights part of an overall pattern - the struggle of Arthur's kingdom, the realm of Logress, the model of chivalry and right, against the barbarism and evil that surrounded and at length engulfed it. So here are the stories of the sword in the stone, of the Green Knight, of the fatal love between Launcelot and Guinevere, of the quest for the Holy Grail, and of the final departing of Arthur to the Vale of Avalon. The illustrations are taken from an edition of MORTE D'ARTHUR published in 1893 with which Aubrey Beardsley first made a name for himself at the age of twenty.

Every child's bookshelf should start with a collection of nursery rhymes so that these fantastic and nonsensical verses (some so old their meaning is long forgotten) are among the first magical words to sound in a child's ear. This collection of over two hundred rhymes was assembled in 1903 with the family in mind ('Tradition in the nursery has acted as a severe editor'). and each page is illustrated each verse decorated, with the imcomparable drawing of Charles Robinson.

First published in 1842, Robert Browning's poetic version of the legend about the lost children of Hamelin is sub-titled 'A Child's Story' and was originally intended only for the private enjoyment of Willie Macready, young son of the famous actor. Once in print, it became a perennial favourite with generations of children (and compilers of poetry anthologies for children!) Kate Greenaway's illustrations, engraved by her regular printer Edmund Evans, were first published in 1888 and have become as popular as the poem itself, being considered by John Ruskin to be her finest work.

First published in 1870-1 as a serial in GOOD WORKS FOR THE YOUNG, a magazine of Christian outlook, George MacDonald's fantasy is reguarded by his admirers as his finest novel. The story of the virtuous Princess Irene and the wicked goblins with heads as hard as stone has a strong moral overtone but is enjoyed by readers of all ages. The author said: 'I do not write for children, but for the child-like, whether of five, or fifty, or seventy-five'. Arthur Hughes, a follower of the Pre-Raphaelite movement, was a close friend of the author and provided the perfect illustrative accompaniment to his work.

Defoe's most celebrated story of Crusoe's shipwreck, his resourcefulness and ingenuity in his soliatry life on a desert island and his rescue of Man Friday has been abridged and retold many times since its publication (in two volumes) in 1719. It even appeared recently in graphic-novel form. In 1968 Kathleen Lines determined to make the original text more accessible to young readers by breaking Defoe's original, continuous narrative into chapters, slightly cutting Crusoe's long meditations, and compressing the relevant bits of THE FARTHER ADVENTURES into a neat Epilogue, so that readers learn what happened to Friday. The evocative engravings are reproduced from a mid-nineteenth-century edition published by Cassell, Petter & Gilpin.

This most romantic of fairy tales is found in many versions, and the story of the beautiful girl who falls into a long sleep, to be awakened by a lover, has been interpreted by some as an allegory of the spring revival of the earth after a long winter. Charles Seddon Evans, a schoolmaster turned publisher, retold the story specially for Arthur Rackham, who illustrated it with silhouette drawing as a companion volume to CINDERELLA, both first published in 1919 and now reissued in Everyman's Library.

This classic of the English countryside, . first published in 1908, is a favourite with readers of all ages. As the late Margery Fisher wrote, 'Adults are sadly aware of the figure of Grahame himself, languishing in a city office and longing for the river: children respond to the fun, the anarchy of Toad and the entrancing detail as Grahame's son Alastair must have done when he listened to the bedside stories that became a book. ' The author invited Arthur Rackham to illustrate his book, but Rackham said he was too busy - a decision he was happily able to reconsider in 1936 when he was approached by the American publisher of the Limited Editions Club. The project, which he carried out with love and great care for the authenticity of detail, was his last: the drawings appeared first in the USA in 1939 and in Britian in 1950.

From the Eastern folk tales that make up the vast collection known as THE THOUSAND AND ONE NIGHTS certain stories - of Aladdin, Sindbad and Ali Baba - have become everlasting favourites with children and a magical ingredient of Christmas pantomine. First introduced to Europe in the early eighteenth century by the French orientalist, Antione Galland, who translated and bowdlerized the stories to suit contemporary taste, this edition presents the fourteen best-known tales selected from an English text of 1821. The illustrations are reproduced from a larger collection in 1899. William Heath Robinson then at the start of his career, was commissioned with four others and his drawings (much the best) reveal a gentle, romantic charm that has been forgotten in the success of his later, purely comic work.

This most beloved of all fairy tales is told in many versions and found in many different cultures - from the Italian CENERANTOLA to the Russian CHERNUSHKA For this edition, first published in 1919, Charles Sedon Evans, a schoolmaster turned publisher, used the features of the tale as told by Charles Perrault - the pumpkin coach the mice horses, the rat coachman, the lizard footmen and the glass slipper - but expanded it to a full-length story so as to offer Arthur Rackham maximum opportunity to illustrate every step of the drama with his exquisite silhouette drawings. This is one of the most beautiful and delightful children's book ever published.

The grandniece of Mark Twain is now remembered only for the last two books she wrote, DADDY-LONG-LEGS (1912) and its sequal DEAR ENEMY (1915). Both remain endearing stories that, as the critic Naomi Lewis says ' make rewarding reading'. Told in the form of letters, this modern version of the Cinderalla tale is an irresistible love-story of an orphan and her unknown benefactor.