Most books for children are dreadful. I had to find that out the hard way.
Here is the list I wish I had three or four years ago. These are the best books that I have found so far to read to my two sons. I read them when they were between the ages of 5 and 11.
Here are the books, listed in the order in which I first read them:
- Children’s Bible
- A. A. Milne: Winnie the Pooh, House at Pooh Corner
- D’Aulaire: Greek Myths
- CS Lewis: Chronicles of Narnia
- Lewis Carroll: Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Through the Looking Glass
- Collodi: Pinocchio
- Brothers Grimm: Fairy Tales
I am in the middle of Grimm now.
While they all have pictures, none are dependent on pictures: the stories hold up even when children only hear the words. They keep your own interest as well. Milne, for example, puts in things that no child will get, yet the person reading the story will. Unlike a lot of writers of children’s books, he understands how stories get read to children.
These books have words that children 6 to 11 will not know. Yet they are written in such a way that it does not matter – they will still be able to follow the story.
In fact, these books have such simple story lines that even small children will understand them. Yet there is far more to them than just a simple retelling of events. So you can read them over and over again, as I have – Pooh and Alice especially.
There are no good children’s books for Homer and Virgil that I know of. Some have tried, but none that I have seen are any good. The same for Marco Polo.
I thought Tolkien might make this list. Not so. At this age CS Lewis is better.
Notice that all of these books are more than 50 years old. You can get retellings of Pinocchio and Grimm and some of the others from the last 10 to 20 years, but the ones I have seen do not begin to compare with the originals.
Not all children’s Bibles are good. Some I could not bear to read. Here are the best that I have found:
- For ages 3-6: Reader’s Digest Bible for Children
- For ages 5-10: The Golden Children’s Bible
- For ages 10 and up: The Authorized Version (King James Bible)
The Authorized Version? Can you be serious? Yes, I am surprised too. I have tried many other full-chapter Bibles, even ones translated just for children, but the AV is the one that works out the best in practice (though I have yet to try the Revised Standard Version).
Perhaps the AV holds up, even with its old-fashioned English, because it sticks the closest to the original. And, just as with Grimm and Pinocchio and Pooh, the original is hard to match.
See also:
Would anything by Robert Munsch count? The Paper Bag Princess and Love You Forever are wonderful modern “classics”. I work with children and they love these books. Btw, I always become emotional when reading Love You Forever. It’s such a touching story.
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I love Grimm’s fairy tales, Winnie the Pooh is very sweet I have always loved it.
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Love Greek myths.
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Shel Silverstein’s “The Giving Tree” I s poignant and it makes me all marshmellowy inside, Love you Forever does that to me as well.
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Brothers Grimm: Fairy Tales can get pretty grisly at times. Like Bugs Bunny or Betty Boop shorts, The Flinstones original series and most early animation, these stories weren’t necessarily meant for the entertainment of children.
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“The Velveteen Rabbit” by Margery Williams is a good thought-provoking book to read to children.
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I love the “Velveteen Rabbit”
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Years later I would learn the Grimm brothers tales were like their name grim. But I think I would like to read the unvarnished original tales before they were cleaned up by the editors. Some may find them to Eurocentric, but that is not a problem for me. I am looking forward to read them.
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Yes, Mary, it’s an interesting story. A professor had our class to analyze it in my undergrad communications course. I don’t remember just why he assigned that particular book, as it is a bit strange – it being a children’s book and all. The story was a bit sad as I recall.
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@mary burrell
“Shel Silverstein’s “The Giving Tree” I s poignant and it makes me all marshmellowy inside, Love you Forever does that to me as well.”—Huge fan of Shel Silverstein’s work.
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I am speaking of The Velveteen Rabbit in my above post.
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@ Pay It forward: I was responding to you in regards to The Velveteen Rabbit. I do love it. I have many children stories that I love.
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Highly recommend The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate DiCamillo way better than The Velveteen Rabbit. My kiddos loved this tale tremendously.
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@ lifelearner: I love the “Velveteen Rabbit” but this looks very sweet. I love reading childrens books.
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I am a bit of an eccentric I also love the Lemony Snickett tales.
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I will check out the Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane.
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Sugar Cane: A Caribbean Rapunzel…
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Roald Dahl’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and The Fantastic Mr. Fox, and Matilda. I love these and I also love the films of the same titles.
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Mrs. Frisby and The Rats of Nimh, The Wonderful Wizard of OZ, Arabian Nights, The Call of the Wild, The Taste of Blackberries, Swiss Family Robinson. Some of my favorites as a kid, I wonder if they would be now.
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Anasi, The Spiderman, West African stories. From Harold Courlander’s “The Cow Tail Switch”
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A Wrinkle In Time is being made into a film coming straight behind Black Panther is going to be hard. I will support Ava DuVernay.
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Read “Mistress Masham’s Repose,” by T. H. While. One of my favorite books, kid or not.
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A.A. Milne House At Pooh Corner is very sweet, as I have always loved the sweet dim witted Pooh Bear And Christopher Robin and all the characters. I am listening to one of my favorite podcasts that has new episodes every two weeks called Tales. Many children’s fairy tales are originally very dark, and have subjects not suitable for young children. The stories have many different versions and evolve into sanitized versions that are suitable for young children. I also love the Madeline stories, and the Shel Silberstein books.
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I am also rediscovering Greek and Roman Mythology.
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@MB
You might find it curious that since this post was published, Winnie the Pooh / Pooh Bear has been BANNED in Mainland China.
Why China censors banned Winnie the Pooh
https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-china-blog-40627855
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@Jefe: Shaking my head at such nonsense. But if we have another four years of tRump, that kind of foolishness could happen in America.
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I know that those in the US cannot fathom a national / global leader any more full of himself than this Chump dude, but I cannot think of any leader more of a megalomaniac than the one represented by this Pooh bear. The US president would have to get about 10 times worse before he gets even close.
Imagine banning the movie “Christopher Robin” because it features the Pooh bear character! So, if you are caught with a DVD in your luggage, you might be arrested and jailed without due process. The whole thing is ridiculous.
Well, maybe we could see him issue executive orders banning Late Night Shows from mimicking him, get twitter and FB to shut down the accounts of anyone who posts a mimicking meme, or even those that use code words innocuous as “45” or “tangerine head”.
No wonder he addressing the other “leader” with such fawning vocabulary as “emperor”.
By the way, you (any ordinary person) are not allowed to refer to the national leader in the PRC as “emperor”. You will get detained while you have your account deleted and scrubbed clean.
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