Puck of Pook's Hill (Penguin Classics) [Mass Market Paperback]

Rudyard Kipling (Author), Sarah Wintle (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 1995 | Series: Penguin Classics

Two children, Dan and Una, acting out their version of "A Midsummer Night's Dream", miraculously conjure up Puck himself. Small and as old as time itself, he brings back the past for them to witness. He re-creates a Roman centurion, a Renaissance craftsman and the villages of time gone by.

Editorial Reviews

Review

''The hidden history of Old England, lovingly written by Kipling for his own children, is coupled with a brilliant reading to make this one of the premier family listening events of the year. The story has everything listeners could want: enchantment, high adventure, battles, intrigue, all wrapped up in romantic poetic language . . . brought exquisitely to life by [Wanda McCaddon].'' --AudioFile

''[Wanda McCaddon] . . . has the requisite British accent and very good judgment as to how to make the tales exciting yet believable.'' --Wilson Library Bulletin --This text refers to the Audio Cassette edition.

About the Author

RUDYARD KIPLING (1865-1936) was born in Bombay, India. At seventeen Kipling began work as a journalist and over the next seven years established an international reputation with his stories and verses of Indian and Army life, including such classics as The Jungle Book and Kim. In 1907, he became the first English writer to receive the Nobel Prize. --This text refers to the Audio Cassette edition.

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Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 240 pages
• Publisher: Penguin Classics (January 1, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0140183531
• ISBN-13: 978-0140183535
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,581,358 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars User-Friendly ( British) history....., July 9, 2000

By 

"andrea54" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Puck of Pook's Hill (Wordsworth Children's Classics) (Children's Library) (Paperback)

I bought this book for my children many years ago - son is now working in e-commerce (a job that I never imagined would exist when he was born!) - and I found it and re-read it with enjoyment some days ago.

Basically, it's about some (upperclass- there weren't any others in books in those days) children who accidentally conjure up "the oldest thing in England" - Puck.

He, in his turn, conjures up for them Normans, Saxons, and, yes, a Jewish moneylender who was the real clout behind the Magna Carta!

I had to revise my ideas about Kipling after reading this - he's a very contradictory character - but most of it reads (very gently) as a sensible argument for tolerance and diversity.

It's also a very good way of bringing history alive...

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars An Excellent Work of Children's Fantasy, October 27, 2000

By 

Puck (Cincinnati, OH USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Puck of Pook's Hill and Rewards and Fairies (Library Binding)

As I am very interested in the historical and mythological nature of Puck (aka Robin Goodfellow), best known for his role as the mischief-making fairy in Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, I found these works by Kipling to be invaluable. These two novels are not only an excellent presentation of Puck, but an insight to British history. While considered children's books, I would recommend them to any adult in search of light reading. Truly two wonderful works of literature.

20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Different look at English history, August 25, 2000

By 

Richard R. Horton (Webster Groves, MO United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Puck of Pook's Hill and Rewards and Fairies (Library Binding)

_Puck of Pook's Hill_ is a set of stories, somewhat linked, about the history of England, built around a frame story involving two young children, Dan and Una, meeting Puck in a meadow near their Sussex home. Puck somehow arranges for a series of historical people, ghosts, I suppose, to come and tell stories of events near their home in the past 2000 years. There are four stories told by Sir Richard Dalyngridge, one of William the Conqueror's men, on the theme of assimilation of the Normans and Saxons into one people: the English. There are three Roman stories, set in 375 AD or so, about a Centurion from the Isle of Wight who holds Hadrian's Wall against the Picts and the Norsemen while Maximus, his general, declares himself Emperor and takes Gaul then heads into Rome (where the real Emperor had him killed, understandably enough). The three other stories deal with the rebuilding of the local church in Henry VII's time, a rebuilding project menaced by smugglers, with the flight of the fairies from England at the time of the Reformation, and with the role of a Jew in forcing John to sign the Magna Carta. (This last an uneasy mixture of anti-Semitism with an apparent attempt to not be anti-semitic.)

_Rewards and Fairies_ presents eleven more stories told by Puck's agency to Dan and Una. We meet some familiar characters again (the church builder, and Richard Dalynrydge), and even some major historical figures: Queen Elizabeth, George Washington, Napoleon. On the whole the stories aren't quite as good as those in _Puck_, though "Marklake Witches" is very good, very moving.

Both books include a number of poems, usually closely associated with the themes of the stories.

These are generally fine stories, but for my taste not up to the level of my favorite Kipling stories, such as "Mrs. Bathurst" and "'They'" and "The Strange Ride of Morrowbie Jukes" and "The Story of Mohammed Din". Still, the plain craft of the stories is as ever with Kipling remarkable.