Level 3 - Penguin Readers - Young King & Other Stories.pdf

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The Young King
and Other Stories
Level 3
Retold by Sue Harmes
Series Editors: Andy Hopkins and Jocelyn Potter
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Pearson Education Limited
Edinburgh Gate, Harlow,
Essex CM20 2JE,
England and Associated Companies throughout the world.
ISBN 0 582 426928
This edition first published 2000
NEW EDITION
3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4
Copyright © Penguin Books Ltd 2000
Illustrations by Gwen Tourret
Cover design by Bender Richardson White
Typeset by Pantek Arts Ltd, Maidstone, Kent
Set in 11/14pt Bembo
Printed in China
SWTC/03
Alt rights reserved; no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in
any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior
written permission of the Publishers.
Published by Pearson Education Limited in association with Penguin Books Ltd, both companies being subsidiaries
of Pearson Pic
For a complete list of the titles available In the Penguin Readers series, please write to your local
Pearson Education office or to: Penguin Readers Marketing Department,
Pearson Education, Edinburgh Gate. Harlow, Essex CM20 2JE.
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Contents
Page
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Introduction
The spring came, and there were flowers and little birds all over the country. But in the
garden of the selfish giant, it was still winter. The birds did not sing in it because there
were no children. The trees forgot to grow flowers. Snow covered the grass, and ice
covered the trees with silver.
Strange and wonderful things happen in the seven short stories in this book. The reader is
taken into a world of kings and queens, princes and princesses, giants and dwarfs, and
talking animals. Exciting and amusing, happy and sad, these are stories for people of all
ages.
The stories were written by the Irish writer Oscar Wilde. He was born in Dublin in 1854. His
father was a well-known doctor, and his mother wrote poems.
Oscar Wilde left Ireland when he was twenty. He went to Oxford University and
studied Latin and Greek. He was a very clever student, but he was also known for his way
of life. He loved beautiful things, and he filled his rooms with them. He wore beautiful and
unusual clothes and amused people with his clever talk.
In 1884, Wilde married a rich Irish woman called Constance Lloyd. They had two sons
and Wilde wrote a book of stories for the boys. The book was called The Happy Prince
and Other Tales (1888). Three of the stories in this book are taken from there. The other
four stories come from a second book for his children, A House of Pomegranates (1891).
By 1895, Wilde was a very successful writer. Crowds of people went to the theatre to
see his plays. Then suddenly his life changed. Wilde had a very close friend, a young man
named Alfred Douglas. Douglas’s father was not happy about Wilde’s interest in his son,
and the two men began a terrible fight in the law courts. Wilde lost this fight, and went to
prison for two years. Life in the prison was very difficult, and Wilde’s health suffered.
When he left prison, he went to live in France. He changed his name to Sebastian
Melmoth, a name that he took from a person in a book. He was now poor, and his health
did not get better. He died in Paris in 1900.
Oscar Wilde wrote a number of different kinds of books. The Picture of Dorian Gray , a long
work of fiction for adults, came out in the same year as his second book of short stories.
This is the strange and clever story of a man who does not show his age. He stays young
and handsome for many years. At the same time, a picture of the man grows old and ugly.
Strange things happen when someone loves beauty and the pleasant things in life too
much.
Wilde’s best poem is The Ballad of Reading Gaol (1898). He wrote this in France, just
after he came out of prison. It is about the pain of prison life.
Wilde’s most important work is his writing for the theatre. Some of his best plays are
Lady Windermere’s Fan (1892), A Woman of No Importance (1893) and An Ideal Husband
(1895). These plays were popular when they were written. They are still popular today.
Wilde has a great gift for writing clever and amusing conversations. His most famous play
is probably The Importance of Being Earnest (1895). It looks at life in an unusual way.
Unimportant things are very serious, and important things are laughed at.
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