From School Library Journal
Grade 3-5–All three adaptations of these classic novels fall prey to the usual pitfalls involved in such a process. The bare outlines of the plots are provided, but character development, a true sense of place and time with regard to setting, and masterful description of the action all go by the wayside. Jungle Book is mistitled as it references only the Mowgli stories and moves from incident to incident so quickly that the law of the jungle morals in Kipling's anthropomorphic fables are lost. Treasure Island is written in a similar breakneck, choppy style, and Long John Silver, one of the most memorable characters ever created, is eminently forgettable in this telling. In 80 Days, the historic events that made such a journey even thinkable, like the opening of the Suez Canal and the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad, are never mentioned, nor is the International Date Line, which enabled Fogg to win his wager, mentioned, let alone explained. The cartoon illustrations in all three volumes border on offensive as no matter which country or culture is depicted, the dot-eyed faces are virtually identical except for minor variations in skin tone. Some illustrations make no sense, as when the action in 80 Days describes the servant Passepartout at the bottom of a circus pyramid, but the picture is of a Japanese tearoom.–Grace Oliff, Ann Blanche Smith School, Hillsdale, NJ
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Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Présentation de l'éditeur
The Jungle Book is a collection of stories by British Nobel laureate Rudyard Kipling. The stories were first published in magazines in 1893–4. The original publications contain illustrations, some by Rudyard's father, John Lockwood Kipling. Kipling was born in India and spent the first six years of his childhood there. After about ten years in England, he went back to India and worked there for about six-and-half years. These stories were written when Kipling lived in Vermont.
The tales in the book (and also those in The Second Jungle Book which followed in 1895, and which includes five further stories about Mowgli) are fables, using animals in an anthropomorphic manner to give moral lessons. The verses of The Law of the Jungle, for example, lay down rules for the safety of individuals, families and communities. Kipling put in them nearly everything he knew or "heard or dreamed about the Indian jungle." Other readers have interpreted the work as allegories of the politics and society of the time. The best-known of them are the three stories revolving around the adventures of an abandoned "man cub" Mowgli who is raised by wolves in the Indian jungle. The most famous of the other stories are probably "Rikki-Tikki-Tavi", the story of a heroic mongoose, and "Toomai of the Elephants", the tale of a young elephant-handler. "The White Seal", in which the main character seeks a haven for his people where they would be safe from hunters, has been considered a metaphor for Zionism, then in its beginning. As with much of Kipling's work, each of the stories is preceded by a piece of verse, and succeeded by another.
The Jungle Book, because of its moral tone, came to be used as a motivational book by the Cub Scouts, a junior element of the Scouting movement. This use of the book's universe was approved by Kipling after a direct petition of Robert Baden-Powell, founder of the Scouting movement, who had originally asked for the author's permission for the use of the Memory Game from Kim in his scheme to develop the morale and fitness of working-class youths in cities. Akela, the head wolf in The Jungle Book, has become a senior figure in the movement, the name being traditionally adopted by the leader of each Cub Scout pack.
The book includes colored illustrations, an active/navigable table of contents and a Free audiobook link for download (which can be downloaded using a PC/Mac) at the end of the book.
The tales in the book (and also those in The Second Jungle Book which followed in 1895, and which includes five further stories about Mowgli) are fables, using animals in an anthropomorphic manner to give moral lessons. The verses of The Law of the Jungle, for example, lay down rules for the safety of individuals, families and communities. Kipling put in them nearly everything he knew or "heard or dreamed about the Indian jungle." Other readers have interpreted the work as allegories of the politics and society of the time. The best-known of them are the three stories revolving around the adventures of an abandoned "man cub" Mowgli who is raised by wolves in the Indian jungle. The most famous of the other stories are probably "Rikki-Tikki-Tavi", the story of a heroic mongoose, and "Toomai of the Elephants", the tale of a young elephant-handler. "The White Seal", in which the main character seeks a haven for his people where they would be safe from hunters, has been considered a metaphor for Zionism, then in its beginning. As with much of Kipling's work, each of the stories is preceded by a piece of verse, and succeeded by another.
The Jungle Book, because of its moral tone, came to be used as a motivational book by the Cub Scouts, a junior element of the Scouting movement. This use of the book's universe was approved by Kipling after a direct petition of Robert Baden-Powell, founder of the Scouting movement, who had originally asked for the author's permission for the use of the Memory Game from Kim in his scheme to develop the morale and fitness of working-class youths in cities. Akela, the head wolf in The Jungle Book, has become a senior figure in the movement, the name being traditionally adopted by the leader of each Cub Scout pack.
The book includes colored illustrations, an active/navigable table of contents and a Free audiobook link for download (which can be downloaded using a PC/Mac) at the end of the book.
