Nautilus

Richards, Laura Elizabeth Howe, 1850-1943Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.0

Word count: 164K words
Chapters: 17

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Nautilus by Laura Elizabeth Howe RichardsAuthor: Richards, Laura Elizabeth Howe, 1850-1943,Language: English, Class: PZ: Language and Literatures: Juvenile belles lettres, Release Date: Mar 13, 2005

Editor's review

Nautilus is a children's book by Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards, available through Project Gutenberg in the juvenile literature category. Richards was an American writer of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries whose work is known for warmth, imagination, and moral instruction. The title evokes the sea, nature, and exploration, making it suitable as an English-language original for young readers. The Project Gutenberg edition is a public-domain ebook in English, and its length and difficulty suit young readers with basic English reading skills. For families and teachers who want children to encounter classic English children's literature, or who hope to use public-domain resources for extensive English reading, this book is a light, free, and reliable choice. When reading, use the image of the nautilus as a starting point for guiding children to observe the relationship between nature and imagination. Because the work is a century old, some expressions differ from contemporary English and require a degree of guidance or support.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Parents who want their children to encounter classic English children's literature
Primary and middle school students looking for free public-domain English extensive reading material
Teachers of English to young learners who need short reading material
Readers interested in late nineteenth-century American children's literature

Not a good fit for

Readers with weak English skills who cannot yet read English originals independently
Readers expecting modern popular science about the ocean
Adult readers who prefer fast-paced plots and strong conflict

Reading tips

On a first reading, read through once to grasp the story without looking up every word.
On a second reading, mark unfamiliar words and old-fashioned expressions and infer their meaning from context.
Parents or teachers can use the image of the nautilus to discuss nature and imagination with the child.
After finishing, retell the content in two or three sentences to check comprehension and practice expression.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

What age is this book suitable for?

This is an English children's literature work, suitable for upper primary to junior middle school readers who already have basic English reading ability. Younger children should read with a parent or use a bilingual edition. Whether it suits a particular child also depends on the child's actual vocabulary and reading habits.

What are the features of the Project Gutenberg edition?

Project Gutenberg provides free public-domain ebooks, and this book is one of them. The edition presents the original English text without modern annotations and in a plain layout. Its advantages are that it is free, easy to obtain, and freely reproducible for teaching; its shortcomings are the lack of an introduction and vocabulary notes, which readers must supply themselves.

Do I need to know about the author before reading?

Not necessarily. Richards's work is warm in style and emphasizes imagination and character formation, so you can go straight into the text. If you want a better sense of the period, you can briefly learn about common themes in late nineteenth-century American children's literature afterward and then revisit details in the book.

Comments

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About the author

Richards, Laura Elizabeth Howe, 1850-1943 Author

Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards (1850–1943) was an American writer of children's literature and biography. Public information is limited, and few details of her life are recorded here, yet her work offers a clear sense of her range. She wrote children's stories such as Captain January and Toto's Merry Winter, told in a bright, warm style suited to young readers, and also produced biographical writing, including Julia Ward Howe, 1819-1910, which traces a life and its era. The collection holds 45 of her works, spanning children's fiction and biography, with historical portraits such as Abigail Adams and Her Times, showing a writer who combined popular narrative with careful attention to historical sources.