Prince Vanc'

Putnam, Eleanor, 1856-1886Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

2.4

Word count: 99K words
Chapters: 10

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.Princo Vanc' by Arlo Bates and Eleanor PutnamAuthor: Putnam, Eleanor, 1856-1886,Language: Esperanto, Class: PZ: Language and Literatures: Juvenile belles lettres, Release Date: Oct 20, 2007

Editor's review

Princo Vanc' is co-authored by Arlo Bates and Eleanor Putnam and written in Esperanto; it is classified as young adult literature. The Esperanto version is itself a noteworthy phenomenon: it transposes an English young adult story into an international auxiliary language, offering language learners a narrative text they can read directly. The work's value lies more in language practice and cross-cultural transmission than in complexity of plot. For Esperanto learners it is moderate in length and plain in style, useful as a bridge from textbooks to original texts; for readers studying the history of Esperanto publishing or children's literature translation, it is also a reference sample. Note that the author Eleanor Putnam died young and the book is co-authored; it should be read in the context of late nineteenth-century English young adult literature, without expecting the pace and depth of modern children's fiction.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Learners with beginner-level Esperanto or above who want to try reading a whole book
Enthusiasts studying Esperanto publications and children's literature translation
Readers interested in nineteenth-century young adult story styles who can read Esperanto

Not a good fit for

General readers with no Esperanto who want a Chinese or English edition
Young readers expecting modern children's fiction plot and pace

Reading tips

First read a chapter without looking up words to grasp the gist, then go back to unfamiliar words.
Make a vocabulary list of recurring high-frequency words and sentence patterns, and review Esperanto grammar alongside.
After finishing, read alongside the English source text to observe choices and language differences in translation.

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 language is this book in, and is Esperanto hard to read?

The whole book is in Esperanto. Esperanto grammar is fairly regular; if you already know basic roots and common affixes, reading narrative texts is relatively smooth. Still, a certain vocabulary is needed, so it is advisable to study a beginner's textbook first.

Is it suitable as a bedtime story for children?

It is not very suitable for reading aloud directly to children who do not know Esperanto. It is better as reading material for Esperanto learners, or retold by an adult who knows Esperanto. For children, choose a translated or adapted edition.

What else should be noted about the author Eleanor Putnam?

Sources show she was born in 1856 and died in 1886, and this book was co-authored with Arlo Bates. She died young and her output was limited; her length and structure should not be judged by modern bestseller standards.

Comments

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About the author

Putnam, Eleanor, 1856-1886 Author · 1856–1886

Eleanor Putnam (1856–1886) was an English-language author of the late nineteenth century about whom little is publicly known. No clear record survives of her early life, education, or career; all that is firmly established is that she lived from 1856 to 1886 and that two of her works are extant. Her representative work, Prince Vance: The Story of a Prince with a Court in His Box, centers on a prince who keeps a court inside a box, and it blends fairy-tale and fantasy elements with a light, inventive touch. Her other work, Princo Vanc', is closely related in subject, its title appearing to be a variant or translated rendering of the same story. Judging from what survives, she excelled at building delicate fantasy narratives around princes, courts, and wondrous containers, suited to young readers. Because she died young and left few works, she is not prominent in literary history, yet these two books remain useful examples for the study of nineteenth-century English fairy tales and children's fantasy.