The Bee-Man of Orn and Other Fanciful Tales

Stockton, Frank Richard, 1834-1902Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 4.0

Word count: 297K words
Chapters: 30

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.The Bee-Man of Orn and Other Fanciful Tales by Frank Richard StocktonAuthor: Stockton, Frank Richard, 1834-1902,Language: English, Class: PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature, Release Date: Apr 1, 2004

Editor's review

This collection brings together Frank Richard Stockton's fanciful short stories, among them "The Bee-Man of Orn," a frequently anthologized tale that turns on identity, circumstance, and reversals of fate, laced with fairy-tale irony and light humor. Stockton's pacing is unhurried, and he excels at surprise endings; the stories work both as entertainment and as a glimpse of how nineteenth-century American fantasy handled adult concerns within a fairy-tale frame. As a public-domain ebook, it is easy to dip into on screen or in print, suited to commutes, bedtime, or short reading sessions. Readers might treat it as "light fantasy": no need to hunt for a tidy moral—watch instead how absurd premises tease out human fixations and choices. For students of English literature or translation practice, these tales are clear in language and moderate in length, making them good material for observing the fantasy genre and how narratives close.

Who it's for

A good fit for

General readers who enjoy nineteenth-century British and American fanciful short fiction and light fairy-tale style
Upper-secondary students and above who want shorter pieces for English reading practice
Readers seeking light material for bedtime or commutes
Writers interested in ironic fairy-tale narration and surprise endings

Not a good fit for

Readers expecting serious war history or social reportage
Readers who prefer long, continuous plots and dislike the jumpiness of short stories
Young children with little patience for classical English syntax and old-fashioned fairy-tale settings

Reading tips

Start with the title story, "The Bee-Man of Orn," then pick other tales as interest dictates; there is no need to read straight through.
Pause after each story and think back on how the ending overturns earlier assumptions before moving on.
English learners can mark new words in the margin and, on a second pass, read only the dialogue and closing paragraphs to feel the narrative rhythm.
For shared family reading, parents might skim ahead and choose shorter, clearly plotted stories to read aloud.

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

Is this a novel or a short-story collection?

It is a collection of fanciful short stories, including "The Bee-Man of Orn" and others. The pieces are largely independent, suited to reading one at a time rather than following a continuous novelistic plot.

How difficult is the English, and is it suitable for beginners?

The text is nineteenth-century English with rather classical syntax; the vocabulary is not forbidding, but the rhythm is distant from modern English. Readers with some grounding in English will find it easier to enter; beginners may want annotations or a translation to compare.

What kind of story is the title piece, "The Bee-Man of Orn"?

It is a fanciful fairy tale with an ironic edge, centering on a character's dissatisfaction with his identity and circumstances and his search, closing with an unexpected turn. Best to read the plot directly rather than spoil it in advance.

What should I keep in mind when reading a public-domain ebook?

Public-domain ebooks are easy to obtain free, but layout, paragraphing, and punctuation can differ between editions. For study or citation, compare multiple versions and note that pagination is not standardized.

This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.

About the author

Stockton, Frank Richard, 1834-1902 Author

Frank Richard Stockton (1834–1902) was an American writer known for humorous and fanciful short stories and novels. This collection holds 33 of his works, spanning a variety of genres: the short story “The Lady, or the Tiger?”, famous for its dilemma ending; the whimsical tales of “The Bee-Man of Orn and Other Fanciful Tales”; light, comic travel and domestic stories such as “The Casting Away of Mrs. Lecks and Mrs. Aleshine”, “The Associate Hermits” and “The Squirrel Inn”; and adventure and exotic settings in “Kate Bonnet: The Romance of a Pirate‘s Daughter” and “A Bicycle of Cathay”. His writing is marked by witty dialogue, absurd premises and gentle satire, with brisk plots and surprising turns, making him a distinctive figure in late nineteenth-century American popular literature. Public information is limited, so details of his life beyond his dates are omitted.