The Mysterious Basket or, The Foundling. A Story for Boys and Girls

Project GutenbergProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 2.6

Word count: 166K 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.The Mysterious Basket; or, The Foundling. A Story for Boys and Girls by AnonymousAuthor: ,Language: English, Class: PZ: Language and Literatures: Juvenile belles lettres, Release Date: Dec 26, 2016

Editor's review

This is a typical nineteenth-century English children's story, built around a mysterious basket and a foundling, with a strong period flavor and a moralizing tone. As a free Project Gutenberg eBook, its value lies first in the text and language sample: the original can be used to observe the narrative pacing, dialogue style, and chapter structure of early children's literature, and it also works as an entry-level English reading text. The story is short, its suspense is set up directly, and it suits classroom or parent-child discussion of themes such as identity, family, and kindness. Note that the anonymous author's writing habits and period assumptions differ from contemporary children's literature; readers should treat it as a historical text rather than a modern coming-of-age novel.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Intermediate English learners who want to practice reading original English texts
Readers studying early children's literature and Project Gutenberg eBooks
Teachers who need short English stories as classroom material
Those interested in nineteenth-century family and foundling themes

Not a good fit for

Young readers seeking contemporary fast-paced narratives
Researchers hoping for detailed author background and publication history
Young children who would struggle to read a full-length English book independently

Reading tips

Read one chapter first, mark unfamiliar words and period expressions, then review how the plot develops.
Treat it as a language sample: excerpt characters' dialogue and observe nineteenth-century English politeness.
In parent-child reading, discuss after each chapter: if it were you, how would you handle the clues in the basket?
Use the Project Gutenberg eBook notes to learn about the source and use of public-domain books.

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 book suitable for English beginners to read directly?

Not really for absolute beginners. The original is nineteenth-century English, and its sentence patterns and vocabulary differ from modern spoken English. It is better attempted after reaching intermediate reading level, or after reading a simplified version to become familiar with the plot.

Why is the author shown as anonymous?

The material only lists the author as Anonymous and provides no further identity information. Readers should regard it as a public-domain children's story by an unknown author and need not force a connection to a specific writer.

What are the features of the Project Gutenberg edition?

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About the author

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