Robin Hood cover

Robin Hood

Rating 3.2
Word count
585K words
Chapters
59

Tags

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.Robin Hood by Ritson, Bewick, Buckman, and TourrierAuthor: ,Language: English, Class: PR: Language and Literatures: English literature, Release Date: Apr 5, 2018

Editor's review

Robin Hood is one of the most widely circulated folkloric figures in the English-speaking world. This edition, prepared and released by Project Gutenberg, gathers texts and illustrations related to the theme, with credits involving Ritson, Bewick, Buckman, Tourrier, and others who took part in compiling or illustrating it. Its value lies not in a single fixed "original" but in showing how the legend took shape within English popular literature and the woodcut tradition, letting readers see how the outlaw-hero story was told, illustrated, and circulated. As a public-domain ebook it is easy to obtain, making it suitable as an English-language introduction to the Robin Hood story and for readers interested in folk literature and illustrated editions. Note that the text carries the linguistic features of early English literature, and its narrative pace differs considerably from today's young-adult fiction; readers should adjust expectations and treat it as a cultural text rather than light entertainment.

Who it's for

A good fit for

  • readers who want an English text of the Robin Hood story and a sense of the legend's shape
  • general readers interested in English folk literature and early illustrated editions
  • learners who need intermediate-level English narrative material and are willing to read slowly
  • parents and teachers seeking an English reader of classic stories for children

Not a good fit for

  • researchers expecting a single authoritative "original" and detailed textual scholarship
  • beginners with weak English who want an easy read-through
  • readers who prefer modern retellings and have little patience for archaic language

Reading tips

  1. Read the main story first, then return to the illustrations and credits to understand how the text was compiled.
  2. Don't look up every unfamiliar or archaic word; follow the plot first.
  3. Compare with other Robin Hood retellings to observe how the same legend changes across versions.
  4. For shared reading, have an adult set the background first, then let the child read passages to lower the language barrier.

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.

Contents

  1. 1
  2. 2
  3. 3
  4. 4
  5. 5
  6. 6
  7. 7
  8. 8
  9. 9
  10. 10
  11. 11
  12. 12
  13. 13
  14. 14
  15. 15
  16. 16
  17. 17
  18. 18
  19. 19
  20. 20
  21. 21
  22. 22
  23. 23
  24. 24
  25. 25
  26. 26
  27. 27
  28. 28
  29. 29
  30. 30
  31. 31
  32. 32
  33. 33
  34. 34
  35. 35
  36. 36
  37. 37
  38. 38
  39. 39
  40. 40
  41. 41
  42. 42
  43. 43
  44. 44
  45. 45
  46. 46
  47. 47
  48. 48
  49. 49
  50. 50
  51. 51
  52. 52
  53. 53
  54. 54
  55. 55
  56. 56
  57. 57
  58. 58
  59. 59

FAQ

Who wrote this book?
Robin Hood belongs to folklore and has no single original author. This edition was released by Project Gutenberg, with credits involving Ritson, Bewick, Buckman, Tourrier, and others connected with compiling the text or drawing the illustrations; the exact division of work should be checked against the book itself, and it should not be simply called the work of one author.
How difficult is the English?
The text carries the linguistic features of early English literature, with sentence patterns and vocabulary older than contemporary popular reading, though the plot itself is not complex. Readers with high-school-level English or above who are willing to read slowly can generally get through it, guessing archaic expressions from context.
Does the book have illustrations?
Judging from the illustrators named in the credits, the book is connected to an illustrated tradition, but how the electronic edition actually presents them should be checked against the file itself. When reading, note where illustrations fall and how they relate to the text; this is an interesting angle for understanding early illustrated editions.
Is it suitable as a child's first English book?
Not really recommended as a first book. The language is old, and folktales may contain violent episodes. For children, it is better for an adult to select and explain passages, or to choose a simplified children's version of Robin Hood as a stepping stone.

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About the author

Project Gutenberg is not a single author but a nonprofit digital library founded by Michael Hart in 1971 and one of the world's earliest free ebook platforms. It relies on volunteers to digitize, proofread, and freely distribute public-domain works and is now operated by the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Its collection contains 2,692 works, mainly religious texts, epics, and story collections, including the King James Bible and the Douay-Rheims volumes, the epic Mahabharata, a literal translation of the Arabian Nights, and Danish editions of the Old and New Testaments. Public information is limited, and its nature is closer to a public-interest compiling and dissemination body; these texts are open to the public, easy to consult and circulate, and have had a profound influence on the spread of ebooks and the preservation of public-domain resources.

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