The Singing Mouse Stories

Hough, Emerson, 1857-1923Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 2.8
Word count
107K words
Chapters
11

Tags

English Originals Children's Literature Spiritual ComfortImaginationGrowing UpLight ReadingAnimal FableHeartwarming NarrativeShort StoriesFairy TalesParent-Child ReadingYouth Reading

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 Singing Mouse Stories by Emerson HoughAuthor: Hough, Emerson, 1857-1923,Language: English, Class: PZ: Language and Literatures: Juvenile belles lettres, Release Date: Apr 7, 2007

Editor's review

Emerson Hough is best known for his Western fiction, but The Singing Mouse Stories turns to a lighter vein of fantasy and fairy tale. The singing mouse named in the title is the book's central image, and the stories build around it short narratives with an allegorical flavor, written in plain language with a simple, warm imagination that lends itself well to reading aloud and storytelling. The work is classed as juvenile literature, yet its gentle attention to nature and to the relations between animals and people does not feel childish to adult readers. Its value lies not in intricate plotting but in the unhurried tone and sense of openness of an old-fashioned fairy tale, making it suitable for bedtime reading or reading together. Note that the stories carry the moralizing air of children's literature from a century ago, which today's readers may not fully accept, and some wording and pacing feel slow. As a public-domain text it is better treated as supplementary material for understanding the range of Hough's writing than as one of his major works.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Not a good fit for

Reading tips

  1. Suited to bedtime or reading together: take one complete short story at a time, with no need to rush
  2. Reading aloud brings out the rhythm of the language and the fairy-tale voice
  3. While reading, note how the animal figures relate to the moral meanings
  4. If reading to a child, explain old-fashioned expressions in everyday words before going on

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

FAQ

What age is this book suitable for? Judging by the language and length, it suits children in the lower-to-middle primary grades who can already follow longer stories; the right age also depends on the child's English level and attention span. As read-together material, parents may want to look through it first to see whether it suits their taste.
Is it very different from Hough's Western novels? Yes, markedly. Hough is known for Western adventure and frontier fiction, while this book is light animal fairy tale, with more imagination and gentler conflict. To see another side of his writing it has reference value, but it does not represent his mainstream style.
Do the stories have a continuous plot? Judging by the title and format, it is closer to a collection of short pieces built around a single image, each fairly independent, so there is no need to read straight through. Skipping around or reading selectively will not hinder understanding, and it suits reading in spare moments.

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

Hough, Emerson, 1857-1923 Author

Emerson Hough (1857-1923) was an American writer whose biographical details remain limited in publicly available sources. The collection here includes 26 of his works, most of them novels and historical narratives set against the backdrop of the American frontier. Representative titles include The Passing of the Frontier: A Chronicle of the Old West, The Covered Wagon, and The Story of the Outlaw: A Study of the Western Desperado. His subjects center on westward expansion, Western outlaws, and historical episodes such as the Mississippi Bubble, as well as life in the West. His writing blends fiction with documentary observation, combining authentic historical atmosphere with adventure plots in a plain yet vivid style. His works offer readable and lively portraits of America's westward development and hold a place in Western-themed literature.