An Esoteric Library

I used to hoard books. Now I hoard epubs. I keep them on my old kindle; I have nearly 2,000 books– and the stack never gets any heavier! Most of these come from Gutenberg, because I like the old authors, and also– free downloads. Many of these gutenberg files have been edited by me, because I like a decent-looking page to read, and also illustrations if I can get them. Here’s a catalogue of some of them, as I fix ’em up.

Read online;

A. A. Milne’s sublime not-a-children’s story Once On A Time:   Start reading here
(and download the book as well)

Carl Sandburg’s Rootabaga Stories; Start reading here


Rootabaga Pigeons, the second book of these wonderful bedtime stories;  Start reading here

 

The Etext Library

Irish Storytellers; A collection of accomplished spinners of tales, including  James Stephens, Brian MacMahon and the inimitable Padraic Colum

E. Nesbit She is probably best known for her series “The Railway Children” but her output exceeded forty books for children alone.  I have a baker’s dozen that I am working my way through.

Read online; a chapter (about writing poetry) from  The Treasure Seekers

Doctor Dolittle; Seven, thus far. More, I sincerely hope, to come.

Some oddities; The King of Gee-Whiz, how’s that for a name! also a lovely half-a-story by the great Walter De la Mare,  two riffs on Peter Pan from J. M. Barrie, and adventures in baby-sitting from the Victorian humorist W. Heath Robinson.

Frank R. Stockton; The writer of the classic; “The Lady? or, The Tiger?” will charm and  beguile you with his wide range of interests and his fluid storytelling skills.

Read online; The Floating Prince

A Literary Miscellany; Herman Hesse’s  glorious Steppenwolf, with new illustrations from a Spanish artist, and The King In Yellow, a forerunner of the Lovecraftian style of horror.

This is The Con-Fusion

Concatenation, Construction, Conversation, Continuation, Fusion.

These are our blogs;

The Principle of Moments; a multi-braned, multi-brained, experiment-in-progress.

The Dancing Goddesses ; addendum and annotation for the book of that name, by author Elizabeth Wayland Barber

Ronald Smart Writes;  stories and memoirs with a mid-century touch

These are our services;

An esoteric library of epub files 

How Six Pigeons

Came Back to Hatrack the Horse after Many Accidents and Six Telegrams

“Hatrack the Horse came out. On his shoulders were two pigeons, on his hands two pigeons. And he reached his hand around behind his back where his hat was hanging and he opened the hat and showed Wiffle the Chick two pigeons in the hat.”

How Deep Red Roses

“I thank them because they took the gold they wanted. Brass feels good to my fingers the same as gold.” And he went on shining up the brass bick- erjiggers on the accordion, humming a little line of an old song, “Tomorrow will never catch up with yesterday because yesterday started sooner.”

How Pink Peony

Now there was a ballplayer named Spuds, came one night to take her riding, out to a valley where the peacocks always cry before it rains, where the frogs always gamble with the golden dice after midnight.

7: TWO STORIES

The Haystack Cricket and How Things Are Different Up in the Moon Towns Why the Big Ball Game between the Hot Grounders and the Grand Standers Was a Hot Game …

Why the Big Ball Game

“Passengers in the railroad trains look out of the windows and the tall grass stands up so they can’t see the ball towns. But the ball towns are there and the tall grass is full of pitchers, catchers, basemen, fielders, short stops, sluggers, southpaws and backstops”

8: TWO STORIES

The Huckabuck Family and How They Raised Pop Corn in Nebraska and Quit and Came Back Yang Yang and Hoo Hoo, or the Song of the Left Foot of the …

Yang Yang and Hoo Hoo,

Then when the room was all quiet the shadow of the goose lifted its left foot and began singing—singing just as the shadow of a goose always sings—with the left foot—very softly with the left foot—so softly you must listen with the softest little listeners you have deep inside your ears.

9. ONE STORY

How a Skyscraper and a Railroad Train Got Picked Up and Carried Away from Pig’s Eye Valley Far in the Pickax Mountains PEOPLE Peter Potato Blossom Wishes Three Whispering Cats …

Pig Wisps

There was an oyster king far in the south who knew how to open oysters and pick out the pearls. He grew rich and all kinds of money came rolling …

Kiss Me

All night she was out in a snowstorm with a horse and a gun hunting wildcats. And the storm of the blowing snow was coming worse on the second day.

Blue Silver

Long ago when the years were dark and the black rains used to come with strong winds and blow the front porches off houses, and pick chimneys off houses, and …

The Mezzotint

978.—Unknown. Interesting mezzotint: View of a manor-house, early part of the century. 15 by 10 inches; black frame. £2 2s.


It was not specially exciting, and the price seemed high.

Once on a Time

ONCE ON A TIME By A.A. Milne DECORATED BY CHARLES ROBINSON   GROSSET & DUNLAP Publishers          New York By Arrangement with G. P. Putnam’s Sons     PREFACE This book was …

The Floating Prince

“If I want a kingdom, I must build up one for myself, and that is just what I will do. I will gather together my subjects as I go along. The first person I meet shall be my chief councilor of state, the second shall be head of the army, the third shall be admiral of the navy, the next shall be chief treasurer, and then I will collect subjects of various classes.”

from the collection of stories by Frank Stockton

The Story of Little Cacinella

Little Cacinella (ladybug) looked around and said, “Very nice.” She stretched her tiny wings, rubbed one little thin leg against the other, looked around again and said:”How very, very nice! How warm the sun! How blue the sky! How green the grass! How very, very nice! and all this is mine!”

Chapter 4. Good Hunting

‘A Princess or a poetry book,’ said Noel sleepily. He was lying on his back on the sofa, kicking his legs. ‘Only I shall look for the Princess all by myself. But I’ll let you see her when we’re married.’
‘Have you got enough poetry to make a book?’ Dicky asked that, and it was rather sensible of him, because when Noel came to look there were only seven of his poems that any of us could understand.

(an excerpt from The Treasure Seekers, by E. Nesbit.)