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A Round Dozen
This is an EXACT reproduction of a book published before 1923. This IS NOT an OCR'd book with strange characters, introduced typographical errors, and jumbled words. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.
132 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1892
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18 people want to read
About the author
Susan Coolidge
390 books174 followersSarah Chauncey Woolsey was an American children's author who wrote under the pen name Susan Coolidge.
Woolsey was born January 29, 1835, into the wealthy, influential New England Dwight family in Cleveland, Ohio. Her father was John Mumford Woolsey (1796–1870) and mother was Jane Andrews. She spent much of her childhood in New Haven Connecticut after her family moved there in 1852.
Woolsey worked as a nurse during the American Civil War (1861–1865), after which she started to write. The niece of the author and poet Gamel Woolsey, she never married, and resided at her family home in Newport, Rhode Island, until her death.
She edited The Autobiography and Correspondence of Mrs. Delaney (1879) and The Diary and Letters of Frances Burney (1880). She is best known, however, for her classic children's novel, What Katy Did (1872). The fictional Carr family was modeled after the author's own, with Katy Carr inspired by Susan (Sarah) herself, and the brothers and sisters modeled on Coolidge's four younger Woolsey siblings.
Woolsey was born January 29, 1835, into the wealthy, influential New England Dwight family in Cleveland, Ohio. Her father was John Mumford Woolsey (1796–1870) and mother was Jane Andrews. She spent much of her childhood in New Haven Connecticut after her family moved there in 1852.
Woolsey worked as a nurse during the American Civil War (1861–1865), after which she started to write. The niece of the author and poet Gamel Woolsey, she never married, and resided at her family home in Newport, Rhode Island, until her death.
She edited The Autobiography and Correspondence of Mrs. Delaney (1879) and The Diary and Letters of Frances Burney (1880). She is best known, however, for her classic children's novel, What Katy Did (1872). The fictional Carr family was modeled after the author's own, with Katy Carr inspired by Susan (Sarah) herself, and the brothers and sisters modeled on Coolidge's four younger Woolsey siblings.
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July 17, 2013
Thirteen children's stories, first published in 1883. Available on Project Gutenberg here.
1. "The Little White Door" -- Apparently inspired by a rock high in the Swiss Alps that looks like a white door in the top of the mountain. Coolidge says she's writing in her own words the story about this rock, "The Door," that was told to her by a Swiss shepherd. It begins in a really lovely way -- the rock really is a door, and a boy manages to climb up to it and finds that it's the door of the house of the clouds -- but then ends up as a moral story about How To Do Capitalism: it's fine to get so rich that you're able to buy up everyone else's farmland, as long as you don't cruelly drive away a poor old widow from her tiny plot.
2. "Little Karen and Her Baby" -- This story probably works better if you don't know anything about human reproduction. I like it, though. "Take courage, Liebchen, child to her who was child of my child's child," she said."
3. "Helen's Thanksgiving" -- A fable for baby Settlement House Workers!
4. "At Fiesole" -- No moral, and rather more realistic than most of Coolidge's stories. An American family goes to Italy because the father, a minister, is ill, and the church has saved just enough money for him to travel for his health. Because of low funds and a return of the father's illness, the two daughters stay with a widow in Fiesole while their parents are elsewhere. They are lonely and then one of them gets sick and nearly dies. It all comes out fine in the end, but that's it -- there's no other plot, and no moral -- "At Fiesole" is just a description of a holiday so traumatic that "is still too fresh in their memories, and too sad, for them to like to speak of it" except sometimes to each other.
This rather stands out from Coolidge's other stories (her novels have sober bits, but they're part of a larger whole that's fully equipped with morals and sweetness). I wonder if she was describing something that really happened and left a deep impression on her, and if she wanted to write things like this more often but had to stick with the sugarier stuff because that was what sold.
5. "Queen Blossom" -- Back to sugar! The flowers are sentient and conspire to make an angelic little invalid Queen of the May. I rather enjoyed how Coolidge handled the implications of making flowers sentient: "They picked us so gently that it scarcely hurt at all," reports the flower who escapes the May crown and reports back to the forest; then
7. "The Secret Door" -- A child helps his Cavalier elder brother escape from the Roundheads during the English Civil War. There's no moral, unless it's "Always know the good hiding places."
8. "The Two Wishes" -- Two children are thoroughly punished for their habit of always wishing out loud for a better life. Really.
9. "Blue and Pink" -- A selfish, vain girl and some humble, kind girls, and the cards they receive on Valentine's Day. I rather like that boys don't figure into the story at all and all the real Valentine-giving and love-poetry-conveying is done among female friends.
10. "A Fortunate Misfortune" -- A shy girl goes on holiday and learns that shyness is really selfishness! There's a similar message in one chapter of A Little Country Girl, but it's presented in a rather more subtle way; this story is just kind of mean.
11. "Toinette and the Elves" -- A bossy eldest sister is given the gift of temporary invisibility from some elves, and discovers that her siblings don't love her as uncritically as she'd believed
12. "Jean's Money, and What It Bought" -- Jean is a schoolteacher; her money is her pay for the term, and what it buys is a trip back to her mother's home in Scotland for her mother and Jean. There's not very much to this story but it catches at my heart, because both of my parents' families live in other countries too, and I've been lucky enough to accompany both on visits there -- though since my parents were able to afford these trips themselves, Jean's story has another layer of poignancy.
13. "How the Storks Came and Went" -- A stork family builds a nest on the roof of a poor widow's house; her children hope the stork will bring good luck, but the widow tells a story about a stork who was such a faithful mother that she allowed herself to die with her flightless children when her nest caught on fire. Happily this is NOT foreshadowing, and the widow finally receives her military pension, maybe-or-maybe-not thanks to the storks.
1. "The Little White Door" -- Apparently inspired by a rock high in the Swiss Alps that looks like a white door in the top of the mountain. Coolidge says she's writing in her own words the story about this rock, "The Door," that was told to her by a Swiss shepherd. It begins in a really lovely way -- the rock really is a door, and a boy manages to climb up to it and finds that it's the door of the house of the clouds -- but then ends up as a moral story about How To Do Capitalism: it's fine to get so rich that you're able to buy up everyone else's farmland, as long as you don't cruelly drive away a poor old widow from her tiny plot.
2. "Little Karen and Her Baby" -- This story probably works better if you don't know anything about human reproduction. I like it, though. "Take courage, Liebchen, child to her who was child of my child's child," she said."
3. "Helen's Thanksgiving" -- A fable for baby Settlement House Workers!
4. "At Fiesole" -- No moral, and rather more realistic than most of Coolidge's stories. An American family goes to Italy because the father, a minister, is ill, and the church has saved just enough money for him to travel for his health. Because of low funds and a return of the father's illness, the two daughters stay with a widow in Fiesole while their parents are elsewhere. They are lonely and then one of them gets sick and nearly dies. It all comes out fine in the end, but that's it -- there's no other plot, and no moral -- "At Fiesole" is just a description of a holiday so traumatic that "is still too fresh in their memories, and too sad, for them to like to speak of it" except sometimes to each other.
This rather stands out from Coolidge's other stories (her novels have sober bits, but they're part of a larger whole that's fully equipped with morals and sweetness). I wonder if she was describing something that really happened and left a deep impression on her, and if she wanted to write things like this more often but had to stick with the sugarier stuff because that was what sold.
5. "Queen Blossom" -- Back to sugar! The flowers are sentient and conspire to make an angelic little invalid Queen of the May. I rather enjoyed how Coolidge handled the implications of making flowers sentient: "They picked us so gently that it scarcely hurt at all," reports the flower who escapes the May crown and reports back to the forest; then
"There is no more to tell," replied the May-flower, faintly. "It is cold out here, and I am growing sleepy. Good-night."6. "A Small Beginning" -- A Horatio Alger story for gently-bred girls: how two sisters, after the death of their guardian, at first have no idea how they can support themselves, but then, because one of them makes really good gingerbread, open a bakery and flourish beyond expectations. I suppose it helps that they have start-up capital, an un-mortgaged house, and apparently the ability to run a business as well as to bake.
After that there was silence in the woods.
7. "The Secret Door" -- A child helps his Cavalier elder brother escape from the Roundheads during the English Civil War. There's no moral, unless it's "Always know the good hiding places."
8. "The Two Wishes" -- Two children are thoroughly punished for their habit of always wishing out loud for a better life. Really.
9. "Blue and Pink" -- A selfish, vain girl and some humble, kind girls, and the cards they receive on Valentine's Day. I rather like that boys don't figure into the story at all and all the real Valentine-giving and love-poetry-conveying is done among female friends.
10. "A Fortunate Misfortune" -- A shy girl goes on holiday and learns that shyness is really selfishness! There's a similar message in one chapter of A Little Country Girl, but it's presented in a rather more subtle way; this story is just kind of mean.
11. "Toinette and the Elves" -- A bossy eldest sister is given the gift of temporary invisibility from some elves, and discovers that her siblings don't love her as uncritically as she'd believed
12. "Jean's Money, and What It Bought" -- Jean is a schoolteacher; her money is her pay for the term, and what it buys is a trip back to her mother's home in Scotland for her mother and Jean. There's not very much to this story but it catches at my heart, because both of my parents' families live in other countries too, and I've been lucky enough to accompany both on visits there -- though since my parents were able to afford these trips themselves, Jean's story has another layer of poignancy.
13. "How the Storks Came and Went" -- A stork family builds a nest on the roof of a poor widow's house; her children hope the stork will bring good luck, but the widow tells a story about a stork who was such a faithful mother that she allowed herself to die with her flightless children when her nest caught on fire. Happily this is NOT foreshadowing, and the widow finally receives her military pension, maybe-or-maybe-not thanks to the storks.
October 2, 2014
Thirteen short stories for girls by the author of the 'Katy Did' series, some of which have a fairy tale quality to them and some of which are more homespun.
The fairy tales feature magical gnomes ('Little Karen and Her baby'), talking clouds ('The Little White Door') flowers that conspire to bring a joyful May-Day to a sick child ('Queen Blossom') and an old lady who grants two dissatisfied siblings a wish each.
The plainer stories all tell of salutary themes for a young readership, such as the pleasures of generosity ('Helen's Thanksgiving'), learning to cope with illness and temporary separation from mother ('At Fiesole'), and making your way in life by doing what you do best ('A Small Beginning').
Then are a few stories which are something else again, such as 'Blue and Pink', which follows the fortunes of two very different valentines cards, one vain and self-absorbed and the other more interested in'the happiness of giving happiness'.
I thought that the titled 'A Fortunate Misfortune', one of the homespun assortment about an introverted girl spending time away from home with an outgoing aunty, had a particularly thoughtful lesson well illustrated, suggesting that shyness may be a form of selfishness.
Throughout the varied collection Coolidge shows herself to be a superior children's writer, mixing the magical with the practical to good effect, rarely stepping out of the story to address the audience direct, but always adding something memorable when she did, as in this example:
"Shouldn't you think they had come out on purpose?" said Winnie, kissing one of the pinkest clusters.
"We did! we did!" cried the May-flowers in chorus. But the children did not understand the flower-language, though the flowers knew well what the children said. Flowers are very clever, you see; much cleverer than little girls.
The fairy tales feature magical gnomes ('Little Karen and Her baby'), talking clouds ('The Little White Door') flowers that conspire to bring a joyful May-Day to a sick child ('Queen Blossom') and an old lady who grants two dissatisfied siblings a wish each.
The plainer stories all tell of salutary themes for a young readership, such as the pleasures of generosity ('Helen's Thanksgiving'), learning to cope with illness and temporary separation from mother ('At Fiesole'), and making your way in life by doing what you do best ('A Small Beginning').
Then are a few stories which are something else again, such as 'Blue and Pink', which follows the fortunes of two very different valentines cards, one vain and self-absorbed and the other more interested in'the happiness of giving happiness'.
I thought that the titled 'A Fortunate Misfortune', one of the homespun assortment about an introverted girl spending time away from home with an outgoing aunty, had a particularly thoughtful lesson well illustrated, suggesting that shyness may be a form of selfishness.
Throughout the varied collection Coolidge shows herself to be a superior children's writer, mixing the magical with the practical to good effect, rarely stepping out of the story to address the audience direct, but always adding something memorable when she did, as in this example:
"Shouldn't you think they had come out on purpose?" said Winnie, kissing one of the pinkest clusters.
"We did! we did!" cried the May-flowers in chorus. But the children did not understand the flower-language, though the flowers knew well what the children said. Flowers are very clever, you see; much cleverer than little girls.
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