Other Fiction Grahame, Kenneth: Dream Days (Illustrated). v1. 16 August 2012

[GrannyGrump]

Kenneth Grahame (1859-1932) is the author of “The Wind in the Willows,” “The Golden Age,” “Dream Days,” “Pagan Papers,” “The Headswoman” etc.

This collection of children's fiction and reminiscences of childhood is a sequel to Grahame's 1895 collection “The Golden Age,” featuring the same family of five children. The first six selections had been previously published in periodicals. The book is best known for its inclusion of Grahame's classic story “The Reluctant Dragon,” which was adapted as a Disney film in 1941.

Like its precursor volume, “Dream Days” received strong approval from the literary critics of the day. In the decades since, the book has perhaps suffered a reputation as a thinner and weaker sequel to The Golden Age—except for its single hit story. In one modern estimation, both books "paint a convincingly unsentimental picture of childhood, with the adults in these sketches totally out of touch with the real concerns of the young people around them, including their griefs and rages."
—From Wikipedia

I would highly recommend this to anyone who enjoys the Penrod books by Booth Tarkington. It has the same exuberant, joyful respect for the innocence and seriousness of bygone childhood imagination. And if the last story doesn’t choke you up just a little, you have neither heart nor soul and should just go back to your “Twilight” collection.
—Goodreads review by Timothy

Grahame relates the imaginings of children with a deft touch, and the reader is caught up in those heartfelt and sometimes amusing worlds. The children are particularly fond of adventures with knights, princesses, and dragons. Fittingly, Lenski’s color illustrations are in the style of medieval tapestries, and some of the line drawings are reminiscent of old woodblock prints. Read this, and remember the child you used to be.

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4 full-page color plates, 24 half-page black-and-white drawings. Small drop caps. Curly quotes, em dashes, etc.