Stories and Poems for Extremely Intelligent Children of All Ages.
Selected by — Harold Bloom
“Anyone, of any age reading this volume will see quickly that I do not accept the category of Children’s Literature, which had some use and distinction a century ago, but now all too often is a mask for the dumbing down that is destroying out literary culture. Most of what is now commercially offered as children’s literature would be inadequate fare for any reader of any age at any time” — Harold Bloom.
Disclaimer: All rights belong to their respective owners. I do not own any of this content. This book is available in Amazon. You can also find a soft copy in google books, but lot of pages are removed for legal reasons.
The King of the Golden River by John Ruskin
The Jumblies by Edward Lear
A Runnable Stag by John Davidson
A Pig Tale by Lewis Carroll
The Elephant’s Child by Rudyard Kipling
I Keep six honest serving-men:
(They taught me all I knew)
Their names are What and Where and When
And How and Why and Who.
I send them over land and sea,
I send them east and west;
But after they have worked for me,
I give them all a rest.
I let them rest from nine till five.
For I am busy then,
As well as breakfast, lunch, and tea,
For they are hungry men:
But different folk have different views:
I know a person small—
She keeps ten million serving-men,
Who get no rest at all!
She sends ‘em abroad on her own affairs,
From the second she opens her eyes—
One million Hows, two million Wheres,
And seven million Whys!
The Bottle Imp by Robert Louis Stevenson
I Saw a Peacock with a Fiery Tail by Anonymous
I Saw a Peacock, with a fiery tail,
I saw a Blazing Comet, drop down hail,
I saw a Cloud, with Ivy circled round,
I saw a sturdy Oak, creep on the ground,
I saw a Pismire, swallow up a Whale,
I saw a raging Sea, brim full of Ale,
I saw a Venice Glass, Sixteen foot deep,
I saw a well, full of mens tears that weep,
I saw their eyes, all in a flame of fire,
I saw a House, as big as the Moon and higher,
I saw the Sun, even in the midst of night,
I saw the man, that saw this wondrous sight.
In Winter, When the Fields Are White by Lewis Carroll
In winter, when the fields are white,
I sing this song for your delight –
In spring, when woods are getting green,
I’ll try and tell you what I mean.
In summer, when the days are long,
Perhaps you’ll understand the song:
In autumn, when the leaves are brown,
Take pen and ink, and write it down.
I sent a message to the fish:
I told them ‘This is what I wish.’
The little fishes of the sea,
They sent an answer back to me.
The little fishes’ answer was
‘We cannot do it, Sir, because – ‘
I sent to them again to say
‘It will be better to obey.’
The fishes answered, with a grin,
‘Why, what a temper you are in!’
I told them once, I told them twice:
They would not listen to advice.
I took a kettle large and new,
Fit for the deed I had to do,
My heart went hop, my heart went thump:
I filled the kettle at the pump.
Then some one came to me and said
‘The little fishes are in bed.’
I said to him, I said it plain,
‘Then you must wake them up again.’
I said it very loud and clear:
I went and shouted in his ear.
But he was very stiff and proud:
He said ‘You needn’t shout so loud!’
And he was very proud and stiff:
He said ‘I’d go and wake them, if -’
I took a corkscrew from the shelf:
I went to wake them up myself.
And when I found the door was locked,
I pulled and pushed and kicked and knocked.
And when I found the door was shut
I tried to turn the handle, but –
Echo’s Lament for Narcissus by Ben Jonson
Slow, slow, fresh fount, keep time with my salt tears;
Yet slower, yet, O faintly, gentle springs:
List to the heavy part the music bears,
Woe weeps out her division, when she sings.
Droop, herbs and flowers,
Fall grief in showers;
Our beauties are not ours:
O, I could still,
Like melting snow upon some craggy hill,
Drop, drop, drop, drop,
Since nature’s pride is, now, a withered daffodil.
The Way Through the Woods by Rudyard Kipling
They shut the road through the woods
Seventy years ago.
Weather and rain have undone it again,
And now you would never know
There was once a road through the woods
Before they planted the trees.It is underneath the coppice and heath,
And the thin anemones.
Only the keeper sees
That, where the ring-dove broods,
And the badgers roll at ease,
There was once a road through the woods.Yet, if you enter the woods
Of a summer evening late,
When the night-air cools on the trout-ringed pools
Where the otter whistles his mate,
(They fear not men in the woods,
Because they see so few.)
You will hear the beat of a horse’s feet,
And the swish of a skirt in the dew,
Steadily cantering through
The misty solitudes,
As though they perfectly knew
The old lost road through the woods…
But there is no road through the woods.
The Remarkable Rocket by Oscar Wilde
Journalism in Tennessee by Mark Twain
Roaring Mad Tom by Anonymous
The Mad Gardener’s Song by Lewis Carroll
The mountain sheep are sweeter,
But the valley sheep are fatter;
We therefore deemed it meeter
To carry off the latter.
We made an expedition;
We met a host, and quelled it;
We forced a strong position,
And killed the men who held it.On Dyfed’s richest valley,
Where herds of kine were browsing,
We made a mighty sally,
To furnish our carousing.
Fierce warriors rushed to meet us;
We met them, and o’erthrew them:
They struggled hard to beat us;
But we conquered them, and slew them.As we drove our prize at leisure,
The king marched forth to catch us:
His rage surpassed all measure,
But his people could not match us.
He fled to his hall-pillars;
And, ere our force we led off,
Some sacked his house and cellars,
While others cut his head off.We there, in strife bewild’ring,
Spilt blood enough to swim in:
We orphaned many children,
And widowed many women.
The eagles and the ravens
We glutted with our foemen;
The heroes and the cravens,
The spearmen and the bowmen.We brought away from battle,
And much their land bemoaned them,
Two thousand head of cattle,
And the head of him who owned them:
Ednyfed, king of Dyfed,
His head was borne before us;
His wine and beasts supplied our feasts,
And his overthrow, our chorus.
Rikki-Tikki-Tavi by Rudyard Kipling
Uncle David’s Nonsensical Story About Giants and Fairies
by Catherine Sinclair
The Fox and Hedgehog by Aesop
A Fox, swimming across a river, was barely able to reach the bank, where he lay bruised and exhausted from his struggle with the swift current. Soon a swarm of blood-sucking flies settled on him; but he lay quietly, still too weak to run away from them.A Hedgehog happened by. “Let me drive the flies away,” he said kindly.“No, no!” exclaimed the Fox, “do not disturb them! They have taken all they can hold. If you drive them away, another greedy swarm will come and take the little blood I have left.”
The Goose-Girl by Jakob and Wilhelm Grimm
The Necklace of Princess Fiorimonde by Mary De Morgan
August by Algernon Charles Swinburne
The Courtship of the Yonghy-Bonghy-Bo by Edward Lear
The Crow and the Pitcher by Aesop
In a spell of dry weather, when the Birds could find very little to drink, a thirsty Crow found a pitcher with a little water in it. But the pitcher was high and had a narrow neck, and no matter how he tried, the Crow could not reach the water. The poor thing felt as if he must die of thirst.Then an idea came to him. Picking up some small pebbles, he dropped them into the pitcher one by one. With each pebble the water rose a little higher until at last it was near enough so he could drink.
Neraval 
Leave a comment