All of the following books contain excellent material for the story-teller. While some of the stories are not perfectly adapted in form for telling, the best of them can be used with comparatively little change.
The list is not by any means comprehensive, but the books mentioned will abundantly reward the story-teller’s search.
MELODIES AND FOLK TALES
- Mother Goose Melodies—edited by W. A. Wheeler
- Chinese Mother Goose Rhymes—translated by Isaac T. Headland
- English Folk Tales—Jacobs
- Book of Folk Stories—Scudder
- Lullaby Land—Eugene Fields
- Child’s Garden of Verse—R. L. Stevenson
- Nonsense Rhymes—Edward Lear
ETHICAL STORIES
- Parables from Nature—Mrs. Gatty
- Firelight Stories—Carolyn Sherwin Bailey
- For the Children’s Hour—Carolyn Sherwin Bailey
- Murray’s Story Land
NATURE STORIES
- The Wonderful Adventures of Nils—Selma Lagerlof
- Further Adventures of Nils—Selma Lagerlof
- True Bird Stories—Olive Thorne Miller
- The Jungle Book—Kipling
- Secrets of the Woods—W. J. Long
- True Tales of Birds and Beasts—David Starr Jordan
TRUE HERO STORIES
- Adventures and Achievements—Tappan
- American Hero Stories—Tappan
- European Hero Stories—Tappan
- Heroes Every Child Should Know—Mabie
- St. Nicholas—in bound volumes
FAIRY TALES AND FOLK LORE
- Household Fairy Tales—Grimm
- Anderson’s Fairy Tales—translated by Mrs. E. Lucas
- Fairy Tales from Perrault—translated by S. R. Littleton
- Aesop’s Fables—Jacobs
- The Golden Spears—Edmund Leamy (Irish Fairy Tales)
- In Fairy-Land—Louey Chisholm
- Japanese Fairy Tales—Williston
- Uncle Remus—Joel Chandler Harris
- Twilight Fairy Tales—Maud Ballington Booth
- Blue Fairy Book—Lang
- Jolly Calle—Helena Nyblom (Swedish Fairy Tales)
HISTORY AND LEGEND
- Boys’ King Arthur—Lanier
- King Arthur and His Knights—M. L. Warren
- Merry Adventures of Robin Hood—Howard Pyle
- Some Great Stories and How to Tell Them—Wyche
- Half a Hundred Hero Tales—Storr
- Story of Siegfried—Baldwin
- Fifty Famous Stories Retold—Baldwin
- Stories of Heroic Deeds—Johonnot
- Viking Tales—Hall
- Wonder Tales from Wagner—Anna Chapin
- True Story Book—Lang
- Stories from Old English Romance—Joyce Pollard
MYTHOLOGICAL STORIES
- Norse Stories Retold—Mabie
- Stories of Norse Heroes—Wilmot-Buxton
- Age of Fable—Bulfinch
- The Wonder Book—Hawthorne
- Tanglewood Tales—Hawthorne
- Story of the Iliad—Church
- Aeneid for Boys and Girls—Church
- Nature Myths—Holbrook
- Myths of Northern Lands—Guerber
NORTH AMERICAN INDIAN STORIES
- Wigwam Stories—Mary C. Judd
- Myths and Legends of the Pacific Northwest—Katharine B. Judson
- Indian Fairy Tales—Mary Hazelton Wade
- Behind the Dark Pines—Martha Young
- Tales of the Red Children—Brown and Bell
In addition to the above, comprehensive lists of books for story-tellers may be secured from the librarians of nearly all the large city libraries for a merely nominal cost, and in some cases without charge except for postage.