The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame
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The Wind in the Willows

Author: Kenneth Grahame

Narrator: Bob Attiyeh

Unabridged: 5 hr 26 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 12/30/2021


Synopsis

Kenneth Grahame's iconic "The Wind in the Willows" was first published in 1908 and has remained one of English literature's most beloved novels. Reading, hearing and rereading Kenneth Grahame’s Wind in the Willows has been a principal joy for me since my mother first read this book to me when I was about four years old. We still have that hardcover edition. I was the same age as Kenneth Grahame’s son when his father first created Mole, Rat, Badger and Toad, and told him these bedtime stories. I dedicate this audio book to my sweet mother, Linda, who introduced her children to great literature, including Wind In The Willows.

Kenneth Grahame first published Wind in the Willows in 1908. We will remember that our world looked very different in 1908. Argentina opened Teatro Colon in that year, the “finest opera house in the world,” to which Caruso, and later Callas would travel during the “summer season.” World War I was not yet on the horizon, or barely. We nostalgically portray the Edwardian period romantically. And indeed, Grahame captures this golden age of long summer afternoons and garden parties among the scenes and seasons of his precious novel. In the century leading up to the publication of Wind in the Willows, the British Empire had defeated Napoleon and the Pax Britannica endured and increased. In these past decades, Britain added 400 million people to her empire, and ten million square miles of land. England itself boasts only just over fifty thousand square miles. Think what that means.

Is Wind in the Willows a great children’s book? Or a serious allegory for adults? Or a novel containing some of the most sensuous prose in the English language? Since Wind in the Willows continues to captivate our imaginations perhaps the book’s power comes from its unique blend of all three of these qualities and more.

--Bob Attiyeh

Author Bio

Kenneth Grahame is best known internationally as a writer of children's books and is accredited with deeply influencing fantasy literature. Born in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1859, he was the third child of an affluent lawyer. His great grand-uncle was the poet and curate James Grahame, and he was also the cousin of Sir Anthony Hope Hawkins, who wrote The Prisoner of Zenda under the pen name "Anthony Hope."

During his early years, Grahame lived with his family in the Western Highlands. His father was an alcoholic, so when his mother died of scarlet fever, the children were sent to live with their maternal grandmother in the village of Cookham Dene. He later used this village as the chief setting for The Wind in the Willows. Grahame was educated at St. Edward's School, Oxford, but was unable to enter Oxford University. Instead, after a period of working for his uncle in London, he joined the Bank of England as a gentleman-clerk in 1879 and later rose to become secretary to the bank.

While pursuing his career at the bank, Grahame began composing light nonfiction pieces as a pastime. Throughout the 1890s, his articles and short stories were published in such journals as the St. James Gazette, the National Observer, and the Yellow Book. Many of these short stories, featuring children, were were published together in three well-received collections: Pagan Papers, The Golden Age, and Dream Days.

Grahame married Elspeth Thomson in 1899, and a year later their son, Alistair, was born. Grahame wrote parts of The Wind in the Willows originally in a letterform to entertain his young son. After an American publisher rejected his manuscript, The Wind in the Willows was published in England in 1908. The book did not receive instant acclamation; however, its reputation grew, and it became a children's classic.

Grahame experienced poor health and retired from the Bank of England in 1907, but he did continue to write. Tragically, his son committed suicide while he was an undergraduate at Oxford, two days before his twentieth birthday. Hereafter, Grahame and his wife spent long periods in Italy, and he did not write any other significant pieces. Grahame died peacefully at his home in Pangbourne, Berkshire, on July 6, 1932.

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