‘Beautiful … How the Just so Stories Were Made cracks through the imperial crustiness that many detest to reach into the warm heart and cool art of the great craftsman that so many admire.

'Batchelor’s achievement is to interweave a close reading of Kipling’s Just so Stories and their illustrations with a richly suggestive exploration of Kipling’s complexity as a man and his protean genius as a writer.’-Phillip Mallett, author of Rudyard Kipling: A Literary Life “Batchelor, who places the Just So Stories directly in the context of Kipling's private and public life, acknowledges that the stories contain traces of racism and imperialism, traits which were much more evident in Kipling's later works highlights the stories for their humour and the deliverance of moral lessons.”-Colin Steele, Canberra Times

“Fluent, engaging and gently erudite”-Boyd Tonkin, The Economist

“In this concise and remarkable book.Batchelor guides us expertly.drawing on multiple sources and making intriguing connections between Kipling’s stories for children and for adults.”-John Carey, The Sunday Times “A scrupulous and poignant account of how love and loss inspired the Just So Stories”-Kathryn Hughes, The Guardian Richly illustrated with original drawings and family photographs, this account reveals Kipling’s public and private lives-and sheds new light on a much-loved and tremendously influential classic. In his stories Kipling played with biblical and other stories of creation and imagined fantastical tales of animals' development and man's discovery of literacy. Batchelor details the playful challenges the stories made to contemporary society. In this original study, John Batchelor explores the artistry with which Kipling created the Just So Stories, using each tale as an entry point into the writer’s life and work-including the tragedy that shadows much of the volume, the death of his daughter Josephine. drawing on multiple sources and making intriguing connections between Kipling’s stories for children and for adults.”-John Carey, The Sunday Times From 'How the Leopard Got Its Spots' to 'The Elephant’s Child,' Rudyard Kipling’s Just So Stories have delighted readers across the world for more than a century. A fascinating, richly illustrated exploration of the poignant origins of Rudyard Kipling’s world-famous children’s classic “In this concise and remarkable book.

Just So Stories by Rudyard Kipling