Other editions of book The King of the Golden River

A classic nineteenth-century fairy tale of adventure, magic, and good deeds, with an ironic sense of humor, brought back to life with illustrations by Quentin Blake.The King of the Golden River tells the tale of the Black brothers: the kind-natured eleven- year-old Gluck and his two nasty older brothers, Hans and Schwartz. For Gluck, play is cleaning the floors, and his education consists of a wholesome quantity of punches. One stormy evening, Gluck is left at home to prepare his older brothers’ dinner when an extraordinary-looking little man knocks at the door. Having been warned not to let anyone in, Gluck watches as the little old man stands drenched and shivering at the door. His soft heart tells him to ignore his brothers’ advice, and so Gluck’s encounter with the mysterious King of the Golden River begins. Appearing at first as a beggar, then the Southwest Wind, and finally as a dwarf, the King of the Golden River issues Gluck a challenge: to climb to the source of the Golden River and throw into the stream three drops of holy water. If he can achieve this, the river will turn to gold.Ruskin’s Victorian tale―first published in 1842―of good’s triumph over evil is a gripping adventure for all ages, and is brought vividly to life in new, never-before- seen illustrations by the celebrated Quentin Blake. 35 color illustrations

The King of the Golden River or The Black Brothers: A Legend of Stiria by John Ruskin was originally written in 1841 for the twelve-year-old Effie (Euphemia) Gray, whom Ruskin later married. It was published in book form in 1851, and became an early Victorian classic which sold out three editions. In the "Advertisement to the First Edition," which prefaces it, it is called a fairy tale, one, it might be added, that illustrates the triumph of love, kindness, and goodness over evil; however, it could also be characterized as a fable, a fabricated aetiological myth or etiology, and a parable.

This is the classic fairy tale of what happened to two men who tried to get rich in evil ways and of how the fortune they sought came to their younger brother, whose kind and loving heart prompted him to right action. The King Of the Golden River is widely regarded as a masterpiece of 19th century stories for children. John Ruskin's The King of the Golden River exemplifies the literary fairy tale, a form which, like the literary ballad, imitates the anonymous products of popular or folk tradition. Ruskin's tale, which he wrote in 1841, two years before he began Modern Painters, tells of Hans and Shwartz, two selfish, evil brothers whose greed costs them their Edenic Treasure Valley and then their lives, and of the third brother, Gluck, whose generosity and self-sacrifice restore the valley's fertility.

"The King of the Golden River" is a delightful fairy tale told with all Ruskin's charm of style, his appreciation of mountain scenery, and with his usual insistence upon drawing a moral. None the less, it is quite unlike his other writings. All his life long his pen was busy interpreting nature and pictures and architecture, or persuading to better views those whom he believed to be in error, or arousing, with the white heat of a prophet's zeal, those whom he knew to be unawakened. There is indeed a good deal of the prophet about John Ruskin. Though essentially an interpreter with a singularly fine appreciation of beauty, no man of the nineteenth century felt more keenly that he had a mission, and none was more loyal to what he believed that mission to be.While still in college, what seemed a chance incident gave occasion and direction to this mission. A certain English reviewer had ridiculed the work of the artist Turner. Now Ruskin held Turner to be the greatest landscape painter the world had seen, and he immediately wrote a notable article in his defense. Slowly this article grew into a pamphlet, and the pamphlet into a book, the first volume of "Modern Painters." The young man awoke to find himself famous. In the next few years four more volumes were added to "Modern Painters," and the other notable series upon art, "The Stones of Venice" and "The Seven Lamps of Architecture," were sent forth.Then, in 1860, when Ruskin was about forty years old, there came a great change. His heaven-born genius for making the appreciation of beauty a common possession was deflected from its true field. He had been asking himself what are the conditions that produce great art, and the answer he found declared that art cannot be separated from life, nor life from industry and industrial conditions. A civilization founded upon unrestricted competition therefore seemed to him necessarily feeble in appreciation of the beautiful, and unequal to its creation. In this way loyalty to his mission bred apparent disloyalty. Delightful discourses upon art gave way to fervid pleas for humanity. For the rest of his life he became a very earnest, if not always very wise, social reformer and a passionate pleader for what he believed to be true economic ideals.There is nothing of all this in "The King of the Golden River." Unlike his other works, it was written merely to entertain. Scarcely that, since it was not written for publication at all, but to meet a challenge set him by a young girl.

The richness of the Treasure Valley, high in the mountains of Stiria is lost through the evil of the owners, the two elder "Black Brothers", Hans and Schwartz, who in their foolishness mistreat Southwest Wind, Esquire, who in turn floods their valley, washing away their "liquid assets", and turning their valley into a dead valley of red sand. Forced into a trade other than farming, Hans and Schwartz become goldsmiths. They cruelly melt their younger brother Gluck's prize heirloom, a golden mug. This action releases the King of the Golden River for Gluck to pour out of the crucible as a finely dressed little golden dwarf. The dwarfish king offers a proposition to brothers: if someone were to climb up to the source of the Golden River high in the mountains and throw into it at least three drops of "holy water", it would become, for that person only, a river of gold. That person must do it on his first and only attempt or be overwhelmed by the river to become a black stone.

In a secluded and mountainous part of Styria there was,in old time, a valley of the most surprising and luxuriantfertility. It was surrounded on all sides by steep androcky mountains, rising into peaks, which were alwayscovered with snow, and from which a number of torrentsdescended in constant cataracts. One of these fellwestward, over the face of a crag so high that, whenthe sun had set to everything else, and all below wasdarkness, his beams still shone full upon this waterfall, sothat it looked like a shower of gold. It was thereforecalled by the people of the neighborhood.the Golden River.It was strange that none of these streams fell into the ?valley itself. They all descended on the other side of the mountains, and wound away through broad plains and by populous cities. (But the clouds were drawn so constantly to the snowy hills, and rested so softly in the circular hollow, that, in time of drought and heat, when all the country rAbout the Publisher Forgotten Books is a publisher of historical writings, such as: Philosophy, Classics, Science, Religion, History, Folklore and Mythology.Forgotten Books' Classic Reprint Series utilizes the latest technology to regenerate facsimiles of historically important writings. Careful attention has been made to accurately preserve the original format of each page whilst digitally enhancing the difficult to read text. Read books online for free at http://www.forgottenbooks.org

A fairy tale of what happened to two men who tried to get rich in evil ways and of how the fortune they sought came to their younger brother, whose kind and loving heart prompted him to right action. Widely regarded as a masterpiece of 19th century stories for children. Includes four black and white illustrations by Maria L. Kirk. Suitable for ages 8 and up.

John Ruskin was born in England in 1819. He was a critic of art, architecture and society. He was a Victorian sage and gifted painter. His goal with his writings was to cause widespread cultural and social change. This combination of the religious intensity of the Evangelical Revival and the artistic excitement of English Romantic painting laid the foundations of Ruskin's later views. The Encyclopedia Britannica sums up Ruskin as follows. "Ruskin has gradually been rediscovered. His formative importance as a thinker about ecology, about the conservation of buildings and environments, about Romantic painting, about art education, and about the human cost of the mechanization of work became steadily more obvious. The outstanding quality of his own drawings and watercolors (modestly treated in his lifetime as working notes or amateur sketches) was increasingly acknowledged, as was his role as a stimulus to the flowering of British painting, architecture, and decorative art in the second half of the 19th century." The King of the Golden River is a delightful fairy tale told with all Ruskin's charm of style. Once upon a time, Gluck, who lives with his two rich and greedy brothers, meets an odd little man and goes on an expedition to a strange and wonderful land. When his evil brothers try to follow, they meet a tragic fate.