Books with title Mother Goose in Prose

*This Book is annotated (it contains a detailed biography of the author). *This book has been checked and corrected for spelling errors. Mother Goose in Prose is a collection of twenty-two children's stories based on Mother Goose nursery rhymes. It was the first children's book written by L. Frank Baum, and the first book illustrated by Maxfield Parrish. It was originally published in 1897 by Way and Williams of Chicago, and re-released by the George M. Hill Company in 1901.

Sing a song o' sixpence, a handful of rye, Four-and-twenty blackbirds baked in a pie; When the pie was opened the birds began to sing, Was not that a dainty dish to set before the King? If you have never heard the legend of Gilligren and the King's pie, you will scarcely understand the above verse; so I will tell you the whole story…Thus The Wonderful Wizard of Oz creator, L. Frank Baum, delights readers of all ages with his imaginative tales of the “real” stories behind the beloved nursery rhymes. Written in 1897, Mother Goose in Prose was the book that launched Baum’s career as a writer.

This was the first of Baum's books for children; it is a collection of very short stories, each based upon one of the familiar rhymes of Mother Goose. In the introduction, Baum explains that many of the rhymes "are but bare suggestions, leaving the imagination to weave in the details of the story. . .1 have thought the children might like to have the stories told at greater length.. . [and] for that reason I have written this book." Although he tells us that he has "followed mainly the suggestions of the rhymes", actually the tales are original inventions of the author rather than (as one might suppose from the title) merely expansions of the old nursery rhymes. Dorothy, a little farm girl, appears in the last story, and it is likely that she is the original idea for the Dorothy who later becomes the heroine of Oz.