Once an essential part of an English-speaking childhood, Kipling’s

have fallen out of favor, replaced by the more contemporary wonders of

and

. Yet these stories are cut from the same cloth as his other children’s books, such as the more enduring

(1894-95), and the later

(1906) and its companion,

(1910). Certainly the

are a looser confederation of tales, each one giving a whimsical explanation for how the natural world came to be, leading up to the invention of writing itself. Yet of all his juvenile works, the

best captures the paradox of Kipling’s art in all its wonder and contradiction. While they superficially appear as charming, if dated, fairy tales…

1989 words

Citation: Grasso, Joshua. "Just So Stories". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 10 February 2020 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=4263, accessed 24 November 2024.]