14 h 30 minAudiobook13 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at cost
Audiobook edition · 14 h 30 minPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
What makes a child rich when his pockets hold so little?
In The Rich Little Poor Boy, Eleanor Gates brings riches and poverty into the same small life. At its center is a boy with little money and room for big dreams. This gentle childhood tale asks you to look beyond what he owns and consider the wealth of a lively mind.
Imagination, resilience and the courage to hope shape the book’s central questions. What can a child draw on when money offers little comfort? Gates invites you to weigh material riches against warmth, friendship and an open mind. The appeal lies in that quiet contrast: a plain life can still hold something precious.
What you’ll discover
- Little money, big dreams Meet a boy whose limited means stand beside his capacity to imagine more.
- Imagination as wealth Explore the idea that a lively mind offers riches beyond the reach of money.
- The courage to hope Consider resilience through small choices, renewed effort and the wish to keep dreaming.
- A question of riches Weigh the comforts money brings against the deeper value of warmth and friendship.
- Warmth in quiet storytelling Spend time with a gentle tale that makes space for childhood hopes and feelings.
Who will love it
Readers who love old New York, boys' adventure books, tales of kind strangers, and stories where reading and daydreaming carry a child through the days. Fans of Aladdin, Robinson Crusoe and King Arthur will feel at home here.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A boy in clothes forty years too big
- Daydreams make the kitchen a kingdom
- A basket brings a book from above
- Out into the city with a dollar
- One-Eye the cowboy and a hero's return
- A scoutmaster, a bath and a goal
- Cis grows up and the roses arrive
- Father Pat and the coming of friends
- What it all means and how it is told
- Choices that test a boy's courage
Who’s who
- Johnnie SmithA ten-year-old boy in oversized clothes who does the housework, loves books and daydreams, and hopes to escape Big Tom Barber's flat.
- Big Tom BarberA huge, bullying longshoreman and Johnnie's foster father, who keeps the boy shut in to work and bosses everyone except his own old father.
- CisBarber's sixteen-year-old stepdaughter, shy and motherly, who works in a box factory and protects Johnnie with secret signals.
- GrandpaBarber's elderly father, a Civil War veteran in a wheelchair who calls for Mother and loves imaginary train trips with Johnnie.
- Mrs. KukorThe warm, rocking-walking neighbor upstairs who sends down books and food in a basket and protects the children as best she can.
- One-EyeA shy, one-eyed cowboy in fur trousers who feeds Johnnie, brings him home and keeps returning with gifts.
- Mr. PerkinsA young, neat Boy Scout leader who trains Johnnie's body, teaches him the scout laws and falls in love with Cis.
- Father PatA big, red-haired Irish priest with gas-damaged lungs who takes up the children's cause and becomes Johnnie's dearest friend.
Formats and delivery
- eBook
- On your phone, tablet, computer or Kindle, with the type as large as you like.
- Large-print eBook
- The same book in bigger, clearer type, from the first page.
- Audiobook
- 14 h 30 min, complete, read by Lucas Linden.
- 15-minute summary
- The key ideas in about 13 minutes, to read or to hear.
- Paperback
- 6 × 9 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Hardcover
- 6 × 9 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Large print paperback
- 8.5 × 11 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Large print hardcover
- 8.5 × 11 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
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Read and hear Der reiche kleine arme Junge in 25 languages and switch at any time. Or read two side by side, paragraph by paragraph: the way to learn a language with a book you love.
Der reiche kleine arme Junge
by Eleanor Gates · 1922
A ten-year-old in a giant's clothes dreams up millionaires and ships to survive Big Tom Barber's kitchen.
Medium level10–20 hours to read25 languages
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In short
The Rich Little Poor Boy is a novel by Eleanor Gates, set in the tenements of New York's Lower East Side in the years just after the Great War. It follows Johnnie Smith, a boy of ten by his own count, who wears a grown man's cast-off clothes and does a woman's housework for a brutal foster father, the longshoreman Tom Barber.
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A boy in clothes forty years too big
The book opens on Johnnie Smith, ten years old, dressed in a shirt and trousers cut down from the clothes of his foster father. His arms are thin, his hands are red and wrinkled from dishwater, and his bright yellow hair is the thing he hates most about himself. Boys taunt him about it, and women want to stroke it.
Big Tom Barber is a huge, hairy longshoreman with a crooked nose that seems to move on its own and a mouth that shows how pleased he is with himself. Every morning he leaves orders about dishes, beds, bead stringing and violet making. He stays dangerous because he cannot stand silence or back talk, and Johnnie has felt his boot and his strap more than once.
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What is The Rich Little Poor Boy about?
It follows Johnnie Smith, a boy kept at housework in a New York tenement by a cruel foster father. His imagination, a basket of books and new friends like a cowboy, a scoutmaster and a priest help him find courage and hope.
Who is One-Eye in The Rich Little Poor Boy?
One-Eye is a tall, shy cowboy with one green eye and fur trousers who works with horses in a big hall. He feeds Johnnie, brings him home and keeps returning with fruit, books and kindness.
What does the title The Rich Little Poor Boy mean?
It comes from Father Pat, who sees that Johnnie has little money but a great deal of imagination, courage, kindness and love of learning. The priest calls him rich for those gifts, and a long letter explains it.
The author
Eleanor Gates
1875–1951 · American playwright
Eleanor Gates was an American novelist and playwright. She was born in Minnesota and lived in California. Her play The Poor Little Rich Girl was produced on Broadway in 1913. Her novel The Rich Little Poor Boy appeared in 1922. She died in 1951.
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