Streszczenie książki Just So Stories

The story in 8 parts

1. Key idea 1 · free to read

   A clever sailor and an idle camel

   The book opens with a Whale who has eaten every fish in the sea except one small Stute Fish. To save his own skin, he asks the Whale if he has ever tasted Man. Nice, he says, but lumpy. He tells the Whale where to find one, on a raft far out at sea.

   The shipwrecked Mariner is a man of endless resource and good sense, and he proves it from inside the Whale. He stamps, thumps and dances hornpipes until the Whale has the hiccups. When the Whale begs him to come out, he names his price. Take him home to the white cliffs of Albion, and he will think about it. Meanwhile he makes a lattice from the raft and ties it with his suspenders.

   The Camel tale has the same bounce. At the beginning of time, the Horse, the Dog and the Ox each ask the Camel to join the work. Each gets one word, Humph. Then the Djinn in charge of all deserts rolls in on a cloud of dust. He gives the Camel a humph of his own, a lump on the back that lets him work three days without food, to make up for the three days he missed. In these first tales, wit solves the problem and idleness gets its bill.

2. 2

   Cake crumbs and shadows change two animals

   The Rhinoceros tale begins on an island off the Red Sea, where a Parsee bakes a cake two feet across and three feet thick, full of currants and plums.

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3. 3

   Curiosity earns the Elephant's Child a trunk

   In the High and Far-Off Times, the Elephant has no trunk, only a blackish, bulging nose as big as a boot.

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4. 4

   Wishes, tricks and a bargain with the Cat

   The Kangaroo begins as a gray, woolly animal with four short legs, and he is unbearably proud.

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5. 5

   Taffy invents the first letter and the alphabet

   These two tales go together.

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6. 6

   The Crab who played with the sea

   In the Time of the Very Beginnings, the Eldest Magician gives every animal a game to play.

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7. 7

   Boasts, bargains and the wit of the weak

   The last tale tells of the Butterfly that Stamped.

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8. 8

   A voice made for the ear, with verse

   Kipling's way of telling is the book's great pleasure.

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