Summer Story

During the summer I have been reading and recording a book called The Little House in the Big Woods, by Laura Ingalls Wilder. The recordings and text are available online. This version has been edited, but not abridged, for second language learners. That means that I keep the entire unsimplified book, but change some wordings to make it easier to understand. One page is about the author & where you can find the book. All of these readings are available freely to the public on the Ming Pao English website.

Once upon a time, long ago in America, Laura lived in the Big Woods of Wisconsin, in a little grey house made of logs. The great, dark trees of the Big Woods stood all around the house, and beyond them were other trees and beyond them were more trees. As far as a man could go to the north in a day, or a week, or a whole month, there was nothing but woods. There were no houses. There were no roads. There were no people. There were only trees and the wild animals who had their homes among them. So far as the little girl could see, there was only the one little house where she lived with her Father and Mother, her sister Mary and baby sister Carrie.

Chapter 1 - Part 1: Introduction

Chapter 1 - Part 2: Wolves in the Night

Chapter 1 - Part 3: Venison

Chapter 1 - Part 4: Smoked Meat

Chapter 1 - Part 5: Food for Winter

Chapter 1 - Part 6: Butchering Time

Chapter 1 - Part 7: After Butchering Time

Chapter 1 - Part 8: Winter

Chapter 1 - Part 9: Winter Night

Chapter 1 - Part 10: About the Author & Where to Find the Book

Chapter 2 - Part 1: Winter Days and Winter Nights

Chapter 2 - Part 2: Jack Frost

Chapter 2 - Part 3: Laura and Mary Helped Mother with the Housework

Chapter 2 - Part 4: Churn on Thursday

Chapter 2 - Part 5: The Best Time of All

Chapter 2 - Part 6: Her Father Began to Play his Fiddle and Sing

Chapter 2 - Part 7: Father Told Stories

Chapter 2 - Part 8: The Story of Grandfather and the Panther

Chapter 3 - Part 1: Introduction (The Long Rifle)

Chapter 3 - Part 2: Making Bullets

Chapter 3 - Part 3: Cleaning the Gun

Chapter 3 - Part 4: Loading the Gun

Chapter 3 - Part 5: Where and Why to Keep a Gun

Chapter 3 - Part 6: The Story of her father and the Voice in the Forest


Copyright

This book is old enough that it is in the public domain in Hong Kong (Copyright Ordinance, section 17). Other juridictions may have different time limits. Public domain means that it has no copyright, and belongs to everyone equally.

If you like the book, you can buy a printed copy from a book store or download it from Project Gutenberg Canada

The original book is in the public domain, which means that you are free to copy it. However this annotated version and the audio recording is under copyright. If you want to use this version for anything more than personal study, especially if you are a school, please email me for copyright permission.

The public domain is very important; it is the culture that all of us own. You can do anything you want with public domain books! You can print them and sell them. You can make a movie based on them and claim your own copyright on your new creation. It is often pointed out that public domain books are free as in speech, but not free as in lunch! You are free to use the text. However you must pay for the internet access to download it. You pay for paper and ink to print it. But nobody can stop you from using a public domain text or charge you a fee for it.