Travels, Shakespeare, Bunyan, and Scott. As examples of English
these books stand preeminent.

Lord Brougham relates that one of his friends, a professor in a
university, consulted one of the ablest historians of his time as
to what would be the best discipline for acquiring a good
narrative style, as a prelude to writing a book of travels through
Asia. The advice given him was to read Robinson Crusoe carefully.
When the professor expressed astonishment, supposing it to be a
jest, the historian said he was quite serious, but that if
Robinson Crusoe would not help him, for any reason, he recommended
Gulliver's Travels. The late Donald G. Mitchell once said: "If you
should ever have any story of your own to tell, and want to tell
it well, I advise you to take Robinson Crusoe for a model!"

Parents and teachers who do not read aloud to young children, or
who do not practise telling stories to children, probably do not
realize what simple but extraordinarily valuable opportunities for
self-education they are ignoring, to say nothing of the help they
can be to children. In order to be successful we have to try and
put ourselves in the child's place.

The average reader does not concentrate sufficiently to get the
thought clearly from the text, and does not imagine himself to be
actually in the midst of the scene he is describing. The
consequence is that his voice and actions are not, except perhaps
in a slight degree, affected by the emotions he is supposed to be
experiencing. Dramatic rendering of dramatic passages is worth
striving for, and should be encouraged on the part of children.