Legend · Adventure
The Story of King Arthur and His Knights
The sword in the stone, the Lady of the Lake and the first great quests of the Round Table.
Five levels, about 80 languages
- A2ElementaryShort sentences and everyday words.
- B1IntermediateYou follow clear stories about familiar things.
- B2Upper intermediateLonger sentences, richer vocabulary.
- C1AdvancedClose to the original, lightly condensed.
- C2ProficientThe complete novel.
One purchase is one book, in one language, at one level: $4.99. Another level of a book you own is $1.99. Editions nobody has asked for yet are written on request: chapter 1 in a few minutes, the rest while you read. How the levels work.
About the book
How Arthur became king
England has no king, and its lords are at war with one another. In London a sword appears, fixed in an anvil on a great block of stone, and whoever can draw it out is the rightful king. Many knights try and fail. A boy named Arthur, sent to fetch a sword for his foster brother, Sir Kay, pulls it free without knowing what it means. From there Howard Pyle tells how Arthur proves his right to the throne, wins the sword Excalibur from the Lady of the Lake, marries Guinevere and founds the Round Table, and then follows three of his court: Merlin, Sir Pellias and Sir Gawaine. Pyle’s book appeared in 1903, twenty years after his Robin Hood.
Why it works for learners
These are some of the most retold stories in Europe, and recognizing them helps: you’ll often know where a scene is going before the paragraph ends. Each section is a self-contained adventure with a clear quest and a clear end. The vocabulary is a small, repeating world: king, knight, sword, horse, castle, lady, forest, battle, magic. Pyle loves ceremony and description, so you also get plenty of practice with colors, clothes and armor.
Which level to start at
B1 is the natural level: the stories are simple, but there is a fair amount of description. A2 works if you want the legend in its bare outline. Pyle’s archaic style, with its “thee” and “thou”, belongs to C1 and C2. This is the first of Pyle’s four Arthur books, so it ends long before the fall of Camelot.
Read next
- The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood, Pyle’s cheerful outlaws
- A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, Mark Twain’s very different visit to Camelot
- Beowulf, an older hero, an older kind of story