Three Good Giants

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By Listen TheBook Posted on Jan 29, 2024

In Category - Children's Fiction, Myths, Legends & Fairy Tales

Authors: François Rabelais In Year : 1887

Book Language: English

Audiobook: Three Good Giants

An Explanation by Way of Preface
Chapter I (1) How the First Giants came into the World.
Chapter II (2) Gargantua is Born.
Chapter III (3) Gargantua as a Baby.
Chapter IV (4) The Royal Tailor's Bill for Gargantua's Suit.
Chapter V (5) The Year Gargantua had Wooden Horses, and what Use he made of them.
Chapter VI (6) How Gargantua was taught Latin.
Chapter VII (7) The new Master found for Gargantua.
Chapter VIII (8) Gargantua goes to Paris, and the Big Mare that takes him there.
Chapter IX (9) The Parisians laugh at Gargantua. He takes his Revenge by stealing the Great Bells of Nôtre Dâme.
Chapter X (10) Ponocrates, the new Teacher, desires Gargantua to show him how he used to study with old Master Holofernes.
Chapter XI (11) The Two Hundred and Fifteen Games of Cards Gargantua knew how to play. What it was he said after he had gone through the List, and what it was Ponocrates remarked.
Chapter XII (12) Gargantua is dosed by Ponocrates, and forgets all that Holofernes had taught him.
Chapter XIII (13) How Gargantua was made not to lose one Hour of the Day.
Chapter XIV (14) How the Awful War between the Bunmakers of Lerne and Gargantua's Country was begun.
Chapter XV (15) How old King Grandgousier received the News.
Chapter XVI (16) How Grandgousier tried to buy Peace with Five Cart-loads of Buns.
Chapter XVII (17) How Gargantua, with a Big Tree, broke down a Castle, and passed the Ford of Vede.
Chapter XVIII (18) How Gargantua combed Cannon-Balls out of his Hair, and how he ate Six Pilgrims in a Salad before Supper.
Chapter XIX (19) How Friar John comes to the Feast, and how King Grandgousier had recruited his Army.
Chapter XX (20) Gargantua's Mare scores a Victory.
Chapter XXI (21) Showing what Gargantua did after the Battle, and how Grandgousier welcomed him Home.
Chapter XXII (22) Grandgousier's Death. Gargantua's Marriage. Pantagruel is Born.
Chapter XXIII (23) The Strange Things Pantagruel did as a Baby.
Chapter XXIV (24) After studying at several Universities, Pantagruel goes to Paris.
Chapter XXV (25) Pantagruel finds Panurge, whom he loves all his life.
Chapter XXVI (26) Pantagruel beats the Sorbonne in Argument, and Panurge proves that an Englishman's fingers are not so nimble as a Frenchman's.
Chapter XXVII (27) What sort of Man Panurge was, and the many Tricks he knew.
Chapter XXVIII (28) Showing why the Leagues are so much shorter in France than in Germany.
Chapter XXIX (29) How the Cunning of Panurge, with the Aid of Eusthenes and Carpalim, discomfited Six Hundred and Sixty Horsemen.
Chapter XXX (30) How Carpalim went hunting for Fresh Meat, and how a Trophy was set up.
Chapter XXXI (31) The Strange Way in which Pantagruel obtained a Victory over the Thirsty People.
Chapter XXXII (32) The Wonderful Way in which Pantagruel disposed of the Giant Loupgarou and his Two Hundred and Ninety-Nine Giants.
Chapter XXXIII (33) How Pantagruel finally conquers the Thirsty People, and the strange business Panurge finds for King Anarchus.
Chapter XXXIV (34) Gargantua comes back from Fairy-land, after which Pantagruel prepares for another Trip.
Chapter XXXV (35) Pantagruel starts on his Travels, and lands at the Island of Pictures.
Chapter XXXVI (36) Panurge bargains with Dindeno for a Ram, and throws his Ram overboard.
Chapter XXXVII (37) The Island of Alliances.
Chapter XXXVIII (38) How Pantagruel came to the Islands of Tohu and Bohu. The Strange Death of Widenostrils, the Swallower of Windmills.
Chapter XXXIX (39) A Great Storm, in which Panurge plays the Coward.
Chapter XL (40) The Island of the Macreons and its Forest, in which the Heroes who are tempted by Demons die.
Chapter XLI (41) Pantagruel touches at the Wonderful Island of Ruach, where Giant Widenostrils had found the Cocks and Hens which killed him. How the People lived by Wind.
Chapter XLII (42) Pantagruel, with his Darts, kills a Monster which Cannon-Balls could not hurt. The Power of the Sign of the Cross.
Chapter XLIII (43) Which tells of several Islands, and the Wonderful People who dwell in them.

As I went on, it did not take me long to discover that it was quite possible for my purpose—following, indeed, the path unconsciously taken in my boyhood—to divide Rabelais sharply into incident and philosophy. That this had not been thought of before surprised, but did not daunt me. I said to myself: I shall limit the incident strictly to his three Giants; I shall hold these, from grandfather to grandson, well together; keep all that is sound in them; cut away the impurity which is not so much of as around them; chisel them out as a sculptor might, and leave his philosophy with face to the wall. This done, I turned the scouring hose, full and strong, upon the incidents themselves, clearing out both dialectics and profanity thoroughly. I did not stop until I had left the famous trio, Grandgousier, Gargantua, and Pantagruel where I had, from the first, hoped to place them,—high and dry above the scum which had so long clogged their rare good-fellowship, and which had made men of judgment blind to the genuine worth that was in them. In this way I believed that I saw the chance to free Rabelais' Giants, so long kept in bonds, from a captivity which has dishonored them. To do this was clearly running against that good old law which has invariably made all Giants—far back from fairy-time—thunder-voiced, great-toothed, rude-handed, hard-hearted, bloody-minded creatures and truculent captors, never, on any account, pitiful captives. But, to such, the Rabelaisian Giants are none of kin. No more are they of blood to that Giant that Jack slew, or that Giant Despair, in whose garden-court Bunyan dreamt that he saw the white bones of slaughtered pilgrims. - Summary by From the preface