Wonder Teller
Cover of The Cat and the Mouse: A Gentle Retelling
Folktales & LegendsPicture bookLevel 2Ages 3–5

The Cat and the Mouse: A Gentle Retelling

English · 15 pages · 335 words · 3 min read

A gentle retelling for listeners ages 3–5 of the English cumulative tale “The Cat and the Mouse” from Joseph Jacobs’s English Fairy Tales (1890): the cat takes the mouse’s tail and wants milk for it, so the mouse leaps and runs to the cow, the farmer, the butcher, and the baker, with a speech that grows longer at every stop, and then all the way back to get her own tail again.

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Original work by
Traditional; collected by Joseph Jacobs
Adapted by
Wonder Teller

A look inside

The opening of The Cat and the Mouse: A Gentle Retelling, free to read.

  1. Illustration from page 2 of The Cat and the Mouse: A Gentle Retelling

    The cat and the mouse played in the malt-house, among the grain.

  2. Illustration from page 3 of The Cat and the Mouse: A Gentle Retelling

    Nip! The cat bit off the mouse’s tail. “Pray, puss, give me my tail!” she begged. “No tail till I get milk,” said the cat.

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