3 ЧАСТЬ choose a famous grown-up book for a four-year-old girl? Her first
thought was to pick a young teenager's romance of the kind that is
written for fifteen-year-old schoolgirls, but for some reason she walked
past that particular shelf.
more than one if you wish.”
bedroom now became her reading room and there she sat reading most
UNIT 6
"Try this,” she said at last. “It's very famous and very good. If
it is too long for you, just let me know and I'll find something short-
er and a bit easier."
"Great Expectations,” Matilda read, “by Charles Dickens. I'd love
Over the next few afternoons Matilda sat reading in the big arm-
chair at the far end of the room with a book on her lap. She was
totally absorbed in the wonderful adventures of Pip and old Miss
Havisham in her house and the spell of magic that Dickens the great
storyteller had created with his words. Co
Within a week, Matilda had finished Great Expectations which in
that edition contained four hundred and eleven pages. “I loved it,"
she said to Mrs Phelps.
“Has Mr Dickens written any others?”
"A great number,” said Mrs Phelps. "Shall I choose you another?”
Over the next six months under Mrs Phelps's watchful eye, Matilda
read the following books: Nicholas Nickleby by Charles Dickens, Oliver
Twist by Charles Dickens, Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë, Pride and
Prejudice by Jane Austen, Tess of the D'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy,
Kim by Rudyard Kipling, The Invisible Man by H. G. Wells, The
Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway, The Good Companions
by J. B. Priestley, Brighton Rock by Graham Greene, Animal Farm
by George Orwell.
It was an impressive list. Once Mrs Phelps said, “Did you know
that public libraries like this allow you to borrow books and take
them home?”
"I didn't know that,” Matilda said. "Could I do it?”
"Of course,” Mrs Phelps said.
"When you have chosen the book you want, bring it to me so I
can make a note of it and it's yours for two weeks. You can take
From then on, Matilda would visit the library only once a week in
order to take out new books and return the old ones.
