Description

‘The book is grand, beautiful, exciting and poignant … It is full of poetical phrasing … yet allows for the naughty spirit of childhood to remain true’ Guardian

‘Never before had Nils travelled around at such good speed, and he had always liked riding fast and wild … Nor had he thought what it might be like to travel so high above the ground. But it was like flying away from worries and sorrows and annoyances of every imaginable kind’

Nils Holgersson is a naughty boy who pulls the tails of cats and trips up his mother while she is carrying the milk pail. Then one day he discovers he has been magically turned into a tiny imp. He climbs on the back of a gander and takes off with a flock of wild geese as they fly over Sweden, soaring above patchwork fields, through storms, to castles and lakes and even to a city under the sea. As he learns about the world, he also learns what it means to care for living things, in Selma Lagerloef’s timeless and beloved fable.

Publisher Review

Grand, beautiful, exciting and poignant... This wise, rich text is a welcome addition to Penguin's Classics series -- Philip Womack * Guardian * I am a strange Japanese who spent his infancy and boyhood under the overwhelming influence of Nils Holgersson. So great was Nils' influence on me that there was a time I could name Sweden's beautiful locales better than those of my own country... The destination of the soul: this is what I, led on by Nils Holgersson, came to seek in the literature of Western Europe -- Kenzaburo Oe Every book of this great storyteller keeps on bringing us astonishing examples of her art... No one in Europe can tell tales so unforgettably -- Hermann Hesse Among women novelists of great talent or genius, none, in my opinion, is to be placed higher than Selma Lagerloef -- Marguerite Yourcenar A childhood favorite -- Philip Gourevitch A masterpiece... It showed me that a book could be an adventure -- Gary Shteyngart