Quotes from book
The Little Lame Prince and his Travelling Cloak

Name: The Little Lame Prince and his Travelling Cloak
Author: Dinah Craik

The Little Lame Prince and his Travelling Cloak is a story for children written by Dinah Maria Mulock Craik and first published in 1875. In the story, the young Prince Dolor, whose legs are paralysed due to a childhood trauma, is exiled to a tower in a wasteland. As he grows older, a fairy godmother provides a magical travelling cloak so he can see, but not touch, the world. He uses this cloak to go on various adventures, and develops great wisdom and empathy in the process. Finally he becomes a wise and compassionate ruler of his own land.The author's style was to stimulate positive feelings in her young readers so that they would be motivated to adopt socially correct actions in whatever circumstances they encountered. She shows how imagination can lead to empathy and enlightened morality. However, some critics have found a deeper theme in this story, relating to the restricted lives of respectable middle-class British Victorian women that enforced helplessness.

“It seemed as if she had given these treasures and left him alone — to use them or lose them, apply them or misapply them, according to his own choice. That is all we can do with children, when they grow into big children, old enough to distinguish between right and wrong, and too old to be forced to do either.”

Dinah Craik book The Little Lame Prince and his Travelling Cloak

Ch 7
The Little Lame Prince and his Travelling Cloak (1875)

“One cannot make oneself, but one can sometimes help a little in the making of somebody else. It is well.”

Dinah Craik book The Little Lame Prince and his Travelling Cloak

Ch 10
The Little Lame Prince and his Travelling Cloak (1875)

“I think, at any day throughout his long reign, the King would sooner have lost his crown than have lost sight of the Beautiful Mountains.”

Dinah Craik book The Little Lame Prince and his Travelling Cloak

Ch 10
The Little Lame Prince and his Travelling Cloak (1875)
Context: Thus King Dolor's reign passed, year after year, long and prosperous. Whether he was happy — "as happy as a king" — is a question no human being can decide. But I think he was, because he had the power of making everybody about him happy, and did it too; also because he was his godmother's godson, and could shut himself up with her whenever he liked, in that quiet little room in view of the Beautiful Mountains, which nobody else ever saw or cared to see. They were too far off, and the city lay so low. But there they were, all the time. No change ever came to them; and I think, at any day throughout his long reign, the King would sooner have lost his crown than have lost sight of the Beautiful Mountains.

“Thus King Dolor's reign passed, year after year, long and prosperous. Whether he was happy — "as happy as a king" — is a question no human being can decide. But I think he was, because he had the power of making everybody about him happy, and did it too;”

Dinah Craik book The Little Lame Prince and his Travelling Cloak