The Jungle Book
by Rudyard Kipling (1865–1936)
- Free to read
- 3 hours to read
- 5 chapters
- Reading level: 6th grade
"The Jungle Book" by Rudyard Kipling is a collection of stories published in 1894. The tales follow Mowgli, a boy raised by wolves in the Indian jungle, alongside animal characters like Shere Khan the tiger and Baloo the bear. Through these fables, Kipling explores themes of abandonment and fostering, law and freedom, and the balance between civilization and wildness. The stories teach lessons about respect for authority while celebrating the freedom to move between different worlds, using animals as archetypes for human nature and society.
- Short stories
- Animals
- Jungles
- India
- Jungle animals
- Mowgli (Fictitious character)
- Adventure stories, English
- Feral children
Read the opening
The Jungle Book
By Rudyard Kipling
Mowgli’s Brothers
Hunting-Song of the Seeonee Pack
Kaa’s Hunting
Road-Song of the Bandar-Log
“Tiger! Tiger!”
Mowgli’s Song
The White Seal
Lukannon
“Rikki-Tikki-Tavi”
Darzee’s Chant
Toomai of the Elephants
Shiv and the Grasshopper
Her Majesty’s Servants
Parade Song of the Camp Animals
Mowgli’s Brothers
Now Rann the Kite brings home the night
That Mang the Bat sets free—
The herds are shut in byre and hut
For loosed till dawn are we.
This is the hour of pride and power,
Talon and tush and claw.
Oh, hear the call!—Good hunting all
That keep the Jungle Law!
Night-Song in the Jungle
It was seven o’clock of a very warm evening in the Seeonee hills when Father Wolf woke up from his day’s rest, scratched himself, yawned, and spread out his paws one after the other to get rid of the sleepy feeling in their tips. Mother Wolf lay with her big gray nose dropped across her four tumbling, squealing cubs, and the moon shone into the mouth of the cave where they all lived. “Augrh!” said Father Wolf. “It is time to hunt again.” He was going to spring down hill when a little shadow with a bushy tail crossed the threshold and whined: “Good luck go with you, O Chief of the Wolves. And good luck and strong white teeth go with noble children that they may never forget the hungry in this world.”
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About this edition
This free edition of The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling comes from Project Gutenberg eBook #236, released 2006-01-16. It is in the public domain in the United States, so you can read it here in full at no cost, on any phone, tablet or computer. Genre: Short Stories, Children & Young Adult Reading, Adventure, British Literature.
Other editions: eBook #35997.
Summary provided by Project Gutenberg (automatically generated).
