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The Story of Doctor Dolittle

First published: 1920
Pages: 105

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3 h 8 min · 22 parts

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Author's Note and Dedication; Introduction
8:55
The First Chapter - Puddleby
6:10
The Second Chapter - Animal Language
13:08
The Third Chapter - More Money Troubles
7:28
The Fourth Chapter - A Message From Africa
6:19
The Fifth Chapter - The Great Journey
6:24
The Sixth Chapter - Polynesia and the King
6:07
The Seventh Chapter - The Bridge of Apes
11:04
The Eighth Chapter - The Leader of the Lions
7:07
The Ninth Chapter - The Monkeys' Council
6:20
The Tenth Chapter - The Rarest Animal of All
9:13
The Eleventh Chapter - The Black Prince
10:33
The Twelfth Chapter - Medicine and Magic
15:07
The Thirteenth Chapter - Red Sails and Blue Wings
7:27
The Fourteenth Chapter - The Rats' Warning
8:21
The Fifteenth Chapter - The Barbary Dragon
10:37
The Sixteenth Chapter - Too-Too the Listener
7:58
The Seventeenth Chapter - The Ocean Gossips
7:28
The Eighteenth Chapter - Smells
12:19
The Nineteenth Chapter - The Rock
8:29
The Twentieth Chapter - The Fisherman
7:09
The Last Chapter - Home Again
5:02

The Story of Doctor Dolittle (1920) is a public domain work.

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About this book

Hugh Lofting published The Story of Doctor Dolittle in 1920, and the book started life as a series of illustrated letters he sent home from the trenches of the First World War. Lofting did not want to write about the actual war for his young children, so he invented Doctor John Dolittle of Puddleby-on-the-Marsh, an English country physician who learns the language of animals from his parrot Polynesia and gives up human patients to treat them instead.

This first book is a children's adventure novel with the rough rhythms of a bedtime story Lofting was making up as he went. The doctor is broke. His sister Sarah leaves the house in disgust. The animals turn up to live in his cottage. Then a message comes from a sick monkey in West Africa, and Dolittle ships out with Jip the dog, Dab-Dab the duck, Gub-Gub the pig, Polynesia the parrot, and Chee-Chee the monkey to cure the outbreak. The voyage runs into pirates, the King of the Jolliginki, the Pushmi-pullyu, and a long return journey. Some of the racial portrayals in the original 1920 text have been edited out of later editions. Worth knowing about before reading. The voice itself is warm, slightly absent-minded, and unmistakable.

About the author

Hugh Lofting

Hugh John Lofting was an English-American writer, trained as a civil engineer, who created the classic children's literature character Doctor Dolittle. The fictional physician talking to animals, based in an English village, first appeared in illustrated letters to his children which Lofting sent from British Army trenches in the First World War.