The Story of a Bad Boy

Thomas Bailey Aldrich, A. B. Frost

• Publisher: University Press of New England
• Year: 2024
• Print ISBN: 9780874517941
• eBook ISBN: 9781684582464

In 1869 Thomas Bailey Aldrich introduced to American literature the original "bad boy"--that all-American boy who plays harmless pranks, devises exciting adventures, has an occasional bout of love-sickness, is bored on Sundays, and is well-liked by almost everyone. Later followed by Mark Twain's The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Story of a Bad Boy--once called the first truly American novel--is Aldrich's partially autobiographical tale of growing up in America. Set in Rivermouth (based on Aldrich's childhood home in Portsmouth, New Hampshire), it follows the exploits of young Tom Bailey through snowball wars, schoolyard fights, Fourth of July parades, adventures at sea, and childhood sweathearts. Now printed in more than fifty editions and read and beloved by Americans for over a century, Aldrich's classic is ready to be rediscovered by a new generation of readers.

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Introduction
• A Preface, in which the Author Declines to Write One
• Contents
• List of Illustrations
• I. In which I Introduce Myself
• II. In which I Entertain Peculiar Views
• III. On Board the Typhoon
• IV. Rivermouth
• V. The Nutter House and the Nutter Family
• VI. Lights and Shadows
• VII. One Memorable Night
• VIII. The Adventures of a Fourth
• IX. I Become An R. M. C.
• X. I fight Conway
• XI. All about Gypsy
• XII. Winter at Rivermouth
• XIII. The Snow-Fort on Slatter’s Hill
• XIV. The Cruise of the Dolphin
• XV. An Old Acquaintance turns up
• XVI. In which Sailor Ben spins a Yarn
• XVII. How we Astonished Rivermouth
• XVIII. A Frog He would a-wooing go
• XIX. I become a Blighted Being
• XX. In which I prove Myself to be the Grandson of My Grandfather
• XXI. In which I leave Rivermouth
• XXII. Exeunt Omnes