8.4 /10 1 Votes
Language English Pages 239 pp (first edition) Originally published 1959 Publisher Methuen Publishing Country United Kingdom | 4.2/5 Goodreads Publication date 1959 OCLC 752626144 Illustrator Cynthia Harnett | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Media type Print (hardcover & paperback) LC Class PZ7.H228 Lo PZ7.H228 Cax Genres Fiction, Children's literature, Historical novel, Historical Fiction Similar Cynthia Harnett books, Fiction books | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
The Load of Unicorn is a children's historical novel written and illustrated by Cynthia Harnett. It was first published in 1959, and was republished by Egmont Classics in 2001. It is set in London in the 15th century, and concerns the adventures of an apprentice of William Caxton, the printer. The title refers to a load of paper with a unicorn watermark, ordered by Caxton from Flanders but never delivered.
Contents
G. P. Putnam's Sons published the first U.S. edition in 1960 as Caxton's Challenge. It has also been published as The Cargo of the Madalena.
Harnett and The Load of Unicorn were a commended runner up for the Carnegie Medal from the Library Association, recognising the year's best children's book by a British subject.
Plot summary
Benedict, known as Bendy, has been apprenticed by his forward-looking father to the printer William Caxton. This infuriates his mean half-brothers who are scriveners and fear that the new-fangled printing press will drive them out of business. They have secretly waylaid the printer's delivery of new paper and are hiding it. Bendy knows about it but is worried about the consequences of telling, especially as his half-brothers may be involved with Lancastrian rebels.
Caxton sends Bendy and another apprentice on a quest to find the complete manuscript of Thomas Mallory's stories of King Arthur. Mallory's stories had been circulating as a series of independent and internally consistent tales, but Caxton believes there is a single manuscript, based on the fact that some of the tales make clear reference to earlier episodes. Bendy's quest proves dangerous as others are also on the trail.
Allusions to history
There is lots of detail about life in London in the 15th century and especially about the craft of printing, all meticulously researched. In the author's postscript, she explains the process of researching and writing the book, and compares then and 1959. The endpapers of the first and some later editions are printed with 15th-century maps of London, and the illustrations show many of the everyday objects of the time.