Hilaire Belloc (1870–1953)

Author of Cautionary Tales for Children

227+ Works 7,593 Members 99 Reviews 19 Favorited

About the Author

Hilaire Belloc, 1870 - 1953 Hilaire Belloc was born in France in 1870, educated at Oxford, and naturalized as a British subject in 1902. Although he began as a writer of humorous verse for children, his works include satire, poetry, history, biography, fiction, and many volumes of essays. With his show more close friend and fellow Catholic, G. K. Chesterton, Belloc founded the New Witness, a weekly newspaper opposing capitalism and free thought and supporting a philosophy known as distributism. The pair was so close in thought and association that George Bernard Shaw nicknamed them Chesterbelloc. During his life, Belloc published over 150 books. Today, however, he is best remembered for only a few works, most notably his light verse, such as Cautionary Tales (1907) and A Bad Child's Book of Beasts (1896). Belloc died in 1953 from burns caused when his dressing gown caught fire from the hearth. (Bowker Author Biography) show less

Includes the names: H.Belloc, H. Belloc, Bellok H., HILARE BELLOC, Hilare Belloc, Hlaire Belloc, Hilary Belloc, Hillary Belloc, Hilaire Belloc, Hillaire Beloc, Hilarie Belloc, Hilaire Belloc, Belloc Hilaire, Hilarie Belloc, Hillaire Belloc, Hailaire Belloc, Hilaire BellocNew York,, Joseph Hilaire P. Belloc, BY (AUTHOR): HILAIRE BELLOC ., Hilaire Belloc Gabriel Oussani, Hilare Belloc Everymans Library, Hilaire: Preface By Evelyn Waugh: Belloc, Hilaire/William Hyde (Illustrator) Belloc, Harold (illustrator) Hilaire; Berson Belloc, Illustrated by Posy Simmonds Hilaire Belloc, illustrated by Posy Simmonds Hilaire Belloc, Belloc H. Pictures By B.T.B. (Lord Ian Basil) Blac

Image credit: George Grantham Bain collection

Works by Hilaire Belloc

Popular Recent

Cautionary Tales for Children (1907) 713 copies

The Path to Rome (1902) 509 copies

The Great Heresies (1936) 487 copies

Characters of the Reformation: historical portraits of 23 men and women and their place in the great religious… (1918) 349 copies

How the Reformation Happened (1928) 332 copies

Cautionary Verses (1939) 315 copies

The Servile State (1912) 301 copies

Selected Cautionary Verses (1940) 241 copies

The Crusades: The World's Debate (1937) 223 copies

Europe and the Faith (1920) 191 copies

Cautionary Tales and Other Verses (1907) 184 copies

Survivals and New Arrivals: The Old and New Enemies of the Catholic Church (1929) 148 copies

The Crisis of Civilization (1602) 146 copies

Essays of a Catholic (1931) 130 copies

Richelieu (1929) 110 copies

Marie Antoinette (1909) 107 copies

The Four Men: A Farrago (1911) 102 copies

The Cruise of the Nona (1925) 95 copies

The Bad Child's Book of Beasts (1896) 92 copies

Joan of Arc (1929) 90 copies

Matilda Who told Lies (1970) 90 copies

Jim, Who Ran Away from His Nurse, and Was Eaten by a Lion (1987) 87 copies

William the Conqueror (1709) 87 copies

Complete Verse (1970) 84 copies

An Essay on the Restoration of Property (1936) 75 copies

Hills and the Sea (1909) 71 copies

The French Revolution (1911) 67 copies

Selected essays of Hilaire Belloc (1948) — Author — 67 copies

The Jews (1922) 66 copies

The Bad Child's Book of Beasts | More Beasts for Worse Children | A Moral Alphabet (1961) 60 copies

The Essential Belloc: A Prophet for Our Times (2010) 60 copies

The Battleground: Syria and Palestine the Seedplot of Religion (2008) 47 copies

Charles I, King of England (1933) 46 copies

Stories, essays, and poems (1938) 46 copies

The Old Road (1910) 45 copies

Economics for Helen (1999) 45 copies

The Free Press (2002) 45 copies

The Bad Child's Book of Beasts / Cautionary Tales (2008) 44 copies

Sonnets and Verse (1923) 43 copies

Poems of To-day: An Anthology (1915) — Contributor — 42 copies

Napoleon (1932) 42 copies

Collected verse (Penguin poets) (1958) 41 copies

The Historic Thames (1910) 39 copies

Wolsey (1930) 38 copies

Mr Petre (1981) 34 copies

Cranmer: Archbishop of Canterbury 1533-1556 (1931) 32 copies

The Mercy of Allah (1922) 32 copies

The Catholic Church and history (1926) 32 copies

Belloc: A Biographical Anthology (1970) 31 copies

On Nothing and Kindred Subjects (1908) 30 copies

Charles II: The Last Rally (1939) 30 copies

Moral Alphabet (1973) 28 copies

Danton (1911) 27 copies

Robespierre (1901) 27 copies

But Soft: We Are Observed (1928) 27 copies

Cautionary Verses / New Cautionary Verses (Everyman's Library Children's Classics) (1997) 26 copies

The Green Overcoat (1912) 26 copies

First and Last (1911) 25 copies

The Party System (1911) 24 copies

More Beasts for Worse Children (1897) 23 copies

Cromwell (1901) 21 copies

Milton (1935) 20 copies

Hilaire Belloc's the Yak, the Python and the Frog (1975) 19 copies

James the Second (1928) 17 copies

The Missing Masterpiece 17 copies

The Bad Child's Book of Beasts, together with More Beasts for Worse Children (1966) 17 copies

A Conversation with an Angel and Other Essays (1928) 17 copies

The postmaster-general (1931) 16 copies

On Something (1910) 16 copies

Hilaire Belloc: An Anthology of His Prose and Verse (1951) — Author; Author — 16 copies

On Everything (1920) 15 copies

Miniatures of French History (1926) 15 copies

On sailing the sea (1939) 15 copies

The man who made gold (1930) 14 copies

Louis XIV (1938) 14 copies

The Bad Childs Pop-Up Book of Beasts (1987) 14 copies

Avril: Being Essays on the Poetry of the French Renaissance (1904) 13 copies

The Girondin (1911) 13 copies

The Road (1923) 13 copies

On the Place of Gilbert Chesterton in English Letters (1940) 12 copies

The Silence of the Sea and Other Stories (1940) 12 copies

The Haunted House (1927) 12 copies

The eye-witness: being a series of descriptions and sketches in which it is attempted to reproduce (1908) 12 copies

Poitiers (1913) 11 copies

The River of London (1912) 11 copies

One Thing and Another: A Miscellany From His Uncollected Essays (1955) 11 copies

Waterloo (1915) 10 copies

On Anything (1910) 10 copies

Advice (1960) 10 copies

A Shorter History of England (1934) 10 copies

Short talks with the dead and others (1928) 10 copies

Algernon and Other Cautionary Tales (1991) 10 copies

Elizabeth: Creature of Circumstance (1942) 10 copies

The Great Heresies and Survivals and New Arrivals (2012) 10 copies

The emerald of Catherine the Great (1926) 10 copies

A History of England (1925) 9 copies

Paris (1900) 9 copies

Crécy (2010) 9 copies

On (2022) 9 copies

This and That and the Other (1912) 9 copies

Belinda (1928) 9 copies

A companion to Mr. Wells's "Outline of history" (1926) 9 copies

The modern traveller (1972) 9 copies

New Cautionary Tales (1930) 9 copies

The Bad Child's Book of Beasts | More Beasts for Worse Children | Cautionary Tales (1924) 8 copies

A Picked Company (1915) 8 copies

The question and the answer (2012) 8 copies

A Conversation with a Cat and Others (1931) 8 copies

Mr. Belloc Still Objects to Mr. Wells's "The Outline of History" 7 copies

Mr. Clutterbuck's election (2009) 7 copies

Elizabethan Commentary (1969) 7 copies

The Chanty of the Nona 7 copies

More Peers : Verses (1924) 7 copies

The tactics and strategy of the great Duke of Marlborough (1933) 6 copies

Letters from Hilaire Belloc 6 copies

High Lights of the French Revolution (2002) 6 copies

The Augustan Books of Poetry: Hillaire Belloc (1925) 6 copies

Tourcoing (1912) 6 copies

A General Sketch of the European War: The First Phase (2012) 6 copies

The Pyrenees; with numerous sketches by the author and twenty-two maps. (1777) 6 copies

Shadowed! (1929) 6 copies

Emmanuel Burden (1920) 6 copies

A General Sketch of the European War (2008) 5 copies

Hilaire Belloc's Prefaces: Written for Fellow Authors (1971) (1971) 5 copies

The Battle of Blenheim (2010) 5 copies

Malplaquet (1911) 5 copies

Places (1942) 5 copies

Towns of destiny (1927) 5 copies

Many Cities (1928) 5 copies

Pongo and the bull (1910) 5 copies

Return to the Baltic (2012) 5 copies

The Stane street (1913) 5 copies

Usury (1991) 5 copies

Esto Perpetua: Algerian Studies and Impressions (2010) 5 copies

Warfare in England (1912) 5 copies

Napoleon's Campaign of 1812 and the Retreat from Moscow (1924) 4 copies

A Change in the Cabinet (2008) 4 copies

An essay on the nature of contemporary England 4 copies

The Elements of the Great War: The Second Phase (1916) 4 copies

Read with Me: A Classic Collection of Stories & Verse. (1985) 4 copies

The Catholic Church and the Principle of Private Property 4 copies

The Aftermath / Lambkin's Remains 4 copies

Verses (2008) 4 copies

Sussex: The Resistant County (1936) 4 copies

Lambkin's Remains (2016) 4 copies

The Contrast (1974) 4 copies

The aftermath;: Or, Gleanings from a busy life. Called upon the outer cover for purposes of sale, Calibans guide to… (2012) 3 copies

Delphi Works of Hilaire Belloc (Illustrated) (Series Five Book 25) (2015) 3 copies

The Footpath Way (2019) 3 copies

The Elements of the Great War: The First Phase (1915) 3 copies

A General Sketch of the European War: The Second Phase (1915) 3 copies

The Fame of Blessed Thomas More: Being Addresses Delivered in His Honour in Chelsea, July 1929 (1929) — Contributor — 3 copies

The House of Commons and Monarchy (1920) 3 copies

Mrs. Markham's new history of England Being an introduction for young people to the current history & institutions… (1926) 2 copies

The Two Maps of Europe 2 copies

The highway and its vehicles 2 copies

Essays of to-day and yesterday 2 copies

The book of the Bayeux tapestry, presenting the complete work in a series of colour facsimiles (1914) 2 copies

Verses (1916) 2 copies

A History of England, Volume 1: Pagan England. Catholic England I: The Dark Ages, B.C to A.D. 1066 2 copies

Belloc essays (1955) 2 copies

The Hedge and the Horse (1936) 2 copies

Gems from Hilaire Belloc (1900) 2 copies

Essays and Belles-Lettres: Stories, Essays and Poems (1938) 2 copies

Hilaire Belloc (Methuen's Library of Humour) (1935) 2 copies

Ladies and gentlemen, for adults only and mature at that, verses 2 copies

The last days of the French monarchy 2 copies

Collected Works 2 copies

Why I Am, and Why I Am Not a Catholic 2 copies

A History of England, Volume 2: Catholic England II. The Early Middle Ages A.D. 1066 to 1348 2 copies

The Elements of The Great War 2 copies

HILAIRE BELLOC 1 copy

The Benefits Moral and Secular of Assassination 1 copy

Blenheim (2023) 1 copy

Historia de inglaterra. Desde los orígenes romanos hasta Jacobo I 1 copy

Historia de Inglaterra. Desde Carlos I hasta el siglo XX 1 copy

O Estado Servil 1 copy

The Vulture 1 copy

The Yak 1 copy

Rebecca, Who Slammed Doors for Fun and Perished Miserably 1 copy

The Frog 1 copy

The Elephant 1 copy

Hilaire Belloc "4 Sussex Poems", Thomas Gray, "Elegy Written in a Country Church-yard" [Sound recording]. Read by… — Author — 1 copy

Mr. Belloc Objects and Still Objects to "The Outline of History" (2008) — Author — 1 copy

Història i sentit : els articles de Hilaire Belloc al diari El Matí, 1929-1936 (1995) 1 copy

A Revolução Francesa 1 copy

My Own Country (1927) — Author — 1 copy

Prose and Verse 1 copy

LibriVox Coffee Break Collection 29 - Dogs 1 copy

Six British battles 1 copy

NEW CAUTIONARY TALES 1 copy

Calendar 1 copy

The Ferrer case 1 copy

Songs of the South Country 1 copy

Hilaire Belloc (portable library) 1 copy

Land and Water Map of the War 1 copy

The Revival of Latin 1 copy

“Tarantella” 1 copy

At the Sign of the Lion: And Other Essays From the Books of Hilaire Belloc (Classic Reprint) (2015) 1 copy

Verses and Sonnets (1896) 1 copy

Delphi Collected Works of Hilaire Belloc (Illustrated) 1 copy

The Praise of Wine. An heroic poem ... to Duff Cooper (1931) 1 copy

Songs from the Bad Child's Book of Beasts with Music by Dudley Glass (1932) 1 copy

Historic Nuns 1 copy

The Way Out (2006) 1 copy

Hilaire Belloc, 1879 - 1953. (1980) 1 copy

Chroniques. No. 5 1 copy

Le migliori prose 1 copy

Home 1 copy

The Honest Man and the Devil 1 copy

The Complete Works of Hilaire Belloc 1 copy

Selected Essays by Hilaire Belloc (1936) 1 copy

The Collected Works of Hilaire Belloc: Historical Books, Economy Studies, Essays, Fiction & Poetry (2021) 1 copy

Sonnets and Verses 1 copy

Hilaire Belloc's Stories, Essays and Poems. Everyman's Library 948 (1963) 1 copy

The Unending Conflict 2017 (CTS Onefifties) (2017) 1 copy

The verse of Hilaire Belloc 1 copy

Philibert (1991) 1 copy

The Second Year of the War 1 copy

L'Europa e la fede. Storia di un connubio inscindibile (2003) 1 copy

Hilaire Belloc's Stories, Essays and Poems. Introduction by J. B. Morton 1 copy

Richelieu / Wolsey 1 copy

Richelieu and Robespierre (2005) 1 copy

A History of England, Volume 4: The Transformation England: I. A.D. 1525-1612 1 copy

The Best of Hilaire Belloc 1 copy

The Alternative 1 copy

Best Detective Stories of the Year, 2nd Series 1 copy

Work Explorer

Associated Works

The Romance of Tristan and Iseult (1150) — Translator, some editions — 1,939 copies

Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama (1995) — Contributor, some editions — 917 copies

The Best Loved Poems of Jacqueline Kennedy-Onassis (2001) — Contributor — 546 copies

Black Water: The Book of Fantastic Literature (1983) — Contributor — 500 copies

The Illustrated Treasury of Children's Literature, Volumes 1-2 (1955) — Contributor — 459 copies

Week-End Wodehouse (1939) — Introduction, some editions — 351 copies

Kai Lung's Golden Hours (1922) — Introduction, some editions — 338 copies

A Book of English Essays (1942) — Contributor — 242 copies

The Mammoth Book of Arthurian Legends (1998) — Contributor — 196 copies

The Children's Treasury: Best Loved Stories and Poems from Around the World (1987) — Contributor — 148 copies

Camelot Chronicles (1992) — Contributor — 121 copies

Poems of Early Childhood (Childcraft) (1923) — Contributor — 119 copies

Storytelling and Other Poems (1949) — Contributor — 90 copies

Beastly Verse (2014) — Contributor — 88 copies

The Everyman Anthology of Poetry for Children (1994) — Contributor — 72 copies

Saints Are Not Sad: Short Biographies of Joyful Saints (1949) — Contributor — 71 copies

If It Had Happened Otherwise (1931) — Contributor — 56 copies

Who Owns America: A New Declaration of Independence (1970) — Contributor — 45 copies

Prose and Poetry for Appreciation (1934) — Contributor — 44 copies

A Century of Humour (1934) — Contributor — 42 copies

The Book of the Sea (1954) — Contributor — 36 copies

Flee to the Fields: The Founding Fathers of the Catholic Land Movement (2003) — Preface — 35 copies

Modern Essays (1921) — Contributor — 33 copies

The English Way: Studies in English Sanctity from St. Bede to Newman (1933) — Contributor — 30 copies

The Great Book of Humour (1935) — Contributor — 22 copies

The Best Horror Stories (1977) — Contributor — 22 copies

100 Story Poems (1951) — Contributor — 20 copies

Essays (1939) — Foreword, some editions — 16 copies

Annual Macabre 1998 (1998) — Contributor — 14 copies

Oxford and Oxfordshire in Verse (1982) — Contributor — 11 copies

All Day Long: An Anthology of Poetry for Children (1954) — Contributor — 9 copies

Tall Short Stories (1960) — Contributor — 9 copies

British and American Essays, 1905-1956 (1959) — Contributor — 7 copies

Number Two Joy Street (1924) — Contributor — 6 copies

Essays by Modern Masters (1930) — Contributor — 5 copies

Cricket Magazine, Vol. 7, No. 12, August 1980 — Contributor — 3 copies

Cricket Magazine, Vol. 4, No. 2, October 1976 (1976) — Contributor — 3 copies

Inquisition: A Political and Military Study of Its Establishment (1932) — Foreword, some editions — 3 copies

The Children's Own Treasure Book (1947) — Contributor — 2 copies

Then and Now. A Selection of Articles, Stories & Poems, Taken from the First Fifty Numbers of ‘Now & Then’,… (1935) — Contributor — 2 copies

The Undying Past (1961) — Contributor — 2 copies

Number Five Joy Street (1927) — Contributor — 2 copies

Number One Joy Street (1923) — Contributor — 2 copies

The dream garden : a children's annual (1905) — Contributor — 2 copies

Essays of the year (1929-1930) (1930) — Contributor — 1 copy

The Romance of Tristan and Iseult [excerpt] — Translator — 1 copy

Tagged

(54) 20th century (59) anthology (265) Arthurian (83) Belloc (150) biography (202) Catholic (124) Catholicism (112) children (84) children's (113) children's literature (56) Church History (99) classic (62) classics (85) England (57) English literature (67) essays (205) fantasy (177) fiction (575) Folio Society (51) France (79) French literature (62) Hilaire Belloc (60) history (462) humor (322) Kindle (62) literature (299) medieval (106) Middle Ages (63) non-fiction (219) poetry (747) read (52) Reformation (84) religion (138) romance (70) short stories (179) textbook (55) to-read (302) travel (107) unread (54)

Common Knowledge

Legal name: Belloc, Joseph Hilaire Pierre René
Other names: Belloc, Joseph-Pierre Hilaire
Birthdate: 1870-07-27
Date of death: 1953-07-16
Burial location: Shrine Church of Our Lady of Consolation, West Grinstead, West Sussex, England, UK
Gender: male
Nationality: France (birth)
UK (naturalized|1902)
Birthplace: La Celle-Saint-Cloud, Seine-et-Oise, France
Place of death: Guildford, Surrey, England, UK
Cause of death: from burns and shock following a fall he had while placing a log into a fireplace
Places of residence: La Celle-Saint-Cloud, France
Education: Oratory School
Oxford University (BA|1895|Balliol College)
Occupations: political activist
biographer
editor
essayist
historian
journalist (show all 15)
lecturer
man of letters
novelist
orator
poet
politician
sailor
satirist
soldier
Relationships: Lowndes, Marie Belloc (sister)
Pitter, Ruth (protégé)
Parkes, Bessie Rayner (mother)
Priestley, Joseph (great-great-grandfather)
Swanton Belloc, Louise (grandmother)
Organizations: Fabian Society
UK Parliament
Awards and honors: Order of St Gregory The Great (Knight Commander)

Members

Reviews

As Grandes Heresias by Hilaire Belloc

Lido

Flagged

Correaf | 5 other reviews | Feb 21, 2024 |

Hilaire Belloc: An Anthology of His Prose and Verse

selected from various writings

Flagged

SrMaryLea | Aug 22, 2023 |

Cautionary Verses

illustrated morality tales

Flagged

SrMaryLea | 7 other reviews | Aug 22, 2023 |

The Four Men by Hilaire Belloc

Think "Three Men In a Boat," except there are four men, they don't know each other, and they're on foot. ;)
But in both cases, there are guys on the move, talking about lots of things and meeting other characters along the way. There are delightful and thought-provoking conversations about poetry, and first love, and food & drink, and horses, and a politician selling his soul.
I enjoyed encountering passages such as: We looked northward to the hill of Mayfield, where St. Dunstan pulled the Devil by the nose; and they keep the tongs wherewith he did it in Mayfield to this day. And: In Sussex , let me tell you, we have but one cheese, the name of which is CHEESE.… (more)

Flagged

ReadMeAnother | 2 other reviews | Aug 16, 2023 |

See More Reviews