Blog · Reading lists
Classics that are easier than you think, in six languages
Plenty of famous classics were written for children or in a plain style, so they're readable well before you're fluent. Good examples are Pinocchio and Cuore in Italian, Perrault's fairy tales and Poil de Carotte in French, Cuentos de la selva in Spanish, the Dik Trom books in Dutch, and Peter Pan or The Secret Garden in English. All are in the public domain and free to read.
“Classic” sounds like hard work: long sentences, old words, three hundred pages before anything happens. Some classics are exactly that. But a lot of the books that every child in Italy, France or the Netherlands grew up with were written to be read by children, and they make some of the best first books for adult learners. They're real literature with nothing simplified, and all of the ones below are in the public domain.
Every book here is in the Passage library, with the level Passage gives it.
Italian
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Le avventure di PinocchioCarlo Collodi · 1883Beginner
Short chapters, everyday words and a plot you half know. The original is wilder than any adaptation.
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CuoreEdmondo De Amicis · 1886Beginner
A schoolboy's diary from Turin, in short dated entries. It opens with five words: “Oggi primo giorno di scuola.”
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Il giornalino di Gian BurrascaVamba · 1912Beginner
A nine-year-old's diary of pranks and disasters. Conversational and very funny.
French
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Contes de PerraultCharles Perrault · 1697Beginner
Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, Puss in Boots. You know the stories, so the French is the only new thing.
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Poil de CarotteJules Renard · 1894Beginner
Short scenes from a red-haired boy's unhappy childhood, mostly dialogue. Sharp rather than sweet.
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Sans familleHector Malot · 1878Beginner
A foundling sold to a travelling entertainer crosses France with a dog troupe and a monkey. Long, but in plain French and gripping.
Spanish
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Cuentos de la selvaHoracio Quiroga · 1918Beginner
Jungle animal stories Quiroga wrote for his children. Under 18,000 words in total.
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MarianelaBenito Pérez Galdós · 1878Beginner
A short, sad novel by the great Spanish realist, in surprisingly plain prose.
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La tía TulaMiguel de Unamuno · 1921Beginner
Unamuno is famous for big ideas, but this short novel is written in clear, direct Spanish.
Dutch
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Uit het leven van Dik TromC. Joh. Kieviet · 1891Beginner
The adventures of a cheerful, chubby village boy. Generations of Dutch children grew up with it.
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Afke's tientalNienke van Hichtum · 1903Beginner
A poor Frisian family with ten children, told in short chapters that follow the different children.
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Kees de jongenTheo Thijssen · 1923Intermediate
A boy growing up in Amsterdam, full of daydreams. A step up from the two above.
Older Dutch books use pre-1947 spellings such as menschen for mensen. They look odd for a page or two, then stop mattering.
Turkish
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Kaşağı ve Diğer HikâyelerÖmer Seyfettin · 1917Intermediate
Short stories by a writer known for pushing Turkish towards the plain spoken language of his day. The title story, about two brothers and a curry comb, is read in Turkish schools.
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Bomba ve Diğer HikâyelerÖmer Seyfettin · 1917Intermediate
More short stories from the same author. Each one is short enough to finish in a sitting.
Try it on a real bookPassage is free to start on iPhone, iPad and Mac. Pick a classic at your level and tap any sentence you don't get.
Download on theApp StoreEnglish
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Peter PanJ. M. Barrie · 1911Beginner
Playful and odd, with lots of dialogue.
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The Secret GardenFrances Hodgson Burnett · 1911Beginner
A spoilt orphan finds a locked garden on a Yorkshire estate. Clear, steady prose, with some Yorkshire dialect in the dialogue.
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Black BeautyAnna Sewell · 1877Beginner
A horse tells his own life story in short chapters.
What makes a classic easy
- It was written for children, or for a broad audience, so the vocabulary stays close to everyday speech.
- The chapters are short, or the book is a collection of stories, so you finish things.
- There's a lot of dialogue, which tends to use short sentences and common verbs.
- You already know the story, as with fairy tales, so you can predict what's coming.
When you're ready for the next step, the reading lists for Spanish, French and Italian continue through intermediate and advanced books, and every language has its own shelf: Spanish, French, Italian, Dutch, Turkish, English.
Questions
Which classics are in the public domain?
It depends on the country. In the EU and the UK, a work generally becomes public domain 70 years after its author's death. In the United States, works published in 1930 or earlier are in the public domain as of 2026. Most 19th-century classics are free everywhere.
Are children's classics too childish for adults?
Less than you'd think. Pinocchio is darker and stranger than the films, Poil de Carotte is about a cruel mother, and Cuore was written to shape a new nation's idea of itself. They read differently as an adult, and that's part of the fun.