The Ballad of the White Horse
By G. K. Chesterton
Cover: King Alfred the Great (c. 1850), colour lithograph after a painting in the Bodleian Gallery by Unknown 19th-century artist · Wikimedia Commons · Public domain (published c. 1850, artist anonymous and long dead)
Chesterton's ballad tells how King Alfred, beaten and hiding in the marshes, gathers the Saxon chiefs for a last stand against the Danes at Ethandune. In galloping rhyme it makes the war a clash of Christian and pagan worlds, and it ends with the white horse on the hill being scoured. This book uses the racial and other slurs of its period as written; the Book Guide explains these words where they occur.
Summary written with Claude Sonnet 5.5.
Table of contents
- 1: Dedication
- 2: Book I. the Vision of the King
- 3: Book II. the Gathering of the Chiefs
- 4: Book III. the Harp of Alfred
- 5: Book IV. the Woman in the Forest
- 6: Book V. Ethandune: the First Stroke
- 7: Book VI. Ethandune: the Slaying of the Chiefs
- 8: Book VII. Ethandune: the Last Charge
- 9: Book VIII. the Scouring of the Horse