The Selfish Giant

Every afternoon, on their way home from school, the children used to go and play in the Giant's garden.

It was a large, lovely garden, with soft green grass. Here and there over the grass stood beautiful flowers like stars, and there were twelve peach trees that in springtime broke out into delicate blossoms of pink and pearl, and in autumn bore rich fruit. The birds sat in the trees and sang so sweetly that the children would stop their games to listen.

"How happy we are here!" they cried to each other.

The Giant comes home

One day the Giant came back. He had been to visit his friend, an ogre in Cornwall, and had stayed with him for seven years. When he arrived and saw the children playing in the garden, he was very angry.

"What are you doing here?" he cried in a gruff voice, and the children ran away.

"My own garden is my own garden," said the Giant. "Anyone can understand that. I will allow nobody to play in it but myself."

So he built a high wall all round it and put up a notice:

TRESPASSERS WILL BE PROSECUTED

He was a very selfish Giant.

The poor children had nowhere to play now. They tried the road, but it was dusty and full of hard stones. They used to wander round the high wall when lessons were over and talk about the beautiful garden inside. "How happy we were there," they said.

A winter that would not end

Then spring came, and all over the country there were little blossoms and little birds.

Only in the garden of the Selfish Giant was it still winter.

The birds did not care to sing in it, because there were no children, and the trees forgot to blossom. Once a beautiful flower put its head out of the grass, but when it saw the notice it was so sorry for the children that it slipped back into the ground and went to sleep.

The only ones who were pleased were the Snow and the Frost. "Spring has forgotten this garden," they cried, "so we will live here all year round." The Snow covered the grass with her great white cloak, and the Frost painted all the trees silver. They invited the North Wind to stay, and he came, wrapped in furs, roaring about the garden all day and blowing the chimney pots down. Then the Hail came too, rattling on the roof of the castle.

"I cannot understand why the spring is so late," said the Selfish Giant, as he sat at the window and looked out at his cold, white garden. "I hope there will be a change in the weather."

But the spring never came, nor the summer. The autumn gave golden fruit to every garden, but to the Giant's garden she gave none. "He is too selfish," she said.

The music

One morning the Giant was lying awake in bed when he heard some lovely music. It sounded so sweet that he thought it must be the King's musicians passing by. It was really only a little linnet singing outside his window, but it was so long since he had heard a bird sing that it seemed the most beautiful music in the world.

The Hail stopped dancing. The North Wind stopped roaring. A delicious perfume came through the open window.

"I believe the spring has come at last," said the Giant, and he jumped out of bed and looked out.

He saw a most wonderful sight. Through a little hole in the wall, the children had crept in, and they were sitting in the branches of the trees. In every tree he could see there was a little child. And the trees were so glad to have the children back that they had covered themselves with blossoms and were waving their arms gently above the children's heads. The birds were flying about and singing with delight, and the flowers were looking up through the green grass and laughing.

Only in one corner was it still winter. It was the farthest corner of the garden, and in it stood a little boy. He was so small that he could not reach up to the branches of the tree, and he was wandering all round it, crying bitterly. The tree was still covered with frost and snow, and the North Wind was blowing above it.

"Climb up, little boy," said the tree, bending its branches down as low as it could. But the boy was too tiny.

The wall comes down

The Giant's heart melted as he looked out.

"How selfish I have been!" he said. "Now I know why the spring would not come here. I will put that poor little boy on the top of the tree, and then I will knock down the wall, and my garden shall be the children's playground for ever and ever."

He crept downstairs and opened the front door very softly and went out into the garden. But when the children saw him, they were so frightened that they all ran away, and the garden became winter again.

Only the little boy did not run, for his eyes were so full of tears that he did not see the Giant coming. And the Giant came up quietly behind him, took him gently in his hand and put him up into the tree.

At once the tree broke into blossom, and the birds came and sang on it. The little boy stretched out his two arms, flung them round the Giant's neck and kissed him.

When the other children saw that the Giant was not wicked any longer, they came running back, and with them came the spring.

"It is your garden now, little children," said the Giant. He took a great axe and knocked down the wall. And when the people were going to market at twelve o'clock, they found the Giant playing with the children in the most beautiful garden they had ever seen.

The little boy

All day long the children played, and in the evening they came to say goodbye.

"But where is your little companion?" asked the Giant. "The boy I put into the tree?" The Giant loved him best because he had kissed him.

"We don't know," said the children. "He has gone away."

The children came every afternoon, but the little boy whom the Giant loved was never seen again. The Giant was very kind to all the children, yet he longed for his first little friend, and often spoke of him.

Years went by, and the Giant grew very old and feeble. He could not play any more, so he sat in a huge armchair, watching the children at their games and admiring his garden. "I have many beautiful flowers," he said, "but the children are the most beautiful flowers of all."

The final spring

One winter morning, as he was dressing, he looked out of his window. He did not hate the winter now, for he knew that it was merely the spring asleep.

Suddenly he rubbed his eyes in wonder. In the farthest corner of the garden was a tree quite covered with lovely white blossoms. Its branches were golden, and silver fruit hung down from them. And underneath it stood the little boy he had loved.

The Giant ran downstairs in great joy and out into the garden. He hurried across the grass and came near to the child. But when he came quite close, his face grew red with anger.

"Who has dared to wound you?" he cried. For on the palms of the child's hands were the prints of two nails, and the prints of two nails were on the little feet.

"Nay," answered the child. "These are the wounds of Love."

A strange awe fell on the Giant, and he knelt before the little child.

The child smiled at the Giant and said, "You let me play once in your garden. Today you shall come with me to my garden, which is Paradise."

And when the children ran in that afternoon, they found the Giant lying dead under the tree, all covered with white blossoms.

About this story

"The Selfish Giant" was published by Oscar Wilde in 1888 in The Happy Prince and Other Tales. Its ending draws on Christian imagery. This is a shortened retelling that keeps close to Wilde's words in places; the original is in the public domain.