The French reading room
Where to start reading in French
New to French? Start the first lesson: the course takes you from your first word to these books, free to start and with no account. Already reading a little? Here is the order.
Most lists of French stories for beginners are graded readers, or a pile of real literature handed over as though every book asked the same thing of you. Here is an order for eight real tales with a number against every step, measured on the texts themselves.
What a step costs
Not its length. A longer tale made of words you already hold is easier than a short one that is all new, so each step below is priced in new dictionary words: the ones a tale asks that the tales before it did not. Meet «entra» after «entrez» and you have met entrer once, not twice.
Why the price does not simply fall
On the Spanish room's shelf, eight tales by one author, the price of a step falls as you go. This shelf has two authors, and the price holds roughly level instead: between 153 and 223 new words a step, from the first tale to the last.
Perrault's 5 fairy tales pay one another back. A step among them costs 153 to 207 new words, and the longest, «Cendrillon» at 2,208 words, asks only 171: by the time you reach it, the furniture of a fairy tale is familiar. 40% of the dictionary words in his five come back in another of them.
Daudet's 3 stories cost 211 to 223 new words each. Of the 1,123 dictionary words in them, 697 never appear in Perrault, and only 28% come back in another of his three. A village church, a mountain pasture and a schoolroom do not share a vocabulary the way fairy tales do. That is not a flaw in the order; it is the moment the shelf changes century, and it is better met knowing it is coming.
The order, and what each step costs
| # | Tale | In English | By | New words | Words held by the end | Length |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Le petit Chaperon rouge first scene free | Little Red Riding Hood | Perrault | 178 | 178 | 683 |
| 2 | Les Fées | The Fairies | Perrault | 153 | 331 | 860 |
| 3 | Le maître Chat ou le Chat botté | The Master Cat, or Puss in Boots | Perrault | 207 | 538 | 1,586 |
| 4 | La Barbe-Bleue | Bluebeard | Perrault | 196 | 734 | 1,804 |
| 5 | Cendrillon | Cinderella | Perrault | 171 | 905 | 2,208 |
| 6 | La Dernière Classe free | The Last Lesson | Daudet | 211 | 1,116 | 1,755 |
| 7 | Le curé de Cucugnan | The Priest of Cucugnan | Daudet | 223 | 1,339 | 1,705 |
| 8 | La chèvre de monsieur Seguin | Monsieur Seguin’s Goat | Daudet | 216 | 1,555 | 2,059 |
Words held by the end is the running total: finish the shelf and you hold 1,555 of them. Across all eight, 608 of the 1,610 dictionary words (38%) appear in more than one tale.
Start here
La Dernière Classe — The Last Lesson
Free and complete, with no account: the whole tale, every word glossed where it stands and an English line under every sentence. It asks 211 dictionary words, every one of them new to a reader starting here.
Le petit Chaperon rouge — Little Red Riding Hood
It asks 178 new words. Its opening scene plays free, with no account.
How far the shelf carries you
| Band | Exam | Words | Of this shelf it opens | What it reads |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| A1 | DELF A1 | 750 | 39.2% | Whole sentences, and the shape of the language. |
| A2 | DELF A2 | 1500 | 95.7% | Ordinary narration: who did what, to whom, when. |
Read those counts as a measure of this shelf, not as what the DELF requires. France Éducation international publishes no word list for its exams, and every «A2 means 1,500 words» you will find is somebody's estimate. The exams named are real; the thresholds beside them are this house's working figures. B1 lies past the end of these eight: between them they hold 1,610 distinct words, which carries a reader through A1 and into A2. Sit the exam when the reading feels easy.
You do not have to be ready first
A glossed reader turns the order upside down: the words arrive while you read rather than before, and the number beside each step is there to help you choose, not to make you wait. Tap any word for its dictionary form and meaning; tap the sentence for the English.
Open the French room «La Dernière Classe» is free and entire, and no account is asked for it.
All eight tales · Charles Perrault · Alphonse Daudet · the shelf, counted