The story starts in the final years of the rule of King Uther Pendragon. However, it still has independent value as the only text in which all Arthur's animals are brought together, and the final parts of his life are related.

The Book of Merlyn was the volume that first contained the adventures with the ants and the geese. It chronicles Arthur's final lessons from Merlyn before his death, although some parts of it were incorporated into the final editions of the previous books, mostly The Sword in the Stone, after White became aware that the compiled text of The Once and Future King would not include his final volume.

The Candle in the Wind (1958), first published in the composite editionĪ final part called The Book of Merlyn (written 1941, published 1977) was published separately following White's death.

The Ill-Made Knight (1940), dealing mainly with the character of Lancelot.The Queen of Air and Darkness (1939), published separately in somewhat different form as The Witch in the Wood.The Sword in the Stone (1938), detailing the youth of Arthur (a revised text of the original publication, which both adds and removes certain parts).White acknowledged that his book's source material is loosely derived from Le Morte d'Arthur, although he reinterprets the events of that story from the perspective of a world recovering from World War II.

The book ends immediately before Arthur's final battle against his illegitimate son Mordred. Arthur is portrayed as an Anglo-Norman rather than a Briton White refers to the actual monarchs of that period as 'mythical'. Arthur is supposed to have lived in the 5th and 6th centuries, but the book is set around the 14th century. Most of the book takes place in Gramarye, the name that White gives to Britain, and chronicles the youth and education of King Arthur, his rule as a king, and the romance between Sir Lancelot and Queen Guinevere. The title refers to a legend that Arthur will one day return as king. It was first published in 1958 as a collection of shorter novels published from 1938 to 1940, with some new or amended material. It is loosely based upon the 1485 work Le Morte d'Arthur by Sir Thomas Malory. The Once and Future King is a collection of fantasy novels by T.

Th white's the once and future king