The Boy's King Arthur was an abridged version of Sir Thomas Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur edited by Sidney Lanier and published in 1880.

[9] Grosset and Dunlap published a new edition in 1950, re-titled King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table, from Sir Thomas Malory's le morte d'Arthur and with illustrations by Florian Kramer.

[8][1] His abridgements and bowdlerizations included the removal of Uther's rape of Igraine, and other items, sexual and otherwise, that would tarnish the image of the Knights of the Round Table for children, including Malory's account of Sir Lancelot's madness, Sir Gareth's pre-marital sex, and the relationship between Tristram and Isolde.

[11] Also watered down are Lancelot's reasons for fighting for Guinevere, reduced to an explanatory footnote, and to a vague accusation of "treason" by Sir Meliagrance, rather than that she had committed adultery with one of the wounded knights.

[12] This subtly alters the context of the fight, making it seem that Lancelot is on the side of truth and honour, rather that trying to hide behind the technicality that it had been him that she had slept with, not a wounded knight.

[13] Professor of English Dennis Prindle suggested that The Boy's King Arthur may have been John Steinbeck's first encounter with Arthurian legend.