Fables from Afar

Abstract

Most of these stories are taken from fable sources outside the normal Western tradition, though perhaps a quarter are traditional Aesopic material. My Abracadabra copy has Third Grade pencilled in, and that is about the appropriate age for the stories. The fifty-eight fables are divided into four sections (Tales from the East, Tales from the West, and so on), but I am unable to sense the division or identify the sources. We read on iii It is in the hope that you will enjoy them as much as the children of long ago in India, China, Japan, and the Isles of the Sea that this little collection of the old, old stories has been made. Tales from the West include a number of La Fontaine fables. Among my favorites overall are A Dumb Witness (9), The Fox and the Goose (113), and The Ant and the Glowworm (115). Here a gnat stings a lion, and the lion never even notices it (79)! See Perseverance (162) for one of those stories that proves that He who earnestly wills can do anything. Here the poor man finally marries the princess. Each illustration includes one color.