![]() Opening line/sentence: “The Shepherd Boy and the Wolf: Everyday a poor shepherd sent his son to take their few sheep out to the pasture.”īrief Book Summary: This collection of familiar and unfamiliar fables is brilliantly brought together in this colorful and beautifully illustrated book. Where there is a specifically Greek context to the fables, I think it should be retained, but this is a minor quibble, and did not effect my enjoyment of this otherwise excellent collection. Pinkney's choice, in King Log and King Stork (also known as The Frogs Who Desired a King), to substitute "the sun" for Zeus. While I feel very strongly that the cultural identity of any work of folklore should be respected, many of these fables are universal, and an Asian fisherman, African-American milkmaid, European farmer, all have their place in Aesop. The artwork is deliciously expressive - Pinkney's faces, whether human or animal, show great emotional range, and I appreciated his multicultural approach, in depicting people of diverse racial backgrounds. ![]() Retold in a contemporary idiom that never feels forced, Pinkney's adaptation feels simultaneously fresh and familiar. Here too the reader will discover some lesser-known selections, from The Gardener and the Dog to The Boy and the Almonds. Here the reader will encounter many old favorites, from The Grasshopper and the Ants to The Fox and the Grapes. Retold and illustrated by the award-winning Jerry Pinkney, whose work has been given the Caldecott Honor five times, this Aesop's Fables presents sixty-one of the classic morality tales, as well as a brief introduction, in which the author lays out his own relationship with the subject matter. Then they sent Mercury with a private message to Jupiter, beseeching him that he would take pity on them once more but Jupiter replied that they were only suffering the punishment due to their folly, and that another time they would learn to let well alone, and not be dissatisfied with their natural condition.My Aesop reading project continues apace, with this, my ninth collection of fables. It no sooner arrived among them than he began laying hold of them and devouring them one by one as fast as he could, and it was in vain that they endeavored to escape him. By degrees, growing bolder and bolder, they at last leaped upon it and treated it with the greatest contempt.ĭissatisfied with so tame a ruler, they forthwith petitioned Jupiter a second time for another and more active king, upon which he sent them a stork. Presently, when they perceived the log lie stock-still, others began to swim up to it and around it. They rushed under the water and into the mud, and dared not come within ten leaps' length of the spot where it lay.Īt length one frog, bolder than the rest, ventured to pop his head above the water and take a survey of their new king at a respectful distance. ![]() Jupiter, knowing the vanity of their hearts, smiled at their request, and threw down a log into the lake, which by the splash and commotion it made, sent the whole commonwealth into the greatest terror and amazement. ![]() With no little clamor they petitioned Jupiter to let them have a king to keep them in better order and make them lead more honest lives. In the days of old, when the frogs were all at liberty in the lakes and had grown quite weary of following every one his own devices, they assembled one day together.
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