This treasury of fables come from a wide variety of ancient sources, both Western and Eastern, and were adapted into French free verse by La Fontaine in the 17th Century. They are considered a classic of French literature. Humorous, nuanced, and ironic, they were originally written for adults but eventually became required learning for children throughout France.
La Fontaine’s Fables are celebrated for their freshness in narration, unconstrained suppleness of metrical structure, unfailing humor of the pointed moral, and consummate art in their apparent artlessness. Keen insight into the foibles of human nature is central to these lessons. Brilliant in their presentation of moral choices, the fables disguise their sympathies that were more democratic than his age would have tolerated in unmasked expression.
Our edition of Jean de La Fontaine’s Fables Choisies presents his first collection, which appeared in 1668, in both their original French and English along with reproductions of original wood engravings from the first edition. Over the course of the next two decades, he wrote and published more than two hundred additional fables, assembling a canon of wit and wisdom that continues to inspire and delight children of all ages.
Originally published as the January 2025 Dispatch.
Jean de La Fontaine was one of the most widely read French poets of the 17th century. Born at Châreau-Thierry in France, by the 1650’s he became a regular visitor to Paris. After a long period of royal suspicion, he was admitted to the French Academy and his reputation has never faded since. Evidence of this is found in the many pictures and statues of the writer, with later depictions on medals, coins and postage stamps. Above all he is known for his Fables, which provided a model for subsequent fabulists across Europe. Though his literary career did not begin until after he was past thirty, he was soon recognized as one of the foremost men of letters of France.
