Item
The Fabulists French: Verse Fables of Nine Centuries
- Title
- en_US The Fabulists French: Verse Fables of Nine Centuries
- Description
- en_US This is a hardbound book (hard cover)
- en_US This book has a dust jacket (book cover)
- en_US Language note: Bilingual: French/English
- en_US First edition
- en_US Norman R. Shapiro
- Creator
- en_US Shapiro, Norman R. See all items with this value
- Contributor
- en_US Schorr, David
- Date
- 2016-01-25T16:07:58Z
- en_US 1992-05
- en_US 1992
- Date Available
- 2016-01-25T16:07:58Z
- Date Issued
- en_US 1992
- Abstract
- en_US Reading this massive and excellent work has been quite a project! The 250 fables or so from seventy fabulists represent of course only a sampling of the French tradition. An excellent prologue conveys Shapiro's good understanding of fable. Fables are not for children. They are not overall successful in reforming people; the coating keeps getting in the way of the pill. They are unpretentious, persistent, indomitable. They are meant to be read aloud. La Fontaine is clearly the measure of all French fable-writing. What comes before him is generally inferior to what comes after. The spread that Shapiro offers is truly amazing, including great geographic diversity: Switzerland, Canada, Louisiana, Algeria, Senegal, Togo, Mauritius, Haiti, and several dialect-areas within France are all here. For each of the seventy fabulists a half-page to a page of careful introduction gives biography, bibliography, and a refreshingly frank critical assessment. For me the collection perks up appreciably in the twentieth century. I cannot understand his statement that Babrius...composed his versions in the pithy four-line form (46). I took copious notes. The book has introduced me to several delightful fabulists of whose very existence I had been unaware, including Kaddour (186) and Franc-Nohain (188). Among the best of the twenty-nine woodcuts are The Mule Who Boasted of the Family Tree (110), Leda and the Turkey (126), and The Olive and the Watermelon (187). Ordering this book has put me in touch with David Schorr, who just sent a catalogue of his latest show, and Liz Dulaney, who works for the publisher and collects fable editions.
- Identifier
- en_US 0252017560 (alk. paper)
- en_US 1879 (Access ID)
- Language
- en_US eng
- Publisher
- en_US University of Illinois Press
- en_US Urbana
- Subject
- en_US PQ1170.E6 F3 1991 See all items with this value
- en_US French See all items with this value
- Type
- en_US Book, Whole
- Item sets
- Carlson Fable Collection Books