Compact Disks

2006? "Beasts and Citizens" Forty Fables of La Fontaine." CD. Translated and red by Craig Hill. Recording by Point One Audio, Lincoln, MA. Concord, MA: Palm Press. Unknown source. It is pleasant to hear the translator read his own work, work we have in several copies, including an advance copy provided to me so that I could offer a review. The complete fables edition was by Arcade Publishing in 2008. The CD jewel case includes a simple leaflet offering a T of C of the fables read and their place in La Fontaine's twelve books. It refers to illustrations; I wonder if something has been lost from the simple foldout. Craig Hill is not an excited reader. Rather, as he is a careful translator, he is a careful reader. I find his title telling, especially since, of the first fables that I read, FK is particularly well done – and particularly telling for us in the United States these days! The rhymes often fortify the sense well. I can find no references to this disc online, but reviews mention the illustrations in the published edition, and the references to illustration here may well be pointing there.

2011 Aesop Dress'd Or a Collection of Fables. Bernard Mandeville, based on Jean de La Fontaine. First published in 1704. The Augustan Reprint Society. Digitalized on CD by "The Again Shop." Wordcount: 19504. Pages: 67. Purchased online. Our collection has three copies of the Augustan Reprint digitalized here. This kind of "book" created by a print-recognition device does not have much appeal for me. A photographic reprint of the book has, for me, much more appeal. I suppose that there is a kind of searchability achieved by this digitalization. I did a quick search for "fox" and immediately got 16 "hits." That is a good sign!

2004 Aesop Goes Modern. CD. 29 tracks. Directed by Daniele J. Suissa. Written by Kim Terrell. Produced by Marc Solomon. Virtual Theatre Project. Boris Trajbar, Boca Raton, FL, through Ebay. "Charming Educational Stories for Ages 4 and Up!" I agree. Seven-year-old Asher meets Aesop and Aesop's father, and they start to tell him fables. They wisely tell him early that there is no right answer to a story. There are musical interludes leading into this encounter and filling in as Asher asks other people what they think a fable means and returns with his best "answer." The last track in fact has a lyre playing for the donkey who cannot play it himself. Track 20 brings Danielle, who recites a La Fontaine's DW section by section in French, and Aesop translates. This version pleases me more than the one Aesop presented as his first fable. I expected a more radical "modernization" of Aesop here. I would say that his storytelling is here taken seriously for what it is.

1993 Aesop Wrote a Fable. Anthony Thistlethwaite. Printed in France. London: Rolling Acres: Purpleteeth Productions. $9.99 through Ebay from Matt Reynolds at Too Many Records in West Palm Beach, FL, Feb., '99. This was a lark! I bid not knowing what the disc might entail. The disc is named after one song (the fourth track on the CD, lasting 2:17). That song starts with these words "Aesop wrote a fable about the tortoise and the hare. I always take the scenic route when I want to get somewhere." It soon moves into the refrain about the singer's woman: "She's a natural born lover, and she loves to take her time." Thus she never uses a calendar or remembers dates or hurries. Is she the tortoise or the hare? Aesop, you do not know what you started!

2001 Aesop: Alive and Well. CD. Diane Ferlatte, Storyteller. Erik Pearson, Guitarist. San Francisco: Olde West Inc. $4.64 from Jukebox On-Line, WindGap, PA, Nov., '09. Guitar background. Lively sung introductions to Aesop and to his life, followed by five stories 6 to 12 minutes in length. CP, BW, AD, "The Monkey & the Donkey," and DS. At the end there is a reprise of "Aesop, Alive and Well." I listened to "Poor Crow" and "The Shepherd Boy." Ferlatte continues to tell of Aesop's life between fables. Narration moves easily into song. The renditions are engaging. For example, the dying laugh of the shepherd boy at others' expense is very well done.

1995 Aesop's Fables. Performed by Eddie Albert, Gregory Hines, Cathy Moriarty, Rod Steiger, and Michael York. 45 minutes. Beverly Hills, CA: Dove Kids: Dove Audio. $16 from Gerard P. Lebel, Lynn, MA, through Ebay, Oct., '99. Very high quality performance by the readers. After each of the fables, the reader offers a personal remark climaxed by verse written for this disk by Judith Cummings. There is nice musical background to support the readings. If one wanted one English-language disk performance of fables, this would be a good disk to start with.

1997? Aesop's Fables. Animated cartoon CD in Chinese. Vol. 14. Jade Animation: Asia Video Publishing Company. Unknown source, cost, and date of acquisition. Crude animation for three stories: "The Prophet"; "The Fox and the Woodcutter"; and "The Mouse and the Frog." The stories, each about 10 minutes long, expand their fables. For the first, I lose contact with the fable. The second and third are clear versions of traditional fables, though extended in Disneyesque fashion to include more exciting episodes. The second fable goes for two-thirds before arriving at the fable. How does the third make sense of the frog's ugly action? Three monkeys appear between stories; I believe I have seen them exercise that function before. This approach to cartoon presentation seems to love panning countryside in repetitive fashion.

1999 Aesop's Fables. CD. Imagination Station. Imagelot Entertainment. Almost 23 minutes. $5.99 from Bidhere125 on Ebay, Oct., '03. Eight fables are performed quite exquisitely here, if the two that I enjoyed are any indication. LM is well performed, with good voices and sound effects. The lion seeks a nap in several places and finally finds the right one. The chatty female mouse gets off a great appeal, concluding with the appeal to become a friend. A week later she hears his roar and saves him. FG is also well told. Clearly articulated morals.

2000 Aesop's Fables. Read by Anton Lesser. With music from Vivaldi's "Four Seasons" and other concertos. Naxos Audiobooks: Junior Classics. Made in Germany. Unknown source As in the promotional CD done by the Sunday Telegraph, the Vivaldi background contributes, as do sound effects, and voice transformations from Lesser. Naxos had used this same recording on an audio cassette in our collection from 2000 and for the Telegraph promotion. Again there are 66 tracks. The stories are kept brief, and they are both well fashioned and well narrated. Of course there is a British accent. Lesser creates contrasting voices well for the lamb and the crane in the first stories, which I enjoyed. This may be the best simple CD recording of Aesop to recommend to listeners.

2001 Aesop's Fables. Unabridged. 4 CDs. "Tracks every 3 minutes." Read by Mary Woods. Ashland, OR: Blackstone Audiobooks. Unknown source. Good readings without further accompaniment. The cover illustration of TH is taken from Arthur Rackham.

2010? Aesop's Fables. 20 fables in five groups of four each, with the title-story of each group featured on the clamshell cover. Pegasus Audio Book. Pegasus: B. Jain Publishers Ltd. $2 from an unknown source. A female British voice tells the stories, listed in their groups on the back cover of the clamshell. The format of the clamshell front cover suggested that Jain had actually published a five-book series in 2010. A bit of snooping online and I found and ordered the set, along with an enclosed CD. Now let us see if this is the CD that comes.

1996? Aesop's Fables. CD. PDFs of editions in English, German, Latin, and Spanish. Jewel case cover of Steinhoewel's title-page. Purchased online. This CD contains Aesop in four languages. The key to the English edition may be that the publisher is listed as "Cassell, Petter, Galpin, & Co." The company took that specific name in 1878. Note also the comment after the introduction by JBR(undell) that about 130 fables not in the first and second editions have been added by another editor. A guess says that this is the edition in our collection for which I have guessed a date of 1890. The break before the added 132 fables comes at the top of 219 here, as in that edition. 1869 and 1874 may have been the dates of the first and second editions, both published, as I believe, without clear indication of a date of publication. The German editionlisted as published in 1479, seems to be an authentic Steinhoewel, part of the Rosenwald collection given to the Library of Congress. The Latin, likewise from Rosenwald and LC, is the Sebastian Brant edition of 1501, printed by Jacob of Pfortzheim . The illustrations are hand-colored. There seems to be another book bound together with Brant's "Esopus." The Spanish version is from Jacob Cronberger in 1521. This disc is a richer resource than I had thought! To get a menu, click on "CD-Start."