Aesop's Fables: A Classic Illustrated Edition

The illustrations in this book are a collection of a few talented artists, all of whom seem to take the morals and culture in the stories very seriously in their drawings. They all remained quite true to these stories and as culturally accurate as we can assume.

I read to Evie when she was too small to understand, I anticipate picking up again when she is around 9 or so! Good lessons that never expire!

short stories with wonderful teachings.

Pages: 90
Reading Level: 3.0

This is a large collection of fables in fairly kid friendly language. The illustrations are great as well. If I was doing a unit on fables or such, this would be a good book to incorporate.

This Aesop collection, edited by Russell Ash and Bernard Higton, presents fifty-three of the classic fables, accompanied by illustrations taken from various Aesop editions of the last 150 years. Here the reader will encounter old favorites, liked The Fox and the Grapes and The Lion and the Mouse,

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as well as many lesser-known selections like The Piping Fisherman and The Fox and the Masks.

The artwork is taken from volumes ranging in date from the 1857 edition illustrated by Charles Henry Bennett to the 1970 volume illustrated by Edward Bawden. Other artists include: Milo Winter, Alexander Calder, Boris Artzybasheff, Walter Crane, Arthur Rackham, and Randolph Caldecott.

This was a fascinating volume, not so much for the fables themselves - all of which I had encountered before - but for the insight it gives into the various ways in which Aesop has been envisioned by illustrators over the course of more than a century. Twenty-nine artists are represented, in all, and their work ranges from the Art Nouveau to a "nursery" style. Some of my personal favorites: Arthur Rackham's Venus and the Cat, Walter Crane's The Peacock's Complaint, and Ernest Henry Griset's The Wolf and the Crane.

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