Read Aesop's Fables for Free Online Page A

finished product? As already noted, the absence of any canon or standard edition of Aesop’s fables has made the first question particularly problematic. Most modern editors use a combination of fables found in the classical editions of Phaedrus and Babrius, supplemented by various medieval and renaissance collections. As to style, well into the twentieth century most English translators of Aesop have seemed to prefer intentionally antiquated language, sprinkling their texts with archaic words and outdated grammar. Fortunately, V. S. Vernon Jones, the translator of the present collection, resisted this temptation. His English is sprightly, concise, and idiomatic, just as the everyday Greek used by the original storytellers must have been. Jones’s translation was published under the title Æsop’s Fables in 1912 by W. Heinemann of London. I have added footnotes, cautiously modernized the punctuation, and brought the spelling to contemporary American standards, but have made essentially no other revisions to his admirable text.
     
    D. L. Ashliman received a B.A. degree from the University of Utah, and M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from Rutgers University, with additional studies at the Universities of Bonn and Göttingen in Germany. He taught folklore, mythology, German, and comparative literature at the University of Pittsburgh for thirty-three years and was emeritized in the year 2000. In addition to teaching, he held a number of administrative positions at the University of Pittsburgh, including Academic Dean for the Semester at Sea program. He also served as a guest professor in the departments of comparative literature and folklore at the University of Augsburg in Germany. D. L. Ashliman is the author of A Guide to Folktales in the English Language, published by Greenwood Press in 1987, as well as numerous articles and conference reports.

1. THE FOX AND THE GRAPES
    A hungry fox saw some fine bunches of grapes hanging from a vine that was trained along a high trellis and did his best to reach them by jumping as high as he could into the air. But it was all in vain, for they were just out of reach. So he gave up trying and walked away with an air of dignity and unconcern, remarking, “I thought those grapes were ripe, but I see now they are quite sour.”

2. THE GOOSE THAT LAID THE GOLDEN EGGS
    A man and his wife had the good fortune to possess a goose which laid a golden egg every day. Lucky though they were, they soon began to think they were not getting rich fast enough, and, imagining the bird must be made of gold inside, they decided to kill it in order to secure the whole store of precious metal at once. But when they cut it open they found it was just like any other goose. Thus, they neither got rich all at once, as they had hoped, nor enjoyed any longer the daily addition to their wealth.
    Much wants more and loses all.

3. THE CAT AND THE MICE
    T here was once a house that was overrun with mice. A cat heard of this and said to herself, “That’s the place for me.” And off she went and took up her quarters in the house and caught the mice one by one and ate them. At last the mice could stand it no longer, and they determined to take to their holes and stay there. “That’s awkward,” said the cat to herself. “The only thing to do is to coax them out by a trick.” So she considered awhile, and then climbed up the wall and let herself hang down by her hind legs from a peg and pretended to be dead. By and by a mouse peeped out and saw the cat hanging there. “Aha!” it cried. “You’re very clever, madam, no doubt; but you may turn yourself into a bag of meal hanging there, if you like, yet you won’t catch us coming anywhere near you.”
     
    If you are wise you won’t be deceived by the innocent airs of those whom you have once found to be dangerous.

4. THE MISCHIEVOUS DOG
    T here was once a dog who used to snap at people and bite them without any provocation, and who was a great nuisance to everyone