Aesop's Fables [Hardcover]

Jerry Pinkney (Author)

Book Description

Grade Level: P and up

In this elegantly designed volume, more than sixty of Aesop's timeless fables have been carefully selected, humorously retold, and brought gloriously to life by four-time Caldecott Honor-winner Jerry Pinkney. Included are the Shepherd Boy and The Wolf, the Lion and the Mouse, the Tortoise and the Hare, plus many other charactersand moralsthat have inspired countless readers for centuries. With more than fifty magnificent full-color illustrations, this handsome edition is a must for every bookshelf.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Beautifully designed, this lush, oversize volume showcases Pinkney's (The Ugly Duckling) artistry in grand style. There's a king's ransom worth of material here, as Pinkney serves up more than 60 of the ancient Greek slave-philosopher's fables. Aesop's wisdom spills across the pages as freely as Pinkney's glorious watercolors, alight with the many creatures who people the tales, from fiddling grasshoppers and diligent ants to wily foxes, clever crows, brave mice and grateful lions. Each of the vigorous retellings concludes with the kind of succinct moral that centuries of readers have come to expect (e.g., "Don't count your chickens before they're hatched"; "You are judged by the company you keep"). And whether the homilies concern a wolf in sheep's clothing or sour grapes, the timeless virtues resonate as freshly as the day they were minted. Pinkney brings his considerable talent to bear on everything from thumbnail animal portraits to sweeping full-page vistas of hearth and woodlands, and his detail, delicacy of line and subtle palette create an elegant foil for the simple parables. If there's room on the shelf for only one picture book version of Aesop, this could be it. All ages. (Oct.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From School Library Journal

Kindergarten-Grade 4-A visually appealing selection of 61 fables that mixes the well known ("The Fox and the Grapes," "The Tortoise and the Hare") with some that have been nearly forgotten ("The Mermaid and the Woodcutter"). In tone and format, this book is reminiscent of early 20th-century Aesop collections for children. Like Arthur Rackham and Milo Winter before him, Pinkney accompanies the stories with a blend of full-page paintings and smaller illustrations. As in those earlier collections, his text uses ele-vated language and an extremely formal sentence structure. While such loftiness is appropriate for a "classic" Aesop collection, with this edition it becomes a bit of a stum-bling block. Unfortunately, Pinkney's intro-duction doesn't give a reason for the text choices or supply sources. Morals are at-tached to each fable and for the most part they are the time-honored ones. Using a mix of watercolor and colored pencil, Pinkney's illustrations of animal characters are fairly realistic while his depictions of humans lean toward the stylized. The artist's masterful use of watercolor is most evident in his pictures of the animals. Highlights include the dou-ble-page spread that accompanies "The Lion and the Mouse" and the full-page illustration for "The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse." While the narrative style occasion-ally gets in the way of sharing aloud and its tone is sometimes at odds with the more re-laxed tone of the art, this handsome title is still one of the best of the current crop.
Denise Anton Wright, Alliance Library System, Bloomington, IL
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 96 pages
• Publisher: Chronicle Books; 1st Ed. edition (September 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1587170000
• ISBN-13: 978-1587170003
• Product Dimensions: 11.6 x 8.6 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #33,977 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #1 in Books > Children's Books > Fairy Tales, Folk Tales & Myths > Collections

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

26 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars HEAVY-DUTY GREAT LITERATURE THAT EVEN A 5YEAR OLD LIKES, July 13, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Aesop's Fables (Hardcover)

Most kid books are just fluff. Boring stuff.

Aesop's Fables, on the other hand teach REAL VALUES: hard work, honesty, unity, etc. And we hear people refer to various fables on a regular basis throughout our lives.

A child is really disadvantaged if he doesn't get exposed to these valuable stories and internalize them at an early age.

I recently had to repeat the story of "the boy who cried wolf" to my 10-year old son, in order to help him to improve his behavior. this is one of the most important books you could buy for your child.

--George Stancliffe

21 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Inclusive language? Not so you would notice, June 20, 2001

By 

"eviepage" (United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Aesop's Fables (Hardcover)

This is a wonderful edition of these timeless tales. The illustrations are rich and vivid, full of action and life. Even the stories without a full page illustration are decorated with a small, evocative miniature. One reviewer finds the presence of "exclusive" language as a distraction. Please don't be misled -- these are not "politically correct" retellings of Aesop. Indeed, they are more true to the original than most versions of the fables available for children. Check it out for yourself and share it with a child.

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars An Excellent Aesop for Younger Readers and Listeners, September 25, 2009

By 

Shanna A. Gonzalez "eyelevelbooks.com" (Gaithersburg, MD) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Aesop's Fables (Hardcover)

Every child should read Aesop at some point, not only because of the time-honored wisdom contained in the stories, but also because knowing Aesop gives a cultural literacy that will bring great pleasure. Many of Aesop's morals have become proverbs whose original meaning is not remembered. When these privileged readers hear someone mention sour grapes, or they are admonished not to count their chickens before they're hatched, they will know exactly what is meant.

This gorgeously illustrated version makes the ancient genre of morality tales accessible to young listeners. The collection includes 52 fables (about a quarter of the corpus attributed to Aesop), including most of the better-known stories -- the tortoise and the hare, the boy who cried wolf, Androcles and the lion, and the stork and the crane -- as well as some lesser-known ones. Pinkney's mesmerizing watercolor paintings will hold attention long enough for the well-written text to be read aloud, and the traditional pithy moral will help anchor it in the memory. A child who has experienced this book ought to be delighted to encounter a broader Aesop collection later (although they will always remember the pictures that accompanied their first Aesop experience). If you must choose only one Aesop collection, choose one with more stories, but if you can afford a version for the younger set, this is an excellent choice.