Jean de La Fontaine: Fables
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Issue Date
2000
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Book, Whole
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Here is a fascinating find. I thought that I had found a French original of an English translation. In fact, what I have found here is the original French 2000 edition of a book which I already have in its French 2007 re-edition. I will recall below my remarks on that edition, but let me first note the elements that are different here in the earlier edition. The cover now presents the wolf against a white background rather than in an all-dark close-up of his face. The publisher is Milan rather than Milan Jeunesse. There is not a listing of other titles dans la même collection. Otherwise it is interiorly identical. The back cover and the ISBN are the same. As I wrote back then, this is a large-format children's book with lively colored illustrations. Here are twenty-seven of La Fontaine's fables in their original form, accompanied by dramatic painted illustrations. The animal paintings here are strong on emotion, beginning with the scowling lion next to the Sommaire (T of C) on 6. The illustrations are generally two-page spreads. Among them some are especially dramatic: GA on 8-9; La Mort et le Bucheron on 14-15; and TT on 16-17. Some fables are spread out onto two pages, but the two illustrations are distinct, as in GGE on 18 and 19 or FC on 20 and 21. Despite good efforts, I cannot find the fly -- if he exists -- in the illustration for Le Coche et la Mouche on 24-25. Did the illustrator want me to look so long, only to be unable to find the minuscule flea? The sons' faces are impressive, I believe, in Le Laboureur et ses Enfants on 32-33. The wolf and the lamb are wonderfully contrasted in size and attitude on 38-39. The sweep of the scene in Le Petit Poisson et le Pecheur is grandiose (46-47). The chagrined fox leaving the stork's home on 53 is a classic, as is the happy shoemaker on 55, especially in contrast with the pale banker in the background. The good scowling lion illustration is repeated on 60 for Les Animaux malades de la peste.
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Milan
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Identifier
10159 (Access ID)