Jacobs, Joseph, History of the Aesopic Fable.
The only elaborate and scholarly study in English. Vol. I of a reprint of Caxton's Aesop. [BibliothÈque de Carabas Series.] Published in 1889 in a limited edition and not easily accessible.
Jacobs, Joseph, The Fables of Aesop. [Illustrated by Richard Heighway.]
Eighty-two selected fables. The Introduction is a summary of all the essential conclusions reached in the study above.
The best general collection from all fields, including both the folk fable and the modern literary fable.
Babbitt, Ellen C., Jataka Tales Retold.
Dutton, Maude Barrows, The Tortoise and the Geese, and Other Fables of Bidpai.
Ramaswami Raju, P. V., Indian Folk Stories and Fables.
These three books are excellent for simplified versions of the eastern group. Those desiring to get closer to the sources may refer to Cowell [ed.], The Jataka, or Stories of the Buddha's Former Births; Rhys-Davids, Buddhist Birth Stories; Keith-Falconer, Bidpai's Fables.
SUGGESTIONS FOR READING
It is possible to piece out a very satisfactory account of the nature and history of the traditional fable by looking up in any good encyclopedia the brief articles under the following heads: Folklore, Fable, Parable, Apologue, Æsop, Demetrius of Phalerum, Babrias, Phaedrus, Avian, Romulus, Maximus Planudes, Jataka, Bidpai, Panchatantra, Hitopadesa.
For a popular account of the whole philosophy of the apologue consult Newbigging, Fables and Fabulists: Ancient and Modern.
For distinctions between various kinds of symbolic tales see Canby, The Short Story in English (pp. 23 ff.); Trench, Notes on the Parables (Introduction); Smith, "The Fable and Kindred Forms," Journal of English and Germanic Philology, Vol. XIV, p. 519.
For origins and parallels read MÜller, "On the Migration of Fables," Selected Essays, Vol. I (reprinted in large part in Warner, Library of the World's Best Literature, Vol. XVIII); Clouston, Popular Tales and Fictions, Vol. I, p. 266, and Vol. II, p. 432. The more general treatises on folklore all touch on these problems.
For suggestions on the use of fables with children see MacClintock, Literature in the Elementary School (chap. xi); Adler, Moral Instruction of Children (chaps. vii and viii); McMurry, Special Method in Reading in the Grades (p. 70).
For a clear and helpful account of the French writers of fables, the most important modern group, read Collins, La Fontaine and Other French Fabulists. Representative examples are given in most excellent translation. The best complete translation of La Fontaine is by Elizur Wright; of Krylov, in verse by I. H. Harrison, in prose by W. R. S. Ralston; of Yriarte, by R. Rockliffe. Gay's complete collection may be found in any edition of his poems.
Satisfactory collections of proverbial sayings useful in finding expressions for the wisdom found in fables are Christy, Proverbs, Maxims, and Phrases of All Ages; Hazlitt, English Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases; Trench, Proverbs and Their Lessons.
A book of great suggestive value covering the whole field of the prose story is Fansler, Types of Prose Narratives. It contains elaborate classifications, discussions and examples of each type, and an extended bibliography. Pp. 83-127 deal with fables, parables, and allegories.
