Progymnasmata for the High School Student – Year One, Week Three

French Fables

You have most likely encountered Aesop’s fables in prose translation, but even in Greek antiquity, authors wrote versions of them in both prose and verse.  After Aesop, the most well-known fablist, definitely in the French-speaking world, but likely well beyond, is Jean de la Fontaine, who wrote verse fables in the 17th century.  But de La Fontaine was preceded by a female poet in the 12th century, known only as Marie de France.  

Day 1 – Marie de France

Read Marie de France’s versifications of two of Aesop’s Fables.  How else does she adapt the fable, besides turning it into verse?  Write two complete sentences in response to this question.  In the first sentence, describe the nature of the adaptation.  In the second sentence, give an example of this adaptation.

2 – The Wolf and the Lamb / Aesop’s The Wolf and the Lamb

21 – The Wolf and the Sow / Aesop’s Sow Giving Birth and the Wolf

Select one of the Aesop’s fables that you have read thus far, and update its moral for the present-day by introducing a person or situation familiar to us today.

Day 2 – Jean de La Fontaine

Read de La Fontaine’s version of The Wolf and the Lamb.  How does he further adapt the fable?  Write a complete sentence in response to this question.  Then versify in the style of de La Fontaine a moral from a fable by Aesop that you have already read.  

Day 3 – Jean de La Fontaine

Compare Aesop’s Golden Goose with de la Fontaine’s Golden Hen.  Can you add to or refine your response to yesterday’s question?  Why do you think la Fontaine changed the goose to a hen?  Does it being a hen change the story in any way?  Write a complete sentence in response to these questions.  

Aesop’s The Goose and the Golden Egg

de La Fontaine’s The Hen with the Golden Eggs

Day 4 – Jean de La Fontaine

A French philosopher once argued that de La Fontaine’s fable of the Grasshopper and the Ant could have deleterious effects on children – “You believe you are making an example of the grasshopper, but they will choose the ant …. they will take the more pleasant part, which is a very natural thing.”  Write one sentence explaining how the Grasshopper and the Ant could influence children negatively.  Then write a second sentence defending the good intentions of the fable.  Refer directly to a detail in the poem in both sentences.

de La Fontaine’s The Grasshopper and the Ant