Aesop’s Fables

Aesop’s Fables can be viewed as a children’s book, but often in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, it was not.  Here the Athenaeum displays four versions of the Fables.  Probably the most traditional approach in illustration, and the one most often reproduced is that version by Englishman Arthur Rackham (1867-1939).  Richard Heighway actually published two sizes of the Fables, both relying on black and while illustrations influenced by the English illustrator and graphic artist Walter Crane (1845-1915).  Finally in this case appears a Rose Valley Press version using woodcuts based upon the famous John Tenniel illustrations.

V.S. Vernon Jones, trans. Æsop’s Fables. New York: Garden City Publishing Co., Inc., 1939.

Illustrated by: Arthur Rackham (1867-1939)

Cover Design by: Arthur Rackham

Gift of: Mr. and Mrs. David S. Loeb

Joseph Jacobs. The Fables of Æsop. London: Macmillan & Co., 1894.

Illustrated by: Richard Heighway (1832-1917?)

Gift of: Charles Hare Hutchinson

“Belling the Cat”

Joseph Jacobs. The Fables of Æsop. London: Macmillan & Co., 1894.

Illustrated by: Richard Heighway

Gift of: Mr. Curtis Allen

Joseph Jacobs. The Fables of Æsop. London: Macmillan & Co., 1894.

Illustrated by: Richard Heighway

Gift of: Mr. Curtis Allen

"Out came a dome of glass like a soap-bubble, rising into the air."

Mrs. Burton Harrison.  Bric-a-brac Stories. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1885.

Illustrated by: Walter Crane

Walter Kahoe. Ten Fables of Aesop. Moylan, Pennsylvania: The Rose Valley Press, 1944.

Illustrated by:  John Tenniel (1820-1914)

Gift of: Dr. Satoko I. Parker