Best Selling Books by Jean de la Fontaine

Extrait : "LE CORBEAU ET LE RENARD - Maître Corbeau, sur un arbre perché, Tenait en son bec un fromage. Maître Renard, par l''odeur alléché, Lui tint à peu près ce langage : "Hé ! bonjour, Monsieur du Corbeau. Que vous êtes joli ! que vous me semblez beau !"

Based on the fable by La Fontaine.

Though they were first written over 300 years ago, this is the first complete English translation of Jean de La Fontaine''s comedic classic Contes et nouvelles en vers. Both sexually charged and wickedly funny, La Fontaine''s Tales will surprise readers who know him only from his work on fables for children. Though the writing is more suggestive than vulgar, it still has the power to shock readers unprepared for the darkness that inhabits these poems. Included are nearly seventy illustrations dating from the 18th and 19th centuries, many of them rare, as well as extensive commentary by the editor.

Dans Folioplus classiques, le texte intégral, enrichi d''une lecture d''image, écho pictural de l''œuvre, est suivi de sa mise en perspective organisée en six points : Vie littéraire : Ecrire au temps de Louis XIV ; L''écrivain à sa table de travail : La Fontaine, ou l''incarnation de la fable ; Groupement de textes thématique :L''animal héros romanesque ; Groupement de textes stylistique : La Fontaine en amont et en aval ; Chronologie : La Fontaine et son temps ; Fiche : Des pistes pour rendre compte de sa lecture.

While one may be tempted by tradition to think of Jean de La Fontaine''s The Fables as children''s stories, such a notion does a disservice to La Fontaine''s elegant poetry and down-to-earth, sometimes bitter philosophy and view of life. A point to keep in mind in reading The Fables is that they were written over a period of more than twenty-five years. The first six books of fables were published in 1668, five more books appeared in 1673-1679, and the twelfth and final book was published in 1694. As such, The Fables reflect the changes in point of view of a writer who matured and perhaps mellowed as he wrote and published his fable-poems.To a certain degree, La Fontaine''s ideas also reflect social and political problems and philosophical styles in France during the reign of Louis XIV (1643-1715). Many of the early fables seem to comment on specific injustices of Louis XIV''s regime, especially as they affected the common people, while the fables from La Fontaine''s later years mainly express a spiritual withdrawal that resembles stoicism in certain respects.As the literary heir of ancient fabulists such as Aesop, Bidpai, and Phaedrus, La Fontaine makes use of a form that was familiar to his readers. Most of his fables feature a story and a moral, the latter often separated from the text of the tale. La Fontaine''s verse form varies; he uses eight-syllable lines as a basic structure, but he often exploits the dignified twelve-syllable Alexandrine form, the verse form identified with seventeenth century French tragedy, when he wishes to express exceptional drama and seriousness.

Book 1. Here is the first book of Fables by Jean de La Fontaine published by the fabulous at the age of 47. Inspired by the work of the Greek fabulous Aesop, Jean de La Fontaine stages animals to better describe eternal human behaviour. Eternal? Yes ! For more than three centuries after their first publication, readers recognise contemporary society there.(by Jean Lambert)

Recounts the famous tale of the race between the persevering turtle and the boastful rabbit.