Information AboutFable |
| CATEGORIES ABOUT FABLE | |
| fables | |
| literary devices playing with meaning | |
| persuasion techniques | |
|
A fable is a brief, succinct story, in prose or verse, that features Animal s, Plant s, Inanimate Objects , or Forces Of Nature which are Anthropomorphized (given Human qualities), and that illustrates a Moral lesson (a "moral"), which may at the end be expressed Explicit ly in a pithy Maxim . A fable differs from a Parable in that the latter ''excludes'' animals, plants, inanimate objects, and forces of nature as actors that assume speech and other powers of humankind. Usage has not always been so clearly distinguished. In the King James Version of the '' Bible '', the Translator s rendered "''μύθος''" ("''mythos''") as "fable" in the New Testament ,For example, in First Timothy , "... neither give heed to fables ...", and "... refuse profane and old wives' fables..." (1 Tim 1.4 and 4.4, respectively). in First and Second Timothy , Titus and First Peter . DEFINITIONS .]] .]] The word "fable" comes from the Latin "''fabula''" ("a story"), from "''fari''" ("to speak"). Used in a Pejorative sense, a "fable" may refer to a deliberately invented or falsified account. A ''non''-authorial Person who, wittingly or not, tells " Tall Tale s", may be termed a " Confabulator ". In its more general sense, though, the word "fable" refers simply to a genre of short stories designed to impart a moral lesson. An author of fables is termed a fabulist, while the word "'''fabulous'''" means "pertaining to fables". A character referred to as "fabulous" (such as The Lone Ranger ) simply means that he was fictional, in the traditional meaning of the word. In recent decades the word's metaphorical meanings have often been taken as literal. "Fabulous" has acquired a meaning equivalent to "outstanding". CHARACTERISTICS Fables can be described as a didactic mode of literature. That is, whether a fable is handed down from generation to generation as Oral Literature or constructed by a literary tale-teller, its purpose is to teach a Lesson or Value , or to give sage Advice . Fables also provide opportunities to Laugh at human Folly , when they provide examples of behavior to avoid rather than to emulate. Fables frequently have Animals as their central characters, and they are often given Anthropomorph ic characteristics, such as the ability to speak and to reason. For instance, Medieval French '' Fabliau x'' might feature Reynard the Fox , a Trickster figure, and offer a subtext mildly subversive of the Feudal order of society. The ancient Aesop , too, had presented a wide range of animals as the Protagonist s of his short fables, including his famous Tortoise and Hare who engage in a race, and the fox who rejects grapes that are out of his reach as being sour. Similarly, the 18th-century Polish fabulist Ignacy Krasicki employs Animal s as the title actors in his verse fable, " The Lamb And The Wolves ." In the same way, he uses Plant s in " The Violet And The Grass ." Personification may also be extended to Things Inanimate , as in Krasicki's " Bread And Sword ." An example of personified Forces Of Nature may be found in his " The Stream And The River ." Divine beings may also appear in fables as active agents in human life. For instance, '' Aesop's Fables '' feature most of the Greek pantheon, including Zeus and Hermes . HISTORY .]] .]] .]] The fable is one of the most enduring forms of , ''The Orientalizing Revolution: Near Eastern Influence on Early Archaic Greek Culture'' (1992), p 121 note 4. Many other familiar ones include “The Crow and the Pitcher,” “The Hare and the Tortoise,” and “The Lion and the Mouse.” Hundreds of fables were composed in Ancient India during the First Millennium BC , often as Stories Within Frame Stories . These included Vishnu Sarma 's '' Panchatantra '', the '' Hitopadesha '', '' Vikram And The Vampire '', and Syntipas ' '' Seven Wise Masters '', which were collections of fables that were later influential throughout the Old World . Earlier Indian Epics such as Vyasa's '' Mahabharata '' and Valmiki 's '' Ramayana '' also contained fables within the main story, often as Side Stories or Back-story . Epicharmus Of Kos and Phormis are reported as having been among the first to invent comic fables.P.W. Buckham, p. 245 Fables had a further long tradition through the Middle Ages , and became part of European literature. During the 17th Century , the French fabulist Jean De La Fontaine (1621-1695) saw the soul of the fable in the moral — a rule of behavior. Starting with the Aesopian pattern, La Fontaine set out to satirize the court, the church, the rising Bourgeoisie , indeed the entire human scene of his time. La Fontaine's model was subsequently emulated by Poland 's Ignacy Krasicki ( 1735 - 1801 ) and Russia 's Ivan Krylov ( 1769 - 1844 ). In modern times, the fable has been trivialized in children's books. Yet it has also been fully adapted to modern adult literature. For instance, James Thurber used the ancient style in his books, ''Fables for Our Time'' and ''The Beast in Me and Other Animals''. George Orwell 's '' Animal Farm '' satirizes Stalinist Communism in particular, and Totalitarianism in general, in the guise of animal fable. Felix Salten 's '' Bambi '' is a '' Bildungsroman '' — a story of a Protagonist 's coming-of-age — cast in the form of a fable. CLASSIC FABULISTS .]]
MODERN FABULISTS
NOTABLE FABLES
NOTES REFERENCES
SEE ALSO EXTERNAL LINKS
|
|
|