Aesop's Fables: Sources and Reflections

Aesop's Fables: Sources and Reflections

            For my research assignment, I chose to focus on the collection of fables known as Aesop’s Fables. Aesop, if we assume he was alive, lived in Greece in approximately the seventh and sixth century BCE. Despite the fact that they were told orally more than a thousand years ago, the texts of the fables remain ever-present in today’s society. In society today, the usage of fables is primarily linked to moral development and the inculcation of social values in children. I was interested in researching what the audience of the fables were way back then. How were the fables interpreted in ancient Greece? The answer to this question is something I did not expect – the fables were written by a slave (Aesop) and were originally a political commentary of society at that time period. The potential to educate children with the morals was unleased by John Locke in the eighteenth century, and a new purpose to the fables was born.

            Answering this question with a research process was somewhat difficult. I had a difficult time finding sources for this topic, so that is one thing I wish I had known earlier. I did not anticipate going to the library and having to use the Interlibrary Loan System (also known as ILLIAD) to get most of the books on the list below. I would recommend only using ILLIAD if you have the time, since it can be time consuming to wait for the materials to arrive and process them later (As a side note, ILLIAD works through an online request system that is viewed across other universities, who then ship the requested materials here if they have them.) However, I would recommend also making an appointment with multiple reference librarians, especially one that is a specialist in the department being explored. Like nearly everyone else who published to this blog post, I realize that starting early is the key (ASAP), and having as much time as possible to process the information, and synthesize it. This became a second challenge after finding sources – finding time to inventory everything I had gathered and making decisions as to the usefulness of the sources.

            The research paper can get done but it is going to take some time – the answer is not one click/push of a button away. The following is a list of sources that I used for this project. Again, most of these were accessed through ILLIAD, which you want to meet with a reference librarian to go further in depth with.

›  Cooper, Kenneth. "Aesop's Fables for Adults." Peabody Journal of Education 33.3 (1955): 143-47. JSTOR. Web. 23 Feb. 2015.

›  Clayton, Edward. "Aesop, Aristotle, and Animals: The Role of Fables in Human Life." Humanitas ` XXI.1,2 (2008): 179-200. 2008. Web. 23 Feb. 2015.

›  Holzberg, Niklas. The Ancient Fable: An Introduction. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 2002. Print.

›  Zafiropoulos, Christos A. Ethics in Aesop's Fables: The Augustana Collection. Leiden: Brill, 2001. Print.