Aesop, Five Centuries of Illustrated Fables (New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, Distributed by New York Graphic Society, Greenwich, Conn). 96 pages, illustrated.
Parents who find themselves stupefied by the vapid quality of present-day children’s books will find this selection a joy. Illustrations for each of the fables selected range from 15th-century Italian woodcuts to drawings by Alexander Calder, and the fables themselves are presented handsomely printed in translations also ranging from Caxton to Marianne Moore. J. J. Grandville’s 19th-century wood engravings, which have been charming readers of the New York Review of Books in recent months, are by far the most apt of all the illustrations. The book is a fine idea, beautifully executed. It belongs on all adult bookshelves, and any those children’s bookshelves which present Beatrix Potter, for example, as neighbors.
