More Aesop's Fables

Meet the voices

• Narrator · 旁白 — An old storyteller who sets the scene each night under Grandpa Owl's tree and then lets the owl tell the tale.
• Grandpa Owl · 猫头鹰爷爷 — A wise, twinkly old owl who knows all of Aesop's fables, tells one a night, and loves to keep his listeners waiting for tomorrow's story.
• Little Rabbit · 小兔子 — A quick, kind-hearted young rabbit who always wants to know why, and this spring has learned a few cheeky tricks of her own.
• Little Squirrel · 小松鼠 — A cheeky young squirrel who never lets go of his acorn, thinks about food first, and always shouts that he knows how the story ends.
• The Town Mouse · 城里老鼠 — A smart mouse from a big house in town who thinks country life is dull.
• The Country Mouse · 乡下老鼠 — A kind, simple mouse from the fields who is happy with rice, fruit and a quiet home.
• The North Wind · 北风 — A loud, cold wind who is sure he is the strongest thing under the sky.
• The Sun · 太阳 — A calm, warm sun who never needs to shout.
• The Traveler · 行人 — A young man walking a long road in a thick coat, who only wants to get where he is going.
• The Dog · 大狗 — A big, greedy dog with a fine piece of meat who wants just a little bit more.
• The Goose · 鹅 — A calm white goose who lays one golden egg every morning and only ever says one thing.
• The Farmer · 农夫 — A poor farmer who suddenly has gold and soon wants far more of it.
• The Farmer's Wife · 妻子 — The farmer's wife, quick with plans and even quicker to spend.
• The Fox · 狐狸 — The same hungry fox who once called the grapes sour, back with a sweeter trick.
• The Crow · 乌鸦 — A proud crow with a piece of meat, who loves to hear how beautiful she is.
• The Wolf · 大灰狼 — A hungry wolf with a clever idea and a tail that won't stay hidden.
• The Lamb · 小羊 — A friendly, curious little lamb who notices everything about the new 'sheep' in her flock.
• The Shepherd · 牧羊人 — A careful shepherd who counts his sheep every single evening.

6 chapters, one journey

Key words in More Aesop's Fables

• 肉 ròu: meat
• 蛋 dàn: egg
• 金 jīn: gold
• 肚子 dù zi: belly
• 米 mǐ: rice
• 葡萄 pú tao: grape
• 大衣 dà yī: overcoat
• 脱 tuō: to take off
• 吹 chuī: to blow
• 唱 chàng: to sing

Behind the story

The six fables in this book are among the most retold in the whole Aesop collection. More than two thousand years ago, the Roman poet Horace put the town mouse and the country mouse into one of his poems, and in the 1600s the French poet La Fontaine turned the fox and the crow into a rhyme that French children still learn by heart.

Chinese readers know these tales by plain, simple titles, such as 北风和太阳 (the North Wind and the Sun) and 狐狸和乌鸦 (the Fox and the Crow), from picture books, cartoons and school reading lists. Their lessons feel right at home in China, where many of the same ideas live on in everyday sayings.

Did you know?

• Linguists love “The North Wind and the Sun”: the International Phonetic Association uses it as a standard sample text, recorded in language after language, Mandarin included, to show how each one sounds.
• “A wolf in sheep's clothing” is everyday Chinese too: people call someone who hides bad intentions behind a friendly face 披着羊皮的狼.
• The golden goose's lesson lives on in a Chinese idiom, 杀鸡取卵, “kill the hen to get the eggs,” for grabbing a quick gain and ruining what would have kept on giving.