Fables de La Fontaine, livre 10

La Fontaine's tenth book gathers 16 fables where animals speak, judge, and expose the follies of mankind. The wolf disputes with the lamb. The crow is flattered by the fox. The tortoise defeats the hare not through speed but through stubborn silence. Each tale operates on two levels: a charming animal story that delights children, and a razor-sharp satire aimed at the courts, salons, and eternal vanities of human society. La Fontaine writes in elegant verse that sounds like music but cuts like a blade. His wolves represent the powerful, his foxes the cunning, his donkeys the credulous. Three centuries have not dulled these fables one whit. The fools La Fontaine dissected still walk among us. This is democracy's oldest entertainment: a menagerie of beasts who reveal what we prefer not to see about ourselves.