Creighton University

An original fable in the magazine “Vanity Fair”.  The author's initials are K.D.  The title states “The Fable of Alph and Pete; Showing That There Is Frequently More Than One Way of Getting By.” A print of a picture titled “Geraldine and Pete” accompanies the story.  The visual artist’s name is Paul Thevenaz.

There is a story somewhere behind this handmade card!  This cat-woman has seized the mouse.  The room shows evidence of her mad dash to catch the mouse.  Is that a TV in the background?  And is that something like a Billiken on top of the TV?  I am a little confused about the cat-woman's clothing.  Where does dress stop and skin start?  Her lower half seems to indicate something like a dress or robe.  Her upper body seems uncovered.  There is not only a story behind the creation of this card.  I would love to learn something of its history.  What a surprise find!

How surprising to find four original "India ink" drawings in a shop specializing in buttons on a hot weekend afternoon at the Marché des Puces!  These drawings are quite clever.  The stork is turning down the fox's soup without even trying it!  The fox is holding out his top hat to catch the crow's cheese.  The hare is catching butterflies while the tortoise crosses the finish line.  The wolf at the river carries a big stick as he accosts the lamb with his jacket and neck-kerchief.  The lettering is so perfect on these four drawings that I wonder if they were not printed.  In any case, I delight in them!

Here was one of two surprises in a blisteringly hot weekend foray to the Marché aux Puces!  "Daniel et Lilli" is basically a button shop on the first floor of the Marché Dauphine.  I did find buttons, but I found more brooches and drawings.  The helpful attendant just kept bringing me more things!  These lovely finds made up for an otherwise not-so-successful day.  The bunny sleeps blissfully against a tree while the tortoise passes by.  What lovely work, and what a lovely "save" from the fate of most ephemera for this one-of-a-kind object!

Here was one of two surprises in a blisteringly hot weekend foray to the Marché aux Puces!  "Daniel et Lilli" is basically a button shop on the first floor of the Marché Dauphine.  I did find buttons, but I found more brooches and drawings.  The helpful attendant just kept bringing me more things!  These lovely finds made up for an otherwise not-so-successful day.  I enjoy the wolf and the lamb here, but I wonder what the wolf holds in his left paw.  Again, what a lovely "save" from the fate of most ephemera for this one-of-a-kind object!

I regularly assigned one creative work when I taught literature, whatever form that creative work might take.  Here’s a delightful flip book of the fox approaching the grapes, trying to get them, and walking away.  Cleverly done!

Several outstanding exemplars remain from many student “creative projects” from courses on ancient literature and especially on fables.  Here is one of the best.  The text is by Walter Thornbury about 1870.  The illustrations are delightful!  It is such a pleasure to come back to them now (January, ’26)!  I give a sample below the cover-page.  Do not miss the cat entering right!

Fables invite the fun of development, creative presentation, analogy, and time-travelling to different cultures and social circumstances.  This delightful work takes the standard Aesopic fable of the gnat who reduces the bull to frustration and gives the bull a new defense.  The artist uses well the fable’s standard strong contrast of size.

This simple work says a lot in its two enhancements of the wolf: the sheepskin and the bloody mouth.

Here is a wonderfully sensitive study of forms.  Is that the fox's tail that sweeps around the right side of the mask?  The fox seems appropriately unimpressed!