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Individual Posters

1939/80? “Parson Weem’s Fable.”  Poster.  23” x 17.5”.  Grant Wood.  Courtesy Amon Carter Museum, Foret Worth.  Baltimore: Lithographed by A. Hoen & Co.  Unknown source.

Though we are not really dealing with a fable here, the story fascinates me.  My recollection is that Pastor Weems spun a story to glorify our first president.  This image shows his father confronting young George with a cherry tree in his hand.  George already looks the way he will look some decades hence.  The curtain put into the scene suggests all sorts of interpretations.  Pastor Weems points a finger just as Aesop did in the first illustrated editions of Aesop in the 1500’s.  Weems in 1800 wrote the first biography of Washington immediately after his death.  He was a parson and travelling bookseller.  The web offers a comment “it is probable he would have accounted it excusable to tell any good story to the credit of his heroes." 

1988 Literature Posters. Monterey, CA: Evan Moor Corporation. $8.95 for the set of four, including "Greek Myths" and "Greek and Roman Names," in Council Bluffs, March, '91.

  • "Aesop's Fables" illustrates characters and objects from TMCM, LM, GGE, FG, FS, and TH. Simple, playful art graces this poster. The angry fox and the scurrying mice are perhaps the best characters here. See the 1988 book Aesop's Fables: Posters & Reproducible Pages based on this poster.
  • "Fable Search" presents twelve morals associated with well known fables. To what fable does this poster's "Half a loaf is better than none" moral belong?

1995 Aesop’s Fables Poster.  Melanie Cargill.  16” x 20”.  Felix Rosenstiel’s Widow and Son, Limited.  Printed in Great Britain.  Unknown source.

We have a framed copy of this large poster already in the collection.   A central scene has many fable characters moving about, including frogs jumping on the sleeping hare.  Eleven individual fables are described in one scene each around this central image.  Surprises for me are “Two Frogs That Wanted Water” and “A Kingfisher.”  This poster represents a good way to acclaim Aesop’s multi-faceted influence.

1996  “No Act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted.  Aesop.”  Frank Schaffer Publications.  Photo: Daniel J. Cox/Tom Stone Images.  Printed in the USA.  Image: 18” x 11.3”.  Poster 19.5” x 13”.  $2.49 from Frank Schaffer Publications.  Unknown date.

This quotation is repeated frequently.  I presume that it comes from either LM or AD.  There are, by percentage, so few fables that promote kindness – and, almost never, as a good thing in itself!  In those two instances, kindness is a way to get ahead in the long run.  Here is a great picture to make the point – and, we can hope, to help children grow in compassion.  This piece is so big that I thought  I had to include it with posters.

1998? "Aesop's Fables" by Walter Crane. Illustrations and text for twenty of Crane's "tiles" from The Baby's' Own Aesop, Engraved and Printed in Colours by Edman Evans, 1887. 24" x 36". 15120. Rohnert Park, CA: Pomegranate Communications, Inc. Designed by Lisa Reid. Printed in Korea. $12.95 from Peder Berge at Puddy Sales, North Brunswick, NJ, through Ebay, May, '01. One extra copy at the same time from the same source.

The poster almost does justice to Crane's work, as my photograph certainly does not. The poster becomes somewhat overwhelming, but the individual tiles are lovely. Pomegranate did a set of boxed note cards at the same time.

2007   “Aesop’s Fables Illustrated by John Hejduk.”  Poster.  20” x 15”.  NY: Rizzoli.  Unknown source.

I was first alerted to the existence of this book at a Georgetown University celebration while I was a guest lecturer there.  Imagine my surprise that the art gallery bookstore had a fable not yet in our growing collection!  The TH image chosen here is apt for the book in this immense poster.  Is this the biggest poster in our collection?

 

2023  "The Fox and the Crow Fable" poster by TaliMooni.  Vilnius Lithuania.  16½" x 23½".  $18.94 through Etsy, Jan., '23.

This is a splendid, dramatic piece of work!  A special touch is the element perhaps not noticed at first: the two creatures exit right in the background, one with cheese and one without.  Snout and beak get special handling here!