Jean de La Fontaine
(1621–1695)

Jean de La Fontaine was a compelling seventeenth-century poet whose witty insight has delighted and educated readers for centuries. Born into a bourgeois family in Château-Thierry, La Fontaine ultimately resolved to become a writer and moved to Paris after a brief and failing marriage. Attracted to society life and thought-provoking conversation, La Fontaine depended upon the support of various patrons to maintain his lifestyle. In Paris, he met intellectuals such as Racine, Molière, and Boileau, although he was not chosen to join the French Academy, an inner circle for writers, until 1683. Nevertheless, he continued to write both poetry and prose, much of which was inspired by the philosophical reflections of Homer, Plato, and Boccaccio.

The sixth-century Greek storyteller Aesop also impacted La Fontaine's writing. In his adaptation of Aesop's work, La Fontaine created a timeless masterpiece, consisting of a twelve-volume collection of over 238 fables. Each fable is a condensed tale that inserts animals into the roles of human beings. On an allegorical level, La Fontaine's fables depict astute observations of human behavior, reminding readers, both young and old, how to live life to the fullest.

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