The Ancient Fable: An Introduction (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: The Ancient Fable: An Introduction Laura Gibbs The Ancient Fable: An Introduction. By Niklas Holzberg. Trans. by Christine Jackson-Holzberg. (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2002. Pp. 128, bibliography, indexes.) Niklas Holzberg's Ancient Fable: An Introduction provides a concise and clear analysis of the Greek and Roman sources for Aesop's fables. The book surveys each of the major sources for the approximately six hundred Greek and Latin fables that have survived from antiquity. This [End Page 111] includes fables as exempla in the different historical periods of Greek and Roman literature; the verse fable collections of the poets Phaedrus, Babrius, and Avianus; and the prose fable collections in Greek and Latin. Each of these brief sections (approximately ten pages or less) is followed by a page or so of bibliographical observations. Although the book is called an "introduction" to the fables, readers would do well to first read through a collection of Aesop's fables in English, given that Holzberg is able to cite and analyze only a few representative fables in the course of the book. Readers who are already familiar with the corpus of ancient fables will appreciate his judicious and even-handed approach in selecting specific fables for close attention. Holzberg's main aim is to provide a critical review of prior scholarship on the fables, but he also advances some ideas and approaches of his own. His most extended argument concerns the authorship of the novelistic Life of Aesop and the Greek prose fables called the Collectio Augustana. "Dare we infer again that the author of this novel also wrote the fable book that now survives in the form of the Collectio Augustana?" Holzberg asks (p. 91). The author of The Ancient Fable wants to answer in the affirmative, and in order to make this argument about authorship he produces a very useful analysis of the structure of both the novel and the prose fable collection. In all of his interpretations, Holzberg insists on respecting the purposes and intentions of the authors under consideration, whether the anonymous author of the Life of Aesop or the poets Phaedrus, Babrius, and Avianus. In the past, many of the classical scholars who studied Aesop's fables were less than enthusiastic about their chosen subject. For example, Holzberg cites August Hausrath's comment that Avianus is "long-winded and boring" (p. 67) and Johann Jakob Reiske's remark that the Life of Aesop is "pitiful entertainment for the common herd" (p. 76). Unlike those scholars who seem to have studied Aesop out of a sense of philological duty, Holzberg conveys real excitement about the fables in all their forms, and his approach to their ancient authors is consistently sympathetic. Holzberg also has good intentions towards his audience, regularly distinguishing between topics he considers suitable for a general introduction and questions that must be set aside for a "specialized study" (p. 65). Yet while this book is meant to provide a general introduction to the fables, many of the chapters will be difficult for readers whose interests are in folklore rather than in classics. Holzberg seems to expect that his audience will have a solid background in Greek and Latin literature, and his analyses of the individual fables usually depend on a highly literary interpretation of their Greek or Latin style. English-speaking readers may also be frustrated by attempts to look up the fables referenced in the text. Generally, Holzberg cites the fables using their Aes. number, based on Ben E. Perry's Aesopica of 1952 (University of Illinois Press). Yet when you consult Perry's text, you will find that all the explanatory materials—even the instructions for using the indexes!—are given in Latin. English-speaking readers need to know that they can also find an English version of the Aesopica numeration system in Perry's Babrius and Phaedrus (Harvard University Press, 1965), which also includes references to motif numbers for many of the fables, a feature not found in the Aesopica. By cataloging and annotating the work of classical scholars who have studied the fables over the past two hundred years, Holzberg is able to make their often highly technical analyses accessible to a...