Aesop was a slave in Greece about two thousand years ago, although exactly when he lived is unknown. His 'fables' were passed on orally until maybe three centuries after his death when they finally came to be written down, so no one knows how many (or even if any for that matter) of the ones we attribute to him today were actually related by him. Like most people I guess, I had heard of the fables without really being aware of what they were, and had the vague idea that they were short, moralistic tales, which is a pretty accurate view of them, it turns out.
When I got a discounted audiobook from Chirp and was able to actually listen to these for the first time, I was sorely disappointed with them. They turned out to be the biggest bunch of claptrap I've ever heard. Not only should Aesop be renamed Mr Obvious, his tales are ridiculous, stupid, clueless, and idiotic for the most part with very few that were interesting to me. None were really instructive. I did get an idea for a fictional work of my own out of this so it wasn't a total loss, but more ideas for fiction I don't really need that much! I'm never going to be able to write all the ones I've already had.
When I say ridiculous, I'm not talking about the fact that they involved animals doing unnatural things or talking, or interacting with humans. That's perfectly fine if you're telling a good fantasy. No, what I'm talking about is the content of the stories themselves. You'd have to be a Trump supporter not to already understand the point of most of these stories, and just like a Trump press conference, many of them didn't even impart any knowledge at all. I found them so ridiculous as to be amusing at times, but in the end I never made it to the end: I DNF'd this because it was so pathetic. I can't commend it as a worthy read. Quite the opposite.
