Jean Claval: "L'Aventure Carto,", 1992

File — Box: CFC Postcards Box 5

Identifier: CFC2021.0036.1-38

Staff Only

Scope and Contents

From the Collection:

The Carlson Fable Collection is a gathering of primary fable materials at Reinert Alumni Memorial Library at Creighton University. It grew out of the personal collection of fable materials gathered by Rev. Gregory Carlson, S.J. and was given to the Creighton Libraries in 1996. There are more than 10,000 books and approximately 8,000 artifacts in the collection.

From plates to stamps, from cards to whiskey decanters, from toys to posters, you'll find just about anything you can imagine here. Please explore all that is to offer here in my fables Catalogue of Objects.

This is the largest online catalog of fable related objects on the internet. Many are from Aesop's Fables but you will find La Fontaine, Velazquez and Krylov also represented in this collection.

Dates

1992

Extent

38 Cards : Jean Claval "L'Aventure Carto: Les Fables de La Fontaine." One title-card and 37 of 40 portrait postcards offering humorous interpretations of La Fontaine's fables. #AC 92001 through AC 920041.

Language of Materials

French

Additional Description

Abstract

This is one of the liveliest sets of illustrations of La Fontaine's fables that I have encountered. Card after card has surprises! The ass who has crossed the river with salt holds onto a bush with a fingered hand in #2. In #9, the angler is wondering about the small fish he has caught just as a huge Jaws-like shark is ready to break the surface just below him! In "Acorn and Pumpkin" (#15), La Fontaine is walking away from and looking back at the bumpkin about to get hit on the nose by a dropping acorn. In OR (#25), for some reason, Marilyn Monroe is letting the breeze attacking the oak and reed blow up her skirt! In FC (#30), the cheese box is a particular brand, "Caprice des Dieux." On the wall of the bedroom of the dying laborer telling his sons that there is a treasure in the family field, there is a calendar from "The Friends of Mona Lisa" for the year 1695. For me, the first of the two most enjoyable scenes is "Fox and Goat" (#16), with a wild array of objects covered underground from previous eras. The other is "Cobbler and Banker" (#32): so much is going on in the village, including perhaps the artist hawking his cards! TB (#23) may be a specific contemporary political satire; the faces of the two human figures are so specifically portrayed. In GGE (#27), is someone about to kill the rich old hen? Enjoy these cards, especially in their enlarged form, occasioned by clicking on a specific card.