Oct. 1: Fables

Today's reading is about fables, how they are entertaining reading and yet convey moral values.
They are allegories in which animals behavior and deeds reflect/highlight the behavior and deeds of people. I best liked Mr. White's comment that "fables serve as an objective and powerful lens through which we can best observe human folly." Most of us can easily remember and pinpoint the power messages of the fables we heard and/or read as children and possibly even as adults. Today's "Try This" is again something that it will take great time than I have time for today to accomplish. Another assignment to put in my composition book for later accomplishment and/or reflection.
1. Write a fable in which you make an unusual animal your main character (my thought is to use the animals of either Australia or Tasmania). That is, instead of opting for a cat, a dog, or a bird, try telling your store from the point of view of a snake or a giraffe, or some extinct animal such as a pterodactyl.
2. Read Henry David Thoreau's fable-like description of the battle between red ants and black ants in the "Brute Neighbors" chapter of Walden. Then write your own account of a confrontation between two similar species--say, between squirrels and chipmunks or ducks and geese (prairie dogs and ground squirrles). Give your fable a distinct moral purpose.