20:
129:
found his level', the story concludes. A less harsh judgement is exhibited in
Japanese and Korean variants where the father seeking a powerful match for his daughter is sent round the traditional characters of sun, cloud and wind, only to discover that he too has his place on the ladder of power. All these are animal fables that lack the transformation theme. In the Japanese case a rat is involved and in the Korean a mole.
136:, "The Mouse Metamorphosed into a Maid" (IX.7), acknowledges the story's Indian origin by making it a Brahmin who fosters the mouse and gives it back the body it had in a former birth. La Fontaine feigns shock at all this and finds at the story's culmination, in which the girl falls in love with the burrowing rat at the mere mention of its name, an argument to confound the Eastern fabulist's beliefs:
233:
to change her into a human, but then goes chasing after a mouse in the middle of the marriage feast. In ancient times it was speculated that the Greek proverb āa saffron (wedding) robe does not suit a weaselā was connected with the fable and has much the same meaning that oneās underlying nature does
85:
drops from the beak of a bird of prey into the hands of a holy man, who turns it into a girl and brings her up as his own. Eventually he seeks a powerful marriage for her but discovers at each application that there is one more powerful: thus the cloud can cover the sun, the wind blows the clouds
128:
The theme of keeping to one's class reappears in a
Romanian folk variant in which a rat sets out to pay God a visit. He applies to the sun and to clouds for directions, but neither will answer such a creature; then he asks the wind, which picks him up and flings him on an ant-heap - 'and there he
124:
as a cautionary tale against social climbing through marrying above one's station. The creature involved is an ambitious field mouse who applies to the sun for the hand of his daughter. He is sent on to a cloud, the wind, a tower, and then the mouse that undermines it, to the humbling of his
228:
and its many versions feature a cat turned into a woman by the goddess, who then tests her on the wedding night by introducing a mouse into the bedchamber. In the Greek version by
Babrius, however, it is a weasel (Ī³Ī±Ī»įæ) that falls in love with a man and begs
86:
about but is resisted by the mountain; the mountain, however, is penetrated by mice. Since the girl feels the call of like to like in this case, she is changed back to her original form and goes to live with her husband in his hole.
99:". There, a holy man grants a mouse's successive wishes to become more than itself until it is changed into a woman fair enough to catch a king's eye. When she dies soon after in an accident, a mood-changing
66:
to change his cat into a woman. This fable has the themes of incomplete transformation and the impossibility of changing character. It has received many treatments in literature, folklore and the arts.
323:
268:
96:
426:
224:) and the Cat", which goes back to Classical times and is given the moral that nature is stronger than nurture. It figures as number 50 in the
37:
is an ancient fable of Indian origin that travelled westwards to Europe during the Middle Ages and also exists in the Far East. The story is
881:
47:
398:
19:
871:
876:
805:
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51:. It concerns a search for a partner through a succession of more powerful forces, resolved only by choosing an equal.
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299:
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795:
367:
91:
684:
283:
785:
704:
591:
310:
See the selection of tales of this type at Fables of Aarne-Thompson-Uther type 2031C (as above)
765:
755:
556:
63:
55:
23:
790:
598:
815:
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775:
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689:
495:
203:
115:
107:
42:
750:
745:
709:
611:
562:
178:
38:
114:, but before a version of any of these works had reached Europe the fable appeared in
865:
780:
694:
663:
719:
585:
436:
77:
383:
845:
840:
820:
729:
579:
356:
225:
699:
679:
294:
Charles
Brucker, āThe fables of Marie de France and the Mirror of Princesā in
181:
to a wry and idiosyncratic recreation in her version of La
Fontaine (1954):
230:
221:
334:
251:
380:
Ainoi, Logoi, Mythoi: Fables in
Archaic, Classical, and Hellenistic Greek
345:
674:
252:
The Mouse Who Was to Marry the Sun: fables of Aarne-Thompson type 2031C
202:
This in turn was set for unaccompanied soprano by the
British composer
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120:
111:
27:
100:
82:
18:
220:
The Indian fable's western equivalent is the story of "Venus (or
408:
404:
177:
The fableās philosophical theme inspired the
American poet
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None can diverge from the ends which Heaven foreordained.
187:
We are what we were at birth, and each trait has remained
106:
The ancient Indian fable was eventually translated into
833:
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656:
645:
620:
549:
486:
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in conformity with earth's and with heaven's logic:
420:
8:
193:Be the devil's tool, resort to black magic,
26:'s "Cat Dressed as a Woman" (a parody of a
653:
427:
413:
405:
62:", in which a man appeals to the goddess
89:A variant of the tale appears among the
243:
146:In all respects, compared and weigh'd,
158:Each fits and fills its destined part
7:
164:Nor witch, nor fiend, nor magic art,
103:plant grows from her burial place.
149:The souls of men and souls of mice
54:The fableās classical analogue is
14:
401:between the 16th ā 20th centuries
265:The Panchatantra of Vishnu Sharma
48:The Husband of the Rat's Daughter
629:The Tall Tales of Vishnu Sharma
234:not change with circumstances.
155:Unlike in sort as well as size.
45:, another example of which is
296:A Companion to Marie de France
267:, University of Chicago 1925,
1:
324:University of Adelaide e-book
531:The Brahmin and the Mongoose
516:The Mouse Turned into a Maid
472:The Moral Philosophy of Doni
161:As Heaven doth well provide;
35:The Mouse Turned into a Maid
882:Fiction about shapeshifting
606:One Thousand and One Nights
468:The Fables of Bidpai/Pilpay
923:
526:The Ass in the Lion's Skin
501:The Tortoise and the Birds
282:, Paris 1820, Fable LXIV,
280:PoƩsies de Marie de France
213:
152:Quite different are made -
41:type 2031C in his list of
761:Edward Backhouse Eastwick
541:The milkmaid and her pail
506:The Bear and the Gardener
444:
320:The Fables of La Fontaine
167:Can set their laws aside.
71:The Mouse-Maid Made Mouse
521:The Deer without a Heart
399:Illustrations from books
216:The Weasel and Aphrodite
877:Fictional mice and rats
75:The story found in the
715:Abu'l-Ma'ali Nasrallah
670:Abu'l-Fazl ibn Mubarak
574:Hikayat Panca Tanderan
511:The Lion and the Mouse
31:
464:The Lights of Canopus
132:The later version in
22:
887:Works about marriage
872:La Fontaine's Fables
569:La Fontaine's Fables
134:La Fontaine's Fables
92:Folk-Tales of Bengal
685:Jean de La Fontaine
536:The Fox and the Cat
206:in 1992 (Opus 54).
97:The Origin of Opium
902:Indian fairy tales
786:Ion Keith-Falconer
32:
859:
858:
829:
828:
806:Silvestre de Sacy
766:Franklin Edgerton
756:Hermann Brockhaus
666:(putative author)
480:Nandaka-prakarana
378:G. J. Van Dijk,
263:Arthur W. Ryder,
250:D. L. Ashliman, "
210:Venus and the Cat
60:Venus and the Cat
24:Utagawa Kuniyoshi
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791:Patrick Olivelle
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599:Kathasaritsagara
476:Tantri Kamandaka
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95:under the name "
43:cumulative tales
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892:Indian folklore
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816:Charles Wilkins
801:Arthur W. Ryder
776:Johannes Hertel
771:A. N. D. Haksar
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705:Ibn al-Muqaffa'
690:Antoine Galland
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592:Kalīla wa-Dimna
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496:The Blue Jackal
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456:Kalila wa Dimna
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751:Gustav Bickell
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746:Theodor Benfey
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563:Calila e Dimna
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557:Aesop's Fables
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460:Calila e Dimna
448:Tantrakhyayika
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393:External links
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298:, Brill 2011,
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179:Marianne Moore
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125:aspirations.
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897:Panchatantra
811:C. H. Tawney
796:N. M. Penzer
720:Thomas North
648:translators,
636:Jungle Tales
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597:
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586:Jataka tales
578:
561:
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452:Panchakhyana
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437:Panchatantra
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78:Panchatantra
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34:
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846:Frame story
841:Beast fable
821:Ramsay Wood
730:Simeon Seth
621:Other media
612:Åukasaptati
580:Hitopadesha
346:Veery Books
226:Perry Index
866:Categories
700:Kshemendra
680:Durgasimha
238:References
269:pp. 353-7
231:Aphrodite
222:Aphrodite
710:Narayana
650:adapters
646:Editors,
384:pp.225-6
368:Fable 32
357:Aesopica
675:Borzuya
488:Stories
335:YQuotes
108:Pahlavi
834:Topics
739:Modern
725:Rudaki
121:Ysopet
112:Arabic
30:scene)
28:kabuki
851:Katha
657:Early
446:aka:
300:p.210
101:opium
83:mouse
64:Venus
16:Fable
58:of "
118:'s
868::
478:ā
474:ā
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462:-
458:ā
454:ā
450:ā
322:,
428:e
421:t
414:v
254:"
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