"Fables have long been an instrument of the disadvantaged and powerless speaking truth to power, and according to Aesop's legend and parts of Ibn al-Muqaffaʿ's history, these fabulists themselves were no strangers to marginalisation. This marker of outsider difference mirrors the condition of the stories' dramatis personae, who mostly take the shape of overlooked and often reviled creatures."

#book #fable #parrhesia #KalilahWaDimnah #IbnAlMuqaffaʿ #MarinaWarner

https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/travelling-tales/