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The poet Jean de la Fontaine was born at Château-Thierry on July 8, 1621. He was a kindly, merry, and generous man and much beloved. His fables were written in verse and were published in three collections at different times of his life. Many were new versions of existing fables; but those of his later years were more often original inventions.
All in this book are of La Fontaine's own invention, although several have since appeared in collections of Æsop's fables without the acknowledgment that is La Fontaine's due.
He died on April 13, 1695, at the age of seventy-three.
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