Aesop's Fables stories

A fable does one job. It sets up a situation, lets two creatures behave badly or well, and finishes with the consequence. There is no subplot and almost no description, which is why a fable survives being read by an exhausted adult at half past seven.

The animals are shorthand. The fox is clever and rarely honest, the lion is powerful and sometimes generous, the ass is patient and put upon. A child works this out after three or four fables and starts predicting the ending, which is a good sign rather than a spoiled one.

These are the ones worth knowing by name.

• The Hare and the Tortoise - for the child who gives up when something is hard. Six minutes, ages 3-7.
• The Lion and the Mouse - for the small one who feels too small to help anybody. Seven minutes, and warm rather than sharp.
• The Crow and the Pitcher - four minutes, and the cleverest problem in the whole set. Good after a day of frustration.
• The Boy Who Cried Wolf - the honesty fable, and the one children argue with. Five minutes.
• The Bundle of Sticks - for siblings who have spent the day at each other. Six minutes.
• The Fox and the Grapes - where the phrase "sour grapes" comes from, and a quiet way into disappointment.

The longer end of the shelf

A few run to ten minutes, such as The Dog in the Manger, which turns a single act of selfishness into a proper story. Treat those as ordinary bedtime stories rather than quick ones.

The lesson at the end is the part parents most often get wrong. Read it, close the book, and say nothing. If your child wants to talk, they will, and the conversation will be better than any question you had prepared.

If you do want to ask something

Ask what the other animal should have done, not what your child would have done. It keeps the discussion about the story rather than about them, which is precisely why fables work as a way of raising an awkward subject. There is more on this in morals in children's stories, and on the man himself in Aesop and his fables.

One caution: do not use a fable as a punishment. A child who realises that The Boy Who Cried Wolf appeared on the evening they told a fib will stop trusting the bookshelf.

Fables belong to the wider Classic Tales theme, alongside fairy tales and nursery stories, but they behave quite differently: no magic, no royalty, no rescue, just cause and effect.

If you came here mainly because you needed something brief, the five-minute bedtime stories page casts a wider net and includes gentler bedtime material. For the youngest listeners, stories for preschoolers filters the whole site to what a three- to five-year-old can hold on to.

Because fables were collected rather than written, several exist here in more than one telling, and putting a pair side by side is the most interesting half hour you can spend on this shelf.

Three pairs worth reading a week apart

• The Hare and the Tortoise and The Tortoise and the Hare — the same race, told from the other end, six and seven minutes.
• The Ant and the Grasshopper and The Grasshopper and the Ants — one is sterner about the winter, the other kinder.
• The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse and The City Mouse and the Country Mouse — eight minutes and seven, and children usually take a firm side.

Ask which telling they preferred rather than which is right. It is the earliest form of literary criticism a six-year-old can do, and they are extremely good at it.