This is a complete English translation of Jean de La Fontaine's comedic classic 'Contes et nouvelles en vers'. Both sexually charged and wickedly funny, La Fontaine's tales will surprise readers who know him only from his work on fables for children.

Sometimes we don't know whether to laugh or to cry. That quandary has been especially poignant during the rise of Donald Trump. The great French essayist Michel de Montaigne wrote that two philosophers in ancient Greece were divided on this question. Finding the human condition so ridiculous, Democritus never stepped out of his door without a mocking laugh, while Heraclitus, full of compassion for the state of humanity, was always weeping. Montaigne wrote that he prefers laughter, not because it is more pleasant than crying but because it shows more disdain. That is the essence of these...