The morals of the stories in The Ant and the Pigeon by Leo Tolstoy

Recently, I read a children's story book that I have been wanting to read for a long long time. In fact, I wanted read this book ever since my mom gave that book to me when I was a kid. At that time, I wasn't very comfortable with English. English was always chaotic and frightening to me. Later, I had almost forgotten about the book.

After almost 25 years, I found this book on the attic and decided read it as I have become comfortable with English now. I remembered only the pictures from the story book. It is these pictures that had created so much of fond memories of the stories that were narrated to me by mom in Kannada. Back then, I didn't notice that each of the story is not even a page long. I guess I had overestimated how long and difficult those stories were when I was a kid. Some of the stories are less than 5 sentences long.

Now, I understand that this is a children's book.So, it must be easy to understand and finish each story in a few minutes. Back then, I simply looked at the pictures and wondered about the stories. Now, having read the book, it is hard to believe that, the stories that were once felt foreign and difficult, have felt not only comfortable but also enjoyable to read.

This fables and stories in the book were originally by Aesop and later translated by Leo Tolstoy is available on Amazon. A free PDF version of the book also available on archive.org.

The book clearly says in the preface that Leo Tolstoy intentionally left out the moral of the story at the end of each story. This is because the Leo Tolstoy believed children could make out the moral of the story by themselves.

If there is any child or adult out there who is struggling to understand the story and derive the moral from the stories can refer this blog. Here, I have listed each story by its title and also their most concise moral lesson.