LA FONTAINE, JEAN DE

born July 8?, 1621, Chteau-Thierry, France died April 13, 1695, Paris poet whose Fables rank among the greatest masterpieces of French literature. Additional reading Biographical and critical studies include Marie-Odile Sweetser, La Fontaine (1987); Agnes Ethel Mackay, La Fontaine and His Friends: A Biography (1972); John C. Lapp, The Esthetics of Negligence: La Fontaine's Contes (1971); and Richard Danner, Patterns of Irony in the Fables of La Fontaine (1985).