Misadventures in the Land of Fables #14
A jackdaw dresses itself in feathers borrowed from other birds. Two of Aesop’s fables are built around this action. They draw broadly the same moral. A condemnation of envy and pretension.
But I don’t feel the actions of Jackdaw are entirely deserving of censure. Or in other words, is he really so bad?
THE VAIN JACKDAW
The Vain Jackdaw is a simple case of envy. Struck by the peacock’s beauty, Jackdaw seeks to emulate it by inserting peacock feathers into its own plumage. It’s a harmless, silly endeavour and the daft bird is mocked for it. I can’t take issue with that, except to note the misleading title of the fable. The Jackdaw is envious rather than vain and if any character could be said to display vanity in this tale it is the peacock.
THE BORROWED FEATHERS
In the Borrowed Feathers, Jackdaw turns up at a beauty contest to decide who becomes the king of the birds. He wins by dressing himself in the discarded feathers of the other birds, but his victory is short-lived. The other birds expose him as a fraud and he is humiliated.
Harsh. And, again, it is the other birds who might more credibly be accused of vanity. (I mean, is there an image of vanity more blatant that the tail of strutting peacock?) Jackdaw’s offence is pretension claiming to be something he is not, something better. Or is it the offence of presumption, not knowing his place?
Jackdaw’s plain appearance would never make him one of the contender’s at a beauty contest, yet he dares to compete for the prize. And to do so, to give himself a chance, he dresses in a motley fashioned from the feathers of his rivals. He cheats. And gets caught.
But it seems to me the skill and imagination he demonstrates make him worthy of applause as much as punishment and Zeus, who called the contest and acts as judge, would be someone who’d appreciate that.
That is why I wrote my version: ‘Jackdaw and the Borrowed Feathers’
(Stripped of Borrowed Feathers: The Raven Jackdaw by Melchior d’Hondecoeter)
