If you are familiar with the fairy tales of Little Red Riding Hood, Cinderella or Tom Thumb then you have probably read Charles Perrault (born January 12, 1628), for his versions of these tales have become classics. He began his writing career as an academic, publishing Parallels between the Ancients and the Moderns 1688-1697. In this work he criticized authority and noted that progress was possible in both the arts and the sciences. A man ahead of his time. Not wanting to jeopardize his standing as a leading member of the Academie Francaise, he published his first children’s book, Stories or Tales from Times Past, with Morals: Tales of Mother Goose (1697) under his son’s name, Pierre. Monsieur Perrault died in 1703.
