A folk tale adapted by Afanasiev. Alexander Afanasiev - Russian treasured tales

“Russian Treasured Tales” by A.N. Afanasyev was published in Geneva more than a hundred years ago. They appeared without the name of the publisher, sine anno. On the title page, under the title, it was only stated: “Balaam. Typical art of the monastic brethren. Year of obscurantism." And on the counter-title there was a note: “Printed exclusively for archaeologists and bibliophiles in a small number of copies.”

Extremely rare already in the last century, Afanasyev’s book has become almost a phantom these days. Judging by the works of Soviet folklorists, only two or three copies of “Treasured Tales” have been preserved in the special departments of the largest libraries in Leningrad and Moscow. The manuscript of Afanasyev’s book is in the Leningrad Institute of Russian Literature of the USSR Academy of Sciences (“Russian folk tales not for publication,” Archive, No. R-1, inventory 1, No. 112). The only copy of “Fairy Tales” that belonged to the Paris National Library disappeared before the First World War. The book is not listed in the catalogs of the British Museum library.

By reprinting Afanasyev’s “Treasured Tales,” we hope to introduce Western and Russian readers to a little-known facet of the Russian imagination - “raunchy”, obscene fairy tales, in which, as the folklorist puts it, “genuine folk speech flows with a living spring, sparkling with all the brilliant and witty sides of the common people.” .

Obscene? Afanasyev did not consider them that way. “They just can’t understand,” he said, “that in these folk stories there is a million times more morality than in sermons full of school rhetoric.”

“Russian Treasured Tales” is organically connected with Afanasyev’s collection of fairy tales, which has become a classic. Fairy tales of immodest content, like the tales of the famous collection, were delivered to Afanasyev by the same collectors and contributors: V.I. Dal, P.I. Yakushkin, Voronezh local historian N.I. Vtorov. In both collections we find the same themes, motifs, plots, with the only difference being that the satirical arrows of “Treasured Tales” are more poisonous, and the language is in some places quite rude. There is even a case when the first, quite “decent” half of the story is placed in a classic collection, while the other, less modest, is in “Treasured Tales”. We are talking about the story “A Man, a Bear, a Fox and a Horsefly.”

There is no need to dwell in detail on why Afanasyev, when publishing “Folk Russian Fairy Tales” (issues 1–8, 1855–1863), was forced to refuse to include that part, which a decade later would be published under the title “Folk Russian Fairy Tales Not for Printing” (the epithet “cherished” appears only in the title of the second and last edition of “Fairy Tales”). Soviet scientist V.P. Anikin explains this refusal this way: “It was impossible to publish anti-popov and anti-lord tales in Russia.” Is it possible to publish - in an uncut and uncleaned form - “Treasured Tales” in Afanasyev’s homeland today? We do not find an answer to this from V.P. Anikin.

The question remains open of how immodest fairy tales got abroad. Mark Azadovsky suggests that in the summer of 1860, during his trip to Western Europe, Afanasyev gave them to Herzen or another emigrant. It is possible that the publisher of Kolokol contributed to the release of Fairy Tales. Subsequent searches, perhaps, will help illuminate the history of the publication of “Russian Treasured Tales” - a book that stumbled over the obstacles of not only tsarist, but also Soviet censorship.

The publication of our cherished fairy tales... is almost a unique phenomenon of its kind. It could easily be that this is precisely why our publication will give rise to all sorts of complaints and outcries not only against the daring publisher, but also against the people who created such tales in which the people's imagination in vivid pictures and without any hesitation in expressions deployed all its strength and all its wealth your humor. Leaving aside all possible complaints against us, we must say that any outcry against the people would be not only injustice, but also an expression of complete ignorance, which for the most part, by the way, is one of the inalienable properties of a screaming pruderie. Our cherished fairy tales are a one-of-a-kind phenomenon, as we said, especially because we do not know of another publication in which genuine folk speech would flow in such a living way in a fairy-tale form, sparkling with all the brilliant and witty sides of the common people.

The literatures of other nations present many similar treasured stories and have long been ahead of us in this regard. If not in the form of fairy tales, then in the form of songs, conversations, short stories, farces, sottises, moralites, dictons, etc., other peoples have a huge number of works in which the popular mind, just as little embarrassed by expressions and pictures, marked it with humor, hooked me with satire and sharply exposed different aspects of life to ridicule. Who doubts that the playful stories of Boccaccio are not drawn from popular life, that the countless French short stories and faceties of the 15th, 16th and 17th centuries are not from the same source as the satirical works of the Spaniards, the Spottliede and Schmahschriften of the Germans, this mass of lampoons and various flying leaflets in all languages, which appeared about all kinds of events in private and public life - not folk works? In Russian literature, however, there is still a whole section of unprintable folk expressions, not for publication. In the literatures of other nations, such barriers to popular speech have not existed for a long time.

...So, accusing the Russian people of crude cynicism would be equivalent to accusing all other peoples of the same thing, in other words, it naturally comes down to zero. The erotic content of cherished Russian fairy tales, without saying anything for or against the morality of the Russian people, simply points only to that side of life that most gives free rein to humor, satire and irony. Our fairy tales are transmitted in the unartificial form as they came from the lips of the people and were recorded from the words of the storytellers. This is their peculiarity: nothing has been touched in them, there are no embellishments or additions. We will not dwell on the fact that in different parts of wider Rus' the same fairy tale is told differently. There are, of course, many such options, and most of them, no doubt, pass from mouth to mouth, without having yet been overheard or written down by collectors. The options we present are taken from among the most famous or most characteristic for some reason.

Let us note... that that part of the fairy tales, where the characters are animals, perfectly depicts all the ingenuity and all the power of observation of our commoner. Far from cities, working in the fields, forests, and rivers, everywhere he deeply understands the nature he loves, faithfully spies and subtly studies the life around him. The vividly captured aspects of this silent, but eloquent life for him, are themselves transferred to his brothers - and a story full of life and light humor is ready. The section of fairy tales about the so-called “foal breed” by the people, of which we have so far presented only a small part, clearly illuminates both the attitude of our peasant to his spiritual shepherds and his correct understanding of them.

Our treasured tales are curious in addition to many aspects in the following respect. They provide an important scientist, a thoughtful researcher of the Russian people with a vast field for comparing the content of some of them with stories of almost the same content by foreign writers, with the works of other peoples. How did Boccaccio’s stories (see, for example, the fairy tale “The Merchant’s Wife and Clerk”), satires and farces of the French of the 16th century penetrate into the Russian backwaters, how did the Western short story degenerate into a Russian fairy tale, what is their social side, where and, perhaps, even from whose side are traces of influence, what kind of doubts and conclusions from the evidence of such an identity, etc., etc.

Propp sees in folk tales a reminder of totemic initiation rituals. The fairy tale does not describe a system of rituals of any specific stage of culture, but its initiation scenario expresses the ahistorical archetypal behavior of the psyche. In fairy tales there is no exact reminder of any culture: here various historical cycles and cultural styles mix and collide with each other. Only patterns of behavior that could exist in many cultural cycles and at different historical moments have been preserved here.

The typological correspondence between the fairy tale and the initiation rite, established by Propp in his 1946 book, was only just beginning to develop in the mid-70s in studies comparing folklore narratives and rites of “passage”.

29. Folk demonology. Bylichki.

Demonological stories are one of the types of non-fairy tale prose, including fairy tales and stories; stories about supernatural beings and phenomena. The tales expressed ideas and concepts about supernatural forces, about the intervention of creatures from lower folk demonology. Bylichki - oral stories about goblins, brownies, merman, mermaids, kikimore, bannik, barn, fire snake, living dead/devils and in general about the intervention in human life of creatures from the world of folk religion. They are characterized by the narrator’s firm confidence in the existence of such forces, but unlike former events, the performer may have doubts. Little tales reflect the everyday likes and dislikes of their narrators. The division is made according to characters: about brownies, about goblins, etc.

30. Types of collections of fairy tales. Collection of Afanasyev.

The classification of fairy tales is given based on the research of the Finnish school and in particular A. Aarne, who divided fairy tales into three types - about animals, fairy tales themselves (magic) and anecdotes. Later, jokes were replaced by social and everyday tales. Tales about animals originated in ancient times. They reflected man's attempts to comprehend the laws of the animal world based on life experience. Propp, in the preface to Afanasyev’s collection of fairy tales, divides tales about animals into 1) tales about wild ones (“The Wolf and the Ice-hole”) 2) about wild and domestic ones (“Once upon a time there was a dog”) 3) about humans and wild ones (“The Man and the Bear” ) 4) about domestic animals (“About the Whacked Goat”) 5) about birds and fish (“The Fox and the Crane”) 6) tales about other animals and plants (“Kolobok”). The most important features: animism, anthropomorphism, totemism. In the depiction of animals, there is a desire for typification: the fox is always gray, the hare is cowardly, etc. - all this is the result of anthropomorphism in the explanation of nature. The main purpose of fairy tales about animals is explanatory and educational. They may explain why domesticated animals are domesticated or why a hare changes its skin. On the other hand, fairy tales often contain moral teachings (“The Wolf and the Seven Little Goats”). There are also so-called allegorical satirical tales (“The Fox and the Black Grouse”, in which, before eating the black grouse, the fox forces him to confess). In fairy tales about animals, convention is important, not fantasy. There is no magic in them - otherwise they become magical. The most important compositional feature of SOZh is the stringing of episodes in them - all meetings and actions are repeated many times - these tales are cumulative, i.e. have a chain structure (“Kolobok”, “Teremok”). The dialogues are expressed more strongly than in a fairy tale - various songs, sayings, etc.

Search. mythol. Russian roots fairy tales. Integrity of options. Most of his corrections relate to the language and style of the tales. For the first time, folklore texts are presented in variants; some dialectal features of the performers’ speech have been preserved; an extensive commentary has been prepared; Where possible, passport information about published texts was introduced. Let us note that from the point of view of modern requirements, not everything in the collection can satisfy us: Afanasyev did not see anything reprehensible in correct stylistic editing or in the creation of consolidated texts.

The collection “Russian Folk Tales” was compiled by A. N. Afanasyev in 1855-1864. For publication, 75 texts were extracted from the archives of the Russian Geographical Society. The remaining materials are collected from various sources. Afanasyev himself recorded no more than 10 fairy tales, mainly from his homeland - the Voronezh province. The largest number of texts belongs to the collection of V. I. Dahl. The largest number of fairy tales are fairy tales: animal tales (1-299), fairy tales (300-749), legendary tales (750-849) and novelistic tales (850-999).

Afanasyev's collection has some shortcomings. He depended on his correspondents, and therefore the quality of the recordings was uneven and varied. The places of occurrence of each fairy tale are not indicated.

Publisher: Rech, 2017

Series: Gift of Speech

ISBN: 978-5-9268-2471-8

Pages: 320 (Offset)

The book was made to order from Labyrinth, so it is sold only there!

A luxurious collection of Russian folk tales was published by the Rech publishing house. Just a holiday for the soul! A collection of fairy tales with illustrations by Tatyana Mavrina!

Tatyana Alekseevna Mavrina is called “the most Russian of all artists.” Mavrina is the only Soviet artist awarded the Hans Christian Andersen Prize for his contribution to the illustration of children's literature.

Her works are easily recognizable. Opening a book, any book illustrated by Tatyana Mavrina, you immediately find yourself in a fairy tale. She creates her own fairy-tale world from bright colors and colors. Here good fellows gallop on mighty horses, there is a hut on chicken legs in the deep forest, and beauties live in high towers.

The book includes 23 full-page illustrations.

Not enough - it will be(

There is no such thing as too much beauty)

Tatyana Mavrina also drew an intricate initial letter for each fairy tale.

The book is in a convenient format. Embossed cover. The spine is fabric. The book was printed in Latvia.

The book contains a large number of fairy tales. It is impossible to list all the tales included in this collection. The contents of the book alone span three pages. There are 70 fairy tales in total.

These tales are truly folk tales, because they were collected by Alexander Nikolaevich Afanasyev, an outstanding Russian scientist, cultural historian, ethnographer and folklorist. Many of us grew up reading these fairy tales.

Moreover, for this edition, Rech selected the most interesting and not the most famous fairy tales.

Fairy tales are not suitable for very young children. There is no Turnip or Kolobok here) The tales are intended for older children. For primary school age.

The font is unusual, the letters are slightly elongated. Comfortable for reading.

The book will become one of the pearls of your home library.

Just like Mavrina’s Fairytale ABC!

Eh, I don’t like “other people’s” second-hand books. The key word is "alien". Somehow I’m disdainful of buying books that I don’t know where they stood, lived and read. The book is alive. It absorbs the energy of the one who turns the pages...
As a child, I had a book that made me love reading. For the current younger generation, this is the book “Harry Potter” (as a rule, it is from this book that children get into reading as a process), but for me it was Afanasyev’s fairy tales with illustrations by Mavrina. But somewhere this book got lost and, unfortunately, disappeared...
I looked for a long time for an alternative, a reissue, but unfortunately I didn’t find it.
There are a lot of fairy tale books on the book market!
But, in my opinion, Afanasyev’s collection is the most accurate, the most consistent and the most correct. Fairy tales are arranged in ascending order - from simple fairy tales to more complex ones. The tales are amazing and Russian!
In search of my book, from new editions I bought:

Compiled by: Alexander Afanasyev, O. Sklyarova
Languages: Russian
Publisher: Olma Media Group
Series: Classics in illustrations
ISBN 978-5-373-05338-9; 2013

A good edition, excellent cover, paper, excellent print quality, but not the same... That’s not the same at all.. There is no integrity in the book, no fabulousness. The illustrations are all different, sometimes even out of topic. The content is very limited. There are only 45 fairy tales in the book. The book is very flawed.

Illustrator: Nina Babarkina
Editor: Natalya Morozova
Languages: Russian
Publisher: Bright City
ISBN 978-5-9663-0141-5; 2009

I knew that it was not Afanasyev. But I bought it anyway. Do you know what I didn't like? The book is very pretentious and museum-like. Inanimate. Fairy tales shouldn't be like that.

This edition is more or less close to the original.
But in terms of content - only 59.3% (slightly more than half) of the tales are from the old edition.
This collection contains only 70 fairy tales out of 118 fairy tales contained in the Soviet edition.
Everything is processed by Afanasiev. The illustrations are black and white, but this is not a minus.
Disadvantages: large format, dividing the text into two horizontal parts (some kind of nonsense, AST probably hired some kind of fan of dividing the text into two parts - several books have already been laid out using this method, including The Lord of the Rings).
And the illustrations are varied. It feels like everything that was was dumped in a heap.
Here, as an example, is a photo of the spreads (I didn’t take any photos, I took the photo from the Labyrinth):

In general, the conclusion is that I didn’t like it.

Without thinking twice (in this situation), I finally ordered a second-hand book edition of the “good old” Afanasyev with his fairy tales)

Second-hand book edition
Publisher: Fiction
State of preservation: Good
ISBN 5-280-01040-5; 1990

The publication is old, not from 90, but from 89. The book is supported.
You can’t say this, but after I leafed through this book I wanted to wash my hands...((Well, I don’t know who held this book in my hands! I can’t help it.. Probably this will pass and the book will become MINE!
And the book itself is, of course, gorgeous! And it’s as if it came from a fairy tale. I don’t understand why I have these feelings? This is probably personal and very subjective)

There are ALL 118 fairy tales in the book! They are arranged in a special way: as I said above - from simple to complex. There’s Baba Yaga, and Koschey, and “you’ll go to the right..” - in general, that’s it!) Such a self-sufficient book in content.

And these are page spreads with wonderful illustrations by T. Mavrina:

And what cool “Boring Tales” at the end!!!)))

Just a fairy tale, not a book!)

P.S.: to sum up what has been said, I have a question for experts: please tell me a good alternative to the above edition from a recently published one. I'm sure I missed something. I will be very grateful!
I also really hope that some publishing house will decide and take on this book. And it will make it just as fabulous, readable and bookish. Let it not be just another soulless “fairy tale”, but let it be fairy tales)