Customer Reviews

Russian Fairy Tales (Pantheon Fairy Tale and Folklore Library)

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

What the Grimm Brothers did for fairy tales in Germany, Afanas'ev did for Russia. Over the course of his lifetime(1826-1871), he collected countless of these wonderful little stories from common folk, just as the Grimms did. This collection contains stories of adventure and enchantment, animal fables and more. Included are stories of Vasilissa and Baba Yaga, the witch whose house was built on chicken feet, and the famous story of the giant turnip. There's even some stories about vampires. But be prepared, this book is huge! And every bit of it distinctly Russian.

Fairy tales get us into the psyche of a culture. Americans see themselves as Paul Bunyan and Johnny Appelseed, conquoring the frontier. This book introduces us to the Russian psyche. It shows us how they look at things--the world, society, life, family, and government.

Some of the stroies are charming, such as the fabel of the Turnip and the Honey-pot. Other stories made absolutley no sense. But I had fun trying to crack these weird nuts.

I enjoyed the translation. It is not as energetic as Seamus Heaney, or J. B. Phillipws, but it is readable, athough you realize that you are reading a translation.

C. S. Lewis, in his preface to "The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe," mentions that as children we read fairy tales, then we outgow them. Then, as adults, we come back to these stories and read them with different eyes. I had that experince with this book.

I have owned since 1975 a copy of an earlier, hardcover, Pantheon reprint edition of this superb collection, which was originally published in 1945. I have used it for both light reading and for serious study (while in courses on Baltic and Slavic Folklore and Folktale Studies). The selection and translation of stories both seem first-rate. (For the latter, I have had to rely on the opinions of those who actually read Russian, instead of just having studied it in school.) The accompanying illustrations are properly enchanting -- and only occasionally are placed where they give away the point of the story.

The only real drawback is that it is still merely a selection from about three volumes (depending on the edition you prefer) of "skazki." This is the Russian term for oral tales of marvels, adventures, and misadventures, equivalent to the German "Maerchen." In both cases, the English term "Fairy Tale" is the conventional, but not really adequate, translation. (As usual in large collections, only a handful of tales concern anything like fairies.) One of the requirements for the selection seems to have been that the tales chosen should be acceptable to American parents in the 1940s, but otherwise the considerable variety of the original seems to have been largely preserved. The suggested reader age of "9 to 12" conceals the pleasure that adult readers with interests in folklore or Russian culture will derive from the volume. Fortunately, they may be lead to it by the fine supplementary material at the end, although this is now half a century old.

Afanas'ev (various transliterations) was one of the many nineteenth-century collectors inspired by the Grimms,. By most accounts he was one of the most responsible, even though his practices of recording and documenting texts are hardly up to modern standards. (Neither were those of the Grimms, for that matter.) The main collection from which this was excerpted was the sourcebook for Vladimir Propp's "Morphology of the Folktale," a key work in modern folktale studies, but as Roman Jakobson (yes, the Structural Linguist) points out in his commentary to this collection, the book had already established itself as a gem of Russian literature, an inspiration and resource for poets.

I got this book to read to my 4 1/2 year old daughter. I have been reading her a few a night and she loves them. There are tons of short fairy tales which are both magical and fun. I can easily read two a night for months! Many stories involve Baba Yaga who is one of our favorite characters. I like the fact that "witches" and other magical beings represent complex characters capable of both good and evil. This is in stark contrast to many more well known fairy tales where the witch, is portrayed to be just evil. The stories are also less dark and frightening and frequently funnier. The book uses a rich vocabulary which is proving a valuable tool in teaching my daughter as well as myself. In short, I like it and strongly recommend it.

5 - As a collection of Russian Fairy Tales (not all that easy to find) this is a nice repository of a wide variety of tales. I'm learning a lot.

3 - The illustrations were disappointing to me, given my personal preferences. A bit too primative and not very whimsical. Others may like them.

If you want to study Russian Fairy Tales, this will be a useful book. If you want a "stories with wonderfully inspiring images to go along" type book ... keep looking. My girlfriend from Russia says there are better books to be found.

I really enjoyed reading these Russian Fairy Tales collected by Alexander Afanasev. These stories are (at least in the Western world) very surreal, but they don't lack a good flow and a good sense of imagination at all. I especially enjoyed the tales that involved talking animals and mythological creatures (such as the Firebird and Baba-Yaga). Much of these are short and very simplistic (partyl because of the English translation), but sometimes less is more.

The only problem I've had with these tales is that they're sometimes repetitive. Some stories have the same structure: third time being the charm, boy gets girl in the end, boy is resurrected from the dead, the bronze and silver and golden kingdoms appear, etc. It's this repetitive structure that makes later stories seem predictable.

That one problem aside, this book is a must-own for those who are fascinated with Russian mythology, or Russian culture, or Russian fantasy, or just Russian in general.

I find the stories in here comparable to Grimms and Hans Christian Anderson. They are magical and a fantastic read and a source of discovery of tales from another culture. It is part of my fairy tale collection which I will savour to pass on to my grandchildren for their enjoyment.

I love that its set in a more adult format; which I feel adds to the longevity of the collection remaining in the home as it can be enjoyed by young and old, no matter your age.

Keep the child in you 'alive' I say. Remain in awe of the wonders of the world.

These stories are great. I wouldn't read some of them to small children as they are much more scary than what we are used to with say Hans christian Anderson. I love the exotic adventures and the mystery of these tales. They take you to places so enchanting. I got it for myself as an adult and am in no way disappointed.

What can I say? Although I am getting into "advanced years", I am still a child at heart who is delighted and entranced with fairy tales of all kinds. This is a recent purchase, so for the most part will be held for winter reading by the fire side. I became interested in Russian fairy tales from admiring beautiful hand painted, lacquered Russian boxes on a web site which included snippets of the fairy tales which the decorations portrayed. How fortunate that I could find this large book of Russian fairy tales translated into English for my reading enjoyment!

I am a relatively serious student of fairy tales and folk tales. I was fascinated to find this book, and it did not disappoint at all.

I knew that Fairy Tales and folk myths in original (non-Disney) form offer a frightening glimpse into the medieval world, with death, violence, starvation, hunger, privations the norm.

This is a glimpse into the history of the world and one very well worth remembering.

Some themes are similar to those one might find elsewhere, such as in Grimm's. This does not detract from the value of this book, as many themes in world literature recur, as they are part of our collective unconscious.

A fascinating read.