Russian Legends

"Legends, folk tales and fairy tales all had a profound impact on Russian painting of the nineteenth and early twentieth century. The Russian artists who dealt with these subjects chose sometimes to paint large canvases in which the greatness and grandeur of the Russian countryside fuses with the magical world of the imagination. The paintings of Viktor Vasnetsov, Nikolai Roerikh, and Mikhail Vrubel, the illustrations of Ivan Bilibin and Elena Polenova, and the works of Vasily Kandinsky register most impressively the worlds of fantasy and the imagination." "This book presents more than 90 illustrations of these fascinating works, while the essays shed interesting light on how these stories contributed to and influenced the visual arts. The book also contains summaries of the fairy tales depicted in these paintings, whereby the reader is given an overview of the major Russian folk tales."--BOOK JACKET.

Richly represented in the Russian folktale tradition, the legends are religious tales (types 750-849 in the Aame-Thompson index) in a peasant village setting. Among the standard themes is the return of Christ, who wanders through rural Russia with his disciples. Satan appears here too, as do a cast of spirits and lesser devils. Pre-Christian gods may be recognized in tales of saints Ilya and Nikolai (Elijah and Saint Nicholas). The hapless peasant in these tales - cheated, betrayed, impoverished, foolish, orphaned, crippled - take the reader deep into the traditional village culture of Russia and into the imperfect human quest for moral choice and justice on this earth.

De verbeelding van sprookjes, heldendichten en volksvertellingen in de Russische schilderkunst van de negentiende en begin twintigste eeuw.

The coming of Christianity to the state of Kievan Rus' at the end of the tenth century had an enormous impact on the development of Russian civilization. Despite the abandonment of the pagan gods, both Christian and pagan practices and beliefs continued to coexist for centuries, producing a system known as "dual faith." Russian Myths deals with mythic beliefs, notions, and customs—concerning the veneration of earth, water, fire, and air, demons and spirit-beings in the world of nature, the cult of the dead, and witchcraft—many of which have their roots in the pre-Christian past but still survive to the present day. To illuminate the evolution of major themes and motifs and set Russian myths in the context of mythology the world over, Elizabeth Warner draws upon a rich variety of sources, including anecdotal narrative forms and religious legends, epic songs, funeral laments and folk religion, and, of course, the folktales where the sacred gives way to pure imagination in the depiction of mythic themes and characters.

This introduction to the Russian folktale considers the origin, structure and language of folktales; tale-tellers and their audiences; the relationship of folktales to Russian ritual life; and the folktale types which are translated in subsequent volumes of "The Complete Russian Folktale".

A scholarly work that aims to be both broad enough in scope to satisfy upper-division undergraduates studying folk belief and narrative and detailed enough to meet the needs of graduate students in the field. Each of the seven chapters in Part 1 focuses on one aspect of Russian folk belief, such as the pagan background, Christian personages, devils and various other logical categories of the topic. The author's thesis - that Russian folk belief represents a "double faith" whereby Slavic pagan beliefs are overlaid with popular Christianity - is persuasive and has analogies in other cultures. The folk narratives constituting Part 2 are translated and include a wide range of tales, from the briefly anecdotal to the more fully developed narrative, covering the various folk personages and motifs explored in Part 1.

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