{"product_id":"2940014373135","title":"Russian Fairy Tales","description":"PREFACE.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe stories contained in the following pages are taken from the\u003cbr\u003ecollections published by Afanasief, Khudyakof, Erlenvein, and\u003cbr\u003eChudinsky. The South-Russian collections of Kulish and Rudchenko I\u003cbr\u003ehave been able to use but little, there being no complete dictionary\u003cbr\u003eavailable of the dialect, or rather the language, in which they are\u003cbr\u003ewritten. Of these works that of Afanasief is by far the most\u003cbr\u003eimportant, extending to nearly 3,000 pages, and containing 332\u003cbr\u003edistinct stories--of many of which several variants are given,\u003cbr\u003esometimes as many as five. Khudyakof's collection contains 122\u003cbr\u003eskazkas--as the Russian folk-tales are called--Erlenvein's 41, and\u003cbr\u003eChudinsky's 31. Afanasief has also published a separate volume,\u003cbr\u003econtaining 33 \"legends,\" and he has inserted a great number of stories\u003cbr\u003eof various kinds in his \"Poetic views of the Old Slavonians about\u003cbr\u003eNature,\" a work to which I have had constant recourse.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrom the stories contained in what may be called the \"chap-book\u003cbr\u003eliterature\" of Russia, I have made but few extracts. It may, however,\u003cbr\u003ebe as well to say a few words about them. There is a Russian word\u003cbr\u003e_lub_, diminutive _lubok_, meaning the soft bark of the lime tree,\u003cbr\u003ewhich at one time was used instead of paper. The popular tales which\u003cbr\u003ewere current in former days were at first printed on sheets or strips\u003cbr\u003eof this substance, whence the term _lubochnuiya_ came to be given to\u003cbr\u003eall such productions of the cheap press, even after paper had taken\u003cbr\u003ethe place of bark.[1]\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe stories which have thus been preserved have no small interest of\u003cbr\u003etheir own, but they cannot be considered as fair illustrations of\u003cbr\u003eRussian folk-lore, for their compilers in many cases took them from\u003cbr\u003eany sources to which they had access, whether eastern or western,\u003cbr\u003emerely adapting what they borrowed to Russian forms of thought and\u003cbr\u003espeech. Through some such process, for instance, seem to have passed\u003cbr\u003ethe very popular Russian stories of Eruslan Lazarevich and of Bova\u003cbr\u003eKorolevich. They have often been quoted as \"creations of the Slavonic\u003cbr\u003emind,\" but there seems to be no reason for doubting that they are\u003cbr\u003emerely Russian adaptations, the first of the adventures of the Persian\u003cbr\u003eRustem, the second of those of the Italian Buovo di Antona, our Sir\u003cbr\u003eBevis of Hampton. The editors of these \"chap-book skazkas\" belonged to\u003cbr\u003ethe pre-scientific period, and had a purely commercial object in view.\u003cbr\u003eTheir stories were intended simply to sell.","brand":"Andrew eBooks","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47166474977520,"sku":"2940014373135","price":1.25,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940014373135_p0.jpg?v=1763606920","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940014373135","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}