E-mail: hermitage2005@yandex.ru Tel.: +7 (8142) 78-18-86
11, Pushkinskaya str., Petrozavodsk, 185910, Russian Federation
PhD in Philology, Senior Researcher, Institute of Linguistics, Literature and History, the Karelian Research Centre, RAS.
The paper was written as part of the state task assigned to the Karelian Research Centre, RAS.
This article is devoted to the connections between folklore and literature as seen in the tale (skaz) “The Serpent with a Silver Back” by Viktor Pul’kin (1941–2008). It identifies the folkloric sources of the work in order to discover the ways, means and reasons for transforming folklore motifs and plots in literature. This is one of the first analyses of Pul’kin’s work either in literary criticism or folklore studies. One feature of the author’s artistic method is the variability of his prose, the existence of his works in different but equally valid versions. Therefore, the study involved editions of the story from different years, which together also formed the basis for its final rendering. The article reconstructs the literary history of the work and reveals that “The Serpent with a Silver Back” makes use of material from numerous genres of folklore, texts of which Pul’kin recorded in expeditions with the folklorist N. A. Krinichnaya. These include bylichkas and byvalshinas, stories on local history, legends, fairy tales, proverbs, rumors, and texts of folk hagiography. In the story, Pul’kin incorporates stereotypes of folk culture without any obvious limitation; he boldly mixes (“contaminates”) plots and rethinks folklore images. He also uses historical and literary sources, information from ethnography, and motifs from patristics. At the same time, he strictly observes basic principles of folklore’s reflection of reality and makes good use of his knowledge of the tradition. In the final version of the story, Christian motifs are amplified, which one may associate with the writer’s worldview. The Christian tonality of the story emerges as the most important factor in overcoming the folklore tradition: folkloric images, motifs and plots are presented in the light of Christian moral categories — compassion, mercy, spiritual beauty. According to the writer, the past is inextricably linked with the present and the future; local history is connected with the history of Russia and of the world.
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