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Russian Fairy Tales: A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore
Paperback
Fiction AnthologiesGeneral Fiction
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Publisher: Toridreams
Pages: 402
Weight: 1.18
Height: 0.82 Width: 6.00 Depth: 9.00
Language: English
INTRODUCTORY.
T
here are but few among those inhabitants of Fairy-land of whom Popu-
lar Tales tell, who are better known to the outer world than Cinderella-
the despised and flouted younger sister, who long sits unnoticed beside the
hearth, then furtively visits the glittering halls of the great and gay, and at last
is transferred from her obscure nook to the place of honor justly due to her
tardily acknowledged merits. Somewhat like the fortunes of Cinderella have
been those of the popular tale itself. Long did it dwell beside the hearths of
the common people, utterly ignored by their superiors in social rank. Then
came a period during which the cultured world recognized its existence, but
accorded to it no higher rank than that allotted to nursery stories and old
wives' tales-except, indeed, on those rare occasions when the charity of a
condescending scholar had invested it with such a garb as was supposed to
enable it to make a respectable appearance in polite society. At length there
arrived the season of its final change, when, transferred from the dusk of the
peasant's hut into the full light of the outer day, and freed from the unbe-
coming garments by which it had been disfigured, it was recognized as the
3 UNKNOWN
scion of a family so truly royal that some of its members deduce their origin
from the olden gods themselves.
In our days the folk-tale, instead of being left to the careless guardianship
of youth and ignorance, is sedulously tended and held in high honor by the
ripest of scholars. Their views with regard to its origin may differ widely.
But whether it be considered in one of its phases as a distorted nature-
myth, or in another as a demoralized apologue or parable-whether it be
regarded at one time as a relic of primeval wisdom, or at another as a blurred
transcript of a page of mediaeval history-its critics agree in declaring it to
be no mere creation of the popular fancy, no chance expression of the un-
cultured thought of the rude tiller of this or that soil. Rather is it believed
of most folk-tales that they, in their original forms, were framed centuries
upon centuries ago; while of some of them it is supposed that they may be
traced back through successive ages to those myths in which, during a pre-
historic period, the oldest of philosophers expressed their ideas relative to
the material or the spiritual world.
But it is not every popular tale which can boast of so noble a lineage, and
one of the great difficulties which beset the mythologist who attempts to dis-
cover the original meaning of folk-tales in general is to decide which of them
are really antique, and worthy, therefore, of being submitted to critical anal-
ysis. Nor is it less difficult, when dealing with the stories of
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