Reading Notes: Russian Folktales, Part B

Well, I was rather horrified by the story where the loyal dog gets killed after he defends the master that abandoned him. Were I the dog, I'd hold a grudge too. I don't see why he should have been killed instead of just given to someone else, but as I said in my last post, Russia's a harsh place, I guess.

There's such a strange mix of stories with happy endings where a risen corpse or demon is defeated and stories where a bad thing happens and that's all. Or at the least, there doesn't seem to be any sort of happy or satisfying conclusion, at least not to me. I have lots of possibilities if I decide to use one of my favorite rewriting strategies and change an ending to suit morals that I like better, but I feel like I've gone that route so often during the semester that I don't know that I have any interest in doing that sort of rewrite again in the class.

My other go-to is to change the perspective a story is written in. Almost all, if not all, of the readings for this class are in third-person, which makes it relatively simple to just tell the same story in a different voice. This is a viable option for any of the Russian folktales, which are all in third-person. The method can make for an interesting character study, particularly if put in a format other than the character seeming to narrate directly to the reader. I haven't done a diary entry kind of rewrite yet, though it's a bit similar to the letter I wrote for Amten. As mentioned in Part A of my reading notes, the river story would be a great candidate for this format, and is currently what I'm leaning towards. I also will be trying to keep it on the short side, since I have a lot of other assignments this week.

Image: Russian Moujik (peasant). Source.

Bibliography: Russian Fairy Tales by W. R. S. Ralston (1887).