Chicherov, Vladimir Ivanovich

Chicherov, Vladimir Ivanovich 

Born May 29 (June 11), 1907, in Viazniki, in what is now Vladimir Oblast; died May 11,1957, in Moscow. Soviet folklorist.

Chicherov graduated from Moscow State University in 1928 and became a professor there in 1953. His doctoral dissertation, The Winter Period of the Russian Agricultural Calendar in the 16th to 19th Centuries (1948; published 1957), was devoted to poetry connected with calendar rituals.

Chicherov’s book Questions of the Theory and History of Folk Works (1959) dealt with historical songs. He also wrote on the theory of folklore, Russian epic poetry, and the various schools of skaziteli (singers of epic folk songs or historical songs) of the Russian north. His ideas about folklore reflected a Marxist conception of the role of the people in history and culture. Chicherov wrote the textbook Russian Folk Works (1959; German translation, 1968).

REFERENCE

Sokolova, V. K. “V. I. Chicherov (1907–1957).” Sovetskaia etnografiia, 1957, no. 3.