(in Russian, skazka), one of the principal genres of imaginative oral folklore; an epic fictional work, generally in prose, dealing with magic, adventure, or everyday life.
The term “folktale” applies to various types of oral prose, and consequently there is disagreement in defining the genre’s characteristics. The folktale differs from other types of epics in that it is imparted by its narrator and perceived by its hearers first and foremost as a poetic invention and a play of the imagination. This, however, does not deprive the folktale of a link with reality; it is reality that determines the folktale’s ideological content, language, plot, motifs, and images.
Many folktales reflect primitive social relations and concepts, totemism, and animism. Folktales that originated during the period of feudalism contain such figures as a tsar, tsarevich, knight, and king. During the period of capitalism, the folk narrators turned increasingly to the themes of money and trade. Folktales expressed the contrast between wealth and poverty and, to an even greater extent, contained motifs of class antagonism. Today, some folktales still survive in books, while others have disappeared; some are of interest only to children, and others continue to interest adult audiences.
The folktales of all peoples have much in common, owing to similar cultural and historical conditions. At the same time, they possess national characteristics and reflect the way of life of a given people, its work, everyday life, and natural surroundings. The narrators impart to the folktales they perform their own individual traits, and consequently most folktales are known in many variants.
Each of the most characteristic groups of folktales has its own distinctive morphological structure. Tales about animals are prominent in the folklore of the USSR’s Far North, of North America, and especially of Africa. Some of these evidently originated before the formation of classes and were connected with totemism. In the course of time they lost their mythological and magical character and became akin to moralizing fables. Some fairy tales were also originally connected with myths and had a magical character. Fairy tales about combats with dragons, about stepmothers and stepdaughters, and about obtaining miraculous objects became prevalent throughout the world. The fairy tales of all peoples are richly ornamented stylistically and are marked by repetitions and by intricate introductions and conclusions.
Tales of adventure recount the unusual adventures of a hero, generally without magical fantasy. The heroes of these tales are quick-witted, resourceful, and shrewd. Akin to these works are tales about historical figures. Folktales about everyday life often have a strong social orientation; the hero is usually a poor peasant, worker, or soldier, and the setting is one familiar to the narrator. Also well known are nebylitsy (fantastic tales) and dokuchnye skazki (wearisome tales).
Folktales have been the subject of a great deal of research. Folklorists who adhere to the mythological theory have studied folktales as “fragments of ancient myths.” Comparatists have generally been concerned with similarities between plots and motifs in the tales of various peoples and have sought to establish the route taken by folktales in their migration. The adherents of the anthropological school founded a theory of a single environmental and psychological basis for the spontaneous emergence of folktale plots. In their studies of folktales, Soviet folklorists have relied on the theories of Marxism-Leninism, on the studies of the revolutionary democrats, and on M. Gorky’s writings on folklore. Soviet scholars have contributed important studies of the interrelationship between the individual and the collective principle in folktales.
The best collections of the tales of various peoples have become a part of the treasury of world literature. These include the collections of eastern tales One Thousand and One Nights, the Indian Pachatantra, the German tales of the brothers Grimm, and the collection of Russian folktales compiled by A. N. Afanas’ev. During the years of Soviet power, numerous collections of the folktales of the USSR’s nationalities have been published.
Folktales remain an enduring source of material for writers, who have extensively utilized characters, themes, and plots from folktales and have created a literature based on folktales. This literature includes the tales of A. S. Pushkin, H. C. Andersen, W. Hauff, and C. Perrault and, in Soviet literature, the tales of A. N. Tolstoy, K. N. Chukovskii, and S. Ia. Marshak and the folktale plays of E. L. Shvarts. Examples of the use of the folktale as a vehicle for satire are the tales of M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin. Artists and composers as well have utilized characters and plots from folktales.
E. V. POMERANTSEVA