HELL SONGS
An expert on them, the brilliant historical novelist D.M. Balashov, spoke very accurately about the role of ballads in Russian national culture: “What amazing humanism and genuine humanity there is in these outwardly “cruel” dramas, often with a bloody outcome! How many poetic discoveries, precious plot discoveries, sometimes awaiting just the touch of a poet, writer or playwright, to be developed into a whole novel, play, poem! [Russian folk ballads / Intro. article, text preparation and notes by D. M. Balashov. - M., 1983, p. 6.]
Ballads in Rus', according to scientists, arose at the turn of the 13th - 14th centuries, when the genre of epics - epic songs about exploits - gradually began to fade away. mighty heroes, defenders of the homeland. The invasion of the horde, the fires of villages, the siege of cities, the tragic fates of captured slaves, civil strife between princes, and class inequality contributed to the creation of new narrative songs that reflected these phenomena.
The term "ballad" has several meanings. This is the name of Provencal dance songs of the 11th - 17th centuries (from ballare - to dance); Anglo-Scottish folk ballads - narrative songs on themes of medieval history, as well as literary romantic ballads. Among the people, the word “ballad” is not used. Singers in the Russian North distinguish works of this genre from epics by calling them “verses” or “songs.” To separate folklore genre from the literary, we have to clarify it by adding a definition - “folk ballad” or “ballad song”. For brevity, we will use the term “ballad”, which means Russian folk ballad. We will specifically stipulate other cases: literary ballad, etc.
The northern style of performing ballads is different in that they are sung, like epics, alone or by two or three, while in the south ballads are sung by a choir, like drawn-out lyrical songs.
The ballads focus on the individual destinies of people who, due to historical or social conditions, find themselves in hopeless situations. Ballads are epic songs with family themes, based on tragic conflicts.
In historical ballads, a person or family members find themselves in a tragic situation in special historical conditions(enemy invasion, war), in love and family - a conflict arises between a young man and a girl or family members on the basis of love or family relationships, in social ballads the cause of a tragic conflict is social inequality.
In historical ballads, scientists distinguish two cycles: about the Tatar or Turkish people and about tragic meetings of relatives. The cycle about sex includes ballads built on the relationship between an enemy and a girl, where the latter suffers or dies, not wanting to become the wife or concubine of the enemy (“Girl taken prisoner by the Tatars”, “Russian girl in Tatar captivity”). Most often, in this situation, she commits suicide (“The Red Girl Runs from the Crowd”). Very rarely, a captive manages to escape (“The Rescue of Polonyanka”, some versions of the ballad “Prince Roman and Marya Yuryevna”). This cycle includes a group of ballads that tell the story of an escape from captivity (“Two Slaves”, “Escape of Slaves from Captivity”) and later adaptations of ballads about Polon (“Young Khancha”, “Pan brings Russian Polonyanka to his wife”).
The cycle about meetings of relatives includes the ballads “Kozarin” and “Mother-in-law in captivity of her son-in-law.” This includes the ballad “Soldier Husband Visiting His Wife,” which researchers associate with the War of 1812. The type of this song is close to ballads about meetings of relatives separated by war and not recognizing each other. They have common motives of initial misrecognition, and then identification (by a mole, ring, towel) and, finally, the tragic need for a new separation.
The plots of love ballads are built on the relationship between a young man and a girl, and only one ballad, “Vasily and Sophia,” tells about the mutual love of the heroes destroyed by Vasily’s mother. In most love ballads, a girl dies at the hands of a young man whom she does not want to marry (“Dmitry and Domna”, “Well done, servant and girl”, “Ustinya”, “Paranya”), is deceived and dies or suffers (“ The Cossack and the Tavern", "The Kidnapping of a Girl", "The Girl and the Adjutant"). And in one of the ballads, a girl kills rapists (“A girl defends her honor”). Sometimes she commits suicide so as not to become the wife of an unloved man (some versions of the ballad “Dmitry and Domna”), being deceived, she drowns herself (“The Deceived Girl”) or kills a child (“The Nun Drowns the Child”).
If we compare love ballads with historical ballads about Polonian women, we will see their similarities: a girl dies defending her honor. The difference is that in the cycle of historical ballads the girl is guided not only by personal, but also by patriotic feelings (she rejects the enemy and does not want to live on a foreign land), but here she defends her right to freedom of choice of a groom, to her personal feeling.
The biggest and most popular group family ballads - oh tragic conflicts between husband and wife. Usually a wife dies at the hands of her husband (“Prince Roman lost his wife,” “The husband ruined his wife,” “Fedor and Martha,” “Panya,” “The Slandered Wife”); the husband gets rid of his wife in other ways (“The husband cuts his wife’s hair”) or leaves home, abandoning her (“Well done and the thin wife”). The wife of her husband kills only in one ballad - “The Wife Killed Her Husband.” Several ballads are dedicated to the tragic death of one of the spouses and the grief of the other: “The wife of the king (Cossack) dies of childbirth”, “The wife of Prince Mikhail is drowning”, “The death of the master”. The mother-in-law plays the role of the daughter-in-law's destroyer in the ballads "Prince Mikhailo" and "Rowan".
A fairly large group of ballads is dedicated to the relationship between brother and sister. In a number of ballads, brothers take care of their sister and severely punish her for violating morality (“The King and the Girl,” “Fedor Kolyshchatoy,” “Alyosha and the Sister of Two Brothers,” “Ivan Dudorovich and Sofya Volkhovichna”). A number of ballads are devoted to the theme of a brother being poisoned by a sister, in which a sister sometimes kills her brother by mistake (“The girl poisoned her brother by mistake”) or so that he would not interfere with her meeting her lover (“Brother, Sister and Lover”). Ballads on the theme “Sister the Poisoner” tell about a sister’s failed attempt to poison her brother. In the ballad “The sister took off her brother’s violent head with a sword” (“Sura River”), the sister kills her brother with a sword.
The theme of incest (incest) between brother and sister is very popular in Russian folklore. The ballads about incest “The Hunter and His Sister”, “Tsar David and Olena”, “Brother Married His Sister” end tragically. The theme of incest is also found in a group of ballads about the relationship between parents and children (“The Widow’s Children”). This group also includes the ballads “Forcible tonsure”, ballads on the theme “Parents abusing their children” - about the tragic fate of children to which their parents doomed them.
In social ballads, as a rule, social conflict is intertwined with family conflict. An important place among them is occupied by ballads about tragic conflicts as a result of social inequality (“Well done and the princess,” “Prince Volkonsky and Vanya the Keykeeper,” “The Princess Loved the Lackey,” “The Girl and the Voivode’s Son”), as well as about robbers ( “The Robber Husband”, “The Robber Brothers and Sister”, “The Good Man Kills the Kisser”, “The Robbers Kill the Young Man”) and about grief and poverty (“Grief”, “Well done and grief”, “Well done and the Smorodina River”, “ Cross Brother", "Sold Son").
Ballads are characterized by motifs that, by the nature of the events depicted in them, can be defined as realistic (that is, poetically reproducing events that took place or could have taken place in reality) and fantastic (that is, depicting incredible, supernatural events).
The central motive is usually the motive of crime. Its main elements: the character is the destroyer, the action is murder, poisoning, violence; the object is the victim (the husband kills his wife; the king gives the order to hang the young man; the mother-in-law harasses the daughter-in-law). It is sometimes preceded by motives of denunciation or slander (the wife is slandered by the mother-in-law, elders or friends of the husband; the young man who boasted of a connection with the queen is slandered by “their evil brothers”; Vanya the key-keeper is denounced by the hay girl); motives for dividing up the loot, thinking about what to do with the victim (they argue about how to kill the captive: with a sword, a spear, or “trample” it with a horse); the motive for preparing a murder (the poisoner produces poison; the brothers prepare a saber and a block to kill their sister or forge a saber in the forge). In addition to the motive for murder, the motive for suicide may be central. Sometimes it is preceded by the motive of preparing for suicide (Domna forges “two damask knives” in the forge; the princess takes the knives out of a silver box).
All central motives in ballads are, as a rule, realistic. Fantastic motifs, although much fewer in number, still occupy a significant place in ballad plots, but they are not central, but secondary. They can be divided into several groups: 1) animistic and totemistic (a young man, hiding from grief, turns into a clear falcon, pike, wolf, ermine; sisters, having gone in search of their brother, become a pike, falcon, star; the mother-in-law turns her daughter-in-law into a mountain ash; on where the girl died, forests rise up, her braid turns into the forest, her blood turns into the sea); 2) anthropomorphic (the dove tells the dove about the innocence of those buried; the raven, to save his life, tells the young man about the captive of the three Tatars; the horse predicts misfortune for the young man; the eagle (or wolf) brings the hand of the princess and tells the children that their mother was killed; a snake slanderes the woman; the characters of the ballads turn to the mountains, rivers, and seas with a request to let them through, and the request is fulfilled; the young man insults the river, and she drowns him, explaining why; 3) magical (the prince revives his wife with dead and living water; Marya Yuryevna blinds the guards). using scattered pearls).
In ballads, the ideological and aesthetic function of fantastic motifs, rooted in ancient times, is to assert justice and expose crime. The miraculous motivates or ends the plot. The specificity of fantastic motifs in ballads (as opposed to fairy tales and epics) is that they are usually associated with the tragic.
So, the young man turns into a pike to escape from Grief, but Grief catches him with a net, pursues him with an eagle, a raven and drives him into the grave. The sisters look for their missing brother everywhere - in the water (by a pike), in the air (by a falcon), in the sky (by a star) and find out that he was killed. The woman turned into a tree dies. The twining plants on the graves of the ruined lovers testify to the strength of their love and their innocence (in some versions, Vasily’s mother, incapable of repentance, uproots them). Having hit a stone, the girl turns to the church, but in a fairy tale she would reincarnate as a girl again as soon as the chase is gone, but in the ballad she no longer comes to life. The horse predicts misfortune for the young man, and the prediction in the ballad comes true, unlike fairy tales, where the hero manages to escape.
The tragic is manifested in a peculiar way in ballads. There are tragic elements in other genres, for example, in fairy tales and epics. In epics that glorify the greatness and power of the hero, his invincibility, the tragic takes an insignificant place, and in fairy tales tragic elements are introduced for a more contrasting presentation of the struggle between good and evil, which always ends in the victory of good and the triumph of the hero who has overcome numerous obstacles. In ballads, evil usually wins, but the dying positive characters gain a moral victory.
In ballads, several aspects of the tragic can be distinguished: national, family, personal. So, in the ballad about the meeting of mother and daughter in Tatar captivity there are all these aspects.
Firstly, the possibility of meeting in captivity a mother and daughter who do not recognize each other speaks of the tragic fate of the people suffering from Tatar raids. Secondly, the fate of a young woman who forgot her homeland and did not recognize her mother is tragic; thirdly, in a tragic situation there is an old captive who has become the slave of her own daughter. Her situation is hopeless: having returned home to her homeland, she will again lose her daughter, and if she remains with her daughter, she will not see other children and her native land. The ballad “Soldier Husband Visiting His Wife,” which is much later in time, has the same aspects, although the socio-historical situation has long changed. The tragic here is manifested in the revelation of the plight of the people: a twenty-year-old soldier, separating husband and wife; the fate of a woman who considered herself a widow, who had found her husband again, only to part with him again; the bitter fate of a soldier who accidentally ends up in his home, but cannot be with his children and wife and leaves with his regiment, perhaps forever. In the cycle of ballads about a Polonian girl, the ballads about a girl who runs away from the Tatars and commits suicide when she is overtaken by a chase are imbued with a special tragedy. The girl dies, but moral victory is on her side; the ballad sounded like a call to resist the enemy.
Social ballads reveal tragic contradictions between those who hold power (king, prince, voivode's son) and the disadvantaged (servant, housekeeper, simple girl). The criminal trade of people who have gone into robbery turns against them.
The basis of the tragic in family ballads is, on the one hand, in the despotism of parents, husband, brother, mother-in-law, and on the other, in the lack of rights and submission of children, wife, sister, daughter-in-law.
In a group of love ballads, the victim is usually a girl.
In a number of ballads, the tragic does not have a sublime character, since it is not associated with high goals, patriotic or moral deeds, but with low, narrowly personal aspirations, and has an everyday basis. The husband kills his wife, having learned that she did not manage the household well in his absence (“The Slandered Wife”), the prince kills the girl who does not reciprocate his feelings, so that “no one will get her” (“Ustinya”, “Paranya”). The irreconcilability of contradictions causes sharp clashes and the use of decisive, cruel means by negative characters. The tragic usually manifests itself in a crime (murder, poisoning) directed against an innocent victim. Aristotle’s statement regarding the hero of tragedy may well be attributed to the ballad: “Let the hero be presented as such as no one would wish to be.” Unlike ancient tragedies, where the actions of negative characters are often explained by the will of the gods, fate, fate of the heroes of the ballad, such character traits as vindictiveness, suspicion, and inability to curb their violent temper lead to crime. Tragedy in ballads depends not only on the character of the characters, but also on the circumstances caused by the disorder of the surrounding world. A deceived girl is forced to drown her newborn baby to save herself from shame. A ballad conflict is not the result of a petty quarrel or an accidental insult, but is generated by deep contradictions inherent in the era in which the ballad arose and was formed. The behavior of people in ballads is assessed from the standpoint of true, ideal family- this reveals the moral aspect of the tragic. The tragic occurs when sharp contradictions are created between strict moral principles and people's behavior. On this basis, on the one hand, the desire for happiness and freedom of the individual in his feelings is born, and on the other - tragic collisions depending on life circumstances. The ballad, like the “model tragedy” (according to Aristotle), represents the transition from happiness to misfortune of an immoral, negative hero, and this also reveals its moral aspect.
Tragedy in ballads often manifests itself in the fact that the killer learns too late about the innocence of the person he killed and bitterly repents. This has become the norm of ballad poetics. Therefore, for example, the poem “The Ural Cossack” by S. T. Aksakov, written in 1821 on the popular plot “The Husband Ruins His Wife,” was changed during its existence in accordance with the popular understanding of the tragic. Aksakov's husband cuts off his unfaithful wife's head with a saber and surrenders himself to the authorities, demanding his own execution. In versions revised by the people, common in the central and southern regions of Russia, the ballad “Soldiers Rode...” (“The soldier, returning home, killed his unfaithful wife”) ends with a monologue of repentance from the killer. And in the North, where traditional epic poetry was preserved longer, the motive of the wife’s innocence is introduced, aggravating the tragic guilt of the husband.
The suffering and death of a positive character and the repentance of the killer evoke in listeners a peculiar emotional reaction similar to Aristotle’s “catharsis”: sympathy, compassion, moral purification, awareness of the inhumanity of evil, reflection and evaluation of actions characters.
In ballads, the “tragic guilt” of the hero does not always take place, and it is also not always explained how the innocently persecuted victim incurred the hatred of the antagonist. This is due to the specifics of folklore, which strives for the ultimate typification of phenomena.
And yet in many ballads we can detect the “tragic guilt” of the heroes. In the ballad “The Slandered Wife,” the husband, enraged by the slanderers, cuts off his wife’s head in anger. He acts consciously, but unintentionally, acts unfairly without being unfair at all. His tragic guilt lies in the affect that arose as a result of erroneous knowledge. Vasily’s mother (“Vasily and Sophia”) wants to get rid of her son’s unworthy, from her point of view, chosen one. Trying to destroy her, she does not assume that her son will share the poisoned drink with his beloved. Here a new aspect of the tragic appears: “The unjust should not be happy,” Aristotle believed. A similar idea is uniquely realized in many ballads: a villain, killing a person he hates, unwittingly destroys his loved one.
The art of the tragic in ballads lies in the ability of their creators to see the tragic in life and convey it in a poetically generalized form with great emotional tension. A peculiar combination of epicness and drama enhances the emotional and aesthetic impact of the tragic, which is greatly facilitated by the extreme compression of dramatic moments. The ballad is to a certain extent characterized by dispassion, which the great Pushkin considered necessary for a dramatic writer. This dispassion is created by a combination of epicness and drama: events are narrated in a stern, objective tone, and in the most tense places the narration is interrupted by dialogue or monologue. Of great importance for revealing the tragic is the art of developing plot action, which is concentrated on one of the most significant conflicts; the plot is freed from details that slow down the action. The arrangement of motives in the plot depends on the art of the tragic. Three types of ballads can be distinguished, differing in the development of the plot.
1. The open course of action in those ballads in which its development begins with a central episode - a description of the atrocity (“Prince Roman lost his wife”, “Prince Mikhailo”, “Rowan”, “The wife of her husband stabbed to death”, “Vasily and Sophia”, “ Slandered wife", "Nun - mother of a child").
The strong emotional impact in these ballads is not so much the murder episode as the behavior of the suffering character, who is not yet aware of the misfortune and is trying to find his missing mother (wife or brother), whom the listener, who already knows about what happened, follows with sympathy and compassion, and in the climax moment is secondarily - and more acutely - experienced with him. Lessing’s statement regarding the aesthetic functions of the open action of tragedy in Euripides is quite applicable to ballads of this type: “... he informed the viewer much earlier about all the disasters that were about to break out over the heads of his characters, trying to inspire compassion for them even when they themselves were far from considering themselves deserving of compassion” [Lessing G.E. Selected works. - M., 1953, p. 555].
2. Predicted fatal outcome. In this group of ballads, the hero, and with him the listener, becomes aware of the impending misfortune from the motives of a prophetic dream, an evil omen, an ominous omen (“Dmitry and Domna”, “Prince Roman and Marya Yuryevna”, “The Husband Killed His Wife”, “The Wife”) Prince Mikhail is drowning") or from the motive of preparation for a crime. In this case, the tragic emotions of the listeners are enhanced by the fact that throughout the development of the plot they, together with the heroes of the ballad, are in anxious anticipation: whether the prediction will come true or not, how this will happen, and are worried about the fate of the characters.
3. Tragic recognition. Such plots are based on an unexpected meeting of relatives who recognize each other by signs or by asking questions. The tragedy here arises as a result of either late recognition after fatal events or the need for a new separation of relatives who accidentally found each other. This method is more widely used in ballads about incest and tragic meetings of relatives. In the ballad “Brother Married His Sister,” brother and sister learn about their relationship after the wedding. They are seized with horror, the brother goes into the forest to be torn apart by wild animals, and the sister goes to the monastery. In the ballad “Hunter and Sister,” a young man, having seduced a girl, suddenly finds out that this is his sister. Out of despair, he commits suicide. In the ballad “The Mother-in-Law Captured by the Son-in-Law,” the mother recognizes her daughter by a mole or other signs in the wife of the Tatar who captivated her and suffers greatly, afraid to confess to her. The ballads “Soldier Husband Visiting His Wife”, “Kozarin”, “Widow’s Children”, “Robber Brothers and Sister”, “Well Done and the Smorodina River”, “There Was One Song...” (“There Was One Song...") are also based on tragic recognition. The husband killed his wife"), "Zaozerye, but aside...".
Ballads with the effect of surprise and tragic recognition can lose it in some versions and develop the action according to the principle of an open plot, and, conversely, ballads with open plot in variants they can be built on the effect of surprise, which disappears when a motive is introduced into the ballad, explaining in advance what happened.
In a ballad that seeks not only to surprise and excite, but also to shake the listener, an extremely important role is played by prophetic dreams, bad omens and predictions. In this genre one can find tragic motifs of great poetic power. These include the motive of unexpected tragic consequences (the mother-in-law kills her daughter-in-law, not suspecting that her death will cause the suicide of her son; the king executes the lover of his daughter, who kills herself out of grief) and the motive of transformation, metamorphosis (blood flows from a felled tree; on the graves of ruined lovers trees grow and intertwine).
The art of the tragic is revealed extremely clearly in the depiction of the attitude towards the terrible as ordinary (the poisoner calmly and confidently prepares the poison; the methodical torture of the daughter-in-law by the mother-in-law in the bathhouse is described in detail). It is this attitude of the villain towards murder that shocks listeners.
The art of the tragic is also manifested in the psychological depiction of the heroes of the ballad, when the depth of feelings of a person struck by the misfortune that has occurred is revealed. If the heroes lyrical songs are overcome by such feelings as sadness, melancholy, resentment, then the heroes of the ballads experience horror, despair, and endure great suffering.
The great emotional impact of ballads on listeners is undoubtedly. Many collectors testify to this. D. M. Balashov writes about the deep impression that the performance of the ballad “The Prince and the Elders” made on the audience: “One of the elderly morons said: “As we listened to this beautiful verse, we cried so much” [Balashov D. M. Russian Folk ballad. In the book Folk ballads. – M.; L., 1963, p. 15].
The power of the emotional and aesthetic impact of ballads lies in the art of the tragic opposition of life and death, which makes it possible to deeply understand the joy of being and experience soul-cleansing compassion for the perishing. The German philosopher N. Hartmann very subtly noted the essence of the sublime in the tragic: “It is not the death of good as such that is sublime, but the good itself in its destruction is illuminated by the sublime. And the more clearly death is reflected in the suffering and defeat of the fighter, the more the charm of the tragic intensifies” [Hartmann N. Aesthetics. - M., 1958, p. 559].
All art system ballads are defined by their tragedy and drama. Composition, methods of depicting a person and typifying life phenomena are subordinated to this need. Features of the composition of the ballad are single-conflict, dynamics, abundance of dialogues and monologues. Often the text of a ballad is structured like the text of a drama:
Evil nettle potion,
Even angrier and fiercer father-in-law!
Father-in-law's love to young daughter-in-law:
“Go, my daughter-in-law,
In an open field,
You become, my daughter-in-law,
Between three roads
Four sides
You are a curly rowan,
Curly, curly."
Here it’s like a stage direction in a play: “The fierceness of the father-in-law is for the young daughter-in-law.” Sometimes the ballad consists almost entirely of dialogue (for example, the children's questions about their missing mother and the father's evasive answers; the dialogue between the brothers-in-law who ask where their brother is and the lying answers of the daughter-in-law who killed her husband). As a rule, there are no beginnings in a ballad. Ballads usually begin directly with the action:
And Prince Roman lost his wife,
He lost his wife, he tormented his body,
He tormented the body and threw it into the river.
The lyrical beginning is characteristic of collapsing ballads, contaminating with lyrical songs. There are no special endings in ballads. Most often, ballads end with a monologue - the killer’s repentance:
His mother is born
I walked along the bank,
I walked along the bank
Proverbs said:
“I sinned grievously, grievously,
I lost three souls:
The first nameless soul,
Unrequited soul to another,
My third darling!”
Pictures of nature are rare in ballads. They usually play a figurative and expressive role:
You take me down to the swamp,
Put me under the block.
The main feature of the ballad - the rapid development of the plot, dynamism - necessitates the extremely sparing use of those poetic means that slow down the action. Ballads have their own system of symbolic means and allegories. So, about the love relationships of the characters it is said:
Don't boast, two brothers, I know your sister:
I had two dinners with your sister,
I ate dinner two times and breakfast the third time.
The prince learns about his wife’s infidelity from the allegorical hints of slanderers: “In your bedroom, all the beds are dirty, / All the beds are dirty...”
Brother-sister incest is discussed as follows:
The guy didn't say anything
He started making jokes.
or:
Without asking his mind,
He started joking with the girl.
A drowned woman caught in a fishermen's net is described as a "catch":
Caught some fresh fish
With arms and legs...
The grave is allegorically called the “new upper room”:
Our mother in the yellow sand,
She is buried in the new upper room.
And the “strong spirit” turns out to be a prison:
They caught the daredevil
They put me in a strong fire -
To the stone fort.
Sometimes allegory in ballads is imbued with irony. So, for example, Prince Volkonsky promises to “reward” the housekeeper with chambers (or mansions), but it turns out that this is a gallows:
For that reason, I will please you, the daring one,
I will reward the young man with all his tents,
These are the chambers - on two pillars,
I'll build you turned ropes,
I'll hang a silk loop for you.
Most often in ballads, the destroyer sneers at the victim. Thus, in the ballad “There Was One Song...” Fyodor ironically suggests to Marfa, who wants to change clothes before going to heat the bathhouse in which she is destined to die:
You're wearing your whole outfit!
Where should you put your outfit? -
Is it possible to dress up an oak tree!
As we can see, the poetic use of irony is one of the ways to reveal the image of the destroyer: he not only shows cruelty by killing an innocent victim, but also mocks her, which aggravates his guilt. The victim uses irony extremely rarely; for example, the housekeeper mocks the prince during torture:
So where am I, a slave,
To know the princess?
Hyperbole is rare in ballads and has a purely expressive function. It is created using a metaphor or simile:
She cried like a river flowed,
Tears roll like streams flow,
I cried because the weather was beating
The feeling of anger is hyperbolized differently. For example, hearing about his wife’s betrayal, the prince:
He will trample the gate with his right foot -
That gate in the middle of the yard flew away
Using hyperbole, the suffering of the victim is revealed:
At first the daughter-in-law cried out -
Mother earth groaned,
She screamed in the other row -
All the dark forests bowed to the ground,
On the third day the daughter-in-law cried out -
The good horse stumbled under him
The main role in the system of poetic means of the ballad is played by the epithet. With the help of epithets, the destroyer and the victim opposed in the conflict are characterized. On the one hand, unmerciful, formidable (executioners), hated (anger), damned (villain), dashing (mother-in-law, stepmother), fierce snake under the well (stepmother), on the other hand - unfortunate (daughter), hapless (lover), bitter (orphan), sinless (soul), innocent (soul, blood, darling), vain (death), righteous (souls), virtuous (sister), etc. The epithet plays an important role in creating the image of a person. With the help of epithets, the social characteristics of the characters are given, their appearance and characters are described, and their personal relationships are assessed.
If we compare the principles of constructing an image in a ballad and other genres, then along with the similarities we will also notice a number of significant differences. So, the basic principle of creating an image in epics and historical song, as in a ballad, is the revelation of character in actions and deeds. But if in epics the actions of the main character are heroic deeds, in historical songs they are participation in political events of national importance, then in ballads they are criminal actions, usually directed against a member of his family.
Different genres draw their means of creating an image from the general folklore system of means, and therefore a number of traditional formulas (anger, annoyance, sadness), conveying certain feelings, are used both in ballads and in epics and historical songs. But the reasons that cause these feelings and their consequences are different in each genre. If the hero is angry at the enemy who attacked his native lands, and defeats him in the fight, and Grozny is angry at his son, who did not support his policy, and almost executes him, then the ballad husband becomes angry because his wife did not save household or cheated on him, and kills her.
The degree of individualization of the heroes also differs. In ballads we cannot yet talk about the individualization of characters, because most of the characters do not even have a name, let alone a character. They differ only in family relationships (husband, brother, mother-in-law). But unlike fairy tales and epics, where negative character Usually portrayed one-sidedly, ballads reveal a more complex, contradictory inner world of the destroyer. A cruel mother-in-law, in one episode tormenting her daughter-in-law, in another appears before us as a loving mother, and in the third she blames herself and suffers. The king, who sent the young man to execution, repents of what he did and regrets that the mistake can no longer be corrected. All this makes the characters more lifelike and convincing.
In epics there are signs of individualization of images. True, the characters of the heroes are static, there is no complexity in this genre spiritual development characters, but the difference between them is not only in the name and certain feats characteristic of each hero. In the same situation, they behave differently (offended by Vladimir, the heroes leave Kyiv, Sukhman commits suicide, and Ilya defends the city). The characters of the heroes and their appearance differ.
In historical songs, the individualization of the image begins to develop, as the task arises of characterizing the spiritual appearance of certain historical figures.
The main means used to create images of characters in different genres also differ. In epics, hyperbole is more often used, distinguishing heroes among ordinary people, in lyrical songs - psychological parallelism and symbolism, allowing one to convey emotional experiences through comparison with the natural world, in ballads - sharp antitheticality, making it possible to more vividly reveal the images of characters faced in a tragic conflict.
The melodic organization of the ballad combined some of the properties of solemn chants, coming from epics and historical songs, with the musical tonality of ballad origin, carrying the intonation of sadness and misfortune. Sometimes the ballad takes on the rhythmic structure of lamentation.
All the noted features of ballads allow us to judge their ideological and artistic value, which ensures their long poetic life. This value lies in the humanistic role of the suffering character, in the condemnation of negative heroes as carriers of evil, in moral ideas (marital fidelity, love for children, respect for the freedom of choice of a spouse), in the art of constructing tragic situations.
The heyday of the ballad genre occurred in the 15th - 16th centuries, when the songs “Vasily and Sophia”, “Dmitry and Domna”, “Prince Roman was losing his wife”, “Prince Mikhailo”, “Rowanka”, which have survived to this day, appeared and became popular. Since the beginning of the 17th century, ballads, which existed along with epics, historical songs and spiritual poems, have been increasingly influenced by non-ritual lyrics, and the tragic endings of traditional ballads have been softened. At the end of the XVII - early XVIII century, the gradual destruction of the genre specificity of the ancient epic ballad begins, which is most clearly manifested in the saturation of ballads with lyrical elements and the destruction of plots. On the other hand, folk ballads, which influenced the emergence of literary ballads, in turn, at the end of the 18th - early XIX centuries begin to be influenced literary forms, which brings to life a “new” ballad - an author’s romantic ballad, sung and mastered by the people.
What is the current state of the ballad?
More than a quarter of a century ago, D. M. Balashov noted that ballads were almost forgotten, although they turned out to be more stable than epics. Expeditions in recent years indicate that the decline of the genre continues: the number of stories recorded by folklorists is decreasing, ballads are not actively used, but are stored in the memory of older people. But the extinction occurs unevenly: in some areas it is possible to record 5 - 10 stories, while in others - not a single one. So, for example, the author of the article in 1970 in the Kargopol district of the Arkhangelsk region and Kenozero (the most “ballad-filled” places before) was lucky enough to find 74 ballads (including “Vasily and Sophia”, “Forcible tonsure”, “The husband ruined his wife”, “The Slandered Wife”, “The Evil Root”, “The Robber Husband”, etc.). During a folklore expedition of the Faculty of Philology of Moscow State University in 1982, in the Chistopol region of the Tatar Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, the ballads “Robber Brothers and Sister”, “Soldier Husband Visiting His Wife”, “Slandered Wife”, “Robber Husband”, “Husband Drowned” were discovered wife”, “Cossacks burn a girl”, as well as a perfectly preserved version of the ballad “A girl’s threats to a young man” (according to scientists, this plot arose no later than the 17th century), in which the girl threatens to take revenge on her offender: “I’ll cook pies from the body”, “from hands... I’ll make a crib”, “from ribs... a detachable table”, “from blood - drunken beer.” A number of expeditions in subsequent years yield much more modest results, despite careful searches (one or two plots of the most common old ballads and several plots of later ones, which the performers consider ancient).
The most popular ballad in Russia on the theme “The Husband Killed His Wife” has been forgotten in some villages, but in others children know it and sing it. An analysis of the versions of the ballad “Prince Roman Lost His Wife” and “The Husband Ruined His Wife,” recorded in the Novgorod, Saratov, Vologda, Perm, Tula, Arkhangelsk, Kaluga regions, as well as in the North Caucasus, Don, Bashkiria, Tatarstan and Moscow, showed that during its long existence (the time range is over two hundred years, right up to the present day, and this ballad arose even earlier, in the 14th - 15th centuries), the themes, issues, ideological essence, as well as the system of characters, imagery, and plot remained unchanged. A study of the processes of the evolution of the plot revealed a tendency to compress it due to the loss of side motifs in both the first and second ballads. More ancient story“Prince Roman was losing his wife” turned out to be impenetrable to lyricization and gradually collapsed due to oblivion and loss of a number of motives, and “The Husband Was Ruining His Wife,” contaminating with lyrical beginnings, in a number of cases lost the plot-forming motives and became lyrical, in some versions turning into a lyrical song. One can also note a tendency towards narrowing the number of characters and schematizing images. The process of lyricization is also manifested in the fact that “high” ballad characters are replaced by traditional lyric characters (Don Cossack, good fellow, husband). In the second ballad, which was later in origin, a greater typification characteristic of the lyrics, a rejection of the personal names of the characters, and greater emotionality appeared.
In addition to the processes of narrowing the range of existing subjects, destruction, and oblivion, old ballads are being replaced by new ones. This process intensified in the second half of the 19th century, when folklore began to be strongly influenced by professional literary creativity. New ballads have rhyme, stanza, and in their metric system they are closer to Western European ballads than to ancient Russian ones. But their themes are largely traditional, although great changes have taken place here too. If in the old ballads the family theme predominated, then in the new ones it was love. In addition, new ballads acquired lyrical characteristics (evaluative statements, moralization, the narrator’s appeal to the listeners, etc.) and became lyrical-epic. It is often difficult to distinguish a romance from a new ballad (especially where we are talking about an imaginary suicide that turns into a reality).
In old ballads, the conflict arose due to the despotism of parents (or brother), and the heroes of new ballads, freed from the shackles of the patriarchal family, are free in their desires and actions, in choosing a lover. Even if their parents do not approve of their behavior, they act in their own way. Life punishes them severely. By killing the seducer, the girl takes revenge for the mental anguish she suffered, for the shame, for the illegitimate child. But prison, loneliness, and suicide await her. Unlike the ballad heroes, who suffer from tragic guilt, the heroes of the new ballads suffer from personal grievances caused by their self-will and permissiveness. The heroine of the old ballad commits suicide so as not to be disgraced, and the heroine of the new one - being disgraced. The people sympathize with her, although they do not approve of her behavior.
The new ballad is a complex and ambiguous phenomenon. Scientists (D. M. Balashov, E. V. Pomerantseva, N. P. Kopaneva, N. P. Zubova) showed a number of ways to form this genre. Traditional plots receive an exotic design, features of Western and Russian literary ballads (kings, queens, castles, knights, jesters, romantic beauties, etc.); distant countries (Mexico, Japan, Spain, England), sea elements, fatal passions; exquisite foreign names of characters (Malvina, Marianna, Arthur, Jack, Colombina, etc.). The plots of Western ballads have entered popular life: “Rival Sisters”, “When I Served as a Coachman at the Post Office”, “The Moon Turned Crimson”, “Walks Along the Don”, Russian poets (A. S. Pushkin, M. Yu. Lermontov, N. A. Nekrasov, S. T. Aksakov, V. V. Krestovsky, etc.). Many independent folk compositions of varying artistic quality (sometimes naturalistically describing brutal murders, accidental or deliberate atrocities). Among the most popular in modern repertoire We should include plots that reflect universal human dramatic situations (“Soldiers were traveling,” “Vanka the Key Holder,” “Like in our village,” “I lost a ring”) and based on a traditional folklore basis.
The productive creative life of new ballads, according to the observations of scientists, is already at its end. In the minds of the performers they are perceived as ancient; but are still popular among older people.
So, old and new ballads are fading away, but their study is just beginning. Gradually, step by step, scientists are revealing the secrets of the ballad. One of its first researchers, N.P. Andreev, pointed out some of the features of these songs, noting “a clearly expressed narrative character, often reaching a level of dramatic tension” [Russian ballad. Preface, edition and appendix by V.I. Chernyshev. Introductory article by N. P. Andreev. B-poet. Big series. - M.; L., 1966, p. 18]. V. Ya. Propp and B. N. Putilov identified other important features of the ballad: its family and everyday themes and frequent tragic resolutions of conflicts [See Byliny, vol. 1. Preparation of the text, introductory article and commentary by V. Ya. Propp and B. N. Putilova. - M., 1958, p. 17]. D. M. Balashov, having studied the nature of the ballad genre on a number of basic subjects in all versions and variants, found out the time of the genre’s emergence, the features of its development, ideological orientation and artistic characteristics. The results of D. M. Balashov’s research were published in a number of articles devoted to the most popular subjects, as well as in the book “The History of the Development of the Russian Ballad Genre” (Petrozavodsk, 1966). Basic genre features D. M. Balashov examines ballads in the article “Russian folk ballad” (in the book “Folk Ballads.” - M.; Leningrad, 1963), where he summarizes his observations. Having defined the range of works included in the ballad genre more clearly than previous researchers, the scientist nevertheless followed the path of a broad interpretation of the genre: “The ballad is an epic narrative song of a dramatic nature” (p. 7). Turning to the ballad genre in creativity Slavic peoples, N. I. Kravtsov in the article “Slavic folk ballad” [See: From the history of the class struggle and the national liberation movement in the Slavic countries. Scientific notes of the Institute of Slavic Studies of the USSR Academy of Sciences, vol. 28, 1964, p. 222 - 246] examined in detail the thematic groups of Slavic ballads, their genre specificity, plot features, paying serious attention to the issue of the generic affiliation of ballads - their epic character.
The study of the ballad genre was continued by B. N. Putilov in the book “Slavic Historical Ballad” [Putilov B. N. Slavic Historical Ballad. - M.; L, 1966]. Having studied only one thematic group of ballads - historical, but on a large material, and most importantly - on a broad social background, the scientist successfully resolved issues related to the specifics of this genre: the features of historical ballads, their difference from epics and historical songs.
Interesting observations on the wonderful motifs in the ballad are contained in the book by O. F. Tumilevich about the ballad and fairy tale [See: Tumilevich O. F. Folk ballad and fairy tale. - Saratov, 1972]. The index compiled by Yu. I. Smirnov is of great importance in the study of ballads and forms close to them [See: Smirnov Yu. I. East Slavic ballads and forms close to them. - M., 1988] (so far the author has published 250 of the ones he allocated plot forms: I. Mother and son (daughter); II. A mythical creature (ethnic enemy, foreigner) needs a girl; III. The ethnic hero gets the girl).
The plots of the ballads are scattered across many publications. They can be found in collections of epics by Rybnikov, Hilferding, Markov, Onchukov, Grigoriev, collections of historical songs by Putilov and Dobrovolsky, collections of lyrical songs by Kireyevsky and Sobolevsky. On the other hand, collections of ballads include works of other genres. Thus, in Chernyshev’s collection there are many lyrical and round dance songs, and in Balashov’s collection there are historical songs, spiritual poems, buffoons, lyrical songs, and new ballads.
This is due to the fact that ballads have a number of features that bring them closer to other genres, and the range of ballad plots is not yet clearly defined. The genre specificity of the ballad is determined by a number of features of its content and form. The content of ballads is characterized by a combination of characteristics: family and everyday themes, tragedy, ideological orientation associated with folk humanistic morality (condemnation of evil, defense of freedom of feeling). These features individually may be inherent in other genres, but in such a combination they exist only in the ballad.
Its form is characterized by: a smaller volume compared to an epic and a larger volume compared to a lyrical song, the presence of a complete plot, single-conflict and intense action, epic narration, objectivity of the story, tonic verse without a chorus or strophic rhyme; chant without recitative or chant.
The ballad is close to spiritual poems and some historical songs, which are also characterized by the presence of a plot, single-conflict and intense action, and narration.
The ballad has a number of common features in common with individual epics, both substantive and formal, for example, family and everyday themes and tragedy (“Danila Lovchanin”, “Sukhman”, “Danube and Nastasya”), the presence of a plot, and narration.
The identification of ballads with lyrical songs is facilitated by their family and everyday themes and narrative, characteristic of some lyrical songs.
The ballad and related genres in the process of existence have mutual influence. In addition, the same theme can be developed through the poetic means of epic and ballad, historical song and ballad, lyrical song and ballad, which sometimes leads to the assimilation of these genres.
If we compare the texts of the epic “Mikhail Kazarin” from the collection of Kirsha Danilov and the ballad “Kozarin” from the collection of D. M. Balashov, we will see how significantly they differ, despite the similarity, which is expressed in the common theme (Kozarin saves the captive of three Tatars, having dealt with them, he almost enters into an incestuous relationship with her, but from questioning he learns that this is his sister), the presence of a plot, in folk humanistic morality. As we can see, what these two works have in common are elements of their content, and the form, despite some common features (epic, narrative, the nature of the verse), is different. The volume of “Mikhaila Kazarinova” is 266 lines, and “Kozarina” is 51, that is, the first text is more than five times longer. In "Mikhail Kazarinov" there is multi-conflict action. The hero arrives in Kyiv to Prince Vladimir; feasts with him; carries out his instructions; on the way back he meets a prophetic raven, from whom he learns about the captive; sees the Tatars and watches how they want to deal with the Russian girl; then he kills them and, having almost committed incest, finds out that this is his sister; takes her to Prince Vladimir, where he receives a reward: a glass of wine in one and a half buckets, turium horn of honey in half a third bucket, and gratitude for the fact that the good fellow serves him faithfully. In “Kozarin” the action is one-conflict: the Tatars want to deal with the girl, and a good fellow saves her and finds out that this is her sister. If we compare the cast of characters, we will see that in “Kozarin” these are brother, sister and enemies, and in “Mikhail Kazarinov” their number is wider in epic style: in addition to those named, Prince Vladimir, Princess Aproksevna and prophetic raven. The action of “Mikhaila Kazarinov” develops slowly, with retardations and detailed descriptions, while in “Kozarin” it develops rapidly and intensely. The time in “Mikhail Kazarinov” is epic, dedicated to the reign of Prince Vladimir, and in “Kozarin” it is uncertain, correlated with the time of the capture of Moscow by the Tatars. The location of “Mikhaila Kazarinov” is localized in Kyiv, where the hero receives a task and where he returns after completing it. And in “Kozarin” the young man appears “from afar out of the open air” and returns “to Holy Rus', to glorious Moscow.” In “Mikhail Kazarinov” the hero is a hero, whose image is created in different ways: epithets (mighty, daring, kind, “good luck good fellow”), descriptions of his heroic armor, weapons, heroic horse, heroic power. There is not a single similar description in Kozarin. True, he also deals with the enemy, but like an ordinary warrior.
So, comparing these texts, we see that “Mikhail Kazarinov” is distinguished by an epic plot development, and “Kozarin” is distinguished by a ballad one.
If we compare three options for developing the theme of the murder of Skopin Shuisky, who, according to rumors, was poisoned by the wife of Dmitry Shuisky, who was jealous of his fame, then we can make an observation about the processes of balladization of the historical song.
The song “Something else happened to us in Moscow” was recorded in 1619 - 1620. It is presented in the form of a lament regarding the death of the governor. There is no event here. Therefore, there is no plot. This is a vivid example of historical songs, the plot of which is open-ended, “and this open-endedness allows us to perceive the content of the works as a link in a really ongoing historical process” [Selivanov F. M. On the specifics of a historical song. On Sat. "Specificities of genres of Russian folklore." - M., 1973, p. 54]. The text “Mikhail Skopin” from the collection of Kirsha Danilov is expanded in epic style (193 lines), with a multi-conflict plot: enemies surround Moscow; Prince Skopin turns to King Carlos of Svitsa, with his help Skopin’s troops defeat the enemy; in Moscow masses with prayers are served, then a feast is held where Skopin is glorified; after some time, Skopin is invited as godfather to Prince Vorotynsky’s christening; at the feast he boasts of his victories; envious boyars, who “fell into trouble,” pour a fierce potion into a glass of sweet honey, and the godfather, the daughter of Malyuta Skuratov, brings it to Skopin; Feeling that he is poisoned, Skopin blames the destroyer and goes home, where he dies.
Despite the influence of some elements of the epic form (volume, multi-conflict nature, the nature of the verse, some stylistic means), this is not an epic, but a historical song, since the characters here are real political figures: Skopin, Vorotynsky, as well as the daughter of the executioner Malyuta Skuratov, whose name became a household name in historical songs. The heroes and Prince Vladimir are absent here. The scene of action is not localized in the epic center - Kyiv. The time is not epic, dedicated to the reign of Vladimir, but specific, although conditional: “one hundred and twenty-seventh year of the eighth thousand.” A hero is not a hero, but a commander who wins not with his personal power, but with strategy: having weighed his possibilities, he resorts to the help of his allies and, leading an army, wins. The motivation for his murder, unlike the ballads, is not family, but political: he is being destroyed by his rivals. The text from the collection of D. M. Balashov is a typical ballad about poisoning. All that remains of historical realities is the name Skopin. This is a single-conflict work, the volume is 38 lines, the action develops intensely and rapidly: the mother asks her son not to idolize Malyuta’s daughter, but he neglects the warning, and his godfather poisons him. The ending is also traditionally ballad-like: a mother’s lament for her lost son and a reproach to the murderer.
The theme “Soldier Husband Visiting His Wife” is developed as a ballad, a lyrical song and a new ballad; The theme “The Prince executes the housekeeper, his wife’s lover” is both a ballad and a new ballad. We can give a number of other examples of the use of the same theme in ballads and related genres. Therefore, if the reader encounters in the collection of ballads offered to his attention a plot included in collections of historical songs, spiritual poems or lyrical songs, he should keep in mind the above considerations about the possibility of developing the same theme in different genres.
The collection, prepared by the famous Slavic scholar B.P. Kirdan, differs from previously published collections of Russian ballads.
Thus, V.I. Chernyshev, compiler of the collection “Russian Ballad” (1936), adhered to the thematic principle of classifying ballads, which, however, was not followed in all sections of his book. Some of the sections were structured according to genre, others - according to chronological principles, and the third - according to ideological and emotional principles. In addition to ballads, the compiler included songs of other genres - play, round dance, comic, dance, narrative lyrical (recruit, soldier, family), as well as buffoons, satirical and humorous songs, new ballads.
When compiling his collection “Folk Ballads” (1963), D. M. Balashov tried to take into account the shortcomings of the previous one, clarify the range of ballad plots, and give a clearer definition of the genre. He took the thematic principle as the basis for classifying the material, but also did not follow it to the end. In addition to the sections “Family and Household Ballads” and “Historical and Social Ballads,” the compiler included “Satirical and Comic Ballads” (ideological and emotional principle) and “New Ballads” (chronological principle).
Compiler of the anthology “Historical Songs. Ballads" (1986) in the folklore series of the Sovremennik publishing house. S. N. Azbelev, sharing the principle of a broad interpretation of the ballad genre, placed ballad songs interspersed with historical ones in chronological order(although it is difficult to establish for a number of ballads), distinguishing three groups: “Songs Ancient Rus'", "Songs of the Transitional Era" and "Songs of the New Time".
In the collection offered to the reader, B.P. Kirdan, unlike his predecessors, quite rightly, in our opinion, does not include buffoons, satirical and humorous songs, emphasizing such important genre-forming features as tragedy and drama. But, on the other hand, if for D. M. Balashov the form is of primary importance (he believes that “all plots, the stylistic assessment of which allows them to be considered ballads, should be classified as ballad genre” [Russian folk ballads. Introductory article, preparation of the text and notes by D. M. Balashov. - M., 1983, p. 8]), then B. P. Kirdan takes the content as a basis and expands the “formal” boundaries of the genre, including in his collection individual works containing motifs, plots or ballad-type situations (narrative lyrical songs, new ballads [Note that D. M. Balashov in his collection singled them out in a special section, but the Western Slavs (Poles, Czechs, Slovaks) did not do this in their publications], as well as some historical songs).
This approach has its own positive side: in each section the reader will be able to follow the processes of evolution of the genre (from epics and historical songs to lyrical songs and new ballads with their stanzas and rhymes borrowed from literature) and get acquainted with a number of works close to ballads that have “ balladry" (by which we can understand the presence of episodes with ballad conflicts in an epic, a historical song or a ballad situation in a lyrical song).
The collection has five thematic sections (“Historical ballads”, “Military-domestic ballads”, “Ballads of robbers”, “Love and pre-marital relationships” and “Family-domestic ballads”), covering different sides life of Rus' for over six hundred years.
The reader will see the fates of different people who lived in ancient times, their thoughts, feelings, experiences, their search for goodness and justice. With sympathy and excitement, he will follow the tragic choice that the father must make, deciding which of his three sons to send to the twenty-year-old soldiery; behind the sacrifice of the mother, begging her tormentors to destroy her so that the children would not hear or be afraid, behind the repentance of the villain and the torment of a sinful or innocent soul...
And if the reader, sympathizing with the heroes of the ballads, experiences catharsis that cleanses and enlightens the soul, it means that the ideological and aesthetic goals of the ballads have been realized and the work of their creators, collectors and publishers is not in vain
A. Kulagina

HISTORICAL BALLADS

PA N BRINGS RUSSIAN POLONYANKA TO MY WIFE

1.
Panushko is walking around the yard,
He chooses a good horse
Panyushka stood at the stirrup,
Panushka was given the whip;
Panya Panu herself said:
“Don’t go to work, sir,
To that sovereign princess,
You won't be alive, sir, -
You, sir, will be killed!” -
“Don’t worry, listen, my lady!
I'll leave in good health,
I'll bring you some gifts, dear lady -

Thin, long, tall,


In a wide ribbon at the bottom,

In white paper stockings."
I'll go, I'll go out into the new hallway,
From the new canopy to the porch,
From the porch into an open field;
I'll look at the blue sea,
How it was on the blue sea
Suddenly the little sails turned white,
Suddenly three chips turned black.
As it was in the first chip -
They're bringing the lord's dress,
The lord's dress is German.
As it was in another shaving -
They are transporting the gentleman not alive;
The gentleman was killed, but not to death.
As it was in the third chip -
They are bringing gifts for Panyushka:
From Rus', a Russian Polonyanka girl,
Thin, long, tall, |
In a white calico shirt,
In a scarlet taffeta sundress,
In a wide, low-cut ribbon,
In scarlet morocco shoes,
In white paper stockings.

THREE TATARIN FUCKED A GIRL

2.
What does the prince and the boyar have?
At the guest's and at the merchant's
Two daughters were born,
And the same son was born
Named Kozarin Petrovich.
Kozarin's family has been spoiled,
Separated from mother and father,
Father and mother did not love each other,
They called him a thief and a robber,
All sorts of plantains.
Kozarin grew up at the age of seventeen,
Kozarin went to an open field,
In the open field and in the expanse.
In the open field and in the expanse
A bird sits on an oak tree and prophesies,
A prophetic bird and a black raven.
Kozarin pulled his tight bow,
Straighten the bow and sharpen the arrow.
As the prophetic bird speaks,
The prophetic bird and the black raven:
- Don’t shoot me, good fellow,
I'll tell you yes about the open field,
About the pure field and about the expanse.
In pure poly and in expanse,
In Razdolitsa there is a white tent,
There is a midday maiden in the tent,
Named Marfa Petrovna.
She sits there and cries tears,
She cries and sits lamenting:
- And who would buy me out?
And he bought me and helped me out

From three dogs and unblessed?

- You sit down, girl, on a good horse,
You, girl, will go to an open field,
In the open field and in the expanse.
The girl sat on a good horse,
The girl said to the good fellow:
- We’ll go, good fellow,
Let us get married in God's church,
Let us exchange a gold ring.
As the good fellow says:
- It’s not common in Rus',
Brother-from-sister does not marry.
The girl got off the good horse.
I bowed to my white breasts,
Another gave up to the silk belt,
The third one gave yes to the damp ground:
- Thank you, brother, my dear,
He bought me out, saved me
From three Tatars and unbaptized,
From three dogs unblessed.

3.
Because of the glorious womb of the Kuban River
The Tatar power rose,
That the Tatar power, the Busurman,
What about the glorious womb of Holy Rus'.
They filled the stone womb of Moscow.
Yes, the girl went to three Tatars,
A maiden for three Tatars, Busurmans.
As the first one said, this is the word:
- I will kill the soul of the red maiden with a sword.
The second one said this:
- I will crush the soul of the maiden with a spear.
The third Tatar said this:
“I’ll crush the girl’s soul with a horse.”
As if from far away, far away from the open field
It’s not clear that the falcon is flying,
What is not gray - the gyrfalcon flies -
A daring, good fellow leaves.
He killed the first Tatar with a sword,
He chopped off the second Tatar with a spear,
He trampled the third Tatar with his horse,
And he took the soul of the beautiful maiden with him.
- We’ll begin, girl, to divide the night into thirds.
To divide the night into thirds and otherwise commit sin.
As the beautiful maiden soul says:

When were you better than your father,
And now it has become worse than the three Tatars,
Worse than the three Busurmanin Tatars.
- Oh, you are, you are a beautiful soul!
Which kingdom-fatherland are you?
- Oh, you are a daring, good fellow!
I myself am a beautiful maiden from Holy Rus',
From holy Rus' and from glorious Moscow,
I am not of great family, no less,
What was the same with the princely family?
How my father had nine sons,

Four brothers serve the king,
And four brothers pray to God,
And the ninth brother is a hero in poly,
And the tenth one is me, bitter.
As the daring, good fellow said:
- Forgive me, girl, for the first reason,
Firstly, great guilt:
You are my kindred sister, dear,
We will go, girl, to Holy Rus'.
To holy Rus', to glorious Moscow.

4.
Peter had Karamyshov,
He had only one daughter,
One daughter and the same,
One and only Elisaphia,
And I wanted to go to the green garden.
Thieves and robbers have arrived
Al takii filthy and Tatar,
They took the girl away from the open field,
They tied the girl to a white tent.
At the white tent the maiden is killed,
The girl is killed near the white tent.
She has a light brown braid and owes her due:
“You are my light-blond braid,
You are my braid and my maiden beauty!
Last night you had your braid combed,
It was braided well.

At the wedding of Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin and Natalia Nikolaevna Goncharova, they sang the poet’s favorite song, bitter and drawn-out.

The eternal plot of a folk song - a girl is forcibly married off - is interpreted in this masterpiece of Russian folklore with psychological subtlety, laconic and dynamic.

“My mother, what is hovering in the field?” - without foreshadowing anything terrible, the girl’s calm voice sounds, and only a gloomy structure of the melody, an alarming repetition: “My dear, what is hovering in the field?” - with sorrowful pressure on each syllable in the word “darling” they make the listener suspect the beginning of important and sad events. The mother’s soft, soothing answer: “My dear, the horses are playing out”, repetition: “My dear, the horses are playing out” - with the same pressure on each syllable in the word “darling” for a moment stops the movement of the anxious feeling. And then again the frightened voice of the girl sounds, looking out the window and has already understood a lot, and in response to it - again the soothing, again affectionate voice of the mother: everything was clear at the beginning, but the mother, feeling sorry for the “child,” drove away dark thoughts from her , protected from premature fear...

This amazing song, which even now invariably touches hearts in any performance - sincerely homely or professionally sophisticated - combines three seemingly difficult to combine features: a strong consistency in the story of the event, i.e. epicness, subtlety and strength in the expression of feelings, i.e. lyricism, and tension in the unfolding of the plot, the “twisting” of the action, i.e. drama, or more precisely, dramaturgy.

“I must confess my own savagery: every time I hear the old song about Percy and Douglas, my heart begins to beat faster than the sound of a war bugle, and yet it is sung by some commoner whose voice is as rough as syllable of a song,” wrote the English poet, adept of learned, refined and virtuosic poetry, Sir Philip Sidney in the 16th century about one English ballad popular among the people.

“...The feelings expressed in this ballad are extremely natural, and poetic, and full of that majestic simplicity that we admire in the greatest poets of antiquity... Only nature can produce such an impression and give pleasure to all tastes, both the most spontaneous and the most refined... There are places in it where not only the thought, but also the language is majestic, and the verses are sonorous,” wrote the English poet and critic, “tastemaker” of the time, and defender of classicist rigor, Joseph Addison, in the 18th century about the same ballad.

By interrupting the conversation about a Russian song with quotes dedicated to an English ballad, one can connect “Mother,” close and alive to us, with that distant and bygone world that stands behind the texts of this book. This connection is not subjective, it was not chosen for the sake of words. The English folk ballad, as well as any Western European folk ballad in general, is a type of folk song. The definition, which has now been accepted by the majority of folklorists in many countries, states that a folk ballad is a narrative song of a predominantly lyrical-dramatic nature with a strophic structure. Let us add that most folk ballads are characterized by a chorus (refrain), often not directly related to the content of the song; the functions of the refrain were apparently initially associated with the rhythmic structures of the work, since the ballad was sometimes (at least in Denmark) not only sung, but also danced.

Listening to “Mother”, reading the ballads of this book, we will have to, following Sidney, “admit our own savagery” and, following Addison, submit to “majestic simplicity”, because, without any commentary, listening to the English “Ballad of Two Sisters”, or the German “Lilothea”, or the Danish “The Power of the Harp”, we will again and again experience the direct emotional impact of these masterpieces of folklore.

What are their roots, who and when were these works created?

Ballads arose in the era of the mature Middle Ages (in many ways as a continuation of the earlier epic tradition) in the form of oral works, maintained in the memory of the people only thanks to the performers. Like any oral monument, ballads “do not know either an author in the usual sense of the word, or a canonical text, or a specific date of creation, or editions separated by impenetrable barriers.” That is why for us there is no history of the development of the ballad as such: only records that begin to be made in different countries at different times, but everywhere not earlier than the 16th century, record them and transfer, so to speak, from the intangible world to the material world. No one can speak with certainty about the age or place of origin of this or that ballad; It is only by certain features that it is possible to divide ballads into certain groups and thereby identify strongholds in the systematization of the complex world of folk ballads.

In particular, in English folkloristics a stable idea has developed about two main layers in the Anglo-Scottish ballad fund: these are, on the one hand, the so-called “traditional ballads” (actually folk) and, on the other hand, “minstrel ballads” (i.e. . created by professional literary musicians, and not “folk singers”). Works of the first type, as noted, are impersonal; as a rule, the location of the action is not specified in them; the plot core is interpreted to a certain extent dryly and dynamically; in ballads of the second type, the singer often reveals himself as a clearly distinguishable “I”, shows a taste for topographical details, for detailed, leisurely storytelling. And yet, ballads of the second type are still included in all collections of folk ballads, since the minstrel should be perceived rather not as a sophisticated bearer of the entire sum of medieval culture, but as a wandering semi-educated singer (something like an organ grinder of a later time), entertaining low people on fairs and inns.

Even the specific historical events underlying certain ballads say little about the time of creation: the cycles of Scandinavian and German ballads about Emperor Theodoric (remember the poems of A. A. Blok about Ravenna, which took the name of Diedrich of Berne in folklore, absorbed early German legends appeared in their final form at very different times, in any case, they were formed over several centuries.

Many ballads exist in different, sometimes very numerous versions. Different versions strictly follow the outline of the plot and accurately convey the sequence of events, but their style can differ quite significantly. This once again emphasizes the existence of folk ballads as an oral monument. The folklore features of the poetics of folk ballads - simple rhymes, stable epithets, magic numbers - also developed into a system largely as a consequence of the “memorability requirements”.

The very word “ballad” for a folk narrative song began to be used relatively late. In French lyric poetry of the 14th–15th centuries, along with the “big song” and the rondel, a stable form called the “ballad”, interpreted as a purely lyrical poem and consisting of three stanzas, eight lines each, with a strictly defined rhyme system (three rhymes run through all stanzas). Having penetrated into English literature, the French ballad, while retaining its lyrical nature for a while, underwent some structural changes due to the fact that the English language is poorer in rhymes: each stanza began to rhyme separately, independently of the other two. Gradually, the requirement of three-strophe was also lost: already in the 15th century in England, ballads of very different lengths were created, and little by little the plot element began to penetrate into them. Therefore, when in the 16th century, folk songs of a narrative nature and verse construction, which arose around this time, were sung with might and main in inns and were extremely popular among the people, began to be printed in the form of “flying sheets” among the people, they began to be called ballads. Over time, the same word began to be used for ancient “traditional” songs that go back centuries. Throughout Scandinavia and Germany, any works of this genre until the 19th century were called folk songs; the term “folk ballad” came into use there only relatively recently.

Literature 5th grade. A textbook-reader for schools with in-depth study of literature. Part 1 Team of authors

Folk ballad

Folk ballad