Anecdotal tales. funny tales

13.02.2019

Once upon a time there were a Bunny and a Squirrel. They were friends, they loved each other. Somehow the Bunny suggests:
- Squirrel, let's live together, get married.
- How so, because you are a Bunny, and I am a Squirrel.
- The strength of our love is higher than stereotypes and species-racial considerations, Squirrel.
They began to live as a family, and there is love, and understanding, and there is sex. There are just no children. They got sad. Bunny says:
- Do we really not have children because I am a Bunny, and you are a Squirrel? How so? Let's go to Owl, she's smart, she knows everything.
They came to the Owl and the Bunny says:
- Owl, tell me why we don't have children? Because we are Bunny and Squirrel?
- Are you crazy or what? You don't have children because you are a boy and he is also a boy!

There lived an old man and an old woman near Lake Chad. The old man went fishing. The first time I threw poison curare - only toads surfaced. The second time he threw poison curare - only crocodiles surfaced. The third time I threw poison to the curare - the Golden Piranha surfaced and wanted to say, they say, let me go old, I will fulfill three cherished desires, but I couldn’t, because I was paralyzed. The old man returned to the old woman with prey, the old woman was delighted, they salted the toads for the winter, they dried the crocodiles for the summer, and they immediately ate the Golden Piranha right raw. Thus, all three wishes were fulfilled by themselves.

Once upon a time there was a sister Alyonushka and a brother Ivanushka. Alyonushka was smart and hardworking, and Ivanushka was an alcoholic. How many times did his sister tell him - “Don’t drink, Ivanushka, you will become a kid!” But Ivanushka did not listen and drank. Once he bought some singed vodka in a stall, drank it and felt that he could no longer stand on two legs, he had to lower himself by four points. And just then the shameful wolves come up to him and say: “Well, the goat, did you drink it?”. And so they hit him on the horns that he threw back his hooves ...
And his sister Alyonushka got his apartment, because good always triumphs over evil!

Bear hut
Who ate from my plate? Father Bear asks menacingly.
Who ate from my plate? the eldest son asks.
- And who ate from my plate? - squeaks the youngest son.
“Fuckers, I haven’t poured you yet. - answers the bear.

A soldier was walking home from service. He knocked on the way to a house. “Let me in,” he says, “to spend the night, masters.” And in the house lived a greedy old woman. “Spend the night, sleep,” she said, “only I have nothing to treat you with.” “It doesn’t matter,” the soldier replied, “just give me an ax, and I’ll cook porridge out of it.” “What are you, a soldier,” the old woman was indignant, “do you think I’m completely stupid? What am I going to chop wood with later? So the soldier remained without salty slurping. By the way, his name was Rodion Raskolnikov.

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oak, and on that oak there are golden chains, and a cat walks along those chains: it goes up - it tells tales, it goes down - it sings songs. (Record by A. S. Pushkin).

Formulas depicting a wonderful horse, Baba Yaga lying in a hut or flying in a mortar, a many-headed Serpent are widely known ... Many of them

The remains of myths and therefore significantly ancient fairy tale. Some fairy tale formulas go back to conspiracies, they retain clear signs magical speech (calling a wonderful horse, appealing to the hut of Baba Yaga, demanding something by pike command).

The dynamism of fairy tale narration made the stylistic role of verbs especially important. The actions of the heroes (functions), which form the structural basis of the motives, are stylistically fixed in the form of supporting verbs in their traditional combination for a particular motive: flew in - hit - became; splashed - grown together; hit - drove, swung - cut down.

The fairy tale actively used the poetic style common to many folklore genres: comparisons, metaphors, words with diminutive suffixes; proverbs, sayings, jokes; various nicknames for people and animals. Traditional epithets, along with the epithets gold and silver, which are especially expressed in this genre, sublimely portrayed the world, poeticized and spiritualized it.

3.3. Household fairy tales

In everyday fairy tales, a different view of a person and the world around him is expressed. At the heart of their fiction are not miracles, but reality, folk everyday life.

The events of everyday fairy tales always unfold in one space - conditionally real, but these events themselves are incredible. For example: at night the king goes with a thief to rob a bank (SUS 951 A); the priest sits on a gourd to nurse a foal out of it (SUS 1319); the girl recognizes the robber in the groom and convicts him (SUS 955). Due to the improbability of events, everyday fairy tales are fairy tales, and not just everyday stories. Their aesthetics requires an unusual, unexpected, sudden development of the action, which should cause surprise in the listeners and, as a result, empathy or laughter.

In everyday fairy tales, purely fantastic characters sometimes appear, such as the devil, grief, share. The meaning of these images is only to reveal the real life conflict underlying

fairy story. For example, a poor man locks his Grief in a chest (bag, barrel, pot), then buries it - and gets richer. His rich brother envy releases Grief, but now it is attached to him (SUS 735 A). In another tale, the devil cannot quarrel between a husband and wife in any way - an ordinary troublemaker woman comes to his aid (SUS 1353).

The plot develops due to the clash of the hero not with magical powers but with difficult life circumstances. The hero comes out unscathed from the most hopeless situations, because he is helped by a happy coincidence of events. But more often he helps himself - with ingenuity, resourcefulness, even trickery. Everyday fairy tales idealize the activity, independence, intelligence, courage of a person in his life struggle.

The artistic sophistication of the narrative form is not characteristic of everyday fairy tales: they are characterized by brevity of presentation, colloquial vocabulary, dialog. Everyday fairy tales do not tend to triple motives and generally do not have such developed plots as fairy tales. Tales of this type do not know colorful epithets and poetic formulas.

Of the compositional formulas, the simplest beginnings of lived-were as a signal of the beginning of a fairy tale are common in them. By origin, it is an archaic (long-gone) tense from the verb "to live", which disappeared from the living language, but "petrified" in the traditional fairy-tale beginning. Some storytellers ended everyday fairy tales with rhymed endings. In this case, the endings lost that artistry that was appropriate for completing fairy tales, but they retained their cheerfulness. For example: Fairy tale not all, but you can’t instruct, but if you had a glass of wine, you would tell end 1 .

The artistic framing of everyday fairy tales with beginnings and endings is not mandatory, many of them begin right from the beginning and end with the final touch of the plot itself. For example, A. K. Baryshnikova begins the tale like this: Popadya did not love the priest, but she loved the deacon. And here's how it ends: Ran home with a TV(i.e. undressed) 2 .

The number of Russian everyday fairy tales is very significant: more than half of the national fairy tale repertoire. This huge

1 Russian folk tales. The tales were told by the Voronezh storyteller A.N. Korolkova / Comp. and resp. Ed. E.V. Pomerantsev. - M., 1969. - S. 333.

2 Tales of Kupriyanikh / Recording of fairy tales, article and comments. A.M. Novikova and I.A. Osovetsky. - Voronezh, 1937. - S. 158, 160. (The tale "How the deacon loved the priest").

material forms inside fabulous view an independent subspecies in which two genres are distinguished: anecdotal and short stories. According to a rough estimate, in Russian folklore there are 646 plots of anecdotal tales, 137 short stories. Among the numerous anecdotal tales there are many plots that are not known to other peoples. They express that "cheerful cunning of the mind", which A. S. Pushkin considered " hallmark our morals."

3.3.1. Anecdotal tales

in family or in society: a poor peasant, a hired worker, a thief, a soldier, a simple-minded fool, an unloved husband. His opponents are a rich man, a priest, a gentleman, a judge, a devil, "smart" older brothers, an evil wife. The people expressed their contempt for them through all sorts of forms of fooling. The conflict of most plots of anecdotal tales is built on fooling.

To For example, a husband finds out about his wife's infidelity. He hides in the hollow of a thick pine tree and pretends to be St. Nicholas - Mikola Duplensky. The imaginary saint advises his wife: "Tomorrow you ... dissolve buckwheat pancakes and spread butter as much as possible with butter,.let these pancakes float

in oil, and the honor of her husband, to QH ate them. When he eats, he will be blind, the light will come out of his eyes and the hearing in his ears will be damaged ... "(SUS

1380: "Nicholas Duplens-ky")1 .

In another tale, a fool accidentally kills his mother. He puts her as if alive in a sleigh and rides out to big road. The lordly troika rushes towards, the fool does not turn off, his sleigh is overturned. The fool shouts that his mother was killed, the frightened master gives three hundred rubles as compensation. Then the fool makes the dead mother sit down in the priest's cellar over pots of milk. Popadya takes her for a thief, hits her on the head with a stick - the body falls. Fool screams: "Got mother killed!" Pop paid the fool a hundred rubles and buried the body for nothing. With the money, the fool

1 Tales of I.F. Kovaleva / Zap. And a comment. E. Hoffman and S. Mints. - M., 1941. - S. 209.

comes home and tells the brothers that he sold his mother in the city at the market. The brothers killed their wives and took them to sell ("If they gave so much for the old woman, they will give twice for the young ones"). They are exiled to Siberia, all the property goes to the fool (SUS 1537: "Dead body").

No one accepts such stories as reality, otherwise they would only cause a feeling of indignation. An anecdotal tale is a hilarious farce, the logic of the development of its plot is the logic of laughter, which is opposite to ordinary logic, is eccentric.

Yu. I. Yudin came to the conclusion that behind all the variety of characters in anecdotal tales, there are two characteristic type heroes. First, it's a fool how active actor: he is allowed what is impossible for ordinary person. And, secondly, a jester, a sly man, pretending to be a simpleton, a "reverse fool", who knows how to deftly fool his opponent. As you can see, the type of hero is always determined by the poetics of laughter. Historically, the tricks of the jester were based on some ancient knowledge that was inaccessible to the mind of an ordinary person (it could be a pagan priest, the leader of ancient initiations). The image of the fool is associated with the idea of the initiate himself at the moment of his temporary ritual "madness" 1 .

Historical analysis allows you to explain the motive of tricks with dead body. As V. Ya. Propp showed, in his ancient form it goes back to the rite of sacrifice at the graves of parents. The mythological meaning of this plot, inherited by the fairy tale, was that dead mother in relation to her son "acted as a" afterlife donor ".

Anecdotal tales began to take shape during the period of the decomposition of the tribal system, parallel to fairy tales and independently of them. The originality of their historicism is determined by the clash of the era of tribal unity with the new world order of the estate-class society.

So, for example, in ancient times there was no condemnation of theft, because there was no private property. People appropriated what nature gave them and what did not belong to anyone. And it's no coincidence large group tales of a clever thief (SUS 1525 A) among all nations portrays him with obvious sympathy: a thief does not steal for self-interest - he demonstrates his superiority over others, as well as complete disregard for property. The courage, intelligence, luck of the thief are admirable. Fairy tales

1 Yudin Yu.I. Russian traditional everyday fairy tale: Dis. To the competition Uch. Step. Doctor philologist. Sciences. - L., 1979.

about a clever thief are based on ancient law, on generic property relations.

AT In the form known to us, the anecdotal tale took shape only in the Middle Ages. She absorbed later class contradictions: between wealth and poverty, between peasants, on the one hand, and landlords, judges, priests -

with another. The type of a seasoned soldier, a swindler and a rogue, could appear no earlier than the "soldier", that is, the time of Peter the Great. Under the influence of church books, especially hagiographic literature, the image of the devil entered the fairy tales and was fixed. Folklore rethinking has begun biblical stories(SUS 790*: Golden Stirrup; SUS-800*: "The drunkard enters paradise", etc.).

AT anecdotal tales according to their content, the following are distinguished story groups: about a clever thief; about clever and lucky guessers, about jesters; about fools; about evil wives; about the owner and employee; about priests; about the court and the judges.

The poetics of anecdotal tales is the poetics of a genre based on laughter. Merging with other forms of folk satire, anecdotal tales used raesh verse.

A talented storyteller, creating a comic style, could completely rhyme his fairy tale. Here is how A. Novopoltsev began the story: There lived an old man, not big - with a fist, and he went to a tavern. Mittens behind the belt, and something else looking for. This old man had three sons...("Shurypa"); The Vyatchans lived, drank ... with cabbage soup and decided to build a church, pray to God, bow to the Russian Savior ...("About the Vyatchans")1.

Specific nicknames for the characters of anecdotal tales are associated with this tradition: Finally - a native from the other world; Tikhon - sacked from the other world; Naum-came to mind; pig motley my wife's sister etc.

Fairy tales use realistic grotesque - fiction based on reality. In the group of plots about fools, the grotesque manifests itself as special shape"stupid" thinking. Fools act according to external analogies: they sow salt (it resembles grain), build a house without windows and then carry light in bags into it, remove a table from the cart - "he has four legs, he will walk", put pots on burnt stumps - "Guys stand without hats." From-

1 Tales and legends Samara region. Collected and recorded by D.N. Sadovnikov. - St. Petersburg, 1884. - S. 119; 164.

The stories themselves are very positive. funny stories. Therefore, they are written mainly for children. And if you combine the two genres and compose jokes about fairy tales, then such jokes can be told in absolutely any company, because they are understandable for children and adults will listen to them with pleasure. And sometimes you yourself just want to plunge into the magical world again. fairy world where the Serpent Gorynych, Ivan Tsarevich, Golden Fish live and feel like a child.

Ivan Tsarevich was about to marry Marya Marevna. And her father, the man was strict: I won’t allow it, he says, until you prove your courage, defeat the Serpent Gorynych and bring me a necklace from his teeth as proof. Ivan grieved, went away through the forest. Suddenly he hears - heroic snoring from behind the bushes. He looks - and there the Serpent sleeps, warmed himself in the sun. Ivan, don't be a fool, took the pincers, and pulled out the sleeping man's teeth. He strung a necklace, brought it - and played a wedding.
First marriage, knock on the door:
“Who is there?” Ivanushka asks.
- Fyas, I caress you: Who was pleated, why was pleated and from Khuda, NEFYAF SHTOMATOLOCH!

The evil Serpent Gorynych attacked the village, well, people think we need help.
They ask Alyosha Popovich:
- Help Alyosha, kill the evil Serpent.
- We should think about it, - Alyosha answers.
- How much will you think?
- Two weeks.
- No, during this time he will eat us all.
They go to Dobrynya Nikitich:
- Help Dobrynya, kill the Serpent.
- You have to think.
- How much will you think?
- A week.
- No, during this time he will eat us all.
They go to Ilya Muromets:
- Help Ilya, kill the Serpent otherwise he will eat us all.
Then Ilya gets up and, without talking, sits on his horse.
People:
- What about thinking?
- What is there to think, it's time to get out!

Ilya Muromets came to the restaurant, sat down at a table. He called the waiter and orders:
- A bucket of vodka.
- What will you eat?
- Here it is, darling, I will eat!

Baba Yaga walks through the forest, sees a completely naked mermaid sitting on the branches.
- "You" - Baba Yaga tells her - "why are you breeding prostitution here in the forest," etc.
The mermaid says: "This is not prostitution, but my erotic costume, and I'm sitting in it."
Baba Yaga came to the hut, undressed, and sat on the porch. Goblin is coming.
- Grandma, why are you completely crazy?
- And this is me in my erotic costume sitting.
- You could at least stroke him, or something ...

Ivan the Fool went to Far Far Away kingdom to fight with Koshchei. Wandered into a dense forest. He sees there is a hut on chicken legs. Well, he says, as usual: "Stand in front of me ... etc." Comes in. Baba Yaga is sitting. "Well, what," he says, " good fellow, are you trying things or are you whining from business?" He told her: "You, grandmother, first feed, drink, take you to the bathhouse and put to sleep, and in the morning you will ask." how will you sleep? Alone or with my daughter?" Ivan thought: "The grandmother is two hundred years old, her daughter is a hundred years old, well, go to the bathhouse."
I woke up in the morning and went to wash my face. Sees - goes with buckets beautiful beautiful girl. Ivan prifigel: "Who are you?" - He says. She replies: "I am Baba Yaga's daughter. And who are you?" "And I'm Ivan... (with annoyance) A FOOL!!!"

Gathered somehow three old school friend, fishing. One is a thief, the other is an engineer, the third is a doctor (although this is not essential). They caught goldfish. Well, as usual for her life, she promised them 1 desire to fulfill - only 3.
Thief
- I - a bag of bucks - have a bag.
Engineer
- I .... well, I don’t know, now, the cockroaches are completely stuck ... - she gave him such a small cockroach
- Let him out, he says, into the house, he will eat all your cockroaches and dissolve himself ...
Doctor
- in the country, here, grit, rats ... - similarly - gives a small rat ... says the same thing.
Thief thinking
- listen, fish - take this bag, and give me such a small cop ...

The fisherman caught a golden fish, which begged:
- Let me go and I will fulfill one of your wishes.
- I have no desire.
- Maybe you need an apartment?
- I have a magnificent five-room apartment.
- Maybe a cottage is needed?
- No, I have a chic two-story apartment.
- Do you need a car?
- No, I have a brand new "Volga".
- Listen, maybe you want to become a Hero of the Soviet Union?
- What, this is a thought, - says the fisherman and looks at the lapel of his
jacket, representing the star of the Hero on it.
- Come on, make me a Hero.
- Be your way, - said the goldfish and swam away, waving its tail. And the fisherman immediately felt a grenade in each hand and saw that three enemy tanks were coming at him.

The old man went to the blue sea.
The first time he threw a net - the sea did not bring him anything.
The old man threw a seine even further - and the second time the sea brought nothing to him.
The old man gathered his strength, and threw a seine quite far .....
And left without a net ...

Ivan Tsarevich rode for three days and three nights, until the rope was taken away ...

Ivan Tsarevich is walking through the forest, all so rollicking, smart, shooting arrows from a bow in all directions. Suddenly - once he slipped on something, he looks down and sees - a TOAD - such an agram. Well, he takes her in his arms to look, and she tells him in a human voice:
- Hello Ivan Tsarevich, I am Vasilisa the Beautiful, kiss me and I will turn into a beauty, you will love me, we will get married, give birth to children, we will live and make good, let's kiss, in general.
Well, Ivan Tsarevich sat down on a bump, took out a knapsack and let's stuff this toad in there. And he says in response:
- No, I have a toad talking more for fun.

After reading the Russian folk tale child asks:
- Was Kashchei the Deathless a drug addict?
- Why do you say that?
Well, he died from a needle.

Come out, Koschey, we will fight.
- With swords?
- On the eggs, fool, Easter!

How are you? one friend asks another:
- Like in a dream!
- The wife is a witch, the mother-in-law is Baba Yaga, the brother is the Nightingale the Robber, the children are imps ....
- But the neighbor is Vasilisa the Beautiful, and her husband is Ivan the Fool!

Ivan the Fool sits on the bank of the river and writes bad words on the water with a pitchfork. A pike emerges and says:
- Are you crazy, Vanya? Around the fry, juveniles, and you put it that way!

Ilya Muromets:
- Serpent Gorynych, why are you flying with one head now?
- A crisis! Three heads do not feed!

Ivan offered all sorts of obscenities to the girls. And they blushed terribly and called Ivan a fool. And so it went from that time, that neither Ivan, then a fool, that neither a girl, then a red one.

Caught a dumb goldfish. She tells him:
- Let go of any desire will fulfill!
The man in response draws a diamond in the air and sticks out his tongue.
Fish:
- Ice cream?
The peasant hums, turns his head, and again draws a rhombus and sticks out his tongue.
Fish:
- Maybe money?
The peasant hums again, turns his head, and again draws a rhombus and sticks out his tongue.
Fish:
- "Renault" in leasing, or what?

Serpent Gorynych from a hangover:
- No, guys, one head is probably better!

So, Ilya Muromets, Dobrynya Nikitich and Alyosha Popovich are sitting in a cave, drinking. Then the Serpent Gorynych flies up and says:
Guys, can I sit here?
- It is forbidden!
The snake has flown away. It's starting to rain outside here. Serpent again:
- Well guys, can I sit here?
- It is forbidden!
Again the Serpent flew away. And on the street already lightning, hail. Serpent:
- Well, guys, it's raining, lightning, etc. Can I sit in the corner here?
- It is forbidden!
- Come on, are you sorry? Sit!
The snake crawled into a corner, sits, whispers:
- You can't, you can't ... Maybe I live here ...

Ivan Tsarevich drove up to the stone, read the inscription on it and wept bitterly. As it was inscribed there: "Here lies the Serpent Gorynych. He was born for high flight, had fiery heart and spoke three languages.

Ivan the fool, where are you?
- In an open field ... I will shoot an arrow, as my father ordered, and in whose yard it falls, I will marry that one.
- And why did you screw the warhead?
- I don't want to get married.

Tsar:
- You saved our forest from the dragon, Ivan - now ask for whatever you want.
- I want to be king instead of you.
- You, Ivan, do not understand. Ask for what you want, not what you dream about. I will give you what you want the most. Think.
Ivan (five minutes later):
- I want to live.
- Well, go ahead and live. At the exit, they will throw some money at you "for life". I've made arrangements for the morning.

Goats, children, open, unlock, your mother has come, she has brought milk!
Goats from behind the door:
- Hey, man, you're driving, we just sent her for beer!

Grandfather caught a goldfish, she pleaded:
- Let me go! I will fulfill your three wishes!
The man thought for a moment and said:
- So this is how I want to marry the last "Miss World", a villa in the Maldives and money, two billion dollars! This is first...

Kolobok, Kolobok, I'll eat you!
"God, I'm tired of everything!" First, I'm pregnant. And secondly, Thumbelina!

Choosing between Vasilisa the Wise and Elena the Beautiful, the real Ivan Tsarevich always chooses Mary the mistress.

A man is walking through the forest, he sees - a bottle. It opens, and from there the genie flies out:
- Make a wish - he says - your wish.
So the man starts:
- I want a villa on the beach mediterranean sea, with marble columns, three-storey, etc. etc.
Jinn interrupts him:
- Are you joking??!! Think what you're asking! Look what I live in!!!

Researchers call everyday anecdotal tales differently: "satiric", "satiric-comic", "everyday", "social everyday", "adventurous". They are based on universal laughter as a means of resolving conflict and destroying the enemy. The hero of this genre is a person humiliated in the family or in society: a poor peasant, a hired worker, a thief, a soldier, a simple-hearted fool, an unloved husband. His opponents are a rich man, a priest, a gentleman, a judge, a devil, "smart" older brothers, an evil wife. The people expressed their contempt for them through all sorts of forms of fooling. The conflict of most plots of anecdotal tales is built on fooling.

For example, a husband finds out about his wife's infidelity. He hides in the hollow of a thick pine tree and pretends to be St. Nicholas - Mikola Duplensky. The imaginary saint advises his wife: "Tomorrow you ... dissolve the buckwheat pancakes and spread butter as much as possible with butter, so that these pancakes float in oil, and honor your husband so that QH eats them. When he eats, he will be blind, the light will come out of his eyes and the hearing in his ears will be spoiled ... ".

In another tale, a fool accidentally kills his mother. He puts her as if alive in a sleigh and leaves for the main road. The lordly troika rushes towards, the fool does not turn off, his sleigh is overturned. The fool shouts that his mother was killed, the frightened master gives three hundred rubles as compensation. Then the fool makes the dead mother sit down in the priest's cellar over pots of milk. Popadya takes her for a thief, hits her on the head with a stick - the body falls. The fool shouts: "Popadya killed mother!" The priest paid the fool a hundred rubles and buried the body for nothing. With money, the fool comes home and tells the brothers that he sold his mother in the city at the market. The brothers killed their wives and took them to sell ("If they gave so much for the old woman, they will give twice for the young ones"). They are exiled to Siberia, all the property goes to the fool.

No one accepts such stories as reality, otherwise they would only cause a feeling of indignation. An anecdotal tale is a hilarious farce, the logic of its plot development is the logic of laughter, which is the opposite of ordinary logic, is eccentric.

Yu.I. Yudin came to the conclusion that behind all the variety of characters in anecdotal tales, there are two characteristic types of heroes. First, it is a fool as an active person: he is allowed what is impossible for an ordinary person. And, secondly, a jester, a sly man, pretending to be a simpleton, a "reverse fool", who knows how to deftly fool his opponent. As you can see, the type of hero is always determined by the poetics of laughter.

Historically, the tricks of the jester were based on some ancient knowledge that was inaccessible to the mind of an ordinary person (it could be a pagan priest, the leader of ancient initiations). The image of the fool is associated with the idea of the initiate himself at the moment of his temporary ritual "madness". Historical analysis also makes it possible to explain the motive for tricks with a dead body. As V. Ya. Propp showed, in its most ancient form it goes back to the ritual of sacrifices at the graves of parents. The mythological meaning of this plot, inherited by the fairy tale, was that the deceased mother in relation to her son acted as a "afterlife giver".

So, for example, in antiquity there was no condemnation of theft, because there was no private property. People appropriated what nature gave them and what did not belong to anyone. And it is no coincidence that a large group of tales about a clever thief among all peoples depicts him with obvious sympathy: a thief does not steal for the sake of self-interest - he demonstrates his superiority over others, as well as complete disregard for property. The courage, intelligence, luck of the thief are admirable. The tales of the clever thief are based on ancient law, on ancestral property relations.

In the form known to us, the anecdotal tale took shape only in the Middle Ages. She absorbed later class contradictions: between wealth and poverty, between peasants, on the one hand, and landowners, judges, priests, on the other. The type of a seasoned soldier, a swindler and a rogue, could appear no earlier than the "soldier", that is, the time of Peter the Great. Under the influence of church books, especially hagiographic literature, the image of the devil entered and was fixed in fairy tales. Folklore rethinking of biblical stories began.

In anecdotal tales, according to their content, the following plot groups are distinguished: about a clever thief; about clever and lucky guessers, about jesters; about fools; about evil wives; about the owner and employee; about priests; about the court and the judges.

The poetics of anecdotal tales is the poetics of a genre based on laughter. Merging with other forms of folk satire, anecdotal tales used raesh verse.

A talented storyteller, creating a comic style, could completely rhyme his fairy tale. This is how A. Novopoltsev began the story: There lived an old man, not big - with a fist, and he went to a tavern. Mittens behind the belt, and looking for something else. This old man had three sons ... ("Shurypa"); Once upon a time there were Vyatchans, they drank ... with cabbage soup and decided to build a church, pray to God, bow to the Russian Savior ... (“About the Vyatches”).

Specific nicknames for the characters of anecdotal tales are associated with this tradition: Finally, a native from the other world; Tikhon - sacked from the other world; Naum - came to mind; the pig is motley my wife's sister, etc.

Fairy tales use realistic grotesque - fiction based on reality. In the group of stories about fools, the grotesque manifests itself as a special form of "stupid" thinking. Fools act according to external analogies: they sow salt (it resembles grain), build a house without windows and then carry light in bags into it, remove a table from the cart - "it has four legs, it will come by itself", put pots on burnt stumps - "guys standing without hats. This is where the technique of the realized metaphor develops, i.e. literally doing something. For example, an employee is ordered to guard the door - he removes it from its hinges and takes it with him.

The tale uses the technique of parody, comic word creation. Especially often the speech of the priest, the deacon, and the rite of the church service itself are parodied. It must be emphasized that Russian folklore does not know an anti-religious theme, the idea of God is never questioned in it. But the tale treats the servants of the cult without indulgence, ridiculing their greed, gluttony and love affairs.

Anecdotal tales can have an elementary, one-motif plot. They are also cumulative ("Stuffed fool", "Good and bad"). But their especially characteristic property is a free and mobile composition, open to contamination. With any performance, the tale could grow or shrink, which depended on specific situation, from interest to intrigue on the part of listeners and the narrator himself.

Zueva T.V., Kirdan B.P. Russian folklore - M., 2002