Reading Notes A: Russian Fairy Tales

The story of the greedy old reverend and the goatskin is interesting in a mildly disturbing way. He refuses to bury the man's wife without being paid and then when he learns of his great treasure dons a goatskin to sneak in and steal it away from him. The most interesting part is how the skin fuses with him as a punishment though. By ripping off the skin the wife also rips off his real skin.

I think I love the story of the bad wife more than any story i've read so far in this class. It's honestly my favorite. The wife is so contrarian she does everything the opposite of what her husband says even to the point of throwing herself into tartarus. Then she eats all the little demons in there except the one who escapes. That little guy runs quite a racket with the bad wifes husband until he possesses the final woman and he runs off the demon by threatening it with his old wife again. It's really amazing. She was so scary she ate demons and scared them even when she wasn't around. I love russian fairy tales.

The one with the cat is a weird story it all goes very matter of fact but i guess ultimately its about fate and trusting god. the really wasn't any explanation for what happened in the end though i dont know why the eldest brother was a 3 year old.

There's a lot of themes of death and trickery and costumes and fate and being punished or rewarded by god in these stories. All of them kind of go along the same basic lines.

(Cat from the story The Tree Copecks)

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