Oral folk art is the traditional verbal creativity of the people. It can be both ancient and new - created in our days. Its main feature is that this art words are passed down from generation to generation by word of mouth.
There are a lot of genres in verbal folk art. These are myths and legends, epics, epics, proverbs and sayings, riddles, ditties, fairy tales, songs... The list of them can be endless. The creator is not an individual, but a people. That is why not a single work has its own specific, single author.
Over the centuries, the creations of people have evolved into entire verbal forms, which subsequently form rhymes (“verses”). Thanks to this technique, the works were easier to transmit and remember. Thus, ritual, round dance, dance, and lullaby songs appeared.
Subjects folklore creativity completely depended and continues to depend on the culture, beliefs, history and region of residence of the people. But main feature Such creations were and remain a combination of a direct reflection of life and a conditional one. Simply put, in folklore there is not, and there has not been, a mandatory reflection of life in the form of life itself; convention is always allowed in it.
Genres of folklore
To better understand what oral folk art is, it is necessary to take a closer look at its genres, and there are a great many of them in this type of verbal art.
Proverbs and sayings
Let's start with those that we know well and sometimes use in everyday life - with proverbs and sayings. These types of oral art are among the most interesting genres that have survived to this day.
No one knows for certain when these genres of oral creativity appeared. The undoubted fact remains how accurately and concisely, figuratively, logically complete, the saying expresses the people's mind and experience accumulated over many centuries.
Meanwhile, many of us have long been accustomed to thinking that proverbs and sayings are one and the same thing. Actually this is not true. A proverb is a complete sentence containing folk wisdom. It is written in simple, often rhyming language.
Example of Russian proverbs:
"God saves man, who save himself"
"Small spool but precious"
“A penny saves the ruble”
Then, as a saying, it is an established phrase or phrase. It is intended for decoration.
Example of Russian sayings:
“Stay with your nose” (be deceived)
“Disservice” (help that turns into harm)
“When the cancer whistles on the mountain” (never)
Signs
Signs are another folklore genre that has undergone quite a few changes, but still has not lost its wisdom and has reached modern people.
It appeared in ancient times, when our ancestors were very close to nature, when people observed it, the phenomena occurring around them, and found connections between events. Over time, people put their observations into words. This is how signs appeared, which through the centuries carry the collected knowledge of their ancestors.
Some examples of weather signs:
The larks fly to the warmth, the chaffinch to the cold.
A lot of sap flows from a birch tree - for a rainy summer.
Sparrows bathe in the sand - predicting rain.
Also, many old signs related to home and everyday life have survived to this day. The most common is: “Spilling salt means shedding tears.” It is believed that this sign appeared in the middle of the 17th century, during the times of riots and uprisings in Rus'. Back then, salt was literally worth its weight in gold. This is where the meaning came from - spilling such an expensive “seasoning” like salt will inevitably lead to a quarrel in the house.
A few more examples of everyday signs that are undoubtedly familiar to us:
“If you whistle at home, you’ll miss the money”
“Clothes inside out means hassle”
“If you sew on yourself, you will sew up a memory”
Fairy tales
Individual elements have also been preserved from antiquity children's folklore- fairy tales. Later, this genre of oral art changed greatly. this happened under the influence of aesthetic and pedagogical functions, but still it continues to exist.
However, some genres of verbal art “die out” over time, and humanity gradually forgets about them. This process is a natural phenomenon; it does not indicate the decline of folk art. On the contrary, the process of “dying away” is a sign that, due to changes in the conditions of human existence, the artistic collective creativity of the people is developing, as a result of which new genres appear and old ones disappear.
Epics
These genres include epics (or as they were also called - antiquities - Russian heroic-patriotic songs-legends, the main plot of which was important historical events or heroic deeds of heroes and warrior maidens). This genre originated in Ancient Rus', existed until the Middle Ages and gradually began to be forgotten by the 19th century.
In addition, almost forgotten genres also include ritual folklore. Let's look at its components a little closer.
Calendar folklore and annual song cycle
These small genres appeared in connection with the need to monitor the agricultural cycle, as well as changes occurring in nature and religious holidays.
Many proverbs, signs, advice and prohibitions have developed in calendar folklore. Here are some of which have survived to this day:
“If it melts early, it won’t melt for a long time”
“March sows with snow and warms with sun”
Quite a few songs were composed by the people for the annual song cycle. So on Maslenitsa it was customary to bake pancakes, perform rituals of farewell to winter and sing ritual songs. This and some other old traditions have been preserved to this day.
Family folklore
It included such small genres as: family stories, lullabies, nurseries, nursery rhymes, wedding songs, funeral laments.
The name “Family Stories” speaks for itself, and this genre of verbal art has existed since time immemorial - perhaps as long as a person has lived in this world. It is noteworthy in that it is formed quite separately, as a rule, within the framework of the family and close circle.
In addition, this genre has its own peculiarity, it can form “certain expressions” that are understandable only to family members or people present during the event that led to the appearance of this phrase. For example, in the Tolstoy family there was such an expression as “the architect is to blame.”
The birth of this expression was preceded by an event: when Ilya Tolstoy was five years old, he was given the promised cup for the New Year. Happy child ran to show everyone his gift. While running across the threshold, he tripped and fell. The cup broke. Little Ilya, justifying himself, said that he was not to blame, but the architect who made this threshold was to blame. Since then, the family of Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy has had its own expression equivalent to the winged one - “the switchman is to blame.”
Lullabies
One more no less interesting genre There were lullabies in family folklore. In the old days, the ability to sing lullabies was considered a special art. During the game, mothers taught their daughters how to “cradle” correctly. This ability was necessary so that older girls, already at the age of six or seven, could look after the younger ones. That is why special attention was paid to this skill.
The purpose of lullabies was not only to calm, but also to protect the child. Many songs were “conspiracies.” They were called upon to protect small child from the dangers that could await him in the future. Often lullabies were addressed to spirits and mythological creatures, carriers of sleep - Dream, Sleep. They were called to lull the baby to sleep. Currently, this genre of folk art is almost forgotten.
Pestushki and nursery rhymes
Pestushki and nursery rhymes were short melodies. They helped the child in development and knowledge of the world around him. Perhaps someone remembers from childhood - “Magpie-Crow...”. Such small songs and sayings encouraged the baby to take action, instilled hygiene skills, developed fine motor skills and reflexes, and helped to explore the world.
Wedding songs
Wedding songs were strikingly different from all other small genres of family folklore. Notable was the fact that these songs were not played outside the wedding ceremony. Moreover, from a functional point of view, they were extremely important, since they played a kind of “legal role” in this event. Along with wedding songs, lamentations played an important role in the ritual. They were an integral part of the holiday; they were lyrical narratives that described the experiences of the bride, parents and girlfriends.
Glorification also played a significant role. Guests used them in songs to praise the bride and groom and wish the newlyweds well-being and happiness. On top of that, not a single wedding could be complete without reproachful songs. This small component of the wedding ceremony consisted of comic songs. As a rule, they were addressed to matchmakers, because of whom the bride “left” her family, girlfriends and lost her maiden will.
Funeral lamentations or laments are another ancient folklore genre, the time and appearance of which no one knows for certain. It has survived only in “scraps” to this day, but from the title you can easily understand what it’s about. we're talking about and what this genre served for.
The main feature of this oral creativity was that it had its own “formula”, or better yet, a strict sequence, which each mourner “decorated” with his own creative element - a story about the life, love or death of the deceased. Now, for example, part of the ritual, as well as crying, can be seen and heard in the film “Viy” (1967).
Occasional folklore
Folklore that does not correspond to generally accepted use. It had an individual character, determined by a specific situation and occasion. It included such small genres as chants, counting rhymes, and conspiracies.
Calls
Russian folklore is incredibly rich. They were small songs, often not devoid of humor and accompanied by playful actions. The plots of this small genre were very different: they could be chants about the weather and weather phenomena, about nature and the seasons, about animals and fairy-tale creatures...
Rain, rain! Rain, rain!
On me and on people!
A spoonful for me.
For people it’s okay.
And for the devil in the forest -
Lei a whole bucket!
Counting books
Counting tables are another small genre of verbal folk art. It arose a long time ago, but has now almost disappeared from modern folklore. Meanwhile, no matter how surprising it may sound, in ancient times, counting rhymes were widely used by adults. Their main function was the distribution of work.
Yes Yes. After all, then many types of work were not only very difficult, but sometimes life-threatening. Therefore, few people at will I wanted to take on something like this. And the counting rhymes made it possible to distribute the work between the participants so that no one would be “offended.” Nowadays, this “important role” of counting rhymes has been lost, but they still exist and still perform their function in children's games.
CONSPIRACY
And finally, the most amazing, but far from the last, ancient genre of oral speech, quite complex in its structure. folk art, which, oddly enough, continues to live in our time - a conspiracy. Function, since its inception of this genre, has not changed. He still continues to play the role of a “magic weapon” designed to fulfill the wish of the speaker. As mentioned above, this genre is quite original in its execution and is often complex in its design - this is its peculiarity.
We can talk about the genres of oral folk art for an infinitely long time, because all directions are interesting and unique in their own way. This article is intended only to acquaint the reader with the immense, multifaceted wealth of human culture and wisdom, clearly reflecting the experience of previous generations.
Oral folk art is the richest heritage of every country. Folklore existed even before the emergence writing, this is not literature, but a masterpiece of the art of oral literature. The genera of folklore creativity were formed in the pre-literary period of art on the basis of ceremonial and ritual actions. The first attempts to comprehend literary genera date back to the era of antiquity.
Types of folklore creativity
Folklore is represented by three genera:
1. Epic literature. This genus is represented in prose and poetry. Russians folklore genres epic kind represented by epics, historical songs, fairy tales, legends, legends, parables, fables, proverbs and sayings.
2. Lyrical literature. At the heart of everything lyrical works thoughts and feelings are present lyrical hero. Examples of folklore genres of the lyrical direction are represented by ritual, lullabies, love songs, ditties, bayat, haivka, Easter and Kupala songs. In addition, there is a separate block - “Folklore lyrics”, which includes literary songs and romances.
3. Dramatic literature. This is a type of literature that combines epic and lyrical methods of depiction. basis dramatic work is a conflict, the content of which is revealed through the acting. Dramatic works have a dynamic plot. Folklore genres dramatic kind are represented by family ritual, calendar songs, and folk dramas.
Some works may contain features of lyrical and epic literature, so they distinguish mixed gender- lyric-epic, which is in turn divided into:
Works with heroic characters, lyric-epic content (epic, duma, historical song).
Non-heroic works (ballad, chronicle song).
There is also folklore for children (lullaby, nursery rhyme, comfort, pestushka, fairy tale).
Genres of folklore
Folklore genres of folk art are represented in two directions:
1. Ritual works of UNT.
Performed during the rituals:
Calendar (carols, Maslenitsa activities, freckles, Trinity songs);
Family and household (birth of a child, wedding celebrations, celebration of national holidays);
Occasional works - came in the form of spells, counting rhymes, chants.
2. Non-ritual works of UNT.
This section includes several subgroups:
Drama (folklore) - nativity scenes, religious works, theater "Petrushki".
Poetry (folklore) - epics, lyrical, historical and spiritual songs, ballads, ditties.
Prose (folklore) in turn is divided into fairy-tale and non-fairy-tale. The first includes tales about magic, animals, everyday life and cumulative tales, and the second is associated with famous heroes and heroes of Rus' who fought with witches (Baba Yaga) and other demonological creatures. Also included in non-fairy tale prose are tales, legends, and mythological stories.
Speech folklore is represented by proverbs, sayings, chants, riddles, and tongue twisters.
Folklore genres carry their own individual plot and meaning.
Images of military battles, exploits of heroes and national heroes are observed in epics, bright events past, everyday life and memories of heroes from the past can be found in historical songs.
Stories about the actions of the heroes Ilya Muromets, Dobrynya Nikitich, Alyosha Popovich are epic. The folklore genre of the fairy tale tells about the actions of Ivan the Tsarevich, Ivan the Fool, Vasilisa the Beautiful and Baba Yaga. Family songs are always represented by characters such as mother-in-law, wifey, hubby.
Literature and folklore
Folklore differs from literature in its unique system of constructing works. Its characteristic difference from literature is that genres folklore works have beginnings, beginnings, sayings, retardations, trinity. Also significant differences style compositions there will be the use of epithet, tautology, parallelism, hyperbole, synecdoche.
Just as in oral folk art (ONT), folklore genres in literature are represented by three genera. This is epic, lyric, drama.
Distinctive features of literature and CNT
Large works of literature, represented by novels, short stories, novellas, are written in calm, measured tones. This allows the reader, without interrupting the reading process, to analyze the plot and draw appropriate conclusions. Folklore contains a saying, a beginning, a saying and a chorus. The technique of tautology is the basic principle of storytelling. Hyperbole, exaggeration, synecdoche and parallelism are also very popular. Such figurative actions are not allowed in literature all over the world.
Small folklore genres as a separate block of CNT works
This system includes mainly works for children. The relevance of these genres continues to this day, because every person gets acquainted with this literature even before he begins to speak.
The lullaby became one of the first works of folklore. The presence of partial conspiracies and amulets is direct evidence of this fact. Many believed that there were actions around a person otherworldly forces If a baby sees something bad in a dream, it will never happen again in reality. This is probably why the lullaby about the “little gray top” is popular even today.
Another genre is nursery rhyme. To understand what exactly such works are, we can equate it to a sentence song or a song with simultaneous actions. This genre promotes the development fine motor skills and emotional health of the child, the key point is considered to be the plots with the play of fingers “Magpie-Crow”, “Ladushki”.
All of the above small folklore genres are necessary for every person. Thanks to them, children learn for the first time what is good and what is bad, and are accustomed to order and hygiene.
Folklore of nationalities
An interesting fact is that different nationalities, in their culture, traditions and customs, have common points of contact in folklore. There are so-called universal desires, thanks to which songs, rituals, legends, and parables appear. Many peoples hold celebrations and chanting to obtain a rich harvest.
From the above, it becomes obvious that different peoples are often close in many spheres of life, and folklore unites customs and traditions into a single structure of folk art.
Folklore, by its nature, content and purpose, is a deeply democratic, truly folk art. He is distinguished not only by his ideological depth, but also by his high artistic qualities. Folk poetry is distinguished by its peculiar artistic system visual arts and genres.
What are genres of Russian folklore?
One of the types of ancient creativity was labor songs with their simplest commands, shouts, signals given as work progresses.
Calendar folklore originally came from the urgent practical goals of people. It was associated with ideas about the annual agricultural cycle and changeable natural conditions. People sought to know the future, so they resorted to fortune telling and talked about the future based on signs.
This also explained wedding folklore. It is permeated with the thought of the safety of the family and clan, and is designed for the favor of the highest patrons.
Individual elements have also been preserved from antiquity children's folklore, which changed later under the influence of aesthetic and pedagogical functions.
Among the oldest genres - funeral lamentations. With the advent of universal conscription, mourning arose for those being drafted into service—recruitment lamentations.
Genres non-ritual folklore also developed under the influence of syncretism. It includes small folklore genres ( proverbs): proverbs, fables, signs and sayings. They contained human judgments about the way of life, about work, about higher natural forces, and statements about human affairs. “This is a vast area of moral assessments and judgments, how to live, how to raise children, how to honor ancestors, thoughts about the need to follow precepts and examples, these are everyday rules of behavior... In a word, the functionality of proverbs covers almost all ideological areas.” 9
Genres of oral prose include legends, tales, tales, legends. These are stories and incidents from life that tell about a person’s meeting with characters of Russian demonology - sorcerers, witches, mermaids, etc. This also includes stories about saints, shrines and miracles - about the communication of a person who has accepted the Christian faith with forces of a higher order .
Genres song epic: epics, historical songs, military songs, spiritual songs and poems.
Gradually, folklore moves away from everyday functions and acquires elements of artistry. The role of the artistic principle in it increases. As a result of historical evolution, folklore became poetic in its main and fundamental qualities, having reworked the traditions of all previous states of folklore. 10
Artistic creativity is embodied in all forms fairy tales: tales about animals, magic, everyday.
This type of creativity is also represented in riddles.
To early species artistic creativity include ballads.
Lyrical songs they also carry artistic function. They are performed outside of rituals. Content and form lyrical songs associated with the expression of the experiences and feelings of performers.
Modern researchers include artistic song folklore of the newest formation romances And ditties.
Children's folklore has its own system of genres, correlated with the age characteristics of children. It carries artistic and pedagogical functions. It is dominated by gaming principles.
The artistic spectacular theatrical basis contains folklore spectacles and folk theater. It is presented in a wide variety of genres and types ( games, dressing up, nativity scene, playgrounds, puppet shows etc.).
A separate type of artistic representation is formed by the so-called fair folklore. It arose from fair performances, shouts of traders, farce barkers, joke speech, jokes and folk sayings.
At the intersection of long-standing traditions of folklore and trends new culture the genre has developed joke.
A detailed account of individual folklore genres will be made in subsequent sections of the manual.
(Poiché quanto sotto riportato è parte della mia tesi di laurea magistrale, se desiderate copiare il testo vi prego di citare sempre la fonte e l’autore (Margherita Sanguineti). Grazie.)
Folklore genres also differ in the way they are performed and various combinations text with melody, intonation, movements (singing, singing and dancing, storytelling, acting, etc.).
With changes to social life societies, new genres also arose in Russian folklore: soldiers', coachmen's, barge haulers' songs. The growth of industry and cities gave rise to romances, jokes, worker, school and student folklore.
There are genres in folklore productive, in the depths of which new works may appear. Now these are ditties, sayings, city songs, jokes, and many types of children's folklore. There are genres unproductive, but continue to exist. Yes, new folk tales does not appear, but the old ones are still told. Many old songs are also sung. But epics and historical songs are practically no longer heard live.
Depending on the stage of development, folklore is usually divided into early traditional folklore, classical folklore and late traditional folklore. Each group belongs special genres, typical for this stage of development of folk art.
Early traditional folklore
1. Labor songs.
These songs are known among all nations, which were performed during labor processes (when lifting heavy objects, plowing fields, manually grinding grain, etc.).
Such songs could be performed when working alone, but they were especially important when working together, since they contained commands for simultaneous action.
Their main element was rhythm, which organized the labor process.
2. Fortune telling and conspiracies.
Fortune telling is a means of recognizing the future. To recognize the future, one had to turn to evil spirits, therefore, fortune telling was perceived as a sinful and dangerous activity.
For fortune-telling, places were chosen where, according to the people, it was possible to come into contact with the inhabitants of the “other world”, as well as the time of day at which this contact was most likely.
Fortune telling was based on the technique of interpreting “signs”: randomly heard words, reflections in water, animal behavior, etc. To obtain these “signs,” actions were taken in which objects, animals, and plants were used. Sometimes actions were accompanied by verbal formulas.
Classic folklore
1. Rituals and ritual folklore
Ritual folklore consisted of verbal, musical, dramatic, game and choreographic genres.
The rituals had ritual and magical significance and contained rules of human behavior in everyday life and work. They are usually divided into work and family.
1.1 Labor rites: calendar rites
The observations of the ancient Slavs on the solstice and the changes in nature associated with it developed into a system of mythological beliefs and practical work skills, reinforced by rituals, signs, and proverbs.
Gradually the rituals formed an annual cycle, and the most important holidays were timed to coincide with the winter and summer solstice.
There are winter, spring, summer and autumn rituals.
1.2. Family rituals
Unlike calendar rituals, the hero of family rituals is a real person. Rituals accompanied many events in his life, among which the most important were birth, marriage and death.
The most developed was wedding ceremony, it had its own characteristics and laws, its own mythology and its own poetry.
1.3. Lamentations
This is an ancient genre of folklore, genetically related to funeral rites. The object of the depiction of lamentations is the tragic in life, therefore they strongly express lyrical beginning, the melody is weakly expressed and in the content of the text one could find many exclamatory-interrogative constructions, synonymous repetitions, unity of beginning, etc.
2. Small genres of folklore. Proverbs.
Small folklore genres include works that differ in genre, but have a common external feature - a small volume.
Small genres of folklore prose, or proverbs, are very diverse: proverbs, sayings, signs, riddles, jokes, proverbs, tongue twisters, puns, well wishes, curses, etc.
3. Fairy tales(see § 2.)
3.1. Animal Tales
3.2. Fairy tales
3.3. Everyday tales
3.3.1. Anecdotal tales
3.3.2. Short story tales
4. Non-fairy prose
Non-fairy tale prose has a different modality than fairy tales: its works are confined to real time, real terrain, real persons. Non-fairy-tale prose is characterized by not being distinguished from the flow of everyday speech and the absence of special genre and style canons. In the most general sense, we can say that her works are characterized by the stylistic form of an epic narrative about the authentic.
The most stable component is the character, around which all the rest of the material is united.
An important feature of non-fairy tale prose is the plot. Usually the plots have an embryonic form (single-motive), but can be conveyed both concisely and in detail.
Works of non-fairy tale prose are capable of contamination.
The following genres belong to non-fairy tale prose: tales, legends and demonological stories.
5. Epics
Epics are epic songs, in which heroic events or individual episodes of ancient Russian history are glorified.
As in fairy tales, epics feature mythological images of enemies, characters are reincarnated, and animals help the heroes.
The epics have a heroic or novelistic character: the idea of heroic epics is the glorification of the unity and independence of the Russian land; in the novelistic epics marital fidelity, true friendship were glorified, personal vices (bragging, arrogance) were condemned.
6. Historical songs
Historical songs are folk epic, lyric epic and lyrical songs, the content of which is dedicated to specific events and real persons of Russian history and expresses the national interests and ideals of the people.
7. Ballads
Folk ballads are lyric-epic songs about a tragic event. Ballads are characterized by personal, family and everyday themes. At the center of the ballads are moral problems: love and hatred, loyalty and betrayal, crime and repentance.
8. Spiritual Poems
Spiritual poems are songs with religious content.
The main feature of spiritual verses is the contrast between everything Christian and the worldly.
Spiritual poems are heterogeneous. In oral existence they interacted with epics, historical songs, ballads, lyrical songs, and lamentations.
9. Lyrical non-ritual songs
In folk lyrics, word and melody are inseparable. The main purpose of songs is to reveal the worldview of the people by directly expressing their feelings, thoughts and moods.
These songs expressed the characteristic experiences of a Russian person in different life situations.
10. Folklore theatre.
Folklore theater is the traditional dramatic creativity of the people.
Specific features of folk theater are the absence of a stage, the separation of performers and audience, action as a form of reflection of reality, the transformation of the performer into another objectified image, the aesthetic orientation of the performance.
The plays were often distributed in in writing, were rehearsed in advance, which did not exclude improvisation.
Folklore theater includes: booths, traveling picture theater (rayok), folk puppet show and folk dramas.
11. Children's folklore.
Children's folklore is a specific area of oral artistic creativity, which, unlike the folklore of adults, has its own poetics, its own forms of existence and its own speakers.
General, generic sign children's folklore - correlation literary text with the game.
Works of children's folklore are performed by adults for children (mother's folklore) and by the children themselves (actually children's folklore)
Late traditional folklore
Late traditional folklore is a collection of works of different genres and different directions, created in peasant, urban, soldier, worker and other environments since the beginning of the development of industry, the growth of cities, and the collapse of the feudal countryside.
Late traditional folklore is characterized by a smaller number of works and generally less high artistic level compared to classical folklore.
1. Ditties
A chastushka is a short rhyming folk song that is sung at a fast tempo to a specific melody.
The themes of the ditties are varied. Most of them are devoted to love and family themes. But they often reflect modern life people, the changes that are taking place in the country contain sharp political hints. The ditty is characterized by a humorous attitude towards its characters, irony, and sometimes sharp satire.
2. Workers' folklore
Workers' folklore – oral folk works, which were created in the working environment or assimilated by it and processed so much that they began to reflect the spiritual needs of this particular environment.
Unlike ditties, workers' folklore did not turn into a national, all-Russian phenomenon. His characteristic feature– locality, isolation within a particular industrial territory. For example, workers in factories, factories and mines in Petrozavodsk, Donbass, the Urals, Altai and Siberia knew almost nothing oral works each other.
Song genres predominated in workers' folklore. The songs depicted the difficult working and living conditions of a simple worker, which were contrasted with the idle life of the oppressors - enterprise owners and overseers.
In form, the songs are monologues-complaints.
3. Folklore of the Great Period Patriotic War.
Folklore of the period of the Great Patriotic War consists of works of various genres: songs, prose, aphoristic. They were created by the participants in events and battles, workers of factories, collective farm fields, partisans, etc.
These works reflect the life and struggle of the peoples of the USSR, the heroism of the country's defenders, faith in victory, the joy of victory, fidelity in love and love betrayals.
In our work we will dwell in more detail on folklore classical genre fairy tales.
The theme of oral folk art in Russian literature is extremely diverse; there are numerous genres and types of folklore. All of them were formed gradually, as a result of the life and creative activity of the people, manifested over several hundred years. Currently, there are specific types of folklore in literature. Oral folk art is that unique layer of knowledge on the basis of which thousands of classical works were built.
Interpretation of the term
Folklore is oral folk art, endowed with ideological depth and highly artistic qualities; it includes all poetic and prose genres, customs and traditions, accompanied by verbal artistic creativity. Folklore genres are classified in different ways, but basically there are several genre groups:
- Labor songs - formed in the process of work, for example, sowing, plowing, haymaking. They represent a variety of shouts, signals, chants, parting words, and songs.
- Calendar folklore - conspiracies, signs.
- Wedding folklore.
- Funeral lamentations, recruiting lamentations.
- Non-ritual folklore is small folklore genres, proverbs, fables, signs and sayings.
- Oral prose - traditions, legends, tales and incidents.
- Children's folklore - pestushki, nursery rhymes, lullabies.
- Song epic (heroic) - epics, poems, songs (historical, military, spiritual).
- Artistic creativity - magical, everyday tales and tales about animals, ballads, romances, ditties.
- Folklore theater - raek, nativity scene, mummers, performances with dolls.
Let's look at the most common types folklore in more detail.
Labor songs
This is a song genre distinguishing feature which is mandatory accompaniment labor process. Labor songs are a way of organizing collective, social work, setting the rhythm using a simple melody and text. For example: “Wow, let’s get a little more friendly to make it more fun.” Such songs helped to start and finish work, united the working squad and were spiritual helpers in the hard physical labor of the people.
Calendar folklore
This type of oral folk art belongs to the ritual traditions of the calendar cycle. The life of a peasant working on the land is inextricably linked with weather conditions. That is why a huge number of rituals appeared that were performed to attract good luck, prosperity, large offspring of livestock, successful farming, etc. The most revered holidays of the calendar were considered Christmas, Maslenitsa, Easter, Epiphany and Trinity. Each celebration was accompanied by songs, chants, incantations and ritual actions. Let us remember the famous custom of singing songs to Kolyada on the night before Christmas: “Cold is not a problem, Kolyada is knocking on the house. Christmas is coming to the house, bringing a lot of joy.”
Wedding folklore
Each place had its own types of folklore, but mostly they were lamentations, sentences and songs. Wedding folklore includes song genres that accompanied three main rituals: matchmaking, farewell of parents to the bride and wedding celebration. For example: “Your product, our merchant, is simply a miracle!” The ritual of handing over the bride to the groom was very colorful and was always accompanied by both drawn-out and short cheerful songs. At the wedding itself, the songs did not stop; they mourned their single life, wished for love and family well-being.
Non-ritual folklore (small genres)
This group of oral folk art includes all types of small genres of folklore. However, this classification is ambiguous. For example, many of the types relate to children's folklore, such as pesters, lullabies, riddles, nursery rhymes, teasers, etc. At the same time, some researchers divide all folklore genres into two groups: calendar-ritual and non-ritual.
Let's consider the most popular types of small genres of folklore.
A proverb is a rhythmic expression, a wise saying that carries a generalized thought and has a conclusion.
Signs - a short verse or expression telling about those signs that will help predict natural phenomena, weather.
A proverb is a phrase, often with humorous twist, illuminating a phenomenon of life, a situation.
A saying is a short verse addressing natural phenomena, living beings, and surrounding objects.
A tongue twister is a small phrase, often rhymed, with words that are difficult to pronounce, designed to improve diction.
Oral prose
The following types of Russian folklore belong to oral prose.
Legends - a story about historical events in the folk retelling. The heroes of legends are warriors, kings, princes, etc.
Legends are myths, epic stories about heroic deeds, people covered with honors and glory; as a rule, this genre is endowed with pathos.
Bylichki - short stories that tell about the hero’s meeting with some kind of “evil spirits”, real cases from the life of the narrator or his friends.
Happened - summary something that really happened once and with someone, while the narrator is not a witness
Children's folklore
This genre is represented by the most in different forms- poetic, song. Types of children's folklore are what accompanied the child from birth until he grew up.
Pestushki are short rhymes or songs that accompany the very first days of a newborn. With the help of them they nursed and nurtured children, for example: “The nightingale sings, sings, pretty, and pretty.”
Nursery rhymes are small melodious poems intended for playing with children.
Stretch, stretch,
Rotok - talker,
Handles - grips,
Walking legs.
Calls - poetic and song appeals to nature and animals. For example: “Red summer, come, bring warm days.”
A joke is a short fairy tale poem sung to a child, a short story about the world around him.
Lullabies - short songs, which parents hum to their child at night to lull them to sleep.
Riddle - poetic or prose sentences that require solving.
Other types of children's folklore are counting rhymes, teasers and fables. They are extremely popular in our time.
Song epic
The heroic epic demonstrates oldest species folklore, he talks about events that once happened in song form.
An epic is an old song told in a solemn but leisurely style. Glorifies the heroes and tells about their heroic deeds for the benefit of the state, the Russian fatherland. about Dobrynya Nikitich, Volga Buslaivaich and others.
Historical songs are a kind of transformation of the epic genre, where the style of presentation is less eloquent, but the poetic form of the narrative is preserved. For example, “The Song of the Prophetic Oleg.”
Artistic creativity
This group includes epic and song genres created in the spirit of folk and artistic creativity.
A fairy tale is a short or long epic narrative, one of the most common genres of oral folk art about fictional events and heroes. All this is folklore, the types of fairy tales in it are as follows: magical, everyday and reflect those ideas about the world, good, evil, life, death, nature that existed among the people. For example, good always defeats evil, and there are wonderful mythical creatures in the world.
Ballads are poetic songs, a genre of song and musical creativity.
Anecdotes are a special type of epic narration about comic situations in people's lives. Initially they did not exist in the form in which we know them. These were stories that were complete in meaning.
Fables - a short narrative about impossible, incredible events, something that was fiction from beginning to end.
A chastushka is a small song, usually a quatrain with humorous content, telling about events and incidental situations.
Folklore theater
Street performances were very common among the people, the subjects for them were various genres, but most often of a dramatic nature.
A nativity scene is a type of dramatic work intended for street puppet theater.
Rayok is a type of picture theater, a device in the form of a box with changing drawings, the stories told reflect oral species folklore
The presented classification is the most common among researchers. However, it is worth understanding that the types of Russian folklore complement each other, and sometimes do not fit into the generally accepted classification. Therefore, when studying the issue, a simplified version is most often used, where only 2 groups of genres are distinguished - ritual and non-ritual folklore.
