Abstract
The article deals with the problems and poetics of Christian fairy tale for children in contemporary Russian literature. The relevance of this issue is motivated by a number of polemic, problematic statements about the form and the content of Christian literature in general, and children's literature in particular. The research reveals features of Christian children’s literature, gives characteristics of its genres and defines the place of the fairy tale as a genre that most satisfies young readers’ needs. The central theme of Christian fairy tales is the theme of realization of existence of God, distinction of good and evil, understanding of sin and punishment. This problem-thematic complex is embodied mainly at the level of composition and character system of fairy tales. During analysis two types of Christian fairy tales are distinguished, generally based on the folklore canon of the fairy tales about animals. In the first type main characters are animals and they help people magically. The predominant didacticism of fairy tales of the first type is realized in schematization of animal images and absence of plot development. The peculiarity of the second type is based on traditional cyclical adventure story and absence of open characters’ convention which is a common feature to parable-allegorical fairy tales.
Highlights
One of the important features of Russian literature of different periods is its religious essence
Aim of the article is to comprehend the problem of existence of a modern Christian fairy tale for children in Russian literature, its problems and poetics
Nowadays there is a stable system of existence of Christian literature for children
Summary
One of the important features of Russian literature of different periods is its religious essence. The consolidation of the foundations of upbringing and education was connected with reading works of ancient Russian literature: hagiographic texts, morals, military and historical novellas, chronicle tales, didactic and natural scientific works of foreign literature (Shestodnev, Physiologist) (Birnbaum & Flier, 1984). This situation is preserved in the 17-19th centuries when the very phenomenon of children's literature was formed. The author claims that the ‘secret belief in God’ was expressed in the mood of literary works, at the level of characters and plots This allows us to say that the tradition of the existence of Christian principle in literature for children was continued. This problem is especially crucial in the genres of modern Christian fairy tale
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