Humor and satire in Russian and Tatar children’s poetry in the second half of the 20th century

Abstract

The article examines the features of humor and satire usage in the works of Russian and Tatar poets addressed to children. Many poems for children have an optimistic worldview, they are full of humor and light irony. Most often poets turn to the techniques of parody, paradox and puns to create playful situations in their poems. Poets, creating humorous works, turn to a naive, “childlike” view of events, playful situations, play with words. In children’s poems, the satirical content is not intended to denounce the shortcomings of the characters, but to bring up the correct view of the world and the rules of conduct in society in a humorous and unobtrusive form. Humorous and satirical works by A. Vvedensky, N. Zabolotsky, D. Kharms, A. Barto, K. Chukovsky, B. Weiner, G. Tukay, M. Gafuri, G. Afzal, Sh. Galiev, R. Valieva, R. Minnullin, L. Leron, F. Yarullin, G. Gilmanov, R. Kurban and L. Shayekh reveal to the readers the unexpected novelty in the familiar phenomena of life, develop a love for poetry, careful attention to the meaning of words. Tracing the history of the satirical and humorous poetry development, we can see that this genre continues to develop in the second half of the twentieth century. We see this success not only in the increasing number of authors writing for children, but also in the growth of their skills, in their ability to create humorous and satirical works, images and characters.