Who’s Afraid of Baba Yaga? A Reading of Ageing From the Gender Perspective

Abstract

Despite the fact that an increase in the old-age population is noticeable in most contemporary societies, the issues of growing old and personal experience of the oldage population, old women in particular, remain unnoticed. In a culture fascinated by youth, old age is perceived in stereotypical ways, with a lot of prejudice, taboos and fears that produce many negative perceptions and discriminatory practices. The paper is based on the analysis of ageing issues and life narratives of elderly women presented in the novel Baba Yaga Laid an Egg (2009) by Dubravka Ugresic. Baba Yaga, the ambivalent mythological heroine, has been shown as a greatly provocative character who – reinterpreted in the feminist key – creates new meanings and an emancipatory potential for women of all ages.