ABSTRACT
Like the bylina, the folktale was considered a disappearing genre in the 1920s. In 1926 the folklorist N. P. Grinkova wrote:
It is quite difficult to find a genuine, traditional folktale in all its beauty in today’s village. This is a dying form of folk art which will disappear in several decades with the death of its current bearers, and this valuable and in many ways irreplaceable material will slip away from the science of folklore. The old, traditional folktale can no longer be heard from the lips of the new generation, which is mostly literate and has the opportunity to satisfy its esthetic demands in books. Life acquires other forms, and art, like life, moves away from the old forms and the old subjects. 1
