ABSTRACT
The corpus of Georgian folk poetry that has now been collected and published is equal in volume to the corpus of classic literary texts: some scholars would argue that in its cultural importance and poetic quality, Georgian folk poetry exceeds the literary heritage. As in Russia, folk poetry and literature in Georgia appear to inhabit separate worlds, and there are far fewer bridges betwen the two than we find, for instance, in English, French, or German cultures, where the Romantic belief in the primacy of the folk and a constant interchange between the two cultures has made them mutually comprehensible.
