Tales of the Past: Russian Children's Literature Abroad Between the Two World Wars
DOI :
https://doi.org/10.11606/issn.2317-4765.rus.235386Mots-clés :
Russian children's literature, Fairy tale, Alexander Pushkin, Hans Christian Andersen, Russian publishing houses in EuropeRésumé
Based on a quantitative analysis of the publishing repertoires that produced Russian-language literature in Europe between 1920 and 1939, this article examines the children's book market. Children's literature exhibited a hierarchy of genres and writers, dominated by the fairy tale genre and two leading authors in this field — Alexander Pushkin and Hans Christian Andersen. Pushkin's works were published largely due to the establishment of Russian Culture Days and the tradition of including his fairy tales in school anthologies. Andersen’s popularity is linked to the embodiment of Romantic aesthetics and philosophical worldview inherited by Russian émigrés. The fairy tale emerged as the leading genre, driven by aesthetic, pedagogical, and pragmatic goals. Despite the substantial number of texts and critics' attention to new children's authors, émigré children's literature continued to be regarded as a lower-tier genre, and the status of the children's writer remained precarious within the literary community. As a result, children were offered canonical texts and folkloric imagery traditionally associated with the essence of the people. The reissuing of works by classic authors and canonical texts of Russian literature formed the cornerstone for transmitting and preserving national cultural traditions and shaping the national identity of children in emigration.
##plugins.themes.default.displayStats.downloads##
Références
Bezrogov, Vitaly. Korabli iz bumagi: jemigracija i uchebnaja kniga XIX-XX vv.: (istoriko-pedagogicheskoe issledovanie): kollektivnaja monografija (Ships made of paper: emigration and educational book of the 19th-20th centuries: (historical and pedagogical research)). Tula: Dizajn Kollegija, 2021. (In Russian).
Bobrinskaya, Varvara. Our duty to Russian children. Vozrozhdenie, April 22, 1926, 2. (In Russian).
Bobrinskaya, Varvara. Children's Literature. In Russian Foreign Book. Prague: Committee of Russian Book Publishing House Flame, 1924. Pp. 110-111. (In Russian).
Bjulleten' Pedagogicheskogo bjuro po delam srednej i nizshej russkoj shkoly za granicej. 3 (Bulletin of the Pedagogical Bureau for Secondary and Lower Russian Schools Abroad. No. 3). Pedagogical Bureau for Secondary and Lower Russian Schools Abroad. Prague, 1924. (In Russian).
Katalog knig, vyshedshih vne Rossii po ijun' 1924 g. (Catalogue of books published outside Russia up to June 1924) (compiled by M.P. Kadish; V.A. Goldenberg). Berlin: Union of Russian Publishers and Booksellers in Germany, [1925]. (In Russian).
Dimianenko, Anna. Children's Books of the Russian Abroad in Europe 1919-1954 (dataset), 2020. DOI: https://doi.org/10.31860/openlit-2020.10-C002.
Dm. [Review of the book: Pushkin A. С. The Tale of the Fisherman and the Fish]. Rul’, № 590, 5 November, 1922, 13. (In Russian).
Elatchitch, Evgenii. [Review of the book: Norwegian fairy tales]. Russian school abroad, no. 8, 1924, 117-118. (In Russian).
G. M. Mamselle Fricassee on one wheel: Soviet propaganda under the banner of the exhibition of children's books. Segodnya, no. 257, 17 September, 1930, 8.
Gousseff, Catherine. L’Exil russe (1920-1939): La fabrique du réfugié apatride. Moscow: Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie, 2014. (In Russian).
Gousseff, Catherine, Sossinskaïa, Anna (prés.). Les enfants de l'exil: récits d'écoliers russes après la révolution de 1917. Paris: Bayard, 2005.
Н. N. T. Children's literature. Segodnya, no. 284, 13 Dec, 1924, 6. (In Russian).
I. G. K. [Golenishchev-Kutuzov Ivan] Book for children. Vozrozhdenie, April 28, 1932, 4. (In Russian).
Iaschenko, Aleksandr. Russian book after the October revolution. Russian book, no. 1, 1921, 2-7. (In Russian).
Iu. M. [Mandel'shtam Ju.] Andersen. Vozrozhdenie, April 8, 1938, 9. (In Russian).
Korvin-Piotrovskiy, Vladimir. Pozdniy gost'. Stikhotvoreniya i poemy (A Late Visitor. Poems) T. Ventslova (Ed.). Moscow: Vodolej, 2012. (In Russian).
Petrusheva, Lidia. Fathers and Children of Russian Emigration. In L. Petrusheva (Ed.), Children of Russian Emigration: A book that exiles dreamed of and failed to publish (pp. 5-20). Moscow: Terra, 1997. (In Russian).
Rudnev, Vadim (ed). The educational work of the Russian zemstvos and towns relief committee abroad. Publ. by Russian zemstvos and town relief com. Paris, 1928.
Tchukovskii, Kornei. Ot dvuh do pjati (From two to five). St. Petersburg: Azbuka, 2013. (In Russian).
Téléchargements
Publiée
Numéro
Rubrique
Licence
(c) Copyright Anna Dimianenko 2025
Ce travail est disponible sous licence Creative Commons Attribution - Pas d’Utilisation Commerciale - Partage dans les Mêmes Conditions 4.0 International.
Os autores que publicam na RUS concordam com os seguintes termos:
a. Os autores mantém os direitos autorais e concedem à revista o direito de primeira publicação, com o trabalho simultaneamente licenciado sob a Licença Creative Commons Atribuição 4.0 Internacional (CC BY-NC-SA) que permite o compartilhamento do trabalho com reconhecimento da autoria e publicação inicial nesta revista.
b. Os autores têm autorização para assumir contratos adicionais separadamente, para distribuição não-exclusiva da versão do trabalho publicada nesta revista (ex.: publicar em repositório institucional ou como capítulo de livro), com reconhecimento de autoria e publicação inicial nesta revista.
c. Os autores têm permissão e são estimulados a publicar e distribuir seu trabalho online (ex.: em repositórios institucionais ou na sua página pessoal) a qualquer ponto antes ou durante o processo editorial, já que isso pode gerar alterações produtivas, bem como aumentar o impacto e a citação do trabalho publicado (Veja O Efeito do Acesso Livre).
