Reviews

Russian Fairy Tales by Alexander Afanasyev

labunnywtf's review

1.0

Too weird. Even for me, who lives for weird.

I have to think a lot gets lost in translation. It just has to. I mean, they got married, and chewed bread for the rest of their lives? Do what?

And then the fairy tales aren't even well thought out. "They did this and this. And then something happened, and she turned into a dove."

"Something happened"? Literally? That's your great plot twist?

No. No, no, no.

suzemo's review

5.0

This is the first book that made me fall in love with the Pantheon Fairy Tale Library.

It's a collection of Russian Folk Tales, with a decent index and cute illustrations that go along with the stories.

magnetarmadda's review

3.0

I feel bad rating a book filled with fairy tales from a whole culture at 3-stars, but it’s not because of the stories themselves, which were really interesting. It’s because of the translation of them and the awkward way they’re written. The end of the book has a fairly good explanation for this: when they were being collected by Afanas’ev, he was inspired by the Brothers Grimm. They have a particular way of telling stories, which I don’t like, and so this book has much the same feel. I’d love to read these fairy tales with a more smooth narrative style, so I’ll keep an eye out for a book like that

pocketvolcano's review

5.0

I love fairy tales and this was a great book full of interesting, funny and sometimes tragic stories.

kai3cll's review

3.0

2.5 rounded up to 3

This is a big book and many of its tales are fun. I once narrated one of the tales to my English Teacher back in school and it had our class rolling with laughter.

So, when I decided to go through the whole of it this time without skipping any tales, it was harder to do than I had thought.

I am usually fine reading a book of this size or bigger but here the stories tend to repeat the essence and some of them come off as more rambling.

If the book was shorter or with more variety of tales and with better editing then this would have been a precious piece to hold.

amy_da1sy's review

adventurous dark informative lighthearted mysterious reflective medium-paced

5.0

staticspider's review against another edition

adventurous dark slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? N/A
• Strong character development? N/A
• Loveable characters? N/A
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

vampai's review

3.0

Recuerdo que en mi infancia vi algunas adaptaciones de cuentos rusos y esos dibujos se me hacían hermosos y ahora como quería leer algo distinto y no soy de leer cuentos le di la oportunidad a este libro que recopila las historias mas populares de dicho lugar.
No se como sentirme al respecto porque muchas de estas historias no se las leería a mis hijos en dado caso que los tenga esto basado en mi propia manera de ser claro esta, pero en general hay historias buenas y otras que pasaron sin pena y gloria al momento de leerlas, lo cual resulta en una verdadera lástima.

hannahtosh's review

4.0

'Fairy tales fulfill the role of a social utopia.'

Beautifully told tales, if a little repetitive with similar morals;

Not this is the miracle of miracles,
That the muzhik fell from heaven;
But that is the miracle of miracles:
That he had climbed into heaven.

ameve2's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0