• Sim-seong Yeon-gu
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• v.30 no.1
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• pp.31-66
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• 2015

A study on a Russian fairy tale entitled "Seven Stars" was conducted from the perspective of analytical psychology. The plot goes as follows. Once upon a time, a village in Russia was suffering from severe drought. Villagers were dying of thirst, and crops were withering day by day. One night, a little girl left their house carrying a wooden dipper to find water for her sick mother by herself. However, water was nowhere to be found. She felt tired and fell asleep. When she woke up, the moon was already over her head, and the dipper had been filled with water. On her way home to give the water to her mother, she found a dog lying on the ground. The dog was also dying of excessive thirst, so she gave the dog a handful of water. Then the wooden dipper suddenly turned into a silver dipper. When she had finally arrived home and her mother has drunk the water, the silver dipper changed into a golden dipper. At that moment, an old man showed up and asked for water. The little girl gave him water. When the old man stared at the water, she realized that there were seven diamonds twinkling like stars in the dipper. The water never ran out. Surprisingly enough, the seven diamonds suddenly soared up into the sky and eventually formed a constellation of the Big Dipper. The water was shared with the other villagers who, then, recovered their strength. The severe drought came to an end, and the villagers danced together with joy. In this fairy tale, the severe drought symbolizes devastation caused by a unidirectional stream of consciousness while the little girl represents a new function, which shows the value of women who can heal and restore from that devastation. Symbolized in a fairy tale character such as 'a daughter' or 'a little girl', the new function eventually reaches up to the value which leads and affects the group as well as individuals. To conclude, this new function represents the unconscious process whose role is to revitalize the maternity and resolve the problems posed to a group as well as individuals.

• Cross-Cultural Studies
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• v.39
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• pp.241-286
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• 2015

This study explores how folktales' motifs are used in diverse cultural contents such as literature, movies, or comics. More precisely, it is concerned with mysterious characters like Babayaga and Koshchei who appear in Russian fairytales. When the motifs of the reviewed literature are analyzed, the following three criteria are used for classification: New Writing, Rewriting, and New Version. Or course, it is New Writing that is far from the original work. Most of the collected works, including Joan Aiken's The Kingdom Under the Sea, Patricia Polacco's Babushka's Doll, Babushka Baba Yaga, and Tai?-Marc Le Thanh's BABAYAGA, belong to New Writing. The New Writing type mainly focuses on Babayaga's secluded life. In fairytales, Babayaga is depicted as the goddess of Mother Earth, the heroine of the Nature, or the ruler of the Animal Kingdom. That is why she lives in the deep and uninhabited wood. She is related to the Coming of Age ceremony. Her 'Hut on hen's legs' is an obstacle for immature protagonists to face before they come of age. Protagonists are supposed to solve the problems posed by Babayaga. If they succeed, they can get her magical help so as to complete their final mission. Babayaga is likely to appear as their antagonist. Protagonist may be subjected to a terrible ordeal created by Babayaga, and then come of age by recovering from that ordeal. Sometimes, Babayaga helps protagonists to get a grip on reality. That is why she lives in a hut in the deep and dark forest which is on the borderline between life and death. On the other hand, Marianna Mayer's Baba Yaga and Vasilisa the Brave has been classified as a controversial work between New Writing and Rewriting. It is apparently closer to New Version. However, it cannot be classified as a work of New Version because the author incorporates 'probability' into her work. Among the reviewed works, it is Korean Writer Rye, Kami's The Spider Woman's House that best reflects the essence of Babayaga. Babayaga and other characters are amusing in movies because most of the movies are animations for children. In one sense, it is positive that the scary characters in folktales are approachable to children. In other sense, however, it is regrettable that symbolic motifs are completely eliminated. In Mike Mignola's Hellboy, Japanese animations such as Index or Narutaru, on-line games such as Cabal or Vampire: The masquerade, the essence of the supernatural characters in folktales is completely eliminated, and only their 'belligerent power' stands out. It is desirable to put stories into perspective whether they are written or told. The literature property of folktales provides a special opportunity to readers. In this light, a variety of motifs have a good reason to be reborn as modern cultural contents. The bottom line is to maintain its true nature.