[A 1913 illustration from Russian folk tale ‘At the Pike’s Behest,’ also known as ‘Emelyan the Fool.’ В. Курдюмов]
One thing about the current war that has surprised much of the world is how well the smaller and outgunned Ukrainian army has fared against the massive and well-armed Russian force since the latter invaded in February.
But two scholars who were not quite so surprised both happen to be experts on the psychology of children’s literature and how such stories influence our behavior as adults, especially in times of crisis.
Social scientists Sophia Moskalenko and Mia Bloom published an article called “How fairy tales shape fighting spirit” in an academic journal called The Conversation that compares the differences in Ukrainian and Russian folklore as reflected in their respective children’s fairy tales.
Their conclusions are provocative:
The master narratives that Ukrainian children grow up with – which serve as the dominant cultural script – are radically different from the ones Russian children absorb.
Traditional Ukrainian bedtime stories, such as “Kotygoroshko,” “Kyrylo Kozhumyaka” and “Ivasyk Telesyk,” all portray unassuming characters persevering against insurmountable odds.
In Ukrainian children’s bedtime stories, the main characters often start out as unlikely heroes, but their courage, cleverness and grit help them succeed against the odds.
In contrast, Russian children’s stories often revolve around a central character named Ivan Durak – Ivan the Stupid.
In Russian fairy tales such as “By the Pike’s Wish,” “Princess Frog” and “Sivka Burka,” the main character eventually prevails. He doesn’t win through his own virtues, though, but through the intervention of a magical being – a fish, a frog, a horse – that does all the hard work while the main character claims credit.
These Russian folk tales seem to suggest that the recipe for success is not to be too smart or work too hard, but to sit tight in hope that magic will take care of everything.
Nobody would suggest that the entire explanation for the Ukrainians’ surprising success against the Russians will boil down to which fairy tales they learned as children, of course, and the authors of this article are suitably modest in their claims.
But they may be on to something extremely significant here.
[Thanks to my friend Laurie Sigillito, founder and CEO of Local News Network, for alerting me to the fairy tales article.]
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