Hedgehogs, the Keepers of Order and Knowledge in Slavic Fairy Tales | Hacker News Reader

Hedgehogs, the Keepers of Order and Knowledge in Slavic Fairy Tales

tinydonkey.fairytalereview.com

94 pointslermontov27 comments

The still as noted is from Hedgehog in the Fog which is an amazing animated short and well worth your 10 minutes:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Rugwd8ZNHY

There's even a chrome theme: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/hedgehog-in-the-fo...

You beat me posting this, amazing short -- one of my all times favorites. Fun fact, it was considered animation for children and in my childhood (nearly 30 years ago) and was shown on kids TV programme in evenings. If I ever have children, this will definitely be on their schedule too.

Ditto, along with Nu Pogodi - which is also great because it doesn't require working knowledge of Russian!

I just found a subtitled version - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oW0jvJC2rvM

Another one I really like is "There once was a dog":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RWBBODkPlpY

And of course Gena and Cheburashka:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Xrr9mcdFvw

Not from my childhood, but rather my wife's and now our son's.

Or the 420 edition of Gena and Cheburashka: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6GpHp9jzUDM

When I first saw this film, I was so touched by it that I had the hedgehog, complete with fog, tattooed on my arm.

Different people take away different meanings from the story but for me it's a reminder to live a life outside your comfort zone, driven by curiosity.

If there is one interesting thing about Slavic Fairy Tales is that no embodiment is considered truly, irredeemably evil. Everything is sort of gray.

Even Death can be called to be Godmother, embodiment of diseases can return a favor, etc.

Not to offend anyone, but considering something/someone "truly, irredeemably evil" is very American attitude. For example, compare contemporary movies from Hollywood vs European.

I always hated fairy tales, even as a child, probably for this very reason. Perhaps I should subscribe to the Slavonic storytelling. Is there a good story-bundle that can be recommended both for adults and children?

I have many physical books of various Eastern European and Slavic tales in my childhood home, but nothing in English or in electronic form.. Anyway, Slavic and Eastern European fairy tales are not very different from other European nations' tales and have much in common (South Europe might be a little different, but I'm not an expert to comment much) to the extend that sometimes only character names differ (or animal type). You might try Grimm's Fairy Tales[1] if haven't read yet, but aim for original/older edition[2] as originally it was quite violent but softened increasingly over time.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grimms'_Fairy_Tales 2. https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~spok/grimmtmp/

I grew up in Ukraine and some of the best books you could get with Slavic stories is this publisher (ababahalamaha in Ukrainian its "А-БА-БА-ГА-ЛА-МА-ГА") - http://ababahalamaha.com.ua/en/Main_Page . Apart from amazing stories, each book is a piece of great artwork.

My boy has a few of these and the artwork really is amazing.

I don't think that's necessarily American. Thing is God in Abrahamic (Judaism, Christanity and Islam) religions is unquestionable force of goodness.

more like rightness

Definitely rightness, not goodness. A "good God" would never punish. Only one with an ulterior agenda (and therefore not a true creator) would resort to punishment.

Yes it's a big distinguishing mark between 'pagan' belief systems and Christian/Islamic systems, a belief in the moral rightness/perfection/correctness of God. Roman pagans, Greek 'mythology', Germanic and Celtic religion, all had gods who were more like exaggerated people (with all their faults and flaws and terrible behaviours) than what Christians and post-Christians think of as a god.

Not to offend you in turn, but you can't impress people with your provincial pigeonholing when it's clearly borne of ignorance. This is about as compelling and defensible a statement as those made by all the people who think Scandanavia constitutes "the rest of the world"

Trying to think of some counterexamples. How about Koschei? I'd also argue that redemption isn't usually a topic even when a classically evil figure does something not simply evil.

I'd also argue that Baba Yaga is also unequivocally evil in every tale I've ever heard.

I'd argue that this rule too, has an exception: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KdYEHsXk1k

I specifically mentioned Koschei rather than Baba Yaga because I know there are stories where Baba Yaga isn't pure evil (although I know of rather few Slavic folk tales, not trying to come across as any kind of expert here!). I don't know of any story where Koschei is benign. I have some trouble seeing how that would work out for a character whose defining attribute is having used dark magic to cheat death.

The original Witcher books (the ones the game is based on) embody this principle very nicely. Although more in a "The road to hell is paved with good intentions" way.

I could also add The Night/Day watch books to this list. Even if you have a dark side and a light side actually, not everything is black and white when you dig a bit.

Ah, that explains why the Russian ports of Sonic the Hedgehog are all puzzle games.

After the sky was finally installed: https://gfycat.com/KlutzyPointedAmericancrocodile

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